Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 8.djvu/330

278 Nothing can be more unjust and ungenerous at this time of day, than to look back upon such a conflict either with contempt or indifference. Revelation itself was at stake. Driven from all their weak defences of necessity and expediency, the Apocryphal party in desperation endeavoured to justify themselves by calling in question the canon of Scripture itself, as if it were a mere matter on which every one might think as he pleased; and to make good their mischievous position, they explored the works of the old heretical writers, to show how much of the Bible was interpolated or uninspired, and how much might safely be called in question. Never indeed was such violence done to the faith of a Protestant community, or the belief of men in such danger of being unsettled. Onward went the conflict till 1830, when Dr. Thomson, exhausted by his almost super-human efforts, fell dead at his post with the banner in his hand, which was immediately caught and raised aloft by Mr. Haldane. It was much indeed that he had been able hitherto to keep pace with the onward stride of such a leader. But after many a change and trial, truth in the end prevailed; the canon of inspiration was more securely settled than ever, and the Bible Society recovered from its errors and restored to healthfulness and efficiency. During this long controversy, Mr. Haldane's exertions, both on the platform and in the press, were so numerous, that we can only particularize his chief publications upon the subject. In 1825 appeared his "Review of the Conduct of the British and Foreign Bible Society relative to the Apocrypha, and to their Administration on the Continent; with an Answer to the Rev. C. Simeon, and Observations on the Cambridge Remarks." This was afterwards followed by a "Second Review," in a pamphlet of more than 200 pages, in consequence of a "Letter addressed to Robert Haldane Esq.," by Dr. Steinkopff, impugning the statements of the first. A third work which he published was entitled "Authenticity and Inspiration of the Scriptures." A fourth was a "Review of Dr. Pye Smith's Defence of Dr. Haffaer's Preface, and of his Denial of the Divine Authority of Part of the Canon, and of the full Inspiration of the Holy Scriptures, by Alexander Carson." This work, written by a friend, served as a sequel to his own on the "Authenticity and Inspiration of the Scriptures." Several other works by the same Dr. Carson, on the canon of Scripture, were published by Mr. Haldane during the course of the controversy, at his own expense. After these, a series of pamphlets appeared from the pen of Mr. Haldane, in which he answered separately the Rev. John Scott of Hull, Mr. Gurney of Norwich, the Rev. Samuel Wilks, and other defenders of the British and Foreign Bible Society.

We must now hasten over the latter days of Haldane, although they were characterized by the same high sense of duty and devoted activity that had distinguished his whole career. Before the Apocryphal controversy had ended, he published a "Refutatation of the Heretical Doctrine promulgated by the Rev. Edward Irving respecting the Person and Atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ;" a work, the title of which will sufficiently explain the purport. In 1834 he published a new edition of his " Evidences of Christianity," to which many valuable chapters were added that had not appeared in the original work of 1816. After this he addressed himself to the revision of his greatest work, "The Exposition of the Epistle to the Romans," upon which he had been more or less employed for thirty years, and published it, greatly improved and enlarged, in 1835. The fact of a lengthened exposition upon such a subject having reached a fifth edition within seven years, was a full attestation of its theological