of the Fathers, published at Oxford, and the Greek text has been in part re-edited by a scholar who has shown a very special aptitude for the work, the Rev. F. Field of King s College, Cambridge. As authorities for the facts of his life, the most valuable are the ecclesiastical histories of Socrates, Sozomen, and Theodoret ; and amongst the moderns, Erasmus, Cave, Lardner, and Tillemont, with the more recent church history of Neander, and his monogram on the Life and Times of Chrysostom, translated by J. C. Stapleton. There has also appeared a valuable German biography by Dr Forster ; and a narrative, full of interest and told with life-like animation, has been given by the late M. Amedee Thierry in the Revue des Deux Mondes, and since republished (Paris, 1860) in one volume, entitled Recits de VHistoire Romaine au cinquieme Siecle. A grace ful and interesting sketch of the concluding scenes of St Chrysostom s life may be found in Dr Newman s Historical Sketches (London, 1873), though that eminent writer seems uot very favourable to the theology of the Antiochene school, or even of Chrysostom himself. Valuable informa tion is given in Professor Bright s History of the Church (Oxford, 1864), and in Canon Robertson s History of the Christian Church (vol. ii., London, 1874). But the best special contribution to English literature on the subject is St Chrysostom: His Life and Times, by the Rev. W. R, W.
Stephens (London, 1872).CHUBB, Thomas (1679-1746), a well-known deistical writer, was the son of a maltster, Henry Chubb, and was born in the village of East-Harnham, near Salisbury, on the 29th September 1679. His father died in 1688, and left in poor circumstances a widow and four children, of whom Thomas was the youngest. All of them were early sent to work ; and consequently the education which Thomas received in his boyhood was of a most elementary kind. In 1694 he was apprenticed to a glove-maker in Salisbury ; but as the work was afterwards found to be unsuitable for him on account of the weakness of his sight, he entered the employment of a tallow chandler, and his income for many years was derived partly from this source and partly from glove-making. Through energy and per severance he succeeded in gaining a fair knowledge of mathe matics, geography, and some other subjects. Theology, however, was what chiefly commanded the attention of Chubb and his companions, among whom he seems to have been the moving spirit. His intellectual activity, and the eagerness he always displayed to gain clear and distinct views of any question that occupied him, marked him out from the first ; and his early habit of committing his thoughts to writing gave him a clear and fluent stvle which afterwards found much favour with the public. He made his first appearance as an author in the Arian controversy, on the side of Winston. A dispute having arisen among his friends about Whiston s argument in favour of the supre macy of the one God and Father, Chubb was led to write an essay which bore the title, The Supremacy of the father Asserted. This, passed round his friends in manuscript, created so favourable an impression that the author ultimately submitted it to the judgment of Whiston, who pronounced it well worthy of publication. After a few emendations by Whiston, it was printed in 1715. A number of tracts on various subjects followed, which were published in a collected form in 1730. Chubb was now regarded as a literary phenomenon. Among other persons of eminence, he attracted the attention of Sir Joseph Jekyll, Master of the Rolls, in whose house he lived for several years. The nature of his position there is not precisely known ; but there are stories told of his having waited at table as a servant out of livery, and of the amusement caused by his short stout figure standing as steward at his patron s sideboard. His love of independ ence and retirement drew him back to Salisbury, where by the kindness of friends he was enabled to devote the rest of his days to his favourite studies. He died on the 8th February 1746. His moral character was excellent, and he is said to have continued a regular attendant on divine worship in the parish church.
Chubb was the author of a very large number of controversial tracts. His principal works are A Discourse Concerning Reason (1733), The True Gospel of Jesus Christ (1739), and Posthumous Works, 2 vols. (1748). The Discourse Concerning Reason aims at showing that reason is, or ought to be, a sufficient guide in matters of religion. After denning the terms of this proposition, he pro ceeds to argue that if man is accountable to God for his actions, he has a right to possess a power sufficient to discover what he is accountable for, and also to discover such motives to right behaviour as will counterbalance those temptations which are unavoidable in the present constitution of things. It will not help the case to say that man, as originally constituted, had such a power, but lost ft through Adam s fall ; since it matters not to mankind whether Adam had originally such a power or not. Men cannot justly be held accountable if they lost in Adam that power. If the power was only impaired through Adam s sin, and if every man will be judged according to the ability he has, then reason is a sufficient guide in matters of religion. Difficulties which unavoidably arise from the constitution of things are only chargeable upon the author of that constitution. If divine revelation was meant to supply the defect of reason, then millions, whom that revelation has never reached, have been unjustly dealt with. The deficiency being general, the revelation should have been given to the whole species. The sufficiency of reason does not make revelation needless, as reason may be neglected or abused, and revelation may be needed to bring men back to a right use of reason in religion. Tine, reason could not discover how divine justice is satisfied by the sufferings and death of Christ, and how the sinner is justified by faith in Him ; but that is repugnant to reason, and can be no part of the genuine revelation. One unjust action cannot satisfy justice for another. Xor can sin, considered abstractedly from the sinner, be the object of favour or displeasure. Only what faith leads to, viz., repentance and turning to Cod, is the true ground of God s mercy and kindness to men. This is most evident to reason when discovered, and must therefore be discoverable by reason. If, as is allowed, reason is a proper guide in matters of revelation, it should not be less so in matters of religion, for the one seems to be as much within the province of reason as the other. At the close Chubb disavows anv intention to injure divine revelation, or to serve the cause o"f infidelity. The True Gospel of Christ is characterized by Lechler, in his Geschichte des englischen Deismus, as an essential moment in the historical development of deism. Its leading thought is that Christianity is not doctrine, but life. Jesus requires us to regulate our life according to the eternal and unchangeable law of action which is based on the reason of things. If men, through violation of this law, incur God s wrath, repentance and reformation are the only means of obtaining God s favour and forgiveness. That these truths may make a greater impression, the gospel declares that God has appointed a day of judgment and retribution. The law of nature is thus the essential content of the gospel. It is no historical account of facts, as Christ s death, resurrection, &c., for it was preached to the poor before these events occurred. Nor do the private opinions of the evangelists and apostles form any part of the gospel. Like Tindal, Chubb comes to the conclusion that the true gospel of Christ is identical with natural religion. The greater por tion of the Posthumous Works is taken up with The Author s Fart- well to his Readers, in which he cocies to a sceptical conclusion regarding a particular providence, the efficacy of prayer, and a future state of existence, although he thinks that man s responsi bility affords some probability of the latter. He rejects the Jewish revelation, because it sullies God s moral character. Jlahomet- anism, he thinks, could not have prevailed by the sword alone ; "it must have prevailed to a very great degree before the sword could have been drawn in its favour." He believed there was a man Jesus, who collected a body of disciples, and laid a foundation for a new sect among the Jews. His objections against the prophecies and miracles are often far-fetched, and contain nothing beyond what had been urged by previous writers. It lends a special interest to Chubb s representation of primitive Christianity that he insists on the fact that it was a gospel for the poor. There is thus a democratic tendency in the view he takes of the gospel. He represents the rise of deistical notions among the artisan class.
of India, in the district of Mirzapur, in the North- West Pro
vinces, situated on the south bank of the Ganges. The fort
