ple, a conduct and character formed under the influence of evangelical truth. Evidences of faith in Jesus Christ, both negatively and positively considered. The character of Mr. Booth and his writings has long been known: we shall therefore be content with giving our readers a slight specimen of the sound and confortable instruction which they may find in these pages. "The love of the Most High is perfectly free, in regard to the choice of its objects. Not being under the least obligation to love any of our apostate race, it would be absurd to suppose him obliged to love them all." Very absurd, indeed, to suppose a wise parent under any obligation to love all his children. They whose minds are in such a state as to be convinced of the absurdity of this, will receive much pleasure from the perusal of these tracts. WORKS OF DEVOTION. ART. LXXIX. A Selection of Psalms, adapted to the Service of a parochial Church. From various Authors. 12mo. pp. 84. THIS selection, we are informed, from the new, from Dr. Watts, and was prompted by the distracted from other authors, without order choice of the singers in a country or judgment. Imperfect as this church, who sometimes selected little work may be, it cannot be usefrom the old version, sometimes less if it corrects such an evil, page will sufficiently demonsrate : "The old presbyterian churches are in such a state of decay that their original form of government is completely at an end, having for the greater part sunk down into Arianism, and their preachers become literary corpses; the whole system is very unpopular. Some congregations in the larger towns continue to maintain a name, and some few others, by endowments, are just kept in existence, and have only breath enough to say Here religion was once, and here preach ed a Bate, a Baxter, a Flavel, a Fleming, a Howe, and a Burgess." ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY AND CHURCH DISCIPLINE. ART. LXXX. 4 Concise History of the Christian Church from the Birth of the Saviour to the present time. By JAMES SABINE 12mo. pp. 491. THIS being avowedly an bridgment from larger works, would have required from us a mere notice, had the author confined him self to "facts as facts," as he at first professed to do. But as he has gone out of his way to misrepresent some facts and to suppress others, we think it our duty to warn the reader of these circumstances, that he may be on his guard with respect to other parts of the volume, and that he may, if the opportunity present itself, examine the authorities whence Mr. Sabine has derived his history. One of his objects in the publication, and perhaps that the principal one, is to serve and exalt the party which is most popular, and which arrogates to itself the title of Evangelical. In conformity to this, Mr. Sabine represents those who are not of that class in the most degrading manner which the following That this is a gross libel, a very small knowledge of that respectable class of dissenters is sufficient to prove; and we think, if Mr. Sabine is a resident in the neighbourhood of the metropolis, as from his preface we may infer, he must have known that he was hazarding an assertion that existing facts could not justify. In spraking of the academies at which ministers are educated Mr. Sabine wholly omits that conducted by Mr. Coward's Trust, which his existed much longer than most, if not all of those which he has noticed, and that at "Not only be sincere, but serious and reverent whenever and whereever you worship God. "If you behave better in one place than in another, let it be at home. ART. LXXXI. The Object and the Conclusion of the Christian Minister's mortal Life ;A Sermon preached at the New Meeting House in Birmingham, Sept, 25, 1808, oz Occasion of the Death of the Rev. John Edwards. By JOHN KENISIH. 8vo. WE have often had occasion to duct. It may be righteous or unnotice with applause the judgment righteous. Resolve in spite of all and zeal displayed in Mr. Kentish's temptations to the contrary, to obprinted discourses. That before serve, in every situation, righteous us, is written in his best style: it conduct. is manly and very judicious. His His biography of his deceased friend is neatly drawn up, and exhibits in a forcible manner the zeal which Mr. Edwards ever manifested for the profession in which he had engaged. This pamphlet before us is enriched with some affecting and some brilliant passages extracted from the works of the deceased, and also with a valuable directory of conduct, which Mr. Edwards addressed to his young friends at Birmingham after he had declined to minister among them. We wish that our limits would allow us to transcribe the whole, but we must content ourselves with selecting a few only of his directions. "Devote your first gains to God, that is, to the relief of the distrest. "Visit the honest and laborious poor in their afflictions. "Temperance is friendly to health, and makes chastity easy, without which none can arrive at, or continue in, the true dignity of their rational nature. "If any man should ask me what is first in religion? I would answer, Sincerity; what is second? Diligence; and what is final? Per "There is a difference in con- severance." ART. LXXXII. The Nature and Guilt of Schism considered with a particular Reference to the Reformation. In Eight Sermons, preached before the University of Oxford, in the Year 1807, at the Lecture founded by the Rev. John Bampton, M. A. Canon of Salisbury. By THOMAS LE MESURIER, M. A. Rector of Newnton Longville, Bucks; and late Fellow of New College, Oxford. 8vo. pp. 443. ACCORDING to the plan which the Bampion lecturers appear in variably to pursue, the first of these sermons is occupied in bringing forward a variety of introductory matter, and in announcing the subject which the preacher means to discuss, and the method in which that discussion is to proceed. The introductory matter relates to the progress of schism, and its guilt. Dissentions were foretold by the first preacher of the Christian doctrine, and his words have been, from a very early age, fatally verified. And although the inference drawn from this fact by unbelievers be unfounded, yet the preacher observes, "We must not suffer ourselves to be deluded into an idea, that it is a matter indifferent in itself, or not an evil of the greatest magnitude. Still less must we imagine, that it is an act against the com mission of which we have no need to be guarded; or which, when committed, requires not to be deplored and repented of. We must regard it as, what in truth it is, what it has always in the church, until very late years, been taken to be, a very grievous sin. It is one, of which every congregation, as well as every individual, looked upon themselves as particularly concerned to stand clear. Whenever, therefore, a separation took place in any church, or community of Christians, great anxiety was shown by every one of the parties to account for their conduct; and to shew that the guilt, which was universally allowed to follow the act, did not belong to them and to their friends, but to those of the other side. It was wisely reasoned that, although our Saviour had foretold consequences which would follow from his doctrine, this did in no degree operate as a recommendation or approbation of them; that his having declared, that he was not come to give peace upon earth, but rather division,' would no way excuse the individuals, by whose means peace should be driven away, and division brought in. It was remembered, that in the very same breath with which he had at another time declared that, It must needs be that offences should come,' he had added, Woe to that man by whom rates from such a particular church, does itat his peril; that he is committing an act, for which he must be seriously and deeply accountable at the day of judgment; that, in short, schism, independently of all considerations of doctrine, though it should be no part of its object to work any express corruption of the truth, is in itself a grievous and a heinous sin; hurtful in the greatest degree to the general interests of Christianity, and big with the most serious consequences to the individual." He afterwards remarks: "I shall perhaps, before I go farther, be called upon to state what I mean, whether I would set up an absolute' authority in the church; whether I would contend that under no circumstances whatever, a man may lawfully separate from the established communion ? Undoubtedly, I claim no such infallibility be circumstances which will not only exfor any church: undoubtedly, there may cuse but justify such a separation. The suffice to establish this point. But then, case of the Reformation alone would whenever such a separation takes place, there must be guilt somewhere. If he who separates is innocent and justifiable, then he who has so acted as to oblige his brother to separate from him is the person guilty and liable to the judgment. It is not therefore and cannot be strictly true, that (always understanding the case of there being a national church established) there can be a separation which He is aware, indeed, that there is not schismatical and sinful, and for the offence cometh.' are Many who will be surprised, and who will revolt at any argument which tends to shew, that it is not left to the arbitrary will or caprice of any man to worship God after that mode which is most agreeable to his imagination. They will look upon it as a novelty to be told (what yet is the old and true doctrine) that to that sound part of Christ's church, which is established in the country where he was born, or where the providence of God has fixed him, he is bound to adhere; that to all its ordi nances in indifferent matters, all those rules, which it has directed to be observ ed, for she purpose of edification, it is his duty to conform; that he who sepa which there will not be some one or other to answer as a criminal.” he knows, may expose him to the The avowal of these principles, charge of uncharitableness, but he can see no difference in the main between the sin of schism and any other sin." And this, he contends, is no novel doctrine, but consistent with the uniform language of the ancient church, and generally held in this country before the days of that prelate occasioned, the writings Hoadly. The controversy which of Whiston, Clarke and Blackburn, the rise of methodism, both out of the church and within its pale, have produced a laxity of sentiment on this subject, which the preacher contemplates as highly alarming to the friends of the establishment. "Such (he adds) being my individual persuasion, I intend, with God's help, to lay before you in some detail the argument against schism, as it is to be collected from scripture; both as it is found in express reasoning and precept, and also as it is supported by facts and examples. Upon this certainly, as upon the corner stone, do I propose to build; feeling that no other foundation can man lay.' I shall however confirm this by shewing the manifest tendency of schism, not only to disturb the peace of the church, but also to corrupt her doctrine; this too made more plain by instances, which the history of Christianity will amply supply. "And, because it has been a favourrite topic with dissenters of all sorts to insist upon our separation from the church of Rome as if it precluded us from objecting to their, or any other separation from our church, I shall pretty much at large shew the difference of the two cases; and prove that not only our church was fully justified in what she then did, but that the reformation can be a precedent only in cases where to have remained in communion with those from whom the separation is made would be sinful. That this therefore can never justify those men, who can allege no actual sinfulness in the terms of our communion and still less those whose cause of complaint against us consists only in this, that we will not so enlarge the platform of our establishment as to comprehend all possible denominations of Christians, whatever their tenets may be. "I shall moreover corroborate my position by shewing most strongly the difference of the two cases in another point of view; and protesting that the assertion and vindication of the independence of our national church, which is the first and great feature of the reformation in England, has, and can have nothing to do with justifying individuals, in their separation from the established communion within whose limits or pale they have their abode, and of which they properly form a part. "But, further, I shall the more enlarge upon the subject, because I conceive that the circumstances of the times do particularly require that you should be reminded of what are the doctrines and principles by which the church of Rome is distinguished: and, when they have been thu brought to your recollection, it will be for you to consider whether they be not such as are subversive of the very foundations of Christianity: whether therefore they ought not in every country to be specially guarded against: and whether there be not still a broad distinction and peculiar line of se paration which should be allowed to subsist between the Romish church on the one hand, and the great body or aggregate of protestant churches on the other. "I propose after that, to revert to the present circumstances of our church for the purpose of considering more particularly (as however I shall have occasion to do through the whole of these discourses, and in connexion with my subject) the reasonings upon which the different bodies, who separate from her, attempt to excuse or to justify their schism; and hope from thence to be enabled to inculcate the more forcibly into those who hear me, the necessity of adhering to the precepts of our Lord and his apostles in maintaining the unity of the faith by continuing in close fellowship with one another." Agreeably to this plan he labours in the second sermon to prove that the Scriptures,, both of the Old and New Testament, enforce the necessity of conformity, and reprobate the sin of schism. In the antediluvian dispensation, as well as in the dispensations which succeeded it, either by direct precept, or by striking examples, this sin is expressly condemned or awfully punished. From the Scriptures of the New Testament he infers that "the disposition which is principally and indeed wholly required in a Christian, is that of being humble, teachable and unpretending; particularly disposed to subthat are set over them." An infemit to authority, and to obey them rence highly grateful to the audience at St. Mary's! The third seruion is designed to combat the charitable doctrine of Hoadly and others, that the favour of God follows sincerity, and to show that truth alone was the promise of that favour; that heresies are censured in unqualified terms by the apostles, and that error is uniformly connected with schism. This latter position is exemplified in the case of the heretics of the early ages of the church: whence the preacher is led in his fourth discourse to trace the further proof error in the usurped domination and corrupt tenets of the Romish church, and to charge the schism which took place at the Reformation wholly upon the Romanists. Here he observes, gress ap "The protestant dissenters, indeed, (and I might have alleged this also, as making their present alliance with the common adversary more monstrous,) are or have been fond, as I before mentioned, of justifying their separation from us by the example of our predecessors. They say, that they have an equal right to separate from our church, as our church had to separate from the church of Rome. I have already stated, or rather hinted certain grounds, upon which it will pear, that the cases are very different; I affirm, now, that it is incumbent upon those who thus argue, to shew that our church requires such terms of communion as are actually sinful; because we and every protestant church do most positively declare and hold, and it will be my business, and is part of my professed design, to shew that this is most strongly the case with the church of Rome. This once shewn, it follows, of course, that, if the church of Rome had ever so much or so entirely been our church, if we had been born indeed within her pale and under her jurisdiction, still the terms of her communion being contrary to the true faith, and, of course, endangering our salvation, it would have been our duty to withdraw ourselves from her fellowship, to break off her yoke from our necks. The fact is, however, that it cannot, with any shew of reason, be pretended that the Roman pontiff ever had a right to exercise any sort of jurisdiction in this kingdom, that he was the head, or in any way the gotion, therefore, the church of England vernor of this church. At the reformadid only reassert that independence which belonged to her in the beginning, and which, neither to her nor to any national church, can be denied. Again, in recognizing the king of this realm for her head, as supreme in ecclesiastical as well as temporal causes, she only followed the example of the primitive church, which, from the moment that it pleased God to give her Christian emperors, submitted for her sovereigns. herself to their authority, and owned them And this lasted for several centuries, without any pretence to the contrary advanced by any one pope.” The fifth and sixth sermons are intended further to justify the English reformation, upon the plea that the church of Rome did and does exact from all her members, such terms as are both sinful and dangerous; and that therefore every man is bound at his peril "to come out of her:" First, because she is idolatrous. "And this idolatry is shewn not only in the invocation of the saints and the honour paid to images and relics, but mot avowedly and directly in the adoration of the bread and wine at the ce lebration of the mass. "Secondly, because she derogates in various ways from the sufficiency of our Lord's atonement, and so as much as in her lies, she makes the cross of Christ of none effect.' "And this she does by the efficacy which she attributes to the merits of her saints, as well as by the ability which she effect declares to be in every man to even more than his own salvation. 66 Thirdly, because she entertains notions and inculcates ideas of Christian perfection, not only erroneous in themselves, but in their consequences highly pernicious: as they almost inevitably lead to great dissoluteness of manners, and at least divert the attention of mankind from the real and essential duties of faith and charity, to practices the most useless and trifling, and even ridicu lous. |