TER LAMDA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER GAMMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~},
the idea of the distinction of person of the Son from the Father. Thus
establishing the originality of the idea in Christianity, and exhibiting
it as the fulfilment of the world's yearnings, he traces it in the
teaching of the apostles, and of the apostolic age,(846) next as marking
the different heretical sects,(847) which respectively lost sight of one
of the two elements, till he finds the church's explicit statement of the
doctrine in its fulness;(848) and then pursues it onwards through the
course of history to the present time.(849) Though the work is to an
English mind difficult, through the air of speculation which pervades it,
and perhaps open to exception in some of its positions; yet, viewed as a
whole, it is a magnificent argument in favour of Christianity; exhibiting
the incarnation as the satisfaction for the world's wants, as the original
and independent treasure in Christianity; and showing the process through
which Providence in history has caused the doctrine to be evolved and
preserved.

The other great problem, the origin of things, and the relation of God to
the world, which is at the basis of religion, as the incarnation is at the
basis of Christianity, has been less frequently handled. Originally
discussed, like the latter, in controversy with the early unbelievers, it
had been touched upon in the speculations of Averroes and Spinoza, in the
materialism of French infidelity, and in the earlier systems of
speculative philosophy in Germany itself. It was this problem which was
attempted by Rothe. (40) Advancing beyond this first question, he has
considered the scheme of Providence in the development of religion, and
the theory of the Christian church in relation to political society. It is
unnecessary here to explain his system: his mind is too original to admit
of comparison without injustice; yet the speculations of our own
Coleridge, who on philosophical principles makes the state to be the
realisation of the church, will perhaps give some imperfect conception of
the character of his attempts.

This second school that we have been considering, though approximating
extremely nearly to orthodoxy, and furnishing the works of most value in
the modern theology, yet seeks to approach religion from the psychological
or philosophical side. It speculates freely, a