The Temple and the Sepulchre. By S. Smith, MA., Vicar
of Lois Wooden and Rural Dean. (Longmans.)—Mr. Smith has reprinted in this small volume, with additions, some interesting letters that ho wrote on Mr. Ferguason's side in a controversy that was carried on in the columns of the Reader on the question of the Holy Places. Mr. Ferguson, as is well known, claims to have discovered in the Mosque of Omar, or Dome of the Rock, the identical church that was built by Constantine over the cave that constituted the Holy Sepulchre, and has to prove in consequence that the world has been mistaken for centuries in offering its worship at the Church on the western hill that has assumed the name. Mr. Smith, it seems, has been at Jerusalem, and is quite convinced of the correctness of Mr. Ferguson's opinion. " When I stood, as I did," he says, " by the Holy Rook in the Harem (1. e., on the eastern hill, or Mount Moriah), I stood on the site of the Church of Constantine, face to face with the site of the Temple of Herod." He finds this position consistent with the Gospel narrative, and with the original records of Josephus, Ensebius, and Socrates ; the conclusion thus arrived at is confirmed by a curious narrative of a pilgrimage in the Acta Sane- forum, A.D. 697, and by the architectural considerations that are advanced by Mr. Ferguson. He attributes the mistake that has arisen to the confusion of the times ; harassed by successive invaders, the Christians raised memorials of the Holy Places just where they could, not in the east on Mount Moriah, from which they were shut out, but in the west on Mount Sion, and in the lapse of years, and amongst un- critical generations, the alteration passed unchallenged. Mr. Smith furnishes much interesting information in these letters ; we wish that he had thrown them into the form of a narrative, as in their present shape they are rather disjointed, and it requires some attention to comprehend the points at issue.
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