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culiar views of it in which he may differ from other preachers, and which his slanderer had not the acuteness to discriminate.

The "Appeal to the Legislature," we are authorized by current report to ascribe to an amiable and promising young writer, the Rev. W. B. Collyer. We congratulate him on the improvement of his taste; he has cast off the gaudy and puerile decorations of a spurious rhetoric, and dispatched them, we hope, to that final receptacle of frippery, the "limbo of vanity." His pamphlet has yielded us sincere pleasure; it is not exempt from faults and inaccuracies, the result probably of haste, but it manifests considerable force and keenness of faculty, and is written for the most part in a chaste and classical style. His defence of the Christian doctrines, though too concise, is rational and satisfactory. His vindication of the excellent men whom the "Barrister" has defamed, is equally zealous and decisive. We shall introduce his quotation from Mr. Burder's Village Sermons, with the comment.

Sermons, which admonish the inferior classes to " sobriety," to "diligence," "to the daily influence of love to God, and love to man"; addresses, which caution the poor against profaneness, against cruelty against open vices, and against the indulgence of even corrupt thoughts: let common sense determine whether such preaching and such publications deserve to be exhibited as subversive of morals, and as sources of depravity. I will produce but one other example.

"We are to live righteously in respect of our neighbours; to give every one his due; to honour all men ; and do the duty of our stations whether to our superiors, inferiors, or equals. The New Testament is full of excellent directions, as to relative duties. The apostles largely teach us the duties of husbands and wives, parents and children, masters, servants, and subjects. A true christian will study his Bible with this view; and in every relation of life he will endeavour to conform himself to it; and he that pretends to religion, without this, is a mere hypocrite." (Vol. IV. Serm. I. p..) I a k, can morality be more plainly inculcated, or more strongly enforced on the poor and ignorant than in this passage? It was impossible for the Barrister to read the Village Sermons without finding these, and many other evidences, that their writer labours to serve the cause of holiness: it is evident that he has read them from his frequent, and designed y mut lated quotations from them. I ask, what is the spirit which could lead him to su press such passages as these, knowing them to be there? to separate sentences from their connection, in order to put a forced and a false construction upon them? and to decry a work and defame a character, in high esteem with the religious public? I will not name the motise. I will not defile my pages with the appellation, which a conduct so illiberal and so dishonourable merits-but the Public will feel it, and they cannot fail to regard it at once with contempt and with execration.' pp. 21, 22.

Mr. C. reprobates with just indignation the " Barrister's" attack on the memory of the pious and ingenious Bunyan, whom he has represented generally as "a premature example of coarse profaneness and vulgar debauchery," and derided under the name of " the tinker?" It is some consolation to be

́convinced that we have now seen human nature in its very basest degradation; in slander and scurrility it can descend no lower. To have trampled on the unsullied characters of the living, in defiance of all justice and decency, was an effort of audacity, which startled and disgusted ús. But to have violated the sanctity of the tomb, to have dishonoured those relics" which have been canonized in successive ages by the veneration of the wise and the gratitude of the pious, evinces such a combination of ferocity and meanness, such an epitome of the hyæna and the worm, as we are confident will never be exceeded by any future being that may appear in the likeness of man. In this insult on the saintly and time-honoured character of Bunyan, there is a folly not inferior to the guilt. That a writer who had to deduce the frequency of crimes from the prevalence of evangelical sentiments, should suffer even the name of Banyan to flow from his pen, even the name of a man who was transformed by the reception of these very sentiments from a monster of vice to a pattern of holiness, is a proof of infatuation scarcely consistent with mental sanity. It was fitting that such should be the penalty of sacrilege, that the disturber of the dead should be smitten with fatuity in his unholy work, and issuing from the desecrated sepulehre, should announce, in the gibberish of his exultation, the punishment of his awful temerity:

The immoral tendency of evangelical preaching has often been sophistically asserted; it might have been well, if one of these writers had undertaken more philosophically to demonstrate the fallacy of the reasoning, and explain what the tendency must be, from the nature of the principles. But the most obvious and decisive mode of discovering the tendency, is to examine the effect. Not one fact has the "Barrister" attempted to adduce, by way of establishing the pernicious effect of preaching the doctrines of the reformation; he has not even dared to tell, as any honest accuser would have done, "how many of the unhappy criminals, who have suffered for a violation of the rights of society and of the laws of their country, ascribed their vices to evangelical principles and evangelical preaching.".

I will take the liberty, (says our author). of turning his eyes, and the eyes of the Legislature and of the Public, to a matter of fact of sufficient notoriety, and authenticated beyond all dispute, which, so far as it goes, disproves the system, and exhibits evangelical preaching the source of lasting morality. I recommend to their serious attention the colliers of Kingswood, and the preaching of Mr. Whitefield and of Mr. Wesley among them. These were men who required not only to be Christianized but humanized. It was a mighty mass of deformity, without shape or order, and it, was moulded in the human form, nay more, it received the impress of the divine image, by the agency of the Holy Spirit, through the preaching of these laborious ministers. The world will not easily forget the

transformation; when men who scarcely had any thing about them human, but their external configuration, changed their very nature; when the ferocious become softened, and the profane exemplary for the simpli city of holiness and when the tears chased each other down their dark cheeks as they listened to the declarations of a Saviour's love, while the total alteration of their life and manners, bore no resemblance to "the morning cloud and the early dew which passeth away." When the Barrister has contemplated this picture, I would remind him that this was the fruit of preaching, and of principles, which he says are subversive of morality.' pp. 52, 53.

The object of the "Defence" is to prove at once the antiquity and scriptural authority of the evangelical doctrines, by a connected series of quotations from the sacred records. This design is executed with a zeal, and in most instances with a propriety, that is worthy of the subject, and creditable to the anonymous author. He discovers a familiar acquaintance with the Christian system, and the oracles of Revelation, on which it rests; and in those parts of his pamphlet which are more strictly polemic, he writes with a vigour and animation that in connection with the importance of the subject will be found extremely interesting.

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The author animadverts with much point on that remarkable absurdity in the system of the "rational" and "moral" divines, relating to the attributes of justice and mercy in the character of God. It is curious enough, that the same men who would represent the Supreme Governor as too merciful to take vengeance on the guilty, also represent him as too just to pardon the penitent. When the evangelical system proclaims a a just God," they tell us it depreciates his benevolence; when it proclaims "a Saviour," they tell us it encourages sin. It will occur to our readers, that this rational mode of soothing the unconcerned, and terrifying the contrite, is precisely the mode ascribed to the master-enemy of mankind; the invisible, though not anonymous, being, whose names, as the learned apprentice" well knows, denote his double trade, as adversary of the truth, and accuser of the brethren.

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After inviting that examination, which the Barrister so scrupulously, avoids, into the characters of those who maintain evangelical sentiments, and demonstrating their conformity to scriptural representations, our author addresses him in the following animated passage;

St. John informs us, that "Whosoever is BORN of GoD doth not commit Sin;" that he " CANNOT SIN, because he is BORN of God." Again, he says, "Whatsoever is BORN of GOD overcometh HE WORLD." St. Paul also observes, that Believers are the "workmanship” of GOD, "created in CHRIST JESUS unto good works ;" and in a sage already cited, he says, " They that are CHRIST's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts." Hence, Sir, we may perceive somewhat of the holy nature of that regeneration, which the Scriptures

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went as essential to the very being of a Christian. Hence also, appears "what manner of persons we' ought to be, in all holy conversation and godliness," before we can have their authority for concluding that we are "the children of God." Now, Sir, Evangelical Mini ters are in the constant practice of enforcing these and such like passages of Scripture; solemnly assuring their hearers, that, if they live in the indulgence of only on known sin, or in the neglect of only ONE known duty, they are not genuine Disciples of CHRIST But, if what I have now asserted be the fact, and I call upon you to prove that it is not, then, Sir, I ask whether the preaching of Evangelical Ministrs can possible have an immoral tendency? But indeed, Sir, I feel an awkwardness in addressing to you such a question as this. It is somewhat like asking, whether the Sun is the source of darkness. Evangelical Religion, Sir, an immoral tendency! Doctrines which carry Piety to the highest elevations of mental and practical holiness an immoral tendency! Who, that has had only a sin. gle glimpse of the real nature of these Doctrines, can doubt that such an imputation as this, is the fruit either of profound ignorance, of a distemper. ed imagination, or of a heart debased below the common level of human depravity? But, Sir, if it have not an immoral tendency, then what be comes of your Pamphlet? Why, truly, as to its object, it is merely-a few sheets of waste paper!-Having failed to prove the immoral tendency, you have effected just nothing at all-for as to Evangelical Truth being a NEW System" of Religion, I can hardly suppose that even you, Sir, will venture to maintain an absurdity so gross, after having weighed the numer ous Scripture testimonies which I have cited. But, Sir, in another view, I am sorry to say, your Pamphlet is something more than waste paper. It

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IS A FOUL AND ATROCIOUS LIBEL UPON INCOMPARABLY THE MOST

VIRTUOUS PART OF THE BRITISH NATION. No class of Persons carry the standard of morals so high as those which are called evangelical and, Sir, until it is demonstrated that their principles actually do produce, by their own proper influence, immoral effects upon Society, the odium of the libel in question must remain upon you.' pp. 89-92.

We have already perhaps extended this article too far; but the nature of the subject will be deemed a compensation, we hope, for the insignificance of the occasion. Our review of the Barrister's second edition may be comprised in two words; he has reprinted the title page! Into what farther disgrace will this unfortunate meddler be betrayed by his hard master? Art. XV1. Letters and Sonnets, on Moral and other Interesting Subjects Addressed to Lord John Russel. By Edmund Cartwright D. D. Prebendary of Lincoln, and Chaplain to his Grace the Duke of Bed ford. Foolscap 8vo. pp. 210. Price 6s. bds. Longman and Co.

1807.

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THE publication of this volume is probably intended as a compliment to the young nobleman whose name appears on the title page, and who will accept it, we hope, with far greater cordiality than it can possibly meet with from the public, in order to save the respectable author from the mortifying reflection of having made a sacrifice, wholly in vain, of his reputation to his gratitude. There are twenty-four

letters, and as many sonnets; how remarkable they are for humour, ingenuity, and useful admonition, may be surmised from the following specimen.

• LETTER IX.

Your Lordship is not aware how happy your letter, which I receiv-' ed this morning, has made me. From your long silence I had begun to fear that I had been forgotten. You have, however, remembered me at last, and in the most agreeable way; in the first place, by writing to me a long and entertaining letter; and in the next place, by making that let' ter the vehicle of a very elegant sonnet, which I have repeatedly read over with singular pleasure. With very little polishing, which you can easily give it, it would do credit to the best sonneteer of us all. Your Lordship has hit off the true style and character of this species of composition as happily in this your first attempt, as you could have done, had you written as many sonnets as PETRARCH. I much doubt, whether at your Lordship's time of life he ever wrote one half so good. Of this I am certain, that in natural feeling, and in simplicity of sentiment and construction, your sonnet will not be easily excelled.

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I have taken the liberty of disobeying for the present your injunction to put it, as soon as I had perused it, into the fire. If, however, I shall not be able to obtain a reprieve for it, it shall be committed, when I receive a second order for its execution, to the flames, though non sine lacrymis if your Lordship will have the goodness to permit me to preserve it, I religiously promise not to suffer it to be copied.

So well apprised am I of your Lordship's diffidence, that, in spight of the good opinion which, I am persuaded, you have every reason to entertain of my sincerity, you will be apt to suspect me, in what I have said about your sonnet, of flattery. But were I thus disposed to act in repugnance to my own nature, I must forget the nature of the climate where you now are, in which, it is said, no venomous reptile can exist, to think of sending there such a venomous reptile e as Flattery. But flattery sometimes conceals its reptility, and then, perhaps, may be met with even in IRELAND, under the concealed character which gives title to the following sonnet.

SONNET X.

THE MAGICIAN.

The tales, that once were held devoutly true,
Of magic spells and necromantic skill,
You disbelieve? Then disbelieve them still-

Your incredulity you soon may rue!
A sly Magician daily may you view

Received with welcome, enter where he will.
Let but his tongue its oily drops distil,
His hearers, take all shapes, or strange or new,
He makes deformity all hearts engage,
He gives to youth th' experience of old age;
For him decrepitude resigns her crutch

I too am ten years younger at his touch.
Who, you will say, can this inchanter be?

What think you, my young friend, of FLATTERY?

pp.

55-60.

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