one way.

tions, the table talk, should all bend, so far as human frailty will allow, Much should be heard of God and Christ and redemption and holiness, and the soul, and eternity; of ministerial duties and personal religion, and all the doctrines and the precepts of the everlasting Gospel. Young men not spiritually disposed to this atmosphere of piety, would shrink from such an institution; but the church could well dispense with their services, and others of better mind would occupy their place.

If any reader should have fancied, from the tone of the preceding remarks, that Mr. Raikes would allow young men to be idle under the notion of being too spiritually minded to study, he has but to turn to several of the next chapters in the work to correct his mistake; for though our judicious author has marked out a course differing from what many other writers have prescribed for initiatory clerical study, it is by no means a course of indolence. It comprises commentators on Scripture, the evidences of Christianity, the doctrines of our established communion as collected from our creeds and articles, the history of the church of Christ, internal and external, with works of religious history, biography, and the various branches of pastoral duty. The books recommended, are in general admirably selected, and the remarks upon them are discriminating and judicious. It would offer but meagre information to attempt to abridge what is itself a digest; we therefore refer our readers, especially candidates for holy orders, to the work itself. The character and attainments of the writer, and his Scriptural soundness of doctrine, and evident earnest desire to promote the glory of God, the spiritual edification of his readers, and the welfare of the church of Christ, especially our own pure and Apostolical branch of it, entitle his remarks and suggestions to the most respectful attention; and we trust they will greatly assist in

says:

"The meaning of an obscure passage may be more distinctly explained in the Christian-Knowledge Society's Family Bible. The general tone of doctrine may be most satisfactorily traced by Mr. Scott. Practical improvement may be found most amply developed by Matthew Henry; and more of learning may be displayed by Patrick and his associates. He, therefore, who professes to interpret Scripture by the help of such guides, must be aware of the character and power of those on whom he leans; and instead of seeking

all he wants from one, must be content to take from each, that which is most likely to be found in it." pp. 108, 109.

The man who is unsatisfied with these assistances must ascend higher. He must go to the Synopsis of Poole, and amidst the multitude of conflicting opinions which he meets with there, he must endeavour to collect that which approximates the nearest to reason. of doubts, however, a more enlarged de

In this maze

Some short ac

gree of information will be wanted to direct him. He must not only know the names of the authors which are cited, but he must also know the churches to which they belong, their creeds, their denominations, their private opinions. Beyond this, he must also be guarded against the shock which may be felt at seeing the variety of opinions held and maintained with regard to a single text. quaintance with this wonderful work, will perhaps lead him to remark, that for acuteness of mind, for that which we commonly call good sense, none of the commentators cited is fit to be compared to Calvin; and should this lead him to consult the commentary of Calvin, he will be surprised to find, that in closeness of practical application, in freedom from all the abuses of what has been called his system, few commentaries can be put in competition with his." pp. 111, 112.

We are gratified in seeing our recent remarks on Calvin's great work thus corroborated; but in truth, what candid man who really knows that work ever thought otherwise? The writings of Calvin are public Christian property; and though there are some things, it may be many things,

sure.

in them not to be approved; yet we should pity the ignorance and party spirit which would deprive the religious student of so valuable a treaThe time we would trust has gone by, at least among the members of the Church of England, when to abuse Calvin was a test of orthodoxy and a stepping stone to fame and preferment.

Sis fur, sis nebulo, sycophanta, aut turpis adulter,

Calvinum ferias fulmine, magnus eris.

We might quote much from the excellent remarks on preaching, but we must content ourselves with the following detached passages.

"But beyond those general feelings which it is essential for the young minister to form, there are certain specific duties involved in the ministerial office, which demand more particular consideration. He is called, specifically called, to preach the word. This is the chief, the peculiar part of his work; and without overlooking or undervaluing those several branches which may be subsequently discussed; it is in the pulpit that he appears as the ambassador for Christ, as the herald of salvation, the messenger of reconciliation. For this purpose his previous education has been including studies, the chief end of which was to strengthen his reasoning faculty, or to enlarge his powers of illustration. For this purpose, literature has been added to theology; and some knowledge of the art of explaining and enforcing truth, has been combined with knowledge of the great truths which are to be believed. Little, it is true, has been done towards realizing this end, by the resources which a common education includes. The materials for the preacher are in some degree provided; but the art, the proper, the specific art of him who is to employ them, who is to exercise his powers in persuading, in convincing others, as yet is left to be acquired where it may be, from experience, from imitation, from reflection, or the mere bias of constitution.

"It is impossible to contemplate calmly the situation of a young man, who is first called to appear in this most important, most responsible post; and who ascends the pulpit with little advantage from previous instruction, and with none from previous exercise. It is impossible to see him, preparing to teach others, and to see hundreds hanging on his lips, for that word which is to feed their souls; without mourning over the circumstances under which this part of the ministry is generally commenced. He may have knowledge, he may have zeal, he may CHRIST, OBSERV. No. 361.

have affection, he may have qualities which ful, but his first efforts in preaching are hereafter may render him eminently usegenerally nothing better than experiments, and experiments which only lead to conviction of error. He naturally begins by imitating the manner of some one whom attempting some mode which he has been he has been accustomed to admire, or by imagining to himself; but his first efforts are attempts in an art which he has never studied, and where he has no adviser to direct him. Even the theory of the system is unknown; and it is probable that years must elapse, before experience and reflection will lead him to discover that mode of preaching which is suited to his powers, and best calculated to edify his hearers." pp. 213–216.

"There are certain primary qualities, which seem almost essential to usefulness; without which, no great or permanent edification can be reasonably expected, and which every one should regard as the means through which a blessing is to be sought. Of these it might be obvious to mention, clearness in statement, both as regards division of subject and language; seriousness of manner; earnestness of tone; and that indescribable mixture of fervour and of affection, which is usually known by the name of unction. not being the results of any particular talents, but rather the expression of that state of mind which we feel to be implied in the office, are looked for in all who undertake it, and may justly be required from all." pp. 219, 220.

These

"If men were generally aware of the charm that belongs to simplicity; or, if they did but bear in mind that gifts may be various in quality while they are equal in amount, and that each man's duty rather leads him to cultivate his own gift, than to covet those of others; the general style of preaching would be less ambitious than it is at present, but probably more useful; and men, instead of labouring to assume and to support a tone which was not natural, would be improving one which was capable of indefinite improvement, if they followed up the course which strictly seemed their own.

"Peculiarities of manner would unquestionably remain, and might be more strongly developed on this plan; but in truth, manner does not signify much, where other qualities of greater importance are not wanting." pp. 221, 222.

"With regard to written and extempore discourses, let but a sermon be prepared under the influence of prayer; let it but be aimed at the souls of men, and be delivered from a heart overflowing with love to those who are addressed, and the difference will be small, whether it lies on paper before he preacher, or is only lodged in the recesses of his mind. Its final success depends upon the grace of God; and that grace will generally ac

I

company the most faithful labours, and the most earnest prayers, whatever may

have been the manner or mode in which they have been exerted." pp. 229, 230.

"A sermon without an application, is like a letter without an address. It may be good, useful, instructive, but it seems to belong to no one; and no one therefore takes it to himself, or is profited by it." p. 237.

Mr. Raikes strongly urges the importance of expositions of Scripture, and cottage lectures. A degree of prejudice has existed in some quarters against this most useful and necessary practice of familiar expositions and lectures, whether in the houses of the rich, or the cottages of the poor. We fear that indolence, and want of tender affection for the souls of men, have sometimes disguised themselves under the stolen mantle of ecclesiastical regularity; and that some who did not care either to lecture or to be lectured, have been fain to hide their spiritual apathy in reprobating the over zeal of their neighbours. We rejoice, however, to say that the subject is now better understood, and there are few places, we presume, where a clergyman of active piety and sound discretion would be impeded, at least in any quarter of authority, in his wish to benefit his flock by reading and explaining the Scriptures to them, wherever he can gain access to their ear or their heart, in public or in private. As little should we suppose that he would be impeded in forming Visiting Societies among them, the value of which Mr. Raikes convincingly demonstrates, and his testimony is of great weight, from his connexion with the diocese of which he is chancellor, where, under

the auspices of its pious, learned, and judicious prelate, these institutions have been widely established, and with most beneficial results.

We have said enough of this work to shew our sense of its seasonableness and utility; we only pray in conclusion, that it may please God to bless the labours of the excellent author, to his own glory and the extensive benefit of the church of Christ. In addition to all the other reasons for the regular theological education of the clergy, there is one arising from the unsettled state of religious opinion at the present moment, which is peculiarly important. We prefer stating it in the words of Dr. Buchanan, who remarks, in his farewell sermon preached at Calcutta, " You will generally observe in the present day, that new opinions concerning forms and doctrine are chiefly introduced by men who have had little learning in their youth, so that when in advanced life they begin to be serious, and to acquire knowledge, the novelty flatters their understanding for a time, and leads them to adopt new systems, as they acquire new knowledge. This is very natural. Whereas those in whom serious piety and sound learning have united in early life are seldom subject to such changes. But the unsettled man is designated by St. Paul as a novice, whatever his age may be; one who, being lifted up for a time in his own conceit, gradually loses his reputation, or perhaps has a fall in the face of the church. And when his pride has been thus humbled, he generally returns to meekness of conduct and sobriety of speech."

THE details of the Reform Bill are dragging their slow length along in the House of Commons, whence the measure as to its chief features will probably find its way, by a large majority, to the House of Lords, again to be tested by that august tribunal. In the mean while, whether we

have reform or no reform, there are many circumstances in the aspect of the times, which must excite the most painful apprehensions in the mind of every true Christian, and every lover of his country. To some of these, for they are too numerous and too extensive in their relations

to allow of our touching on them all, we shall devote a few pages. As to the bare question of parliamentary reform, it is in our view a comparatively secondary matfer, or at least but one among many considerations; it is to the general character of the times, of which this measure is only an index, that we must chiefly turn our attention. Long before the agitated and agitating bill was introduced, the public mind was in such a ferment, that the king and his late ministers durst not appear in public in London; while in the country the clergyman, the landlord, and the farmer, were keeping watch and ward day and night to preserve their property from the conflagrations which blazed around them, and their lives from the fury of a riotous peasantry. Our hope was that the Reform Bill, if allowed quietly to pass at its first introduction, would have silenced these alarms, as the expectation of it did; and in the end, by rectifying anomalies, have done considerable good, with little harm, neither its good nor evil being at all proportioned to the hopes or fears of its more zealous friends and enemies. But what a difference have the fierce contests of the last nine months produced; what tumults, what losses, what bloodshed, what exasperations, what political bandings together of rash, irreligious, and reckless men; what ulterior, and boldly avowed, views of spoliation and revolution; and not least, what a virulent and factious spirit in the minds of some who were once accustomed to obey the law of God relative to kings, and those in authority, but who, in their exasperation at the measures of the present ministry, are indulging a strain of invective which used to be heard only from the lips of infuriated political partizans. Such things were sure to spring out of a lengthened political contest; but were the contest terminated, we fear that we could not be easily re-instated in a tranquil condition. There has been a shaking, a convulsion, the effects of which may be felt for years to come; in particular, all established institutions, civil and ecclesiastical, have felt a concussion, which not a few eager spirits are prepared to follow up by a complete subversion. We do not indeed believe that this is the general character of public feeling; certainly it is not the feeling of any moral, religious, and well-judging men; but it is the feeling of too many of the misguided multitude, and it is fomented by some of higher rank and attainment, for party purposes. Thus we stand upon the brink of a precipice; and whether we shall be precipitated over it, or retrace our steps to a more safe position, will mainly depend, under the blessing of God, upon the conduet of the sound mass of the community, of whatever name, party, or political interest. In this view we deprecate, from whatever quarter it may come, that spirit of animosity and virulent exaggeration which is afloat on every side; whether

in parliament or in private life, in England or in Ireland, in Catholics or Orangemen, in the church or the world. This spirit is the worst possible for healing the wounds of the country. We may add also, that loss of temper in these matters always leads to loss of argument, at least in the eyes of others, if not of the individual himself. We do not scruple to apply this remark to some of those who have lately vindicated objects of undoubted importance, more especially those connected with the best, the spiritual, the eternal interests of individuals and nations. The cause of social order, the cause of Protestantism, the cause of religion, and the interests of the Established Church, are at this moment grievously suffering from this unguarded spirit. The weapons of the world are brought to fight the battles of the Lord of hosts; and a speech commenced with a defence of religion, of Protestantism, of Scriptural education, of the circulation of the word of God, turns out to be in the end a political invective against "an unprincipled cabinet," and "theirunprincipled bill." Thus things come to be blendedwhich have no real connexion.

In times like these, when numerous questions of extraordinary importance are under discussion, and the rapid extension of intelligence brings them home to every family and social circle, it is very important that religious persons, and more especially the ministers of Christ, should come to a full decision as to the line of conduct which they ought to pursue, so as not to fail in their duties as members of civil society, and yet not to be entangled in unprofitable turmoils and party janglings. We refer, of course, chiefly to persons in private life, who are not of necessity obliged to take an active part in public proceedings, though the spirit of the remark applies to all. In coming to a right decision, it ought to be considered, on the one hand, that questions of extensive political interest are not of necessity alien to the thoughts of a well-regulated religious mind, as they involve the peace and happiness of society, and bear not remotely even upon higher interests than those of the passing scene. There is nothing in the spirit of Christianity that renders it unlawful for a Christian to feel deeplyinterested in events which regard the destinies of states and empires; nor, even in the case of the members of the sacred profession, does an individual, in becoming a minister of religion, cease to be a man and a citizen, or forfeit any privilege which he before possessed as a member of civil society. He is not, indeed, to be so engrossed in things temporal as to forget the paramount importance of things eternal, but is to view the flitting scenes of an evanescent life with the eye of a Christian, not permitting his affections to centre in "the things that perish in the using," but studying the moderation enjoined by the Apostle, 1 Cor. vii. 29–31.

Yet while this Christian moderation forbids the virulence and entanglement of partizanship, and limits within well regulated bounds the just interest which every Christian should feel in important secular pursuits, varying according to his particular station and duties in life, whether as a statesman or a private individual; there is nothing, we repeat, in Christianity, or in the highest elevation of a devout spirit, that ought to render any man indifferent to the important scenes which are passing around him; and in this respect it is to be lamented that many of those who are best qualified from their characters and attainments to interpose in the affairs of state, shrink from a public duty lest it should be accompanied by peril and temptation; as if the providence of God had intended that legislation, government, and the whole economy of political and national intercourse, should be conducted by those who are morally least fitted for it; or as if, because a Christian is not to make the present world his final home and rest, he is to retire to the abstraction of his closet or the indolence of a cell, and to shun that share of responsibility in the great movements of the world for which his abilities fit him, or which his station requires of him. The very circumstance that he is alive to his moral accountableness, and is anxious to escape "the corruptions that are in the world," and feels it a duty to avoid the snares of ambition and the turbulence of interested strife, is powerfully in favour of his salutary interposition for the general welfare; not burying his talent, or willingly leaving to less scrupulous spirits the whole regulation of the public weal or woe. In this respect some good men have betrayed a culpable degree of moral cowardice; flying where they should have manfully contended, and sacrificing the public welfare to personal ease and indolence. Christians ought not to survey with a careless eye the great events which are ever passing on the arena of the world, and instead of endeavouring to benefit their generation, retire within themselves in self-indulgent abstraction, leaving in this sense" the potsherds of the earth to strive with the potsherds of the earth," heedless of the momentous conflictions which are passing around them; caring little for war or peace; inquiring not whether laws are good or bad; nor turning aside to regard with the smallest concern, the condition of empires, the vast totality of their fellow-beings, if only they can quietly read and meditate in an unmolested corner. This surely is not the duty of a Christian citizen; and it certainly derives no sanction from the word of God; a very large portion of which is occupied with topics of legislation, political history, and other matters connected with the social weal.

But the danger in the present day, at least in many quarters, is on the other

side. How many persons in these heated times who have no peculiar public duties to discharge, live and breathe in politics, to the serious injury of their temper, their happiness, their family concerns, and their spiritual welfare. What an injurious effect also has this spirit in the social circle,and how detrimentally does it operate in the exclusion of religious conversation on topics of infinitely higher importance than the rise and fall of cabinets, or the counting of parliamentary majorities. Worst of all is it when it seizes the members of the sacred profession, and converts a Christian pastor into a secular partizan. We are unwilling to go much into particulars, or beyond those general observations which each of our readers may verify and apply in his own circle of experience; but we cannot refrain from noticing an illustration of our remarks in a recent instance to which the journals of the month have been giving marked and ostentatious publicity. We allude to the Bishop of Chichester's published letter to a reform club at Rye; of which the Times newspaper remarks, that "the Church of England has no reward too high for the author of such sentiments as these; he is worthy to redeem a whole convocation of your Philpottses and Marshes; he is the staff to save an establishment long after it begins to totter." For this coarse, left-handed panegyric of his radical eulogist, we do not of course make his lordship responsible; and as to the principle of parliamentary reform, we have before expressed our opinion that under all the difficulties of existing circumstances it is a thing desirable, perhaps. necessary so that we cannot be suspected of selecting his lordship's letter for censure because he happens to be a reformer; but we have selected it because it proves most forcibly all that we have urged respecting the danger of clergymen mingling as leaders or zealous agents in party politics. what says his lordship? "In consequence of an expectation verygenerally entertained that the recess of parliament at the present season (the letter is dated Dec. 26) would be extremely short, I made arrangements for remaining in town instead of holding an ordination and passing the Christmas at Chichester, as I wished and intended." His lordship then proceeds to discuss the merits of the Reform Bill, and adds, " I will not anticipate the possibility of defeat; for I trust that the idle fears and interested hopes which in some quarters obstructed the success of the late measure may by this time be sufficiently dissipated. If the many marks of national feeling which have been since exhibited (some of them we must deplore and condemn) shall not have convinced our opponents of their mistake, still we have the satisfaction of knowing that the constitution places in the hands of the sovereign a safe and easy remedy for ignorant or factious opposition;" namely, by the creation of new

For