consequences. It is, in fact, only by the application of old established and long-tried principles to the ever-varying succession of events as they arise, that we learn to conduct ourselves properly under them: whereas too many invert the order of reasoning; and, by hastily applying past occurrences, and insulated events to modern, crude and undigested theories, mislead their followers into a total misconception of the first elements and essential principles of our common faith. I am here led to observe, that the sentiments above quoted from Archbishop Wake, and the prin. ciples on which they rest, are exactly such as go to the subversion of all the plans contemplated by Mr. Wix, and to the entire sanction and support of those measures which he is anxious to overthrow. The Archbishop, in omitting to consider with Mr. Wix the apostolical succession as fundamental and essential to our common Christianity, does not fail to appreciate its excellence wherever possessed by any church. But he was too wise not to see the advantage he should give to the Papists by an admission of its indispensable necessity to the existence of a true church; and was far too well acquainted with the nature and genius of true Christianity, not to see that the carnal mind and blinded conscience of papal Rome were a thousand times more opposed to the doctrine of Christ, than any external circumstances attending the appointment of those who were to preach it. Nor, again, in assuming the general orthodoxy, though mixed with errors not fundamental, of his dissenting brethren, did the Archbishop at all decline the mention of heresy and schism too, as amongst the weeds to be rooted out at the general and expected "restitution of all things: though he was also far too candid to cast in the teeth of the great body of Dissenters in his day, the occasional heresies of some part of that multifarious body, and to stigmatize them generally, as sonte modern churchmen have seen fit to do, as Socinians, Quakers, &c.; or to assume, as the ground of his argument, that all were guilty of the crime of schism whose consciences, however misinformed, separated them from the pale of our Establishment, and some able men amongst them at the expense of its honours and emoluments. But the most material, and I should apprehend to Mr. Wix and his adherents (if he have any), the most edifying part of the Archbishop's example, is the display he makes of just the very same readiness to join with the Protestant, as far as practicable, which Mr. Wix displays to join with his fellow-Christians the Papists. Substitute Papist for Protestant, and every word the Archbishop utters, every sentiment he breathes is in exact conformity with the words and sentiments of Mr. Wix. I shall make no further use of this observation than to suggest, that the premises being thus completely reversed, it is no more than fair to reverse the conclusion to be obtained from them. The conclusion which, to all appearance, Mr. Wix mainly drives at throughout the whole of his project, is the possibility and the hope of bringing in the Papists to an alliance with the Church of England against the Dissenters and the British and Foreign Bible Society. The conclusion then to be derived on the contrary side, from the premises laid down by Archbishop Wake, is the possibility and the hope of bringing in the Dissenters, and in general the Reformed Protestant Churches at home and abroad, to an alliance with the Church of England against the principles of Popery, and in support of the invaluable and, I trust, interminable operations of the British and Foreign Bible Society. I remain, sir, &c. VIGIL. the daring advance of blasphemy has been commensurate with the accelerated progress of scriptural knowledge; and never did infidelity appear abroad with such bold and disgusting effrontery as we now behold it, since the Bible has been indiscriminately put into the hands of the people without note or comment. We mean not to cast any reflection on the well intended zeal of other religious Associations: all we design is, to recommend our Society as having a claim of preference on the members of the Establishment; inasmuch as the abuse of the sacred volume is guarded against by explanatory publications, to which, being in unison with the doctrines of our church, they cannot object; so that, if in the holy Scriptures "there are some things hard to be understood," the most anxious caution is employed, that "the unlearned and unstable may not wrest them to their own destruction." To the Editor of the Christian Observer. WHOEVER has had his attention drawn to the controversies which have been unhappily raised on the subject of the British and Foreign Bible Society, must have observed the eagerness with which the real or supposed errors of individuals or Auxiliary Societies have been Jaid to the charge of the Parent Institution. Such conduct has ever appeared to me extremely unfair and illiberal; but my opinion has lately been strengthened by reading the First Report of a District Committee of the Society for promoting Christian Knowledge for the Deanery of Henley in Oxfordshire, containing remarks, of which I am well convinced that the general Board in Bartlett's Buildings would entirely disapprove. These remarks are, however, so exceptionable, that I trust you will favour me by the insertion of this letter in the Christian Observer, in order chiefly that the members of similar committees may be cautioned against a practice so injurious to the society which they wish to support, as that of making their reports the organs of direct or sinister attacks upon other institutions. The passages in the Henley Report to which I particularly allude, are contained in the following extract. "We do not affect to make men Christians, and nothing more; we are anxious to unite them in firm attachment to the venerable institutions of their country. For this purpose, we consider the Liturgy and formularies of our Church only second in importance to the Bible itself; nor do we think it altogether safe to commit the inspired writings into the hands of the illiterate, without such interpretations as may assist them in their humble studies, and the help of such explanations as have received, from the guides of our church, the stamp of their authority. It is indeed a singular coincidence, that The proposition, that it is not "altogether safe to commit the inspired writings into the hands of the illiterate without interpretation," &c. has been so often and so ably refuted in many of the tracts on the catalogue of the Society for promoting Christian Knowledge, that it would be an unnecessary intrusion to offer upon it any observations of my own. I shall, therefore, merely leave it to its authors to shew in what way it can be made to harmonize with the following extracts from a tract entitled, "A brief Confutation of the Errors of the Church of Rome; extracted from Archbishop Secker's Five Sermons against Popery; by Bishop Porteus," and placed on the catalogue of the Society for promoting Christian Knowledge. "But they tell us there is great danger that the Scripture may be misunderstood and perverted: unlearned and unstable men,' St. Peter hath declared,' may wrest it to their own destruction,' Now this is possible indeed and so it is possible every thing may be applied to an ill purpose; health, strength, food, liberty, common day-light; but is this a reason for taking away any of them? It is possible that persons may do themselves harm by having the Scriptures; but is it not something more than possible, that they may suffer harm from the want of them, and be destroyed,' as the Prophet tells us, for lack of knowledge?" And again: "We permit, we beseech, we require you all to read the Scriptures diligently, and judge of their meaning impartially; to compare with them every thing we teach you, and believe nothing but what you find agreeable to them. We have no fear of your being poisoned by the food of life, or led into error by the word of Truth. On the contrary, we know not any surer way of preserving men from errors, than that which St. Paul prescribes Timothy in the third chapter of his Second Epistle: 'This know, that in the last days perilous times shall come. Evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. But continue thou in those things which thou hast learned, and hast been assured of: knowing of whom thou hast learned them; and that from a child thou hast known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation, through faith, which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.'" (Brief Confutation, 5th edit. p. 66.) But the part of the Report which I consider as the most objectionable is that in which it is declared to be a singular coincidence that blasphemy and infidelity never appeared with such bold and disgusting effrontery as "since the Bible has been indiscriminately put CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 220. into the hands of the people without note or comment."-Now, sir, I apprehend that no one will deny that the evident intention of this sentence was to insinuate, that the late dreadful progress of blasphemy and infidelity was, at least in some measure, to be ascribed to the domestic operations of the Bible Society. For, notwithstanding the disavowal by which it is followed, I humbly conceive, that if this were not its intention, no possible meaning can be assigned to it. The charge here insinuated is of such a nature, as scarcely to need refutation; and can be considered, by myself at least, in no other light than as a libel upon the word of God. For most extraordinary indeed would it be, if the reading of that Sacred Volume which God has given in mercy to man to direct him to happiness and to heaven, should tend to make him a blasphemer or an infidel. Sooner than I could bring myself to believe it, I would be persuaded that sweet. is bitter, and light is darkness. I, would willingly in charity suppose, that the gentlemen who drew up this Report had been misled into the opinion they have published by false representations, were it not that it was in their power to prove its truth or falsehood, in the most decisive manner, by the evidence of facts. For, if it were true, then, of course, we should see, in the first place, that infidels would be among the most strenuous supporters of the Bible Society; and, in the next, that infidel principles would prevail to the greatest extent in those districts in which its greatest exertions had been made. Now, with regard to the former of these facts, it is notorious that the efforts of the agents of infidelity are chiefly employed in vilifying the Bible; and that where they have met with the greatest success, the unhappy. victims of their artful publications act in systematic opposition to the Bible Society and its advocates. 3 D Whether the latter fact were true, the framers of the Report possessed peculiar advantages for ascertaining; since they resided in one of the most favourable districts in the kingdom for that purpose, as you may learn from their own statement in the following passage. "That the public call upon us for the supply of Bibles and Testaments should be comparatively small in the town and neighbourhood of Henley, at a time when such a general distribution of the holy Scriptures has taken place, can create no surprise; the wants of the poor have been more than anticipated, and the supply may almost be said to have exceeded the demand." Here then was a district where, if the opinion of these gentlemen were correct, the advance of blasphemy must have been most daring and rapid: here we might have expected that infidelity would have shewn its boldest front; here we might have imagined that the whole population would have been contaminated almost beyond hope of remedy; and that, so far from possessing an attachment to the Established Church, they would scarcely retain a single religious feeling. The very next sentence of the Henley Report shall inform you of the dismal effects which have been produced in this district by the labours of the Bible Society. "It is therefore with the sincerest satisfaction we report, that the uninfluenced and eager applications for the Book of Common Prayer, by the poor of every age and description afford a ground for the consolatory assurance, that blessings and advantages of the established religion are not under valued by the lower orders in this neighbourhood; nor their attachment to the communion in which they were born impaired by that presumptuous licence of opinion which now so unhappily prevails." Is it not, then, sir, most extraordinary, that any individuals could reject the evidence of such facts as are here recorded against a propos the sition so revolting to the Christian mind, as, that the tendency of reading the pure unadulterated word of God was to lead the simple uneducated man to blaspheme His name, to deny the authority of His revelation, and almost to doubt His existence? Surely that prejudice must be powerful indeed, which could have the effect of so blinding their intellectual organs, that they were unable to discover the palpable contradiction given in their own Report to their insinuations. Is it not strange, that they were not rather led, with all humility and thankfulness, to advert to the providential coincidence, that, when the flood gates of infidelity were opened on the land, an additional society, which has distributed, according to the last Report, two million five hundred and fifty thousand Bibles and Testaments, should have been raised to check the progress of its devastations ?* In my observations upon this truly singular Report, it has been ⚫ I am here forcibly reminded of the following statements of the Bishop of Gloucester, at the recent anniversary of the British and Foreign Bible Society, in allusion to the late atrocious conspiracy. "May I be permitted," remarked his lordship," to dwell, for a short time, on the subject of the enemies of this cause; and on an occurrence, which has excited the attention, not only of every statesman, but of every Christian and every subject in the realm, to the perpetration of a crime which I will not mention? "What has been the principle chiefly apparent in the leaders of this design? -Hatred of the Bible, of its restraints and injunctions, wherever that hatred could be avowed; or a most entire per. version of its precepts, when these men could not venture to avow a hatred of the Bible itself. I happen to know, from undoubted authority, that every one of these individuals had, previous ly to the commission of the crime, avowedly renounced his faith in the Scriptures. They found in those Scriptures a declared opposition to their prin ciples and practices, and therefore they renounced the Bible ! my wish to consider the gentlemen whose names are signed to it, as alone responsible for its contents; for, although it purports to proceed from the District Committee, I cannot believe that several of its members would ever have agreed to sanction opinions so objectionable, and so diametrically opposite to those which, as I am well convinced, they hold.-In the list of the Vice-Presidents, I observe the names of at least five gentlemen, who are among the most strenuous and steady advocates of the Bible Society; and among the Committee are the excellent and respectable Rector and Curate of Henleythe former of whom is a Vice-President, and the latter one of the Secretaries, of the Henley Auxiliary in aid of that institution. But although I desire explicitly to be understood not to charge these and other individuals, of whose sentiments I am not so well aware, with holding the opinions to which I have objected, it is yet to be feared that many who are unacquainted with the parties will be apt to identify them with the framers of the Report. I trust, therefore, that they will not allow future reports of the committee to be made the organ "It has been seen, in a variety of circumstances, during the past year, that the enemies of religion bave, in their spirit and conduct, born unwilling testimony to the truth of the Scriptures; while these Scriptures have been rever ed and defended, by the resisters of faction, and the decided friends of the laws of their country. Well, then, my lord, may we, amidst whatever trials we may meet with, call to mind this re flection and be comforted." The Earl of Harrowby also, whose abode was to have been the scene of that direful catastrophe, and who there fore of all men would have least cause to patronize the Bible Society, if it had any tendency to lead to that infidel and blasphemous spirit which is so intimately connected with the recent plans of revolution and murder, delivered his sentiments at the same meeting in perfect coincidence with those of his honourable and right reverend brother. of attack upon the British and Foreign Bible Society, without at least entering their protest against such a practice; and that in every instance the members of District Committees will be well satisfied of the candour, liberality, and discretion of those gentlemen who may be requested to draw up their reports, before they place in them a confidence so implicit as may be injurious to their own reputation, as well as to the venerable Society in Bartlett's Buildings; in the prosperity of which no one takes a more lively interest than Your's, &c. A CLERICAL MEMBER OF THE SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE, but not of the HENLEY DISTRICT COMMITTEE. To the Editor of the Christian Observer. YOUR correspondent H. G. in your Number for April (page 242) was, I think, perfectly correct in his interpretation of the Rubric, respecting the service for the 30th of January. There can be little doubt that the comma is incorrectly placed, when it is made so to divide the sentence as to intimate that the service is to be on the Sunday and the fast on the Monday. The Rubric was originally as follows: "If this day should happen to be Sunday, this form of service shall be used the next day following." The words," and the fast kept," were introduced long after, and apparently without any intention of altering the sense of the original injunction. Your correspondent has punctuated the sentence correctly: "If this day shall happen to be Sunday, this form of prayer shall be used and the fast kept the next day following." Many Prayer-books incorrectly insert a comma after "used," which has added to the ambiguity. I have understood, however, that in a recent church edition this typographical mistake is cor rected. F. Y. |