"But, you will urge, how many sects are there, differing from the National Church solely in points and forms, which no parties hold essential to Christianity? Surely where men agree in all fundamental doctrines, and differ only in trifles, one course of religious instruction may be equally applied to all. There is one plain matter of fact in answer to such a suggestion. If these points of separation are so trivial, and so irrelevant to the real, sincere profession of the gospel, why does any separation exist? Why are these sects no longer portions of our Church? Who is it that is placed in this most serious dilemma? Either we have divided the Christian world for nothing at all, or we have divided it on doctrines which have nothing to do with Christianity. I do not wish to urge any such truth in accusation; but it surely is sufficient to excuse us from comprehending in our religious education, and recognising as innocent and safe, any principle so utterly destructive of the peace and the unity of Christians.

"These points are, moreover, in general, points of discipline, and principles of submission,-of discipline and submission in the most natural and reasonable field for its voluntary practice, where the bond is religion, and the authority is God. But discipline and submission are necessary parts of our system. Impatience of authority, obstinacy in opinion, self-conceit, and wilfulness of purpose,—these are not the features of character which we wish to impress upon the young. We do not approve of them in morals, and we cannot reconcile them to government. Nothing and I speak from experience so completely takes a young man from your influence, in every particular of conduct, as any approach to sectarianism -any tendency, I mean, to depart from the religion of his country and his home. Allow him a rash freedom to choose for himself his own form of religion, without any dutiful deference to a higher and binding authority, and either you give up religion as the first and most solemn of actions, or you sanction a similar freedom in all other acts and decisions.

"Again, He is in one state or another. He has either no religion at all, and has adopted his creed without thought, and you sanction such thoughtlessness by abstaining from any attempt at correction, -or he is warm and anxious in his zeal; and this zeal-I speak again from experience infuses the spirit of opposition into every department of instruction. He himself is ardent in conversion; and you make no effort to convert him. He distrusts your religion, and despises your

coldness. There is one, the greatest secret of the heart, which you cannot discuss without dispute; and you cannot procure his confidence. You speak in the language of authority, and may compel an external submission; but he departs with the pride of a martyr, and the complacency of one who bears within him the ultimate standard of appeal. It begets coldness, suspicion, and reserve. There is something always behind the mere outward communication, which you cannot reach, and scarcely dare to touch. You cannot place him before you, and claim that supreme authority over his counsels, and affections, and conduct, which, as the minister of God, charged with the care of his soul, you have the right and the duty to assert. And still less can you attach him to your side by that spirit of confidence and friendship, to form which, with all beneath our care, is the great business and pleasure we should aim at, and without which we cannot succeed in forming them to all goodness and truth.

"So much for our intercourse with those whose religion would exclude them from our control. Our intercourse with others would not be facilitated or improved by the presence of such an example. And its influence on the minds of the young, who belong to our own communion, would be fatal in the highest degree. It would infallibly break them up into every variety of sects."

We believe the objections here so calmly urged, in conviction of their natural force, can never be rebutted, but then they may be set aside; for they are but creatures of the mind, and you may, if you will, call them phantoms. An act of Parliament is a substance-it is a piece of parchment-you see it yellow-you hear it rustle-you hold it up in your hand-you call it a charter of rights-and the world calls you a Liberal. All the Dissenters want is really, after all-you say-not much; it is merely "full, true, perfect, and absolute liberty." On what plea do they call themselves Dissenters? Think what they will -strive all they can to destroy what most you value and hold holiestset themselves against the majority in all that is dearest to it, and which that majority has through a long succession of ages laboured to build up, extend, and guard as an inviolable trust, and an inappretiable treasure-and then complain to the State of the hardship of being ex

cluded from any of the privileges which, by their own act, they relinquished, and long pursued with immitigable hate to sweep away! till they find that to possess them will be to their own temporal advantage, and then what a change of tone and temper, and how laudatory are they all! And that is conduct according to conscience! and to concede such claims is to shew a mind in unison with the Spirit of the Age! And that spirit is a glorious spirit to which the spirit of Christianity itself must bow, and from it accept the law of thought, feeling, action, life!

To be admitted to enter the University of Cambridge was, we presume, at the time said to be a boon bestowed rather than a right granted to Dissenters. But be it said that it was a right granted; was it given them as part of their natural right of inheritance, or as the whole? If as a part, there was meanness and injustice in the niggardly grant; if as a whole, why yield to the Dissenters now? Till entitled to graduate, they will not now rest; and after they have been so entitled, how long will they rest till they bestir themselves to procure all the advantages which graduation may yield? They will not wait a year-not a day-not an hour. They are meditating it now— they have been meditating it longand they will gain their object-for feeble will be the force of those inside the door-a simultaneous rush will be made-not with Professor Sedgwick at its head-for he is sincere,and affects to believe nothing that he does not believe-and he seems not to believe this-but with some men, even more liberal than he, constrained by none of his high thoughts-a pretender, perhaps, in that science in which the Professor is a true proficient-not a Dissenter even from that Church, of which the Head of the Petitioners is an affectionate-would we could say, in all senses, a faithful son-but by a man of no religion but that known by the name of Natural-a Deist in his loftier hours-in his lowest, an Atheist.

"I congratulate," says the Professor," the members of the Senate who signed the petition on the favourable hearing their prayer has met with, and on the sure grounds of

hope, that before many months are over, their wishes will be accomplished. They have asked for nothing but what the present condition of the country imperiously demands ! and what is at once compatible with the honour of the University and the safety of our Ecclesiastical Establishments. Under the contemplated change, none but well-educated men in a good condition of life can come among us from the Dissenting Body, and from such men what cause have we of fear?" So the concession of the claims of the Dissenters is imperiously demanded ? By whom? Why, by themselves-for what else can be meant by those most indefinite words, "the present condition of the country?" Does the Church of England demand it? Do the Universities demand it? Do the nobility, gentry, Episcopalian people of England demand it? No. But the Dissenters demand it -a multitude, with all creeds, and with none-who, to use the words of the Editor of the Standard-let us call him by his honoued name-Dr Giffard-" if they want degrees, let them go where these degrees can be already had without difficulty; or if they want to raise them in the English soil, let them erect and endow Universities of their own, with titles of their own; and as soon as these Universities and titles merit the same consideration as the Universities and titles of Oxford and Cambridge, there can be no doubt that they will receive it. Meanwhile let not the Dissenters, or any one else, claim a participation in what they have not earned, or seek to enforce it, either directly or by intrusion, or by claiming a legal right to forge, as it were, the indorsements of Oxford and Cambridge."

"Under the contemplated change, none but well-educated men, in a good condition of life, can come among us from the Dissenting body," says Professor Sedgwick; "and from such men we have nothing to fear.” What! is nothing ever to be feared from well-educated men, in a good condition of life? From none else, say we. Understand, however, "welleducated" and "good," in a somewhat different sense from that in which they are here used, with an unintentionally sophistical quirk.

The better, in mere worldly circumstances, the condition of the Dissenters is for reasons too plain to be even alluded to the stronger their animosity to the Established Church. A good education implies a right religious belief; and that, it will not be said, is possessed by all the Dissenters who may be laxly said to be well-educated, and strict ly in a good condition of life. Many of them will have no religious be lief at all-but among them there will no doubt be men of talents, and zeal, and energy, and ambition. If they have no principle-and many will have none-will there be "nothing to fear from such persons" when they possess power? If they have principle-and many, nay most, will have it-if it be dear to them, will they not do their best to procure for it full freedom of playfor in that alone can it be said to have life? And, if so, will they sleep while others wake, or rather will they not wake while others sleep, till they break the dreams of the slumberers by the crash made in falling first by one part, and then by another of the old sacred edifice, which, long before its natural date, may be sorely dilapidated, and at last reduced to ruin by a rougher hand than that of time?

"The spoliation of Church property," the Professor continues, cannot begin at Cambridge. If such a calamity be in reserve for us, (which God forbid,) it will either commence suddenly in some brutal acts of democratic violence, fatal to all property, or be brought about gradually by the progressive alienation of those who, from their property and intelligence, have a natural weight in the councils of the State. Against the former kind of spoliation academical regulations offer no defence; from the latter, we must be base churchmen, and no better than moral cowards, if we think we have aught to fear, provided we be true to our selves, and waste not foolishly our strength in defending untenable positions, and maintaining a system of exclusion opposed to the temper of the age in which we live, and the present tolerant spirit of English law." Warmly conceived, and well expressed; but glowing though be the words, at their first drop on the paper,

"they languish, grow dim, and die," in the parching-up light of truth. Church spoliation may not begin at Cambridge-but it may end there; and the measure that seems so full of promise of all good to Professor Sedgwick's eyes, may not only prepare a path, but open a door to the spoiler. The Dissenters become a part of the governing body-but that will not satisfy them, if they be as other men. "Should they be told," to use the words of Sir Robert Peel," that all offices of emolument, all of a pecuniary nature, are to be closed against them; that they may take a degree which qualifies them for such office, but that they must not enjoy any of its profits or emolument will not the same argument now advanced in favour of conceding to them degrees be repeated?" We have already said that they will-if the laws of nature be not changed as well as those of the Universities-and that the same arguments will be triumphant. "By admitting them to the governing body," says Sir Robert, "a small minority will be created, and it is well known what even a small minority can effect, particularly when in pursuit of objects of ambition. It is a great fallacy to say, that because Dissenters are now admitted to the benefits of University education, without any injurious effects, (which we don't believe,) the same result would follow a further extension of their privileges. The first concession will involve the remainder; a new subject of discontent will be created, and it will be saying, 'Peace -peace-when is no peace;' and an instrument would be placed in the hands of Dissenters to wield for the purpose of extorting the remaining equal rights and privileges." Thus far Sir Robert Peel. Now, the spirit of encroachment is often a still, stealthy, but sure spirit, working almost imperceptibly, while it is undermining deep, or boring thorough; so that all at once sinks foundation, and into rubbish topples down wall. And the spirit of concession is a weak, wavering spirit, that yields first an inch and then an ell, till at last, looking back, it sees the people whom it had been conciliating grown into a great crowd, discontented with the ground they have

been thus suffered to occupy, and pressing on in battalious array, "with the measured tread of marching men," whom there is no power to stop, were there the desire, and they carry without collision the last posts of all on the summit of the hill. "Well-educated men, in a good condition," form the great body of Dissenters, and "from such what have we to fear?" Every thing and all. "The college endowments are, with limited exceptions," says the Professor, "secured to the members of the Established Church." "By what spells, what conjurations, and what mighty magic," ask we, that the spirit of the age shall not cut the security like a rotten rope, or consume it like dry flax?

Is it true, that "academical regulations offer no defence against brutal acts of democratic violence ?" No. All regulations do-for the sanctity of unviolated law overawes the multitude, else whence the stability of any state?" Academical regulations" are poor and inadequate words to express the power of time-hallowed institutions. Let the great, old, famous English Universities remain what they have been for so many ages, in purpose and in spirit, and sacred in the eyes and in the hearts of so many millions, with not one "moral coward" among them all, and the might of their majesty, combined with that of a venerable and magnificent Church Establishment, will prevail even over "the brutality of democratic violence," for it will be for ever curbing it, and, better still, humanizing it, by the irresistible influences of religion, felt wide and afar over dwellers in darksome places, who yet know not whence the bless ing comes, while they owe it to a spirit that holds its court among those towers and temples, and speaks in the voice, and bestows through the hands, of its own Christian priesthood.

With our admiration of Professor Sedgwick's talents, and our respect for his character, sorry are we to say, that we do not think that he and his friends, who have presented that Petition, have been true to them

t

selves." And as "for foolishly wasting their strength in defending untenable positions," how much oftener have empires been lost by relinquishing positions foolishly thought to be untenable, when they might have been held against all invaders -in front impregnable-nor to be turned on either flank, the one protected by rocks commanding the enemy's whole position, and the other by a wood, into which had he ventured, he had been lost. We are sick at "the eternal blazon" of the temper of the age." What is its temper? Is it, in sad truth, an irreligious age? No. Then let not the friends of religion fear. But neither let them act as if they did fear. Let them defy the hordes of infidels, by whom the Dissenters are backed -backed, perhaps, though we know not how that is-without or against their will. True, that Cambridge is a University in the proper sense of the word-a place of national education, not for the Church merely, but for all the learned faculties, a great scientific body, and a lay corporation." The passage quoted in a former part of this article explains that assertion, and puts it in its true light. It has long been soand it gained its glory under a system, which, we fear, has seen almost its latest day. Well does the Rev. Christopher Wordsworth say, in some pages this moment come to our hands-"What then is the title and definition of an English University? Call them, if you will, as they call themselves, SEMINARIES OF SOUND LEARNING AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.' Call them, even as they are called by Dissenters, National Seminaries of Education;' but call them not Scientific Institutions, or Literary Academies: the names are honourable, but they are not descriptive of the English Universities. The Universities of England have produced, and are producing, and still, by God's blessing, hope to produce, men eminent in every department of literature and science; but this is neither their sole, nor is it their primary and characteristic object." Farewell.

THE historians of modern times, with all their ability and philosophic penetration, have failed in tracing with the lucid colours which might have been expected from them, the influence of religion on modern civilisation. The two greatest, Hume and Gibbon, were taint. ed with the infidel spirit of the age in which they lived, and which worked out its natural and appropriate fruit in the French Revolution. The view which they exhibit, accordingly, of the influence of Christianity, is not only defective, but false they have neither told the whole truth, nor nothing but the truth. The expedient which they have adopted for this purpose is the same which, in all ages, has been the most prolific source of error: viz. the application to one age, of the feelings and information of another; and supposing that every thing must be always prejudicial or ridiculous, because it is so in the age in which they live. Thus, they ridicule or vilify the Monasteries and Nunneries, the Papal power and superstitious feelings of the middle ages,-forgetting that the eighteenth was not the fourteenth century; that asylums for helpless weakness are not required, when the reign of law and the authority of government is established; and that spells thrown over the imagination, useless or ridiculous in an age of order and civilisation, are the only bridles on vio

VOL. XXXV, NO. CCXXII,

lence in a period of anarchy and blood. The insolent and ungrateful modern liberals who revile the Christian faith, and see in its institutions only the remnant of feudal servitude and the remains of Gothic institutions, in fact owe the spread of the principles on which they pride themselves, and which constitute their political strength, mainly to the effects of the religion which they abhor; and, but for the previous effects of Christianity in breaking the fetters of slavery, diffusing general information on the most momentous of all subjects, coercing the violence of power, and mitigating the horrors of war, instead of being permitted to carry on, unmolested, their parricidal warfare against the Parents to which they owe all their blessings, they would have been crouching, as in Persia or Turkey, beneath the fetters of Oriental