ir own chosen vocation. The
Teuton considers himself a born theologian. So it was after the
announcement of the destructive theories of Semler. All classes of
thinkers invited themselves to discuss the Scriptures and their claims
with as much freedom as if God had told them it was the true aim of
their life.

What was the consequence? Semler, having left so much room for doubt,
and having rather indicated a direction than supplied a plan, a great
number of men adopted the accommodation-theory and each one built his
own edifice upon it. But the conclusions arrived at by them were very
unlike, and generally incongruous. And such a result was very natural;
for, all claiming the unrestricted use of reason, the issue of their
thinking was the work of the individual mind. No two intellects are
perfectly similar. Set a number of men to write upon a given subject and
they will employ a different style, give expression to diverse thoughts,
and perhaps reach antipodal conclusions. So when these writers against
inspiration plied the pen, and burdened the press with their prolix
effusions, there was no harmony in their thoughts. In one opinion they
were firmly united, _that the Bible is a human book_. But how much of it
was authentic; what was history and what myth; what poetry and what
incident; these and a thousand kindred points divided the Rationalists
into almost as many classes as there were individuals.

There were two principal tendencies which gave a permanence and
efficiency to Rationalism quite beyond the expectation of its most
sanguine friends and admirers. One was _literary_, and inaugurated by
Lessing; the other purely _philosophical_, and conducted by Kant.

The literary despotism at Berlin was one of the most remarkable in the
annals of periodical literature. We refer to the _Universal German
Library_, under the control of Nicolai. Its avowed aim was to laud every
Rationalistic book to the skies, but to reproach every evangelical
publication as unworthy the support, or even the notice, of rational
beings. Its appliances for gaining knowledge were extensive, and it
commanded a survey of the literature of England, Holland, France, and
Italy. Whatever appeared in these lands received its immediate
attention, and was reproached or magnified according to its relations to
the skeptical creed of Nicolai and his co-laborers. Commencing in 1765,
it ran a career of power and prosperity such as but few serials have
ever en