Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

Let him say, how many know the meaning, albeit, those headings are intended to convey the substance of the matter? There is Te Deum laudamus; Benedicite omnia opera Domini; Jubilate Deo; Magnificat; Cantate Domino; Deus Misereatur. The advice as to the mote

and beam, would not here be altogether inapplicable.

But, confession and absolution we totally reject! Indeed, how, then, are we to understand this language, employed in the ordination of a priest? "The bishop shall lay his hand, severally, upon the head of each of them kneeling upon their knees before him, saying, to every one,-Receive the Holy Ghost, whose sins thou dost forgive, they are forgiven; and whose sins thou dost retain, they are retained." The service, too, at the Lord's Sup per, looks much like confession and absolution; but, in the order for the visitation of the sick, it is too palpable to be mistaken. "Our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath left power to his Church to absolve all sinners who truly repent and believe in him, of his great mercy, forgive thee thine offences. And, by his authority, committed to ME, I abSOLVE thee from all thy sins, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, Amen." Yes, truly, "As is the Mother, so is her Daughter."

Well, but no Protestant believes in such preposterous assumptions! That may be: and, if so, he should be honest enough to leave a Church in whose doctrines he does not believe. Doubtless, there is much truth in the description given of the members and ministers of the Church of England, by one who knew them well, and whose knowledge led to Christian practice, who did not think one thing, and profess another, but who renounced her emoluments when he saw her corruptions-Dr. John Jebb. He observed, "the Church-of-England-man is a sectarist, partly Papist, partly Protestant. He is a Protestant, because he asserts the sufficiency of the Scriptures. He is a Papist, because he in the same breath requires assent to certain additions to those Scriptures. He is a Protestant, because he has separated from the Church of Rome, upon the plea of the right of private judgment. He is a Papist, because he refuses the same liberty of separation to his brethren. He is a Protestant, because he maintains the unrighteousness of persecution, when he is himself the sufferer. He is a Papist, because when opportunity offers, he has always shown himself a persecutor in his turn. The

Church of England clergyman also is a Papist, because in the liturgy is found the Athanasian Creed. He is a Protestant, because, though enjoined by temporal and spiritual authority, to recite it monthly, he hardly ever reads it. He is a Papist, because he subscribes the 39 Articles; and he is a Protestant, because he does not believe them."

That we are not singular in our opinion as to the close affinity of the Churches of England and Rome, will be evident by the following examples:-Edward VI. in his address to the men of Cornwall, who were in arms for the restoration of Popery, expressly stated, that the Common Prayer was no other than the old Mass Book done into English, all but some few words that were left out.-Pope Pius IV. and Gregory XIII. offered to confirm the English liturgy as a sound standard and exposition of faith.-During the reign of Elizabeth, the Church of England was excommunicated by a bull of the Pope. The English Secretary of State, however, procured two persons to visit England, from the Pope, "to whom he showed the London and Canterbury service in their cathedrals in all the pomp of it, who thereupon declared that they wondered the Pope should be so ill informed and advised, as to interdict a prince whose service and ceremonies so symbolized with his own; and therefore returning to Rome, they informed the Pope that they saw no service, ceremonies, or orders in England, but might very well serve in Rome, whereupon the bull was recalled."That speech of Lord Chatham's is well known, in which he said, "The dissenting ministers, my lords, are represented as men of close ambition; they are so my lords, and their ambition is, to keep close to the college of fishermen, not of cardinals, and to the doctrine of inspired Apostles, not to the decrees of interested and aspiring Bishops. They contend for a scriptural creed and a spiritual worship; we have a Calvinistic creed, a Popish liturgy, and an Arminian clergy."-The celebrated Dr. Geddes thus states his view of the matter, "With the Church of England, we are in the very form of our liturgy so much agreed, or to speak more properly, the liturgy of the Church of England is so nearly a copy of ours, that with very little variation, the one might be substituted for the other. When I run over tables and rules for the moveable and immoveable feasts, and find in them the same commencement and economy of the ecclesiastical year-the same, or

rather much better distribution of the Psalms and other books of Scripture-the same, or a similar calendar of feasts and fasts-the same terms of Advent, Lent, Septuagessima, Easter, Whitsunday, &c. &c.-the same Collects, Epistles, and Gospels-and nearly the same mode of administering the sacraments, I, in a great measure, recognise the Roman Catholic liturgy."-It is only a few years since a clergyman of the Church of England, we believe, proposed, that a holy alliance should be entered into by the two Churches, on the express ground that they were so nearly allied in their creeds and formularies. These various testimonies justify the application of the saying, "As is the Mother, so is her Daughter."

The question may well then be asked, In what essential quality do the two Churches differ? Really it is difficult to say. Perhaps Sir Richard Steele's dedication to the Pope, may explain the matter:-"Your Holiness is not perhaps aware, how near the Churches of us Protestants have at length come to those privileges and perfections, which you boast of as peculiar to your own. The most sagacious persons have not been able to discover any other difference between us as to the main principle of all doctrine, government, worship, and discipline, but this one, that you cannot err in any thing you determine, and we never do; that is, in other words, that you are infallible, and we always in the right. We cannot but esteem the advantage to be exceedingly on our side in this case, cause we have all the benefits of infallibility, without the absurdity of pretending to it, and without the uneasy task of maintaining a point so shocking to the understanding of mankind." How truly does Robert Robinson remark on this passage, "This is not a libel; this is a satire: the worst is, this satirical stroke is true. The Church of Rome refuses the Scriptures to the people; some Protestant Churches grant the sight of the Book, but retain the meaning. Can you see any difference?"

be

We confess we see no practical difference either in this or in several other particulars of the two Churches. John Hales of Eaton, we think, might have used a stronger word at the commencement of the sentence, "Peradventure the dregs of the Church of Rome are not yet sufficiently washed from the hearts of many men.' The thorough cleansing is reserved for this and the coming age. The voice of warning has yet to be acted up to;

[ocr errors]

"Come out of her my people, and be not partakers of her plagues." In a louder and louder note that voice will be raised, till the cry is heard to the advancement of mental liberty, of Christian purity, of complete and perfect Reformation. A UNITARIAN PROTESTANT,

Zeal, not Fanaticism, Recommended; an Address to Unitarians.

REVIVALS are the order of the day. In America the greatest efforts have been made, to produce, over a wide extent of country, what are termed revivals of religion. These efforts have met with but too ample success among our transatlantic brethren. No inconsiderable degree of pains have been taken, to bring the spirit of fanaticism across the ocean, and to give it here a local habitation and a name. In England, however, there has been but a feeble response to the call made from many quarters. But in Wales much has been done. The natural warmth of the people the ignorance in which many of them are enshrouded, offered a suitable sphere for the operation of the agents commonly used in producing revivals. But both Scotland and England are, we hope, too well informed, at least, to be led into the excesses of the Transatlantic revivalists. It would require more time than our object permits us to occupy on this topic, to speak of all the evils which have ensued from these religious whirlwinds among the Americans. Suffice it to say, the harmony of churches-the harmony and proprieties of private life-the good understanding of Christian ministers, have been broken up; the laws of kindness, forbearance, yea, and of truth and integrity, infringed, under the pretext of advancing the kingdom of Christ. Strange is it, that men bearing the Christian name-ay, and professed ministers of Christ, should ever imagine, that raptures and convictions, the work of a moment, are the signs of a genuine conversion, and the fruits of true religion. How do they degrade the holy doctrine of the Gospel, to a level with systems of Paganism, and justify the unrestrained energy of the passions. It would be well for such to ponder well the following remarks from a learned and judi

T

cious historian. "To raise an intense feeling of religion, is neither difficult nor sufficient. It is effected now by the Bramin superstition in the Yogees and Juggernaut victims of India, as it was in ancient times among the whole nation of Egypt, under its monstrous system of bull and goat worship, cat veneration, and dog-headed deities. In the middle ages, it filled Europe with monks, and Asia with pilgrims and crusaders. It animated St. Dominic and the Pope, and their emissaries, in the murders of the Albigenses. It has supported and now revived the Spanish inquisition, and hallowed the Moloch sacrifices of Auto da Fés. The human heart is so constituted, as to feel responsive to the sacred touch-to be obedient to the heavenly call. But when the sensibility has been kindled, to what shall it be applied? Here begins the difficulty, which every heart has felt, and every age lamented. In the direction of this great principle, the mind ignobly, but unavoidably follows the imperfect reason, feeling, views, and habits of the day. Within the period which this history embraces, it was taught to employ its sincere energies in building monasteries, in procuring and venerating dead men's bones, in enriching the Church, in idle and endless processions, in superstitious rites, in useless pilgrimages, in crusades of danger and death, and in obeying the Machiavellian mandates of a distant Pope. Religion, heavenly as its origin has been, sublime as its principle always will be, still needs in every age as much wisdom as impulse. But it can have no more wisdom for its companion, than the age affords. When the judg ment is weak and the knowledge small, the fervour of the principle will connect it with folly as with truth; and the pious man, with all his sincerity, will offend many by his absurdities, as well as edify by his goodness."

From the tenor of this passage, and from the decision of our own judgments, it is evident, that the perfect Christian is he whose powers are well balanced and harmonized -whose affections and reason, whose heart and mind, are both in healthful and vigorous activity. Now it appears to us, that, to speak generally, the Orthodox, especially the Revivalists, have activity of the feelings-the Unitarians, activity of the intellect. Well, we are assured, it would be, if they participated in our intellectual energy,

* Turner's History of England.

« ZurückWeiter »