the conviction of wise and virtuous enquirers. I therefore believe that every religious community, keeping in view the numerous and interesting circumstances which I have mentioned in a foregoing paragraph, might be progressively improved by welltimed and well-conducted revisions of its tenets and its discipline. Yet "a church which frequently modifies, varies, and changes its doctrines," is, I do not say with Bossuet, "destitute of the direction of the Holy Spirit," but, I do say, deficient in that sound discretion which, aiming at general utility, and looking to the comparative importance as well as credibility of religious opinions, would practically forward the most proper and most beneficial purposes of a national church, to which the laws wisely intend to assign permanent, as well as extensive influence. Upon the favourite maxim of Bossuet, Mosheim and his learned Editor have made some very judicious observations, which may be found in page 310, volume four, of Mosheim's Ecclesiastical History, second edition. "When Ravaillac assassinated Henry the Fourth it was from a principle of religion. But this did not so much abate from the mischief of the act. It even rendered the act still more mischievous, for a reason we shall see presently, than if it had originated from a principle of revenge."* The reason is thus explained in page 165. As to the motive of religion, whatever it may sometime prove to be in point of strength and constancy, it is not in point of extent so universal, especially in its application to acts of a mischievous nature, as any of the three preceding (i. e. self-regarding) motives. It may, however, be as universal in a particular state, or in a particular district of a particular state. It is liable, indeed, to be very irregular in its operations. It is apt, however, to be frequently as powerful as the motive of vengeance, or indeed any motive whatsoever. It will sometimes be more powerful than any other motive. It is at any rate much more con A pernicious act, therefore, when committed through the motive of religion, is more mischievous than when committed through the motive of ill-will. On the word conscience there is an interesting Note, of which I shall produce the most interesting part. "Fanaticism never sleeps; it is never glutted; it is never stopped by philanthropy, for it makes a merit of trampling on philanthrophy; it is never stopped by conscience, for it has pressed conscience into its service." The foregoing observations are founded upon an accurate knowledge of human nature; and many of my countrymen, from their experience of the past, and with their prospects of the future, would do well to reflect upon the justness and importance of them. Let me take this opportunity of commending, as I ought to do, most sincerely and most ardently, three pamphlets, for which the well-wishers to genuine Christianity and our ecclesiastical establishments are indebted to Mr. Sedgwick.* His statements of facts, his arguments from reason and scripture, and his animated description of characters, do honour to the elegance of his taste, the vigour of his understanding, and the soundness of his moral and religious principles. They will preserve, I trust, many wellmeaning and attentive readers from the sorceries which might be practised upon their credulity and their piety. But fanaticism, when it has once taken possession of common minds, "Nec modum habens neque consilium, ratione modoque Tractari non vult."+ The attic raillery of Addison, the caustic satire of Swift, the solid reasoning of Locke, the energetic eloquence of Barrow, the profound learning of Taylor, Pearson, Bentley, and Stillingfleet, the pious expositions of Christian Fathers, the glowing expostulations of Prophets, the simple, sage, and solemn preaching of Apostles, would be of little or no avail when opposed to them stand the « Θεόκλητοι, θεοδίδακτοι, θεύσσυτοι, θεόπνευστοι, θεύγλωσσοι κήρυκες Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, * Let me add, that in the first Number of Mr. Cumberland's Review there is a most argumentative and animated critique on the Life of Mr. Newton lately published by Mr. Cecil. † Horat. such as Whitfield, Wesley, Romaine, Hawes, Hawker, Rowland Hill, Newton the midshipman, Bunyan the tinker, Boehmen the shoemaker, and other nameless rhapsodists, whose Θεύρυτοι καὶ θεοτέρατοι λόγοι, however understood and admired they may be in some of our conventicles, are not so well adapted to pulpits in what I think the best Yuxis 'Iarpetov in Christendom, the Church of Eng land. I have often endeavoured to understand the grounds and the properties of that vital religion which is so eagerly inculcated, and so loudly extolled. But the spirit of it I must confess Οὐκ ἐμοὶ χριστὸς δοκεῖ, ̓Αλλ' ἔστι πολλῶν ὀνομάτων ἐπώνυμος. The rapidity, stubbornness, and virulence of the malady which is spreading around us, are equally alarming. By a process scarcely paralleled in any other kind of intellectual or moral aberration, this mentis gratissimus error diffuses its influence from the whole head, over the whole heart. It appears to endow men with eyes which see not, and ears which hear not. When philosophy, or history, or criticism, offers any aid to the fanatic, he either • Fit pugil, et medicum urget,'t or answers with mingled scorn and self-complacency to the following effect: "Ea με τήνδε τὴν νόσον νοσεῖν, ἐπεὶ Κέρδιστον εὖ φρονοῦντα μὴ δοκεῖν φρονεῖν."† Now the nobility and gentry among the Roman Catholics have a visible interest in watching and restraining the zeal of Roman Catholic priests. Rational Dissenters (as they denominate themselves) have embraced a theological system which carries with it few allurements to enthusiasts; and widely as they may differ from the doctrines of the English church, they have far less to * Fragm. Eurip. or Sophocl. Eschyl. Prom. Vinct. lin. 384. VOL. IV. 2 N † Horat. dread from its discipline than from those "wholesome severities,” which in the giddiness of power, and the blindness of bigotry, our evangelical sectaries would be impelled by their conscience truckling to their ambition and vengeance, to employ against what they would call the impious heretic and the factious schismatic. Is it not sound policy, then, to conciliate the Roman Catholics and Rational Dissenters, and at the same time not to oppress the common foes of them and the establishment—not to irritate them by contumelious and legal disabilities for this or that secular office-not to subject them to stripes or imprisonment— God forbid this!—but, by well-considered and well-applied regulations to restrain them, as men who might be ready to do evil that good, according to their own peculiar apprehensions of duty, and perhaps their own views of their own peculiar interests, may come-men, who actually do hold language not only the most insulting to a learned priesthood, but the most inflammatory to illiterate hearers? In a printed paper, and with the signature of their names, have not twelve of these officious missionaries boasted of having lately introduced the gospel in the neighbourhood of a city where, according to the import of their words and the conceptions of their followers, Heathenism, or Mahometanism, or Judaism, or rank Deism, may have been heard, but the gospel has not, for centuries upon centuries, either in parochial churches or a cathedral? Not very long ago, nor very far from the place where I have resided for more than twentythree years, and where, to say nothing of well-meant, and perhaps well-chosen advice conveyed by sermons, the service of our Common Prayer Book-a service established by the national laws, endeared to us by long use, prepared at first by Protestant reformers, and some of them Protestant martyrs, improved by subsequent revisions from learned prelates and dignitaries, selected in many parts from the offices of Christian churches and the works of Christian Fathers, written almost every where in a clear and most impressive style, replete with instruction to the young and the old, the rich and the poor, the prosperous and the unfortunate, the virtuous and the wicked; and in addition to all these excellencies of human composition, containing large portions of scripture in the Psalms, Lessons, Epistles, and Gospelsyes, in that very sanctuary where this very service is generally performed with due exactness, and, I would add, seriousness, one of our evangelical preachers, in the presence of a plain and well-disposed congregation, mingled at the moment with a crowd of vagrant and intrusive Methodists, expressly and unblushingly talked of himself as introducing to his dearly-beloved hearers, a stranger, Jesus Christ. Introduce seems to be an occasional watch-word of these Modern Hirim-a tessera by which the faithful champion of religion is distinguished from the lukewarm hireling who at any time puts his trust in the "carnal weapons" of reason and morality-a Shibboleth which separates the true Gileadites, happily gifted with " tongues that are for a sign," from the recreant and babbling Ephraimites. If persons bearing high academical titles, and fancying them. selves in theology, τρίτου κρατῆρος γείσασθαι, thus in effect represent the whole service of the church as established by law, and the whole preaching of churchmen, except their own, as having in them no portion of Christianity, what are we to expect from other teachers, who understand οὐδὲ τὰ τρία Στησι χόρου. When language of this portentous kind is gravely uttered in the sanctuary, it makes, and is intended to make, an instantaneous and deep impression, which no smooth explanations, no sly evasions, no partial and compulsory retractations can afterwards efface. "The Papists," exclaims the fanatic, "keep the scriptures from the laity. The English clergy read them, but cannot teach them, for they understand not the saving truths of the word, nor feel its vital energies. Precious, therefore, to us, and quite inestimable, is the privilege of comparing the regenerate state of man with his unregenerate. When the wind blew,' we, like other blind and reprobate sinners, vainly puffed up by our fleshly minds,' once supposed ourselves to know whence it came and whither it was going.' But we thankfully remember when and where, and by what lips touched with the dew of sacred truth, the gospel was first declared' unto us. To us it is now given to understand the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, to be endowed abundantly with the means of grace,' and to be refreshed with the sure and certain hope' of glory. In the mean |