A commentary on Ecclesiastes

by Thomas Pelham Dale

NEW THEOLOGICAL DICTIONARY.

DICTIONARY OF DOCTRINAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. By various writers. Edited by the Rev. John Henry Blunt, M.A., F.S.A. Editor of the Annotated Book of Common Prayer. Second Edition.

Complete in one volume of 833 pages, imperial 8vo (equal to six 8vo volumes of 400 pages each), and printed in large readable type, 42s. or half-bound in morocco, 52s. 6d.

1. Nature of the Work. This Dictionary consists of a series of original Essays (alphabetically arranged, and 575 in number) on all the principal subjects connected with the Doctrines of the Christian Church. Some idea of the subjects, and of the length of the articles, may be formed from the following titles of those which occupy the work from page 700 to page 720.

Sign.
Simony.
Sin.
Sinaitic Codex.
Socinianism.
Solifidianism.
Soul. Spinozism.
Spirit.
Spirit, The Holy.
Sponsors.
Subdeacons.
Sublapsarianism.
Substance. Suffragan.
Sunday.
Supererogation.
Supernatural.
Superstition.
Supralapsarianism.
Supremacy, Papal.

2. Object of the Work. The writers of all the Essays have endeavoured to make them sufficiently exhaustive to render it unnecessary for the majority of readers to go further for information, and, at the same time, sufficiently suggestive of more recondite sources of Theological study, to help the student in following up his subjects. By means of a Table prefixed to the Dictionary, a regular course of such study may be carried out in its pages.

3. Principles of the Work. The Editor and his coadjutors have carefully avoided any party bias, and consequently the work cannot be said to be either “High Church,” “Low Church,” or “Broad Church.” The only bias of the Dictionary is that given by Revelation, History, Logic, and the literary idiosyncrasy of each particular contributor. But the Editor has not attempted to assist the circulation of the book by making it colourless on the pretence of impartiality. Errors are freely condemned, and truths are expressed as if they were worth expressing; but he believes that no terms of condemnation which may be used ever transgress the bounds of Christian courtesy.

4. Part of a Series. The Dictionary of Theology is complete in itself, but it is also intended to form part of a Series, entitled, “A Summary of Theology,” of which the second volume, “A Dictionary of Sects, Heresies, and Schools of Thought,” is in the press.

“Taken as a whole the articles are the work of practised writers, and well informed and solid theologians.... We know no book of its size and bulk which supplies the information here given at all; far less which supplies it in an arrangement so accessible, with a completeness of information so thorough, and with an ability in the treatment of profound subjects so great. Dr. Hook’s most useful volume is a work of high calibre, but it is the work of a single mind. We have here a wider range of thought from a greater variety of sides. We have here also the work of men who evidently know what they write about and are somewhat more profound (to say the least), than the writers of the current Dictionaries of Sects and Heresies.”—Guardian.

“Mere antiquarianism, however interesting, has little place in it. But for all practical purposes its historical articles are excellent. They are of course, and of necessity, a good deal condensed, yet they are wonderfully complete; see for example such articles as ‘Atheism,’ ‘Cabbala,’ ‘Calvinism,’ ‘Canonization,’ ‘Convocations,’ ‘Evangelical,’ ‘Fathers,’ ‘Infant Baptism,’ &c., &c. But the strength of the book lies in the theology proper, and herein more particularly in what one may call the metaphysical side of doctrine:—see the articles on ‘Conceptualism,’ ‘Doubt,’ ‘Dualism,’ ‘Election,’ ‘Eternity,’ ‘Everlasting Punishment,’ ‘Fatalism,’ and the like. We mention these as characteristic of the book. At the same time other more practical matters are fully dealt with. There are excellent and elaborate papers on such words as ‘Eucharist,’ ‘Confession,’ ‘Blood,’ ‘Cross,’ ‘Antichrist,’ to say nothing of the host of minor matters on which it is most convenient to be able to turn to a book which gives you at a glance the pith of a whole library in a column or a page. Thus it will be obvious that it takes a very much wider range than any undertaking of the same kind in our language; and that to those of our clergy who have not the fortune to spend in books, and would not have the leisure to use them if they possessed them, it will be the most serviceable and reliable substitute for a large library we can think of. And in many cases, while keeping strictly within its province as a Dictionary, it contrives to be marvellously suggestive of thought and reflections, which a serious minded man will take with him and ponder over for his own elaboration and future use. As an example of this we may refer to the whole article on Doubt. It is treated of under the successive heads of,—(1) its nature; (2) its origin; (3) the history of the principal periods of Doubt; (4) the consciousness—or actual experience of Doubt, and how to deal with its different phases and kinds; (5) the relations of Doubt to action and to belief. To explain a little we will here quote a paragraph or two, which may not be unacceptable to our readers.... The variety of the references given in the course of this article, and at its conclusion, show how carefully the writer has thought out and studied his subject in its various manifestations in many various minds, and illustrate very forcibly how much reading goes to a very small amount of space in anything worth the name of ‘Dictionary of Theology.’ We trust most sincerely that the book may be largely used. For a present to a clergyman on his ordination, or from a parishioner to his pastor, it would be most appropriate. It may indeed be called ‘a box of tools for a working clergyman.’”—Literary Churchman.