But the question cannot be put, or could not stand for a moment, on the high ground of the necessity of symbols in Christian worship; since, during the best ages of the Church, the Jewish temple and all its symbols had passed away, and for many generations following there were no Christian temples-no places in which symbolism could be developed. The Church passed through ages of persecution and consequent concealment, worshipping in private houses and catacombs; and it is curious that many of the symbols since introducedsuch as lights, altar-tombs, incense, and bones of saints-are memorials of these hiding-places of the Church; and the ingenuity of man afterwards devised the older and more mysterious origin which has been assigned them. The necessity of lights, when men met underground for worship, and were constrained to use a sarcophagus for a table, and needed the odour of incense to purify the air, affords no reason for our continuing the same practices. The early Christians would have been but too happy in having the power of dispensing with these things, through toleration being afforded them in such Churches as ours. And the idea of the costly decorations and gorgeous apparel, which is the primary association with symbolism now, was out of the question with them-in fact, it was not thought of in the Church till after the time of Constantine. Yet no one can doubt that, during the three first centuries of the Church, devotion was at its highest pitch, and the most abundant presence of the Holy Spirit was vouchsafed; though there was not and could not be amongst them anything of that which is called symbolism, which men now so highly vaunt, as if it were all in all to the progress and perfection of the Church.

It should, moreover, be remembered that much of the point and emphasis of the Jewish symbols depended upon there being but one of each kind-one temple, one place of sacrifice, one high priest, &c.-throughout; so that, while the temple stood, St. Paul, and those who desired to conciliate the Jews, by worshipping with them, could only do so by going up to Jerusalem. But the characteristic of Christianity is, that it is a witness throughout all the earth; and neither at Jerusalem, nor in any one place, do men worship, God is a Spirit, and is to be worshipped in spirit and in truth; and wheresoever two or three are met together in his name, there he is in the midst of them, and in nearer presence than the pillar of cloud and of fire.

The law is declared by St. Paul to be our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ; and the best part of what is now called symbolism is of such a character, and is rather a sign of declension in the Church, from its high, and spiritual, and en

lightened primitive standing. The Church is a living body, and living men are its appointed teachers; but symbols came into the Church during the dark ages, when clergy and people had fallen into deplorable ignorance. The better part of symbolism is an attempt to supply, through visible forms and sculptured imagery, instruction to the people, which they had become too ignorant to read, and too gross to understand by mere discourse-an ignorance, too, in no small degree ascribable to the Romanists, who withheld the Scriptures from the people, and conducted all their services in Latin, and not in the language of the people. The front of Wells Cathedral, which Flaxman has commended in his lectures, is a good example of what we mean. In its enrichments, all the most prominent facts of Scripture history, such as the creation of Adam and Eve, the temptation, &c., in small compartments, form the different subjects-like pictures introduced into the first books given to children. Pictorial instruction was, in like manner, afforded to those who could not read, by the large painted windows of the cathedrals and halls. And not only were scriptural subjects thus introduced, but the lives of the patron saints; and traditions still more local and questionable sometimes afforded these materials for architectural ornament or popular instruction, and some decorations had reference merely to the builder, like the portcullis and roses in buildings of Henry VII.

But in the subjects introduced for instruction, and especially in symbols borrowed from the Old Testament, especial care must be taken that men are not taught to Judaize, by being thrown back upon a more confined and less perfect dispensation and system than the Christian. We may be led into error by the Jewish symbols, if the imperfect light to which those symbols were adapted be not enlarged, so as to interpret them according to the fuller revelations contained in the New Testament, and peculiar to Christianity. Error may be inculcated, not only by substituting mere symbols in place of Christian realities, as we have stated it already; but also by keeping sets of such symbols in the same relative positions towards each other, when placed in the Church, which they held in the Jewish temple; when the whole analogy of Christianity, and the express letter of Scripture, might require that, if they are retained at all in the Church, their relative positions should be altered. The editors of Durandus are not aware of this, for speaking of screens, they say, "We are contending for a much simpler thing: for no more, indeed, than the concession of a probability that in the earliest Christian churches there was at least this resemblance to the temple

that there should be in both a holy of holies and an outer court...........If we were now arguing for rood-screens, we should show that any such distinction of parts made a screen of some sort necessary." (lxiv.) This might be excusable in Durandus, as belonging to the Roman Church, but it is not excusable in his Anglican editors; for it proceeds upon the mistake of separating the clergy from the laity-a mistake of the Roman Church, which ought to be regarded as most sectarian, cutting off the larger portion, viz., the laity, from the body; and most pernicious, as leading to that isolation of the clergy which became the source of such corruption in morals and discipline as roused one indignant protest from the outraged humanity of Europe at the Reformation, and which forms a rankling sore, even now, in all those countries where Romanism prevails. From the Jewish congregation females were legally excluded, by the legal sign of the covenant: from the holy place the people were excluded-none but priests and Levites were admissible: from the most holy place priests and all others were excluded-none might enter there save the high priest, and he only on One day in the year. Is not the mere statement of these facts in itself quite enough to show that the screens of separation must not be in the Christian Church? In Christ Jesus there is neither circumcision nor uncircumcision, male nor female, bond nor free. And He, our High Priest the only One who could enter the holy of holies, supposing it to have place in the Church-He is not entered into the holy place made with hands, but into heaven itself, and is seated at the right hand of God. It is clearly and positively declared in Scripture, that these distinctions are done away with in the Church; it is the chief point on which St. Paul insists in arguing with the Jews, especially in the Epistles to the Galatians and the Hebrews. And the rending of the vail of separation in the temple, at the crucifixion of Christ, is given as the sign that this chiefest symbol, and the highest act of Christian worship, are transferred from earth to heaven; by resurrection and ascension Christ has entered there, and through the rent vail-his flesh-there he ever liveth to make intercession for us-and we, through him, the only Mediator, have continual access to the throne of grace in heaven.

For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us.' "Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of. Jesus, by a new and living way which he hath consecrated for us, through the vail, that is to say, his flesh; and having an nigh priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a

true heart, in full assurance of faith." (Heb. ix. 24, x. 19). And St. Peter, addressing the whole body of believers, calls them all lively stones, built up as a spiritual house, an holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ; and says, "Ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should show forth the praises of Him who hath called you out of darkness into His marvellous light." (1 Peter ii. 9). And it is put beyond dispute that he is thus addressing the whole body of believers, laity as well as clergy, by his proceeding to exhort them severally according to their different ranks and stations -masters and servants, husbands and wives; and especially by his saying," The elders which are among you I exhort, who also am an elder.........feed the flock of God which is among you.......Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves to the elder: yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility." (v. 1, 5).

The only line of separation which we are warranted in drawing is that which divides the Church from the world. For admission into the Church, baptism is the ordinance, and in baptism the line of separation is past. All then become members of one body; in that body there can be no division without schism, immediate injury to both, and peril of death. The clergy, it is true, are more honourable members, but set in that honourable place for the good of the body, and not for their own sakes; and it is only in proportion as both parties feel this mutual dependence and need of each other, that the station will be kept, and due honour be rendered. Without it there will soon spring up arrogance in the one party and independence in the other.

The Reformers were not a horde of ruthless barbarians, wantonly destroying beautiful objects from want of taste to appreciate or want of knowledge to comprehend them; it was because they well knew the false doctrine inculcated through these outward forms, and the corruptions which were invariably consequent upon the practices which the forms indicated, that they warred against the things. We know these evils not as they did-by experience; we have coldly to think them out, or darkly grope them out in the pages of history. The editors of Durandus occasionally recognize the truth of the oneness of the Church as consisting of all the baptized; for, when speaking of what they conceive a Church ought to be, they say," We enter.........close by us is the font; for by regeneration we enter the Church." (cxxx.) But they are not consistentslipping out of the true idea of a Church, which is necessarily, at present, an abstract thing, during the absence of the Head

and the scattered condition of the members; and slipping into a congregation of worshippers, which, as a present and real thing, is necessarily but a fragment, and that consisting of some who, not being of the body, are not in the Church at the time, having either never been admitted, or been put out for discipline sake. "In early ages the laity were not all classed en masse, as with us now. Among them were three classes-the faithful, the catechumens, who had not yet been admitted to holy baptism, and the penitents, or those who had lapsed. True to itself, Church architecture provided then a separate place for each of these divisions." (Ivi.) Yes, we say, but the place provided for the unbaptized was not within the Church of which we are now speaking; and into the Church of which we are speaking all the baptized were admitted, even such of the laity as were not sufficiently instructed to be admitted to the communion and their dismissal when that holy mystery was about to be celebrated is the usual derivation assigned for the word missa, or "mass." And it admits of no question that the early Church regarded baptism as so much of an introductory rite that it was equally valid when not performed in the Church, and even when administered by those who were not priests; and St. Paul seems to have studiously avoided baptizing when any inferior minister was at hand. "I thank God that I baptized none of you, but Crispus and Gaius: lest any should say that I had baptized in mine own name." (1 Cor. 1, 14). The lavers in the temple and the tabernacle were in the outer court, and not in the holy place; and many of the primitive baptisms certainly took place, by choice, in running streams, following the practice of John the Baptist; and it is even said that such was the baptism of Augustine by St. Ambrose, and that on this occa sion it was they extemporized the Te Deum.

And this leads us to the last error we shall notice, but which pervades the whole of symbolism, namely, the attempt which is made to prefigure, and even anticipate, in our present imperfect condition, the Church as it shall be when perfected and united to its Head in the kingdom of heaven. For such kind of symbolism this is not the time. The creation, still under the curse brought in by the fall, cannot now afford fit materials; and that which is attempted to be shown requires living men as its expositors, and cannot be shown in the lifeless forms of creation, however perfect they might be.

It is truly observed, that "the Revelation is nothing but one continued symbolical poem." (xlii.) But what of that? It symbolizes a future condition of the Church-the glorious, the heavenly; not the present-the suffering, the earthly con