sprinkling and incensing, in short using pretty nearly all the rites which most of us have seen in some foreign places of worship. Verily "Ichabod" must be written as the motto of the "English Church as by law established," if such things are allowed to be done without let or hindrance.

It is not at all necessary for us to enter now into the question of Establishments, or of the value of rules enforced by Parliamentary authority. Accepting the English Church in its present form as a fact, and believing that God has set His seal to the work of thousands of His servants in it, we cannot but ask why should the work be hindered, and the spirituality endangered, by the vagaries of a set of men whom their Romanist models despise, and whom, unhappily, not a few of the less-instructed laity accept as types of "the clergymen of the Church of England"? "If (we are told) they 're not acting up to the Church's rules, why don't you get rid of them ?" It is a dilemma, and an awkward one. We trust the wisdom of the Legislature will enable us to get clear of it. One matter we would merely hint at, our position with regard to the orthodox Protestant dissenters. We are constantly told that many Wesleyans, for instance, are anxious to become re-united to the Church, but that they are hindered by the possibility of "movements" like the present. Can we afford to keep these men out? Ought we to do it? Does it not seem as if the time were come for reasserting strongly the principles of the Reformation, and so enabling us to welcome back to our Communion all those evangelical Christians who are working a good work in the Lord? We do hope that the Bishop of London's promised measures will enable us to feel that we can do this. Surely such miserable child's play on the part of some who unhappily are still "of us," ought to have the effect of making all good and earnest and truly spiritual men, in and out of the Church, draw closer together? Surely there is need for union-union of a very different kind from that which the author of the Eirenicon fondly dreams?

H. S. F.

MR. POYNDER ON THE UNHAPPY CONDUCT OF OUR STATESMEN WITH RESPECT TO POPERY.

Ir is a painful and humiliating consideration, that Infidelity and Popery are making rapid progress in our Protestant country. Popery, especially, is now patronised and supported by all our leading statesmen; while, alas! some of our ecclesiastical rulers are sympathising with this wicked system, and offering it no strenuous opposition. Among our statesmen

there is a sad lack of true patriotism. Selfish ambition seems to be their ruling passion, nor are they at all scrupulous about the means they employ for gratifying this passion. As Judas betrayed his own Lord and Master for the sake of money, so these statesmen betray their country for the sake of place.

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"The game of politics," as the Editor of the Times observes, "is proverbially a selfish one." Again; Again; "Of all professions statesmanship is that in which the greatest laxity of practice is tolerated by the usages of society. Concealment, evasion, factious combinations, the surrender of convictions to party objects, and the systematic pursuit of expediency, are things of daily occurrence among men of the highest character once embarked in the contention of political life. . . . . We are disposed totally to deny to public men, with regard to public affairs, that license which no private man can arrogate to himself in regard to private affairs without loss of caste and character. We are ashamed, in construing the words and writings of noblemen and gentlemen who have held high office, and aspire to hold it again, to expose arts such as moved the indignation, and pointed the irony of the author of 'Provincial Letters; but it has come to this, that those doctrines of mental reservation, and of words taken in their non-natural sense, which disgrace the followers of Loyola, have become stock arguments in the mouths of members of the British House of Commons. . . A man shall write one thing on Tuesday, and state the contrary on Thursday, and yet his honour remains unimpeached, and his veracity unsullied, and this in a legislature jealous above all things of the good repute of its members." See the Times, June 20, 1853.

On the 29th January, 1855, the Times, alluding to Lord John Russell's abrupt secession from the Cabinet, wrote as follows:-"Lord John Russell, even on his own showing, was not actuated by one spark of patriotism, or one feeling rising above the most sordid personal calculation. . . . . Can it be wondered at that our public service is one vast abuse, where all that is petty, personal, partisan, is preferred to all that is liberal, public-spirited, and patriotic ?"

On the 5th of June, 1855, the same paper exposed the disloyalty of Mr. Gladstone in reference to the war with Russia, and denounced his line of policy as "an unmitigated scandal, which will not be easily forgotten. Thrice he attempted to sow the seeds of distrust between us and our allies. According to Mr. Gladstone, the Western Powers are fraudful, unscrupulous, domineering, and dangerous to the peace of the world, while Russia is a meek, submissive, contented, rational, humble-minded Christian state." Equally and deservedly severe are the editor's remarks on the disloyalty of Lord Grey,

who "censured every act of the British Government and its allies, but to justify every act of the Czar,.... and even to pronounce, in the British House of Peers, an elaborate defence of the character and good faith, the moderation and the political conduct of Nicholas of Russia. . . . . If Lord Grey's reputation as a statesman were the only sacrifice required in expiation of these absurdities, the result would be indifferent to the world. . . . . Here among the people of England, we well know that so unnatural a speech will awaken no echo but in the indignation of the country. But abroad, and more especially in Russia, the effect will be more injurious. There the poison will be circulated without the antidote, and the nation to which we are opposed in arms will read its own justification in the language of a British peer."

On the 21st March, 1859, the Times writes:-"It is one of the misfortunes of a life spent in the manoeuvres of faction and the combinations of party, that it destroys all feeling for what is fitting and appropriate, and teaches men to regard things of the greatest consequence merely as materials for the application of a certain kind of professional dexterity."

The foregoing extracts show how little confidence is to be placed in the patriotism of our public men. Nothing can be more hollow, heartless, and insincere than their professions of loyalty and appeals to justice. In good keeping with such total want of patriotism is the speech of Earl Grey on the condition of Ireland, delivered in the House of Lords on the 16th of March last. The noble Earl said:" If disaffection and poverty are the chronic conditions of Ireland, it is impossible to account for such a fact except by attributing it to the misgovernment of that country."

According to Earl Grey's own showing, the Romish Relief Bill has been productive of no good whatever; for he admits that the prospects of Ireland are more gloomy than ever. Dislike to the British Government and Parliament are more widespread and more deeply seated in the minds of the people than they were. This grand panacea of 1829, which was to cure all the ills of Ireland, has not cured one. It has turned out a complete failure, and a sheer and contemptible piece of empiricism. Some of those persons who supported this fatal measure have had the candour to admit that it had entirely disappointed their expectations; but why were such irrational expectations ever entertained?

Earl Grey says:-" If we suppose that the Roman Catholics of Ireland have the feelings of other men, it is impossible that they should not be deeply impressed with the injustice to which they are subject, of devoting all the national revenues which originally belonged to the Roman Catholic Church to the

exclusive support of the rich minority, while the poor majority are left to their own resources. And I say further, that if they have the feelings common to mankind, it is impossible that they should not resent this injustice." Is this fit language for a British peer to use? Is it not calculated to inflame the passions of the poor deluded priest-ridden Romanists of Ireland, -who are sufficiently excitable,-and incite them to acts of rebellion and bloodshed? I very much doubt if the language used by Mr. Gordon of Jamaica, for which he was unceremoniously executed, was at all more inflammatory or seditious than that sometimes used in our Houses of Parliament.

All Lord Grey's reasoning is based on the false assumption, that the Church of Rome is a true Church of Christ, free from all taint of idolatry. His Lordship asks :-"Who gives us the right to say that the Roman Catholic religion is false? The fundamental principles of Christianity are held in common with ourselves by the Roman Catholic Church. . . . . If the soundness of doctrines is to be tested by those who profess it, the Roman Catholics need not shrink from the test."

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The Church of England in the most unequivocal language denounces the religion of the Church of Rome as false and idolatrous. It may have escaped Earl Grey's recollection, but he has himself solemnly sworn that he believed the religion of the Church of Rome to be idolatrous; just as Lord Holland's memory failed him, when he had the temerity to ask Archbishop Magee if his Grace actually believed the doctrines of the Romish Church to be idolatrous? Dr. Magee replied,— "It cannot be of much importance to your Lordship to know my opinion on this subject, since your Lordship has yourself solemnly sworn that such is your own belief." This argumentum ad hominem effectually silenced Lord Holland, and his Lordship had nothing more to say for himself.

Earl Grey, like Mr. Bright, appeals to our fears, not to our reason. His Lordship makes a great mistake in using the language of intimidation. It will be sure to recoil upon himself, and destroy that respect for his character which his position in society ought to command. His Lordship harps upon "justice for Ireland," the old war-cry of the factious demagogue. We have heard enough of such clap-trap, and are disgusted with it. The chief remedy which Earl Grey proposes for the ills of Ireland is securing payment for the idolatrous priests of Rome, which is the very worst remedy that could possibly be conceived. If there be one sin more likely than another to call down God's judgments upon our guilty land, it is the support and endowment of an idolatrous priesthood.

All attempts to conciliate Romanists by concessions are worse than useless. There can be "no peace with Rome," as

Bishop Hall said. Romanists are taught by their priests from their childhood to look upon Protestants as heretics, who ought to be exterminated. This teaching is in strict accordance with their sanguinary Canon law, which has never been repealed, and never will, because the pretended Vicar of Christ is too infallible to err, and too immutable to change! If Romanists are true to their religion, they must be persecutors; for they cannot tolerate what they call heresy, if they can put it down per fas aut nefas. It is impossible to read an account of these cruelties without shuddering. Dr. G. Benson, in his Dissertation on the Man of Sin, says: "The horrible and infernal Court of Inquisition is said, in about thirty years, to have consumed one hundred and fifty thousand by various kinds of torments, and still remains in Spain, Portugal, Italy, and other places, on purpose to hinder all kinds of free inquiry, and to keep mankind in the greatest ignorance of the true religion, and in a most slavish subjection to an hierarchy of ambitious, lazy, and debauched priests."

The impurities of the Confessional, the cruelties of the Inquisition, and the impious frauds foisted upon the world for miracles, show what these priests of Rome really are. Bishop Burnet says:-"Popery is a mass of impostures, supported by men who manage them with great advantages, and impose them with inexpressible severities on those who dare call anything in question that they dictate to them." The conduct of the Romish priests at the terrible conflagration of the cathedral at Santiago was characteristic of those wretched celibates, who are strangers to the domestic affections. Such are the men whom Earl Grey proposes to endow with money derived from Church property in Ireland, because his Lordship believes that the Church of Rome is a true and Christian church, not a false and idolatrous one.

It is clearly the duty of this Protestant country to legislate for Ireland on the assumption that the Church of Rome is a false, idolatrous, persecuting, and antichristian church, which will admit of no rival. Nothing but supremacy will satisfy her. All history proves such to be the case; and the Church of England, in her Homilies, speaks of the religion of the Church of Rome as not only idolatrous, but as false, feigned, and counterfeit. In the Homily "On Obedience" we read :-" Concerning the usurped power of the Bishop of Rome, which he most wrongfully challengeth as the successor of Christ and Peter, we may easily perceive how false, feigned, and forged it is, not only in that it hath no sufficient ground in Holy Scripture, but also by the fruits and doctrine thereof." Again, in the Homily on Good Works we read :-" And briefly to pass over the ungodly and counterfeit religion, let us rehearse some other kinds