The Reformation was, in all senses, a resurrection of the Bible: it was its recovery and restoration as an ancient document; and the recognition of its authority as the word of God; and the discovery of its meaning as a rule of faith, and worship, and life; and its new diffusion through the Christian body. The restoration of the Scriptures to their place of power and honor brought with it a revival of true piety, scarcely, if at all, inferior in extent and fervency to that which attended the preaching of the apostles. There were, however, deductions from the full influence and permanent benefit that might have resulted from this recovery of the sacred canon. Of these deductions, the first was the limited and imperfect diffusion of copies; for though the publication of the Bible by means of the press was actually great, it fell very far short of being complete. The next deduction arose from the infant state of the science of biblical criticism; the next, from the still unbroken influence of scholastic systems and modes of expression, which spread a dense coloring medium over the lucidness of the apostolic style; the next, and the most considerable and pernicious of these drawbacks, arose from the acrimony of controversy, and from that spirit of contumacious scrupulosity which is the parent of schism. These imperfections were great enough to bar the progress of Christianity, and to sully its glory at the time, and to procure the speedy decline of piety in all the Protestant countries. But when the present aspect of the church is compared with its condition at the era of the Reformation, several circumstances connected with the state of the Scriptures offer themselves to observation, that are decidedly in favor of our times; and such as seem pregnant with hope for the future. Of these, the first is the unexampled multiplication and diffusion of the sacred volume: the second, is the progress that has been made towards bringing the original text to a state of undisputed purity; as well as the advancement of the science of biblical criticism, by which means the verbal meaning of the inspired writers is now ascertained more satisfactorily than at any time since the apostolic age: and the third, is the incipient adoption of an improved method of exposition; attended by an increasing disposition to bow to the Bible, as the only arbiter in matters of religion. It remains, then, briefly to point out in what manner these auspicious circumstances support the hope of an approaching revival of genuine religion. For the first of them, namely, the multiplication and diffusion of the sacred volume: