struction is its portion. The writer of this paper, does not enter into the arcanum of controversy respecting the moral and spiritual condition of individuals in that community. It is not to sit in judgment on man, but to consider the system received and maintained by that church, which is openly and decidedly condemned in the word of God. All who fear Jehovah are commanded to separate themselves from her, lest they should partake in her sins and be involved in her plagues. (Rev. xviii. 4-6.) It would be a mere waste of time to enter formally into the debate with Protestants, in order to convince them of the propriety and necessity of leaving the Romish church. It has been attempted to be proved that the character of the Romish Hierarchy is changed, and therefore separation from her communion is less necessary. But however plausible and well calculated to set the mind at rest such reasoning may be, it is to be feared that this security from dangerous innovation, and a return to that long and black night of moral darkness which matured that mass of superstition, is not well founded. It is readily acceded that we are not able to trace the footsteps of that church during the recent triumphs of popery by the blood of the saints; but does this difference in the history of Antichrist arise from a reformation of Spirit, or circumstances adventitious? The latter, we apprehend, is the case. The rapid spread of deism and appearance of atheism in France, after the night of persecution and horror in that country, the progress of knowledge and French philosophy over Europe, the suppression of the Jesuits, and the great and unprecedented political agitations throughout Europe, in which the Church of Rome was particularly involved, have certainly given a check to the audacious spirit of popery, and for a season

gave a moderation to its language, but no real reform has been effected-no cure! The tiger has only been in chains. Now, when she begins to breathe, and finds by the return of peace that all is not lost, she cherishes the same determined hostility to pure and undefiled religion. She assumes the same tone of infallibility. She thunders from her high throne, in which she sits as queen, the same damnatory fulminations against readers and circulators of the Holy Scriptures, and she seeks to excite in the breast of her clergy and kings, who have given their power and kingdom to the beast, the same active malignity and opposition to every thing good and holy, which characterized them before and after the Reformation.

In 1762, the Jesuits were put down, not by any violent act of confederated princes against that infamous order, but by the authority of Clement XIV. It is well known that he employed four years in discussing the subject, and then deliberately acquiesced in the suppression of this society, which had, by the enormities of its members, wearied out the very patience of Europe. Why should the order be now revived? Is it not a proof that the spirit of popery is always the same.

Let this be the motto of Protestants, "no peace with the heresies of Rome." In renouncing her authority and communion because she is antichristian, in lifting up our standard against her as the enemy of God's heritage, we should decidedly deny the right of her clergy to administer the ordinances of Christ's church. Without right or authority, all ordinances cease to be valid. The right and authority to administer ordinances and disciple nations is immediately derived from Christ. "And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore,

and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you; and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.” (Matt. xxviii. 18-20.) Corruptions existing in churches do not, we conceive, deprive their Bishops of the power delegated to administer the ordinances of Christ. Great abuses existed in the Church of Corinth. Errors crept into the Churches of Galatia, Pergamos, and Thyatira. (See 1 Cor. i. 11; iv. 1, 2; xi. 18. 22; Gal. i. 6, 7; Rev. ii. 14 20 and 23.) No intimation is given that these elders ceased to have the right to administer the ordinances. They are called upon to reform. But it would be a hopeless attempt to reform the Romish Church. The popes and prelates and the whole priesthood decidedly oppose all reformation; for an acknowledgment of existing abuses is conceding that the church and its head are fallible. The history of what passed in the first quarrels of Luther with the Church of Rome, concerning indulgences, confirm the assertion that every attempt to reform that church is utterly hopeless. When the reformers were roused to examine and form their judgment of the real state of religion in the Romish Church, they found that there were not only corruptions and abuses, but that false worship, errors, and superstitions of the incredible kind had actually deluged it, and swept away the very vestiges of a Christian church; and that its grossness and abuses were daily on the increase. "More over, (says the venerable Claude,) there was not any hope of remedy, either on the part of the Pope, or on the part of the prelates. For the Court of Rome, with all its associates, had loudly declared against a reformation, maintaining

that the Church of Rome could not err; that she was the mistress of man's faith; and not to believe as she believed, was a heresy worthy of the flames. And as to the prelates, they had all servile obedience to the will of the Popes, besides that ignorance, that negligence, that love of the things of the world, and those other vices in which they are plunged." Luther says, "popery is a mere rhapsody of blasphemies. The Pope (say their own canons) and his are not bound to be subject and obedient to the commands of God. If the Pope be so negligent of his own salvation, so negligent and remiss in office that he should draw innumerable multitudes to hell after him, to be there ever tormented; yet may no mortal man reprove him of any fault in so doing. The Pope hath power to commute and dissolve vows made to God, and then if any man defer to pay his Vows according to God's commands he is not held guilty. The Pope hath not his authority from the Scriptures, but the Scriptures from the Pope." But why should we multiply instances. The Church of Rome is not only corrupt; but corruption itself. Its destruction is the only remedy for such an evil. "The beast which thou sayest," &c. (Rev. xvii. 8.)

What right then, we ask, have the clergy in that church to administer the ordinances of Christ's appointment. Where is their authority? By whom given? Not by Christ, but by the man of sin. The name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, which they use in the admission of infants and converts to their church, when they apply spittle, oil, salt and water to the body, is no proof that the ordinance is valid. It is not the name, but the authority of Christ, the Great Head of the Church, which makes ordinances valid and scriptural. The vagabond Jews adjured the evil

spirit by Jesus, but what was the result? (See Acts xix. 15, 16.)

Let us renounce the authority of the Pope, and avow that his clergy are acting opposite to the mind and the will of Christ; and that we do not acknowledge the validity of any act which they officially perform as servants of Christ, because they are the servants of Antichrist. January 4, 1826.

MORTALITY AND IMMORTALITY. "Were but one immortal, how would other

envy,

How would worlds adore."

THERE is something irresistibly humiliating in the universal empire of death. How like a dream does it make this life feel, even while the reality of life's enjoyments is present to every sense. So potent is its spell, that like a mighty enchantress, it bids all human glory depart, and turns to nothingness, and a negation, all the bright scenes and living agencies of this mighty earth. "There is hope of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, but man dieth and wasteth away, man giveth up the ghost, and where is he?" The very thought that this fearful reality awaits every living thing, and the absolute certainty that all these objects which now appear, will soon be as though they had never been, seems to cast the dreariness of winter over all the vernal creation of hope, and to spread the darkness of a starless midnight over the proudest monuments of human greatness, and the fairest productions of human genius. It enwraps and covers all up with one vast funeral pall, and turns life itself, with all its businesses, into a mere ceremony of entombment. We may amuse ourselves with dreams of perpetuity, and may hope to live, at least, by our deeds, and to build up a name which shall defy forgetfulness. But the NEW SERIES, No. 19.

.

expectation is delusive, and it must end in vanity. Whatever men achieve, though great and splendid, and calculated for a few short years to attract attention, is destined at last to fall before the dilapidating hand of time. Great Babylon, the glory of the eastern, and proud Rome, the wonder of the western world, are sunk into the gulf of oblivion. A few vestiges only remain to sharpen the regrets and admonish the ambition of succeeding generations. The world passeth away, and the fashion of it perishes: so that man cannot obtain in any of the works material, physical, or intellectual, which he may commit to posterity, that desired immortality which is his constant and proudest aim; and while neither the works of art, nor mysteries of science can offer satisfaction to the unlimited ambition of the human heart, so neither can sense or reason promise the wished-for gratification. That nature with which, in general, the idea of pleasure is most strictly associated, is frail as a flower of the field, and at its highest glory, like the blossoms of spring, is nearest its fall. One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh, and we all do fade as a leaf. Our fathers, where are they? and the prophets do they live for ever? Human life is but a tale soon told; its gayest and brightest scenes but an amusement which is speedily to terminate, and from which the busy actors, and interested spectators are soon to be hurried away; what question then to mortal man can be so important as that which relates to the condition of his mind when it has done with time, and to the duration and character of that state to which this life is but the vestibule and the prelude. That there is in man a mysterious something above that which time can wear and death consume, and the grave imprison, who can doubt, 2 Y

that listens even to the instincts and impulses of his own heart. But on so momentous a subject, the faint traces of proof which are to be discerned in the mystic page of nature's works, by the feeble and flickering taper of reason, are insufficient to produce conviction; at all events they are but a feeble basis for consolation, and totally inadequate to support a faith that can triumph over the world and over death. Revelation has laid the foundation of a Christian's hope deep and firm, and divine authority has interposed when human reason stumbles. This light shines on all, and shines through every age, our guiding star to the regions of immortality. It is one of the greatest mysteries in our unhappy nature, that it should be indisposed to accept and credit a testimony so clear, so desirable, and in every sense so blessed, as that which revelation offers. It is the only authority in the universe that can assure man of his immortality, and confirm and settle the conjectures of conscience and the aspirations of his better desires. Well may those be charged with being their own greatest enemies, who refuse the all-important assurance of God's word, and who can pass by, either, as insignificant or doubtful, the promise of life eternal. Our attention cannot be too intensively fixed upon this bright and heavenly light, for this alone discloses the mysteries of God, and the mysteries even of man's nature, which ancient philosophy and modern science alike attempt in vain to explore. Those, and those only, are the wise men of their species who take the salutary guidance of this divine teacher, and resolve to shape their course across this troubled sea of life, and amidst these adverse currents of passion, sense, and time, to the shores of true and heavenly bliss. Some men may choose to float at random upon the

current, or prefer a pilot of reason to one of revelation, and others may make their boast of a universal scepticism, and find their solace in a gloomy recklessness of futurity; but none can be happy, none can have the sense of security, none can feel that he has reached the true end of his being, save the man whose faith in Jesus Christ has brought him to anticipate an eternal abode with and in his God. SUBURBANUS.

ON THE AVOWED UNION OF UNITARIANS AND DEISTS IN THE SAME CHURCHES.

"From Socinianism to Deism," said D'Alembert, there is but a very slight shade, and a single step to take." Carlile and other infidels have claimed the same affinity to modern Unitarians, and impartial persons in general have been disposed to concede the justice of their claims. It is true, Unitarians have not been at one with themselves, whether to acknowledge or to disallow these pretensions; by some of them they have been rejected as a slander upon their principles, whilst others have admitted that unbelievers cannot be far from them. Such a recognition, however, of the family tie, has recently taken place, as ought not to be hid in a corner; and I beg leave, therefore, to claim for it the marked attention of the readers of the Congregational Magazine.

I allude to a discussion which, for some months past, has been carried on in the Monthly Repository, a publication which, among periodicals, holds the place of organ to the body of Unitarians. In the number of that work for February, an article appeared with the signature of Noah Jones, to the writer of which the public are much indebted for drawing aside the veil, and exposing to view

66

the internal state of Unitarian churches. He states that he has seen many instances" in which the acknowledged Christian and the infidel (or the "unbeliever," as the gentle term is,) "are equally acknowledged in Unitarian congregations;" that it is "notorious that their places of worship are frequented by unbelievers, who not only join in their devotions, and listen with complacency to the discourses of their ministers, but take an active part in the management of the internal concerns of their churches, and are, in some cases, the principal pecuniary supporters of their cause," and that there are "actual instances in which unbelievers are active, efficient, and highly respected members of Unitarian churches." He intimates, that "the deist" is taken "into the very bosom of their churches, and "the privilege of his religious instructions" quested; that he is a party in the discussion of "plans for the promotion" of what he thinks" error,' and gives his "advice and vote in the election of teachers," &c. &c. Such is the account which this writer, himself a Unitarian, gives of the materials of which the churches of his own community are composed.

re

دو

Subsequent parts of this correspondence supply several additional particulars. It appears, that while the deists" take part in the meetings" of Unitarians, they throw out sneers and scoffs against religion in the very place of worship." This, to be sure, is rather a free use of their religious liberty and church fellowship. If they are nonconformists to Christianity, they surely have not dissented from good manners, and even such a natural theologian as Esop the fabulist might have taught them, that it is a reflection on their breeding, to scoff at the religious customs of any people. But all this falls far short of the full and true'

state of the case. It is stated, by these Unitarians, that their pulpits have been repeatedly occupied by an avowed deist; and an instance is given in which a "deistical minister" was proposed as the pastor of a Unitarian congregation, but "in the case referred to," fortunately, (we are told,) "the Christians were the larger number." So they,

"Through mere good fortune took a diff'rent course."

A minister is also mentioned, "who having renounced Christianity, very coolly proposed to his congregation to continue him as their minister;" but "though a very clever and respectable man," it does not appear that his offer was accepted. It is not difficult, however, to judge of the state of things where " a respectable man" could "coolly" make such a proposal. Such a person would not offer any thing to his fellow worshippers which they were likely to deem offensive or insulting.

It is but justice, however, to the writer of this paper, to say, that he disapproves of this intermixture of "faithful members," and "those who think them believers in a lie,” and warmly insists on the adoption of measures for dissolving this holy alliance. His zeal one would think very excusable, inasmuch as he insists upon nothing more than that they who "pity" Christ

He

as an enthusiast, if they do not brand him as an impostor," should have no share in the management of a Christian church, or be numbered among its members. states it to be his "chief design to ascertain the general sentiment of Unitarians on the subject," and he must confess, that his Unitarian connexions have not left him in the dark on this point. In opposition to his views, the following number of the Repository contains no fewer than four communications,