by the additional prayer, that the members of "the Catholic church" might be led into truth, and preserve the faith in unity, and be righteous in life; all implying the possibility of a mixture of tares amongst them; of ungoverned, quarrelsome, and even unholy professors.

I think your readers will agree with me, that much of the confusion in this chapter (which forms an exception to the clearness of the rest of the book) arises from the Layman's misapprehension of our church's view on this point. S. B.

***The Layman is abundantly able to reply for himself, if he thinks it necessary; but we ought to remind our correspondent that he was speaking only of the highest and best sense in which the word can be employed;" and that he added, "We may probably justify ourselves by apostolic example" in applying it to "the general mass of those who profess and call themselves Christians;" and that this use is "in some measure warranted by the necessity of the case," since we "have to speak of the general body of professing Christians, as distinguished from the followers of Mahomet or Confucius;" only we must "take especial care not to confound the attributes of the spiritual church of Christ with those of the mass of mere external professors."

This Edition contains a powerful address to the Bishop of Oxford, in reply to Dr. Pusey's letter to his Lordship.

BISHOP MILVAINE AND THE VOLUNTARY PRINCIPLE.

For the Christian Observer.

We are almost fain to indulge a little innocent revenge upon our highly esteemed and beloved friend, Bishop M'Ilvaine of Ohio, in the matter of voluntaryism. When that excellent prelate was in England, he spoke (as he has done since his return home) in terms of affectionate regard and esteem of the Church of England; and admitted, zealous voluntary as he is, that, for a country circumstanced like ours, an established church might be desirable; at all events that it is a powerful instrument of good; but that abstractedly, and in particular in the case of his own country, he preferred the voluntary principle; and we believe that his opinion was quoted, not without zest, by some of our dissenting brethren. He distinctly stated, as we remember, that the episcopal clergy in the United States, were, as a body, much better supported than those of the Church of England; that cases of afflicting penury, such as bows down many excellent clergymen among us, were not known in the States' churches; and that the general provision in towns was such as enabled the clergy to live upon the footing of the merchants and best class of professional men.

Now even if this estimate were not over-sanguine, still the case of a new country, where the chief necessaries of life are so copiously supplied, that, to use an American proverb, you have but to plant a tenpenny nail and it turns to a crow-bar, would furnish no just

specimen of what was necessary or feasible in an old and thicklypeopled land, where population pressed closely upon the means of subsistence. We may abate indeed for this, that the population increases rapidly by importation, and that in the new lands there is much temporary pressure; but then again the principle of a national church, carried out by the first settlers, and afterwards fostered by England, has scarcely had time to wear out,* so that upon the whole, the balance is favourable to America for trying the experiment of the power of the voluntary principle.

Bishop M'Ilvaine is not the man knowingly to put forth inconsistent statements; and we doubt not the passages which we are about to quote from a recent address delivered by him to the Convention of Ohio appear perfectly consistent with his preference for the voluntary principle and with his eulogies upon its practical operation; but to our minds there is an irreconcileable discrepancy. We do not however give the extracts with any gratification; on the contrary we are much distressed to find that our reverend brethren in the United States are exposed to so much difficulty, and the church of Christ and the souls of men to so much peril; but the facts deserve serious consideration, as illustrating the working of the voluntary principle under its most favourable aspect; for America is constantly spoken of as exhibiting a prolific soil for its growth; and the episcopal church as that in which the clergy are probably the most handsomely provided for. But let us listen to the faithful prelate :

"Nearly connected with the subject of missions and education for the ministry is that of an alarming and growing deficiency in the support of the parochial ministry. I say alarming and growing deficiency, for it is rapidly grow ing as the expenses of living throughout the State increase, and the thirst for gain in the community grows more insatiate; and it is alarming when, with regard to a very large majority of our ministers, it may be said that no men, with half their toil and care, not to speak of their merits, are paid their stipulated support with half as much irregularity, and uncertainty, and tardiness, and real deficiency; and no class of educated men are compelled to live and cultivate their minds, and educate their families, and consecrate their strength to their calling upon a pecuniary support half so contracted. Our ministers in general are worse sustained than they were a few years ago, while the wealth of the whole country has been rapidly increasing, and the demand for ministers of finished education and popular talents, men of iron sinews and inexhaustible strength, men of nerves never wearying, spirits never flagging, resources never failing, has increased as much. Our parishes insist upon having pastors well furnished in point of education. They are right. We desire to ordain no others; but it should be remembered that such ministers are put to the cost of some

Many Americans themselves are not aware of the rapidity of the process of declension or, as the irreligious portion of them would say, of improvement, in the rejection of public religious observances. Mr. Lear, the Private Secretary of General Washington, says, speaking of his solemn inauguration as President:

"The morning was employed in making such arrangements as were necessary for the ceremonies of the day. At nine o'clock all the churches in the city were opened, and prayers offered

up to the great Ruler of the universe for the preservation of the President." "After the President had finished his speech we proceeded from the senate chamber on foot to St. Paul's Church, New York, in the same order that we had observed in our carriages, where the Bishop read prayers suited to the occasion. We were then met at the church door by our carriages, and we went home."

Alas that such national solemnities should now be only matters of history!

six or eight years of expensive instruction to become thus furnished for their work. Our parishes desire their ministers to be men of families, men of study, living among their people, setting an example in the training of their children; devoting all their minds, attainments, time and strength to their mimstry. But can a parish with reason expect all this, when the support of the pastor is scarcely sufficient to keep a family from rags, and not enough to enable the head of it ever to pass a day without the depressing sense of poverty, and the distracting thought of children for whose education he has no means, and of days of infirmity for which he has no prospect of the least provision?

I fully believe that one of the greatest dangers now to be apprehended in this country to the cause of enlightened scriptural religion is the increasing difficulty of supporting an educated and faithful ministry-a ministry sufficiently at ease from worldly care to live unentangled in the affairs of this life; a ministry so far secured from the caprices and multiform fancies of the people, as to feel it a small thing to be judged of man's judgment; a ministry so competently provided for in worldly substance as to have books to study, time to read them, retirement to meditate thereon, and composure of mind and heart to profit thereby. Woe to the cause of religion when men shall be willing to dispense with these essential things for the sake of a race of pastors more cheaply supported. Such may easily be provided. Men enough can be raised up who will support themselves and preach besides, whose preparation to teach shall cost no care to learn; whose sermons will require neither books, nor thought, nor knowledge, nor care; wrought out as well from the labours of the plough, or the din of the anvil, as from the efforts of the mind and the quiet of the study. But who wants such ministers? Our labour is more and more to prepare the very opposite. We found seminaries of classical and theological learning; we require many years of toilsome study; we close the door of the ministry against those who are not well learned and furnished for doctrine and instruction in righteousness; when we send out our young men, we exhort them to give themselves continually to prayer and the ministry of the word; we tell them that No man that warreth' in this warfare entangleth himself in the affairs of this life, that he may please Him who hath chosen him to be a soldier;' the Church in her ordination service enjoins them to forsake and set aside, as much as possible, all worldly cares and studies;' to give themselves wholly to the one thing whereunto it hath pleased God to call them,' to draw all their studies and cares this way. They are required solemnly to vow at their ordination that they will be diligent in prayer and in reading the Holy Scriptures, and in such studies as help to the knowledge of the same, laying aside the study of the world and the flesh.' But what encouragement is there to urge these solemn and universally approved obligations, if we must send our ministers to parishes, where to live it is absolutely necessary that worldly cares and studies should be endured; where to be wholly given to their stewardship is to be worse than infidels, in not providing for them of their own household; and to obtain books and time and retirement for study is impossible? Brethren, did I suppose it out of the power of our parishes to do better for the ministry I should be silent on this subject. But I cannot suppose it. I know that while our ministers have been suffering by deficient support, the farmers have been adding field to field, barn to barn; enlarging their farms; extending their crops;—the merchants have been, whatever the present check, increasing their investments; widening their trade; enriching their incomes. I know too that a very trifling increase in the contribution of each parishioner would set the pastor free from his grinding solici tude for the decent maintenance of his family, and enable parishes that suppose they cannot sustain a pastor, to have the blessing of his services.

"I have known, within the last year, a case of a minister so reduced, even after the closest economy, that a loaf of corn bread would have been sometimes a luxury to his family, when two more dollars per annum from each adult parishioner would have made his household glad and free. And shall it be sup posed they could not do it? I have known another case of a pastor full of toil for his people, so poor that his children were sometimes without raiment decent enough to allow them to go out, while the domestic economy was so rigid, that every article of work, however menial, was done by the husband and wife; and can it be supposed that if he had any congregation to preach to, above the grade of paupers, enough could not have been gathered, had there been only a willing mind, to make his condition abundantly more comfortable? Now, Brethrenthe plea of inability means too often, I fear, only inconvenience and unwillingness. A person is unable to do more for his minister, because he wants all he can get to

invest in more business, additional acres, another farm, a new speculation. Public improvements find no lack of means. The same persons that can find no more pence for their minister, can find many dollars for whatever will increase their worldly benefit. A person of large property will see his minister suffering, or the parish vacant, and feel comforted with a sense of having done his duty, because he has contributed his share, and he has estimated his share by an almost equal division of the necessary salary among the several parishioners; and he will not give more, but will see his pastor in want or his church vacant, not because he cannot do more, but because more is not his share, or because others will not do

more.

"Much of the evil of which I have been speaking arises out of a want of punctuality and business-faithfulness on the part of the vestries of parishes in collecting the subscriptions or pew-rents. Many a hard winter has a minister's family endured, just because the vestry on whom he depended for the collection of his salary, did not find it convenient to see about it. And here let me say that, by all experience, the worst method of supporting the ministry, because the most changeable, the most uncertain, the most difficult of collection, and that which most subjects the minister to all the whims and caprices of those whom his very faithfulness may offend, is that of annual subscription, especially when connected with the practice of engaging a minister by the year.

"I know that till a church is built, the plan of subscription is necessary; but I have not the least doubt that wherever there is a church, the most permanent, regular, and agreeable plan, on all sides, of sustaining the minister, is by rents. It is not the best mode conceivable; but it is the best attainable. In almost every case of a pastor comfortably supported you will find the plan of rents adopted. Where subscription is the mode, I will answer for it, that in nine cases out of ten the stipulated salary is defective in amount; is defective in payment, collected irregularly, here a little and there a little; decreasing as the times grow hard, scarcely ever improving as the times of the people grow prosperous and the minister's expenses grow heavier."

If after perusing the above any reader should prefer the casual and scanty drippings of voluntaryism to a well-regulated national provision for the clergy, we can only say that we wonder at their judgment and their taste.

REVIEW OF NEW PUBLICATIONS.

THE LIFE OF BISHOP BURGESS.

The Life of Thomas Burgess, D.D. &c. &c. late Lord Bishop of Salisbury. By John S. HARFORD, Esq. D.C.L. F.R.S. 1 vol. 8vo. 1840.

Mr. HARFORD justly observes, that if the charm of a biographical work consists in novel incidents or striking vicissitudes, the memoir of the life of the learned, devout, and charitable Bishop Burgess must fail of exciting general interest; and accordingly, what is called "the leadthe leading journal of Europe" has pronounced that it is very dull and tiresome. To us however it has proved eminently interesting; and we cannot but think that either the work itself, or the por

tions of it which we are about to extract, will be so to our readers. Perhaps, sitting at the hearth where in years past, and not to be recalled, our revered friend would condescend to hold intercourse with us; and listening in recollection to his mild, affectionate tones; and never forgetting that benignant smile, of which Mr. Harford tells us that Mr. Smelt, the sub-tutor to George the Fourth, used to say, "Of all the sweet things I can think of, there is nothing quite equal to