That, in so far as concerns form, the alteration thus made is an improvement-and that a most capital one-is out of all dispute. Compared with the old Catechism, in so far as concerns form, this new one is therefore an eminently good thing: but this it could not be, if that original were not as eminently a bad one.

§ IX. The Religion thus taught by the Rulers of the Church of England, is not the Religion of Jesus.

In this state of things,-the religion, which in these same schools is thus taught, is it the religion of Jesus?—Not it indeed-it is a quite different thing. Of this proposition, the proof rests-not on any points of detail-not on inferences drawn, on such or such particular subjects, from such or such particular texts. It applies not to this or that opinion to this or that word. It goes to the whole together. The ground it rests upon is the broadest of all grounds: viz. that, administered as they are, and as above they have been seen to be administered, the portions of discourse thus forced into the minds, or at least into the mouths, of these poor children, form altogether a substitute-not a mere additament, but a complete substitute to the religion, which would be composed of the discourses of Jesus.

Not being the religion of Jesus, whose religion then is that substitute ?-By invention, so far as depends upon this Catechism, it is the religion of

the authors of this Catechism; so far as depends upon the Thirty-nine Articles, of those who respectively gave the force of law to that Catechism and to the Thirty-nine Articles: by adoption, it has, in each succeeding portion of time, been the religion of their successors-the rulers of that portion of time, and is now the religion of their successors the rulers of this present time.

That part of the religion, which is contained in the Thirty-nine Articles not being at present in question, (for how consistently soever it might be, it appears not that any such security for orthodoxy, as that of a subscription to the Thirty-nine Articles, has yet been put about the necks of the National Society's Scholars),-what, on the present occasion, remains to be said on this subject, will have to confine itself to this Catechism.

In such a place-administered to minds so circumstanced-how repugnant soever to the original-any Exposition, any discourse, professing to give an account of that original,-supersedes it. The child is to understand it-Yes: but this is the sense in which he is to understand it. The child is to believe it-Yes: but this is the sense in which he is to believe it.

Of any persuasion that can be entertained by the child, where is the immediate source? In any assurance given by the person whose discourse the original was? No: but in the assurances given by the person, by whom the original, if it be the origi

nal, the exposition, if it be the exposition,-is put into the child's hands. The person who is present to his senses, in whose presence he stands, and by whose authority he is governed, he is the personin the nature of the case he alone can be the person -in whom the trust of the child is placed. The person, whose discourse, the discourse expressed by the sacred original was, is not present to his senses. Unless by mere accident, even the person, whose discourse the exposition is, is not present to his senses. The person-the only person-constantly and necessarily present to his senses, is the Schoolmaster, by whom the exposition is put into his hands. A person incidentally present to his senses, may indeed be this or that person in still higher authority, by whom the school is now and then visited, and to whose authority the child sees the master bow. But these two-the master and the master's superior-are, to this purpose, one.

Now then, by all these powers, it is either in lieu of, or at any rate in conjunction with, the sacred original, that into the child's hands the non-sacred exposition is thus put. If, in lieu of it, then clearly the exposition alone, and not the sacred original, is the object of his faith. In the words of the exposition, and in the discourse of those, by whom and by whose authority, it is put into his handsin these alone, and not in any words of him whose words the words of the sacred original pur

port to exhibit-are to be seen or heard the sources of their faith.

But even if, at the same time with the exposition, the sacred original be put into the child's hands, still, as above-still, in effect it is as if the exposition had, without the original, been put into his hands. Say to a child-" this paper (No. I.) is "not to be believed, but in the sense, which, in this "paper (No. II.) is put upon it"-in words, this is telling the child to believe in No. I.: but, in effect, it is just the same thing as telling him to pay no regard to it.

If the sacred original thus dealt with be the religion of Jesus, what is it then but mere mockery, to call the religion thus taught the religion of Jesus? It is the religion of the persons, under whose authority the Exposition is put into the child's hands.

The person of Jesus is not present to them: hence it is, therefore, that his person is not the object of their mockery. But the words of Jesus are present to them: and these words are not in effect less truly the objects of this their mockery, than his person was the object of the mockery of those men, by whom, while on the cross, he was hailed King of the Jews."

A thing conceivable indeed is that the sense, put upon the original by the Exposition, is the sense that truly belongs to it :-in a word, that it

is a faithful one: and, in so far as this is the case, so far (except it be the absurdity and presumption of putting men's word above God's word,—the oppression thus exercised upon those who are compelled to do the same,-and the evil example set in both these ways) no mischief is done.

Note, that the less advanced the age in which the Exposition was penned, the less the probability of its being a faithful one. But, be it ever so faithful, where is the advantage that a copy has over the original?

Meantime, the security for this faithfulness, where is it ?-The ground made for its being a faithful one -the evidence of its faithfulness, where is it?

One such security-one such ground-one such evidence, and no other-does the nature of the case admit of, and what is it ?-Nothing can be more obvious.

This security-need it any more be mentioned? is no other than the test above brought to view (§ 3 and 8) consisting of the undiscontinued assortment of quotations: of quotations, supported by a correspondent accompaniment of references. But once more-under the full view and consciousness of its importance, this test, which the framers of the Catechism knew better than to give, hath, as hath been seen all along, been studiously avoided to be given by their successors, and more especially by the present generation of their successors.*

* So in the case of Subscriptions. To the extent of the whole