school; and that the portions read be the regular lessons of the day, as appointed by the Church. By this course of reading, added to the gene. ral notions of the Bible history, already obtained by them in the lower classes, and the information given, and the connection kept up between the several parts of the history by the questions of the visiting Clergy, the children would soon become sufficiently acquainted with the Bible; and a foundation would be laid for the habit of daily reading the lessons of the day through life which could not but be attended with the most beneficial effect. Another measure, Sir, I have much at heart-it is the introduction of plain Psalmody into every National School. The first effect of this would be the gradual removal out of every Church of much discordant music, together with what is but too often witnessed in the gallery, the irreverent behaviour of the singers and the second, that, as these children grow up, and descend into the congregation, and form a part of it, they would carry the knowledge of singing with them, and congregational psalmody which, when well and heartily performed, is a distinction of Protestantism, and truly a singing to the praise and glory of God," would be again by little and little restored. If some musical instrument be required to conduct the children, I would recommend the introduction of handorgans, which may be purchased at all sizes and prices, and are now carried to very great perfection. The last measure that I would propose, is, I am convinced, inti mately connected with the welfare of the National Schools throughout the kingdom. It would be deceiving ourselves o that suppose every National School is perfectly conducted on the system: many must be, and are from various causes in a very low state; though the lowest I am convinced, is a great improvement on the former system pursued. Now what I would propose with all due deference to the heads of our Church, is that the Rural Deans, wherever restored, and I trust that they will soon be restored in every Diocese, should be called on to visit the schools in their respective deaneries, and report regularly to the Bishop or Archdeacon. It comes already within their province; and as they are men already in autho. rity, and not strangers, there would be less unwillingness felt by the Clergy to submit to their visitation. I merely throw out these hints, Sir, in the hope that they may meet the eye of persons able, if they think well of them, to carry them into effect; and subscribe myself, A hearty well-wisher and active promoter, as far as my means will allow, of the National System of Education. To the Editor of the Remembrancer. IN Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy SIR, is the following interesting anecdote of Bishop Morton, which may be worthy of being added in the account of his life, given in a former Number. Yours, &c. X. "Under these his troubles, he retired first to his patron the Earl of Rutland; after that to one Captain Saunders in Herefordshire; thence to Mr. Rotheram's in Bedfordshire, and at last going to London, with about 604. (which it seems was then bis all) he was overtaken on the road by Sir Christopher Yelverton, who being known to the Bishop, though the Bishop was unknown to him; and in discourse, asking the old gentleman, what he was? The good Bishop replied, I am that old man the Bishop of Durham, notwithstanding all your votes: för Sir Christopher was not free from the stain of the times. Whereupon Sir Christopher demanded whither he was going? to London, replied the old gentleman, to live a little while, and then die. On this Sir Christopher entered into further discourse with him, took him home with him to Northamptonshire; where he became tutor to that son of his, which was afterwards the incomparably learned Sir Henry Yelverton, and prefaced this most excellent Bishop's little piece of episcopacy. After some time Sir Christo before his brethren directly opposite, but equally just, views of his situation, accord pher died, and then Sir Henry (whom the good old Bishop had made a true son of the Church of England, and endeared to himselfing to the different lights in which it might with the affection of a most tender child) be regarded; whether with relation to his gratefully continued to support him, till God was pleased to call him to a greater reward," temporal or to his eternal interests, with "This Bishop was a person of such exthe eye of sense or with that of faith, of alted devotion, that he seldom answered, at a man or of a Christian. He represents the end of any prayer, with a single Amen; himself (and who can be unmoved with would never kneel on a cashion, nor in his the representation?) as sorrowful, from last sickness, ever prayed with his cap on the infirmity of the suffering flesh, yet alhis head. He professed at his very last, the way rejoicing, with a joy unspeakable, highest esteem for the doctrine, discipline, and that no man could take from him; as government, and worship of the Church of poor, in this world's goods, yet making England; and exhorted those about him to many rich, with the unsearchable and im continue stedfast in it. He had a mighty perishable riches of Christ; as having value for the Liturgy, gave express orders nothing, according to external appeatto be buried by it, and took great consolation ances, and yet possessing all things, in in the Church's preparatives for death, viz. profession of faith, charity and repentthe present abundance of God's revelations ance; absolution and receiving of the blessed and grace, and in the sure hope of an imEucharist. The learned Spanhemius, Rivet, measurable, everlasting inheritance. Willius, and other great men in the foreign Churches, were his acquaintance and correspondents." WE shall offer no apology to our readers for the insertion of a second sermon in the same number: we But I must not detain you longer from that which more particularly concerns us. It would be superfluous in me, I am sure, to caution any one who now hears me, against imagining that the glorious picture of himself here exhibited by St. Paul was designed merely to be gazed upon, as something marvellous and supernatural, with inactive and unprofitable admiration, leave it to be its own apologist, fully I satisfied of the interest with which it will be perused. 2 Cor. vi. 8. By honour and dishonour, by evil report and good report. have no need to hold it up to your view only by the primitive believers of Corinth, as an object of study and imitation, not but by us also, to whom it is still preserved fresh and unfaded in the pages of the ought the point to be overlooked, that the everlasting gospel. It is true, indeed, nor mighty master who drew and realized in himself, the original, was placed in a coudition, and possessed of aids and advantages to which the present state of things affords no parallel. No inconsiderable mischief has accrued to the cause of reli THE passage, of which these words form a part, is a noble specimen of the great apostle's eloquence. It is one among many proofs, that if "Paul of Tarsus" had not claimed our veneration as an apostle, we might have been called upon to admiregion, from a strange want of attention to him as an orator. But yet it has about it a reality of grandeur, an intensity of pathos, to which its author could never have given birth, had he been less than he was. For never had pagan orator circumstances so affecting to describe, as those which the ambassador of Christ here places before us. Never could the disputer of this world exhibit a spectacle so magnificent, as that which we contemplate, while the Christian hero establishes his authority among his fellow-soldiers, by declaring (what they well knew to be the truth) in what severe and various trials, and by the use of what admirable weapons, he proved himself faithful to the Captain of his and their salvation. He puts forth paradoxes indeed; but they are not such as the philosophers of his day delighted in, great swelling words of vanity. He sets the change of times and circumstances in the church. To institute a strict comparison between apostles and uninspired men, between the days of mighty signs and wonders, and those of ordinaty gifts and graces; to consider what was originally said of the first ministers and converts, as applicable, without limit or qualifica tion, to modern teachers and hearers, is surely to disregard manifest matter of fact, and to pay little heed to the admonitions of reason-that reason, which was doubtless designed by the giver of it, to assist us in the use of his revelations, as well as in all other matters. Yet so it is; to the eyes of zeal there appears little or no difference between those truths of Jesus Christ, which are in their very nature absolute and immutable, the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever; and those, which being of a relative kind, vary with the objects of their relation. And what is the consequence? a train of absurdities, and impracticabilities, tending to bring contempt upon the name, to contract the influence, and to diminish the practice of religion. While, however, we thus feel ourselves compelled to take away somewhat from the original import and extent of scripture, we can never forget that much, very much, remains, We cannot but remember, that the apostolical epistles, to which our subject now leads us more especially to refer, were dictated by the Holy Spirit for two ends; first, for the edification of those particular churches and individuals to whom they were primarily addressed; and secondly, for that of Christians in general, in all ages, and under all circumstances. And no careful reader of them will ever overlook the vivid portraiture which they exhibit of their principal author, as mainly subservient to this latter use. Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ, was the rule of life which he repeatedly pressed upon the believers of his day; and by such striking representations of himself as that to which, in the beginning of this discourse, I called your attention, he being dead yet speaketh with no other design. Yes, to every one of us, whatever place he may occupy in the body of which Christ is the head, the character of St. Paul is proposed as a model; and every one may find enough in it that may be brought "home to his own business and bosom." But, if this be true of Christians in general, how much more is it of those who walk apart from the rest, in that particular and more hallowed path of duty, which was once trodden by the apostle! The description from which the words of the text are taken delineates him in his peculiar capacity of a minister of the gospel; and whatever lessons are deducible from it, in the present state of the church, to such ministers, questionless, they primarily and especially belong. And to no particular of it does this observation more strongly apply, than to the instance which I have selected for our present consideration. Blessed be the merciful Providence, whence our rest and quietness, are derived; we are not now called upon, like the apostle, to give painful proof of our fidelity in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumulls; but honour and dishonour, evil report and good report are things, in which we have still, and must ever have * 1 Cor. iv. 16. xi. 1. Phil. iii. 17. 1 Thess. i. 6. an interest, little affected by the lapse of centuries or the altered condition of the church. These are points, with reference to which our conduct must always be a matter, not of contingent or remote, but of certain and immediate importance. To all men this must be so; but to none more, to none, I should have said so much as to the duly appointed and authorized ministers of religion. Let not any one imagine that theirs is a walk of life upon which the sunshine of human favour continually falls. Let no man seek admission into their or der, from the hope that all among whom he shall labour, will esteem him very highly in love for his work's sake. As long as there are any who are inclined to say to them, as was said to the prophets of old, Prophesy not unto us right things, speak unto us smooth things, prophesy deceits: get ye out of the way, turn aside out of the path, cause the Holy One of Israel to cease from before us -as long as unscriptural and mischievous doctrines prevail, against which they feel themselves bound to raise their voice-as long as enthusiasts exist, who measure ministerial qualifications and exertions by a standard of visionary and unattainable perfection-as long as there are some, who dissent from the doctrines, and separate themselves from the communion of the established church; some, who are indifferent about religion in any form; and others even, whose bitter hostility would blot out the name of Christianity from the face of the earth : so long must the clergy expect the rude breath of censure from time to time to blow upon them; so long will they meet with severe judges of their actions, and uncandid interpreters of their motives. We therefore, above all men, my brethren of the ministry, must be prepared to keep an even course through honour and dishonour, through evil report and good report. We must so familiarize ourselves with both, that neither the fascinations of the one, nor the terrors of the other, may prevent us from regarding them with the eyes of sound judgment, always bearing in mind, that upon our conduct with regard to them, hang results, affecting not merely ourselves, but the high and holy interests also committed to our care and keeping. How then, it remains to be considered, shall this conduct be regulated? With what temper shall we meet these continually operating instruments of our trial, the good or bad opinion, the praise or censure of those among whom our ministry is exercised? For indifference about them we * Isaiah xxx. 10. have no authority, how much soever it may sometimes be affected as a distinction, and admired as a virtue. Nature does not incline to it, reason does not counsel it, experience does not warrant it, religion does not sanction it. Why sounds the voice of praise so sweetly in our ears from our earliest childhood, if honour is to have Bo charms for us? Why is that strong sense of shame implanted in our breasts, if dishonour is to excite in us no emotions? We observe too, that these feelings act with the greatest force upon the best constitated minds; we find them to be closely connected with the purest principles of our nature; we see that their manifest tendency, except they be perverted from their proper use and end, is to incite to good, and to restrain from evil. Admitting the approbation of our fellow men to be an object unworthy of being proposed as a primary motive to action; yet there is no difficulty in pointing out its powerful, though not always direct, bearing upon the well-being and happiness of mankind. The possession of it naturally binds us to each other with the silver cords of peace and charity; it enlarges the sphere of our usefulness; it gives influence to our good counsels and examples. Would we then promote the ascendancy of truth? we must dress it in such a garb as, while it detracts nothing from its native simplicity and dignity, may win regard, and conciliate favour. Would we arm virtue with its full power of spreading blessings around? we must take especial care that it offend not the world, without absolute necessity. Would we gain over the hearts and affections of men to the saving gospel of Christ? we must represent it to them in all the loveliness, which is its natural ornament and recommendation. Such being the dictates of Nature, the lessons of experience, and the conclusi ons of reason, how great must be their weight with us, when we find them all confirmed by the paramount authority of religion; speaking to us in the language, and exemplified in the character of St. Paul! Can we question the wisdom, or the duty of leaving no lawful means unemployed to obtain a good: report in the world, when we hear our great predecessor and guide declaring the assiduity with which he labonred to give no offence in any thing, that the ministry might not be blamed; the solicitude which he felt to cut off occasim of blame from them which desired occasim? Can we look at his demeanour before Festus and Agrippa, and not learn from it to temper our sincerity with conciliation, and our zeal with courtesy? If he then, furnished as he was with such extraordinary means of advancing his cause, condescended to avail himself of these ordinary instruments also, surely the use of them is more than permitted to us. Nor was his counsel to others, in this respect, at variance with his own practice. His injunction to the Thessa lonians is to abstain not only from the reality, but from all appearance of evil *. And when he comprehends in one neverto-be-forgotten sentence the sum and substance of all his charges to those objects of his peculiar affection, the Philippian believers, he exhorts them to pursue not only whatsoever things are true, honest, just, pure, and lovely; but whatsoever also are of good report; if there be any praise, as well as any virtue, this he entreats them to think upont. Had he been an enthusiast, he would have held different language: but he was far removed from that character. He knew that worldly principles might have a legitimate use, even for the attainment of spiritual ends; and that to secure the favour of God, it was by no means absolutely necessary to sacrifice the good will of men. But, as I have already reminded you, this is not all the lesson which the words of our text propose to us. Their author, we learn from them, studied to shew himself, as he charged others, approved unto God, a workman that needed not be ashamed, by dishonour, as well as honour, by evil report, as well as good report, among men. And we too, my reverend brethren, while we regard the approbation of the world as a legitimate object of a Christian minister's ambition, must beware, lest we be over-solicitous for its attainment. Aliowing to it a very high place among the good things of the earth, we yet, above all men, are bound to remember ourselves, and to put others in mind, that, after all, it is but earthly; and being such, partakes of the universal nature of earthly things, in its very imperfect worth, and very limited duration. If indeed we were interested in approving ourselves only to such beings as now compose our society; or if their voices were always in unison with the judgment of that incorruptible, unerring, eternal Arbiter, by whose sentence we must finally stand or fall; then indeed we might be well content to purchase a good report from our brethren of the earth at almost 1 Thess. v. 22. + Phil. iv. 8. 2 Tim. ii. 15. . any price. But assured as we are, that the praise of men is one thing, and the praise of God another*; and that, in very many instances, these two things cannot be made to coincide, however much we may labour to bring them together; we can never be too much on our guard, lest, while we pursue the former with ill-regulated and excessive eagerness, we make sad shipwreck of the latter. The word of truth has, in many places, warned us of this danger: but nowhere more pointedly, than in that remarkable, and it may at first sight appear hard saying, of our Lord, Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! In conformity with the principle already laid down, I would by no means forget that this declaration had an extraordinary and especial applicability to those to whom it was originally addressed, the first disciples of Christ; as men, who, by the very nature of their new calling, could not possibly accom modate themselves to the then prevailing notions and habits of the world, without betraying the cause for which they had forsaken all. But reason and experience afford plain and daily proof, that the saying is far from having lost its force, far from wanting its interest, at this day. The matter of fact upon which it was founded, namely, the great dissimilarity of men's characters, still is, and must ever be, existent; and with it the impossibility of gaining the favourable suffrages of all, except by some unholy compromise of principles, some faithless abandonment of truth. There is indeed a middle course, a negative kind of conduct, by which this universal approbation may sometimes, though by no means always, be obtained: but it is altogether unworthy of beings designed and fitted for active exertion; it cau no ways be reconciled with the precepts, or spirit of Christ's religion; and least of all does it become them who by their ministerial engagements have specially pledged themselves to the studious enforcement of those precepts, and the eminent exemplification of that spirit. No, my brethren, we must not calculate upon a portion altogether different from that which fell to the lot of those holy and blessed ones, who are our guides and examples in the ministry. The prophets were hated and evil spoken of: the apostles were defamed and reviled; and made as the filth of the earth, and the off-scouring of all things: the divine Author and * John xii. 43. + Luke vi. 26. + 1 Cor. iv. 12, 13. . Finisher of our faith himself, the sinless Redeemer, to whose all-cleansing blood * we look for the remedy of our guilt, even He, while he ministered upon earth, was despised and rejected of men. And what right have we to expect a total exemption from similar treatment? Have we yet to learn, that the servant is not greater than his lord? Were we disposed to entertain such an expectation, the experience of the times in which we live, might, I am sure, be sufficient to undeceive us. Never was God's altar more virulently attacked, than it has been of late, through the reputation of those who are appointed to stand before it. Never has the world seen a more striking proof that no degree of ministerial excellence can secure from evil report, than it has been our lot to witness, in the deliberate and laboured attempt which has been recently made, by confederate hostility, to bring into hatred and contempt a prelate t, whose meek bearing of his faculties might have won the good will even of those, who were incapable of being moved to veneration, by the extent of his learning, and the unaffectedness of his piety; by the irreproachable purity of his life, and the exemplary disposal of his patronage. Still it is certain, (a certainty for which we have abundant reason to be thankful) still, I say, it is most certain, that, if we be but faithful to the sacred trust reposed in us; if we sedulously apply ourselves to the discharge of our high duties, under a deep sense of their exceeding importance, and of our awful responsibility; we shall have our reward even here, in the good report of all from whom it is worth seeking: we shall receive honour from the thinking, the wise, the good; we shall receive it even, as an involuntary tribute to our sincerity and diligence, from some who would gladly withhold it. This is one of the most gracious dispensations of the God that loveth righteousness: it is one among many proofs, that a Governor presides over the moral world, who will, in his own good time, fully and finally vindicate his government, by awarding honour and dishonour according to the perfect measures of wisdom and justice: it is an earnest of that glorious, that beatific Well done,' which shall be pronounced upon the good and faithful servant, before assembled men and angels: it is a mighty encouragement to labour for the attainment of that praise, which shall be heard through all eternity. when the feeble voice of human applause * 1 John i. 7. + Bishop of London. |