pelled to be as passive during the transaction as negroes in a slave-market; this is another principle of the Esta blishment, universally allowed and recognized, which I hesitate not to denounce, as utterly unscriptural and mischievous. No one can pretend to vindicate it as scriptural; whilst few who have at all studied the true character of the Christian pastorate will be disposed to consider it otherwise than as a most deadly evil in the Church. ment to be unscriptural and mischievous. | eternal interests are at stake, are comSome will maintain that this, even if true, is no reason for secession. They will say that nothing but doctrinal corruption can justify secession? But why not? What is the great harm of secession? Secession is not schism. THE ESTABLISHMENT IS NOT THE CHURCH. In leaving the Establishment we do not leave the Church. The Church in England is the body of Christ's people in England. But, in quitting the Establishment, I do not separate from them, but rather am throwing down some barriers which separate me from many of them, and drawing closer the bonds which unite me to them. Nor do I even separate, in heart and spirit, from that portion of the Church which is in the Establishment. I still love that section of my fellow-Christians. I do indeed leave them in one point; I take, as I conceive, a step in advance of them, in renouncing certain practical evils, to which they adhere. And, undoubtedly, I may lament and condemn their conduct in this, if they persevere in it. But will love therefore be lost? Shall I not still feel at one with them? Undoubtedly. I leave the Establishment; but I have still the same Lord, the same faith, the same spiritual baptism, the same God, as many who remain in the Establishment. The episcopacy, as it is called, of the Establishment, is not merely an episcopacy or oversight, which might be scriptural; but a prelacy, which is unscriptural. In the Old Testament it is needless to seek for it. The appeal to the Levitical hierarchy, which was a sacrificial institution, and consequently has its counterpart, not in the officers of the Church of Christ, but in Christ himself, is altogether unmeaning. In the New Testament we do indeed find a considerable variety of church officers, ordinary and extraordinary; but where bishops, in the sense of prelates, are to be found, we have yet to learn. Its patronage, the method of appointing its ministers to the cure of souls, treating the cure of souls as property, allowing the right of appointing to it to be transferred as a marketable commodity from one party to another, and to be exercised by the most worldly and ungodly; whilst the parties, whose The principle of compulsory maintenance of ministers will not be so readily abandoned; but it is one which I cannot but regard as most pernicious to the well understood interest alike of the Church (ministers as well as people) and of the world; tending, as it does, to introduce ministers into a position for which they are utterly unsuited, and to maintain them in it, whilst its duties are wholly neglected, and souls are starving and perishing around by hundreds and thousands; tending too, as it does, to the oblivion of Christian responsibilities, and the stagnation of Christian feeling in the Churches themselves, and to the vast augmentation of distrust, alienation, and open hostility in the multitudes without. But I must now glance at one or two of the principles of the Establishment, in its relation to the State. And first, I would notice the prin ciple of State Supremacy. This is one of the recognized and daily-working principles of the English Establishment. The Established Church is essentially a State Church. It is subjected to the State's absolute control and rule. The power of the State, that is, of Parlia ment, and those whom it entrusts with its authority, to appoint the chief ministers of the Establishment, and to make the laws which regulate not only its internal government and discipline, but its very standards of doctrine and forms of worship; the power of the State to do all this is undeniable. It is in daily and hourly exercise. The bishops have all been appointed by the State, and hold their office, not by the free choice of the Church, but by the authority of Parliament. And so all matters of discipline are decided, not by the laws of Christ, and the judgment of Christian men, but by State-made laws and State-appointed judges. And the very standards and formularies of the Establishment are what they are, simply and solely, because Parliament wills them to be 80. Parliament made them binding, and Parliament keeps them binding. In a word, Parliament is the supreme head of the Establishment. Men of every religion, and men of no religion, are the avowed and allowed arbiters of every matter, whether in doctrine, government, or discipline, connected with the national Establishment. Men who, under a wholesome state of things, would not be allowed as members of the Church, are submitted to as its rulers. And, to make way for their rule, Christ is practically dethroned. Το Christ's word, Christ's laws, Christ's people, no deference whatever is paid, in deciding ecclesiastical causes, if they contravene the laws of Parliament, or the maxims, canons, and traditions of Ecclesiastical Courts, derived, as these chiefly are, from the Papacy itself. Now, all this is absurdly impious. It is a truly heathenish state of things. In fact, the principle of State-supremacy is not only essentially, but actually, heathen. It was taken by the popes from the heathen emperors, who held the office of Pontifex Maximus (or high-priest of heathenism). The Pope borrowed the idea from his pagan predecessors, and constituted himself the Pontifex Maximus of Popery, as the emperors had been of heathenism. And Henry VIII. took the office from the Pope, becoming, in England, the Pontifex Maximus of Established Protestantism. And now the course of affairs has transferred the office from the Crown of England to the Parliament. But Christ is the only rightful Head of the Church. Christians may have no other. In all civil matters every Christian owes a full and undivided submission to the Queen and Parliament; but in spiritual matters, in matters of faith and worship, and the administration of the internal government and discipline of the Church, he owes the Queen and Parliament no submission. These matters belong, not to Cæsar, but to Christ. Christ is the sole head of Christians in these matters. State payment is another unscriptural principle of the Establishment; and which, therefore, condemns the Establishment, and renders secession a duty. The evil of the ministers of religion being the stipendiaries of Parliament is fully admitted by the advocates of the Established system, when they indig nantly deny the fact, and resent the allegation, as a deliberate untruth, a Dissenting clap-trap, and the like. It is, however, the truth. The clergyman's stipend is State wages, and nothing else. It is said that the State no more pays the Established minister his rent-charge than it pays the landowner his rent, or the Dissenting minister his endowment, or his pew-rents; inasmuch as it equally protects them all in the enjoyment of their property, and nothing more. But is this a true statement of the case? I would ask, is there not a difference in the respective terms on which this protection is accorded? What interference is there by the State with the creed of the landowner or of the Dissenting minister (who only meets the terms of his trustdeed)? The State imposes no restrictions of its own, in regard either to their belief or teaching, on either the landlord or Dissenting minister. Under the Fourth Reason Mr. Dodson enumerates, among the sins of the Establishment, her false and unscriptural teaching-her utter abandonment of principle-her schismatical character-and her persecuting spirit. We very much commend the book, of which these are golden specimens, and thank Mr. Dodson for the invaluable services he has done to the cause of God and his country. EXTRACTS The Fragment Basket. FROM DR. CHALMERS' SERMONS, IN POSTHUMOUS WORKS. THE WAR OF 1809.-In this day, set apart for the expression of public sentiments, you should rise in gratitude to the Ruler of nations, that mighty Being who has turned the battle from your gates; who has singled you out from the countries of Europe, and given you the exclusive privilege of living in peace, while the world around you is involved in all the cruelty and turbulence of war. I fear that none of us have a lively enough conception of the gratitude that we ought to feel for so inestimable a blessing-that we live in the bosom of domestic tranquillitythat we have no midnight alarm to disturb us no sound of horror to strike upon our ear, and keep us awake and trembling in the agony of apprehension-no moanings of wounded acquaintances no shrieks of the dying to rend the heart of sensibility-no hostile footsteps to warn us of the nearness of a brutal and enraged soldiery-no loud and stormy approaches to send anguish into the mother's heart, and make her weep in the wildness of despair over the members of her shrinking and devoted family. What a picture of horror-the seat of war-when the marauding army of the conqueror is let loose upon the country-when they separate into parties, and each singles out its own house or its own neighbourhood as the object of its brutality and its vengeance-when every nerve is strained to deeds of barbarity -when pity is laughed at as a weakness, or its gentle whispers are drowned in the wild uproar of rapacity and desolation and murder. What a contrast to the country in which we live! -what a spectacle of peace in the midst of a wild and troubled theatre! What would not the houseless victims of Spain give for the warmth and security of our dwellings ?-where every man lives under his own vine and his own fig-tree-where he steps forth in the morning and prosecutes in safety the labours of the day-where he returns in the evening, and has his peaceful fireside enlivened by the smiling aspect of his family around himwhere the sabbath morn still continues to bless the humble abode of the poor man and of the labourer-where the church-bell is still heard to waft its delightful music along our valleys, and to call an assembled people to the exercises of piety. Let the piety of this day be gratitude to that mighty Being who takes up the hills in his hands, and weighs the nations in a balance. He has thrown around our happy country the shelter of a protecting ocean he has mustered his own elements to defend us. The green island of the north sits in the bosom of security-it hears the sound of battle from afar, but quietness dwells there, and peace and joy are among its children. RELIGIOUS ENTHUSIASM.-The term expressive of contempt varies with the age and country. Paul was called mad in the judgment-hall of Cæsarea. A man with the devotedness of Paul would, in the court of Charles II., have been called a Puritan; in a conclave of High Churchmen he would be called a Methodist; in our tasteful and literary circles he would be called a fanatic; in a party of ecclesiastics, where coldness passes for rationality, he would be called an enthusiast: and in private life, where secularity and indifference form the tame and undeviating features of almost every company, he would, if altogether a Christian, be spoken of as a man whose wrongheaded peculiarities rendered him a very odd and unnatural exception to the general character of the species. A HUNDRED YEARS HENCE.-It strikes me as the most impressive of all sentiments-that it will be all the same a hundred years after this. It is often uttered in the form of a proverb, and with the levity of a mind that is not aware of its importance. A hundred years after this! Good heavens! with what speed and with what certainty will those hundred years come to their termination. This day will draw to a close, and a number of days Europe what it is to invade the shores of a great and a high-spirited country. COURTEOUSNESS.-There is a set of people whom I cannot bear the pinks of fashionable propriety-whose every word is precise, and whose every movement is unexceptionable; but who, though versed in all the categories of polite behaviour, have not a particle of soul or of cordiality about them. We allow that their manners may be abundantly correct. There may be elegance in every gesture, and gracefulness in every position; not a smile out of place, and not a step that would not makes up one revolution of the seasons. Year follows year, and a number of years makes up a century. These little intervals of time accumulate and fill up that mighty space which appears to the fancy so big and so immeasurable. The hundred years will come, and they will see out the wreck of whole generations. Every living thing that now moves on the face of the earth will disappear from it. The infant that now hangs on his mother's bosom will only live in the remembrance of his grandchildren. The scene of life and of in-scrutiny. This is all very fine; but telligence that is now before me will what I want is the heart and the be changed into the dark and loath-gaiety of social intercourse-the franksome forms of corruption. The people who now hear me, they will cease to be spoken of; their memory will perish from the face of the country; their flesh will be devoured with worms; the dark and creeping things that live in the holes of the earth will feed upon their bodies; their coffins will have mouldered away, and their bones be thrown up in the new-made grave. And is this the consummation of all things? Is this the final end and issue of man? Is this the upshot of his busy history? Is there nothing beyond time and the grave to alleviate the gloomy picture, to chase away these dismal images? Must we sleep for ever in the dust, and bid an eternal adieu to the light of heaven? DR. CHALMERS AND BONAPARTE.May that day in which Bonaparte ascends the throne of Britain be the last of my existence; may I be the first to ascend the scaffold he erects to extinguish the worth and spirit of the country; may my blood mingle with the blood of patriots; and may I die at the foot of that altar on which British independence is to be the victim. The future year is big with wonders. It may involve us in all the horrors of a desolating war. It may decide the complexion of the civilized world. It may decide the future tranquillity of ages. It may give an awful lesson to ambition; and teach the nations of bear the measurement of the severest ness that spreads ease and animation lity to all, that chases timidity from around it-the eye that speaks affabievery bosom, and tells every man in the company to be confident and happy. This is what I conceive to be the virtue mality of those who walk by rule, and of the text, and not the sickening for would reduce the whole of human life to a wire-bound system of misery and constraint. DEATH.-Manhood will come, and old age will come, and the dying-bed will come, and the very last look you shall ever cast on your acquaintances will come, and the agony of the parting breath will come, and the time when you are stretched a lifeless corpse before the eyes of weeping relatives will come, and the coffin that is to enclose you will come, and that hour when the company assemble to carry you to the churchyard will come, and that minute when you are put into the grave will come, and the throwing in of the loose earth into the narrow house where you are laid, and the spreading of the green sod over it,— all, all will come on every living creature who now hears me; and in a few little years the minister who now speaks, and the people who now listen, will be carried to their long homes, and make room for another generation. Now, all this, you know, must and will happen-your common sense and common experience serve to convince you of it. Perhaps it may have been little thought of in the days of careless, and thoughtless, and thankless unconcern which you have spent hitherto; but I call upon you to think of it now, to lay it seriously to heart, and no longer to trifle and delay, when the high matters of death, and judgment, and eternity are thus set so evidently before you. And the tidings wherewith I am charged and the blood lieth upon your own head and not upon mine, if you will not listen to them-the object of my coming amongst you, is to let you know what more things are to come; it is to carry you beyond the regions of sight and of sense to the regions of faith; and to assure you, in the name of Him who cannot lie, that as sure as the hour of laying the body in the grave comes, so surely will also come the hour of the spirit returning to the God who gave it. Yes, and the day of final reckoning will come; and the appearance of the Son of God in heaven, and his mighty angels around him, will come; and the opening of the books will come; and the standing of the men of all generations before the judgment-seat will come; and the solemn passing of that sentence which is to fix you for eternity will come. THE COMMUNION TABLE. - Every year the communion table presents us with a new spectacle. Some new communicants come forward to offer their first vows, and some old ones have disappeared for ever. Christians who were seen last year to live, and to move, and to handle the symbols of redeeming mercy, are now mouldering in the churchyard. Their friends have wept over them, and the grave-digger has performed for them the last offices. The change is gradual, and fails to impress us; but, in a few years, the change will be complete. Another people will sit at that table, and another minister will speak to them. shall be all lying in quietness together, and a new generation of men will tread upon our graves. It appears to us a distant futurity, but the lapse of a few seasons will bring it round. The sun holds his unvaried course in the firmament of heaven; he marks the footsteps of time, and the span of a, We few revolutions will bring us to our destiny. Man hastens to his end, and, in a little time, the grave will receive him into its peaceful bosom. In this day of solemnity you should think of the mutability of all things. You should think of that country to which you are fast hastening. You should listen to the voice of wisdom which proclaims the vanity of the world, and tells every man among us that it is not here where the firm footing of his interest lies. "BLESSED ARE THE MEEK, FOR THEY SHALL INHERIT THE EARTH." BISHOP BURNET, who had frequently dwelt on this passage, but was still unsatisfied in his own mind of the just and true explanation, took a walk one morning some considerable distance from his parish, and observing a habitation more wretched than any he had before seen, walked towards it, and, to his surprise, heard a voice of great, joyous praise. Drawing nearer, he heard it as that of an individual only. He wanted to learn the cause, and, looking in at the window, viewed the poor inhabitant in the most wretched state of outward want and poverty that he had ever beheld. She had, on a little stool before her, a piece of black bread, and a cup of cold water; to heaven, as in a rapture of praise, reand with her eyes and hands lifted up peated these words: "What! all this, and Jesus Christ too? What! all this, and Jesus Christ too ?" It wants not to be added that, with the living les son which this blessed man here learnt, he, with holy gratitude, returned, well understanding who only inherited, in our Lord's sense, the whole earth, by possessing him. And thus we best find out the supposed paradox of St. Paul: "As having nothing, yet possessing ali things." GOSPEL HEARERS. MANY men take no pleasure in flowers, or care any further for them than to look upon them, to smell them, and have them in their hands. But the bees draw from them both honey and wax, and the skilful apothecary maketh many medicines of them against divers |
0 Отзывы Google не подтверждает отзывы, однако проверяет данные и удаляет недостоверную информацию. Написать отзыв |