reasons, gain admission with equal facilities of influence. And far be it from any of their dissenting brethren to regard their success with any other than a holy jealousy, a Godly emulation." The present learned Dr. Pye Smith, also a dissenter, in a sermon lately preached before a number of dissenting ministers, and since published, says :-"I must profess my opinion that the increase of vital piety in the Established Church, within the last thirty or forty years, has been proportionately, and comparing the measures of advantages, greater than among us." Let it also be remembered that while God is thus blessing the Church, he is, at the same time, making her a blessing to those separate from her communion; a holy impulse is thus given to other sections of the Christian community. The divine influence, so abundantly vouchsafed to the Established Church, like the genial influence of spring, incapable of being confined within our own enclosures, spreads over the length and breadth of our country, causing our moral desarts to rejoice and blossom as the rose. Is this the state of things which evidences the Church of England to be " a great national evil, and an obstacle to the progress of truth and godliness in the land," as one has lately, falsely, and we think impiously,. asserted? We boast not of this state of things in our beloved Church—we ascribe all the glory of it to that God whose work it is; while, at the same time, we rejoice in it, as the most decisive evidence that God is with us and for us."

We intend in a future number to notice the nature and causes of the hostility manifested against the Church. We will conclude this paper in the words of the author from whom we have already extracted so largely:"The consideration that God is with her and for her, justifies and demands attachment to our beloved Church. It is an important branch of practical godliness, to love and favour that which God loves and favours. If absolute perfection be necessary to secure our fellowship with any branch of the visible Church of Christ, then is it certain that in this imperfect world, we must remain strangers to the privileges of Christian fellowship. That a scrupulosity of conscience which would lead an individual to separate from the Church of England, on the ground of certain real, or supposed imperfections, would, for the very same reason, render separation from every other Christian communion necessary. He who separates from the Church on such grounds, to be consistent, must separate ad infinitum. We may lay it down as a principle, the truth of which we think few will be found to question, that, that which does not cause God to alienate his favour, or to separate from the Church, will not excuse, much less justify, our separation from her. Rightly considered, the evidences which have been adduced of God's favour to our Church, supplies us with one of the strongest motives to warm and steadfast attachment to her. It should also lead those separate from her, seriously to consider how far they are justified in their own consciences, and in the sight of God, in their continued separation from a Church so largely and so manifestly enjoying the favour and blessing of heaven. Ought they not rather to say, we will go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.'

The Reading Desk.

THE LITURGY A STANDARD OF FAITH.

THE following extract is selected from the Primary Charge of the Right Reverend Dr. Onderdonk, Bishop of New York; we are indebted for it to the "Banner of the Church," published at Boston, America. The argument is admirably stated by the Bishop:

"The conducting of public worship by a prescribed form, has many and conclusive arguments in its favour, drawn from the nature of things, the authority of Scripture, and the great interests of evangelical truth and piety. The view of the subject the most in unison with the present design, embraces its connexion with the proper exhibition and maintenance of a standard of faith. Creeds, articles, and confessions, made only the rule of instruction, and not themselves necessarily brought into public use, and thus made every one's voluntarily and openly adopted rule and measure of belief, experience teaches, are insufficient long to preserve unity and consistency in any Christain body. The glosses and dogmas of individual teachers, unrestrained by the necessary exhibition of the solemn decisions of the united wisdom and piety of the Church, gain an easy ascendancy, and lead captive the minds of many. Discord, confusion, and their connected evil works, naturally and necessarily ensue. And the only remedy for the endless divisions thus created, is in such vague and indiscriminate principles of union as endanger the sacrifice of all that is peculiar and distinctive in the Gospel scheme, to the mere desire of a fair show of sectarian or of party influence. The only effected remedy is in standards, which are not only proposed as rules, but are themselves brought constantly to the notice, and constantly kept in the use, of the public congregations. Such is the case with our Liturgy. Besides all the other strong reasons which should commend it to our enlightened and devout regard, and our discriminating and unmeasured preference, it is a standard of faith, which makes to the world the most solemn profession of the truth as it is in Jesus, and interests therein all the sensibilities, and all the warm affections, of evangelical devotion: and this is giving to that truth its proper direction, and its genuine influence. Formal confessions of faith may serve to guide the understanding, and define to the world our views of the Christian system. But the incorporation of them into our required religious exercises, the bringing of them, in solemn offering, before the throne of grace, the thus engaging in their behalf the holiest, the purest, and the best affections of our nature, most efficiently answers the great ends for which the truths of our religion were revealed.

"This position has much to recommend it to the enlightened assent of every well-directed understanding. But it is best appreciated by that renewed heart which sees, in the truths of the Gospel, man's only refuge from the guilt, dominion, and everlasting consequences of sin, and experiences that that refuge is all-sufficient. To such a heart, the grace of GOD, bringing salvation through JESUS CHRIST, presents a point to which not only its reasoning powers are to assent, but its best and liveliest affections are to be drawn.

"But admirable as this is, and unanswerable, it is of no avail unless the theory be put in practice. The moment a departure, however slight, is

made, the principle is weakened. With every added irregularity, there is another loss of power. And a Liturgy left optional to use or to omit, to use wholly or in part, would be just as much worse than no Liturgy at all, as the contempt of law is worse than its abrogation. If the arguments for a form of prayer on the Lord's day are valid, then they are on all occasions of social worship. If they are not, then let the whole be given up, and let us honestly confess that in following the Jewish Church, in following Christ, in following the Apostles, in following the consent of all antiquity, in following the great body of Christian worshippers in all ages, we have followed that which does not tend to edification, does not promote spirituality, discourages vital godliness. To us there seems no medium between such a course and that which Bishop Onderdonk so forcibly urges.

"By positive provisions, the Church confines the devotions of her people on all occasions of public worship, to her pious prescriptions, and prohibits the addition to them of any other. And this, my reverend brethren, is our ark of safety. If our Liturgy was left to discretionary use; if it was allowed us to mingle with it any devotional exercises by which the unwary might be drawn into unfavourable comparison of required and stated forms with the more imposing show of fancied peculiar gifts; or if, on any occasion of public worship, we could substitute for its tried value and excellencies, what might attract by the greater glare of novelty, and the more favourable allowance to the weakness or vanity of the human heart; one half, at least, of our present peculiar privileges and exalted blessings would be sacrificed. It is in its principle of exclusive and unmixed requirement, that our Liturgy towers so much above all other existing provisions for preserving to religious societies unity and consistency of faith. Well persuaded, then, that the strong influence thus exerted is in behalf of the genuine principles of the Gospel, be our attachment to those principles the rule and measure by which we govern our estimate of the provisions of the Liturgy, and our zeal and efforts in fulfilling and maintaining them. This is no sectarian cause. It is the cause of the best interests of the Gospel, which, in the uncommon spiritual dissensions of the present day, lie bleeding in many communities, where they were wont to have been honoured, for the want of due guard against the presumptuous intrusions of human frailty and folly. Fearful is the responsibility incurred by every system, and every act, which may weaken the influence of our Liturgical standard of faith, or substitute aught in the regard which should be had for it alone."

"We ask for this important subject the serious and impartial consideration of all our brethren and friends, and fervently pray that God may guide us into all truth!"

The Pulpit.

EXPOSITORY PREACHING.

THE following is from the most Rev. Dr. Hort, Archbishop of Tuam, who, in his instructions to the clergy of his diocese, in 1742, thus recommends the reviving" of what he calls "that almost antiquated exercise of expounding the holy Scriptures to your congregations."

"I am afraid the bulk of your people are very little acquainted with this divine book; some for want of inclination to read it, and others for want of proper helps for understanding it; and yet this is the book that is able to make them wise unto salvation.* This book is the great rule of their faith and practice, and according to this book they must be judged at the last day.

"Who then shall teach them to understand it but their pastors, who are called by that honourable name, because they are to feed their people with knowledge and understanding? For the priest's lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth; for he is the messenger of the Lord of Hosts.

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By this means you will by degrees lead those into the knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, who will not be at the pains, or may want leisure, to read them at home; or if they do not read, yet, for want of commentators, are sometimes at a loss for the true sense.

"Let me add, that this exercise will be of no small advantage even to yourselves, as it will lay you under a necessity of studying the word of God, which you are by profession, and promise at your ordination, bound to do for a Clergyman can no more be unskilful in the Holy Scriptures, without great shame and reproach, than a lawyer in the law.

"The Epistles and Gospels, and Lessons for the day, will furnish you with choice of subjects for this work, which will become easy and familiar to the minister, after he has once made himself master of the sense and connexion. And the same notes will generally serve, as the same portions return in an annual rotation.

"But let me not be misunderstood. I am not recommending this as an additional task, over and above the sermon, but to be substituted sometimes in the place of it; and which, in my judgment, will be more profitable; especially if care be taken to make such practical inferences and applications in the course of the exposition, as may naturally arise out of the text. This will indeed make it a sermon in another shape; with this difference only, that the variety of subjects and incidents will enliven the attention, and give a more agreeable, as well as instructive entertainment to the audience; who, I dare say, will come with a better appetite to this exercise, when judiciously performed, and fill your churches better.

"It will remain in the Minister's discretion to interpose a sermon when he pleases; but he will do well to note down those Sundays, in order to expound, in the following year, those portions of Holy Scripture which by this means were omitted.

"And if the people were admonished to bring their Bibles with them, according to the good old practice of our ancestors, and to accompany the Minister as he reads and expounds, they would understand and retain it better, and be enabled to spend an hour most profitably in recollecting and repeating to their families what they had heard at Church.

"If this custom, practised in the times of puritanism, was laid aside in a licentious age, when all seriousness in religion grew out of fashion, let us not be ashamed to revive it; for it is no shame to learn that which is good from any body."

2 Tim. iii. 15.

Sayings and Boings of Old Time.

THE CONVERSION OF A POPISH JESUIT.

THE subsequent account of the conversion of Samuel Mason, bred up with the Jesuits at Paris, is extracted from that valuable and scarce old work, entitled " Foxes and Firebrands," and written by Mr. Robert Ware, son of Sir James Ware. The whole story deserves the most serious thought, for we are greatly mistaken if the same popish practices are not being performed at the present day. The population is now so much more dense than it then was, that such practices of the Romish Foxes, the Jesuit priests, may now be carried on with much less fear of detection. Thus proceeds the account:

"Samuel Mason, his conversion to the Protestant Church of England now established by her Royal Highness Queen Elizabeth, our Gracious Sovereign Lady of England, France, and Ireland: together with his speech in the Cathedral of Christ-Church, Dublin, June the 6th, 1566, and also his narrative presented to Sir Henry Sidney on the 25th of August following, being made before him, being then Lord Deputy, the Archbishop, Mayor and Aldermen of the city of Dublin, formerly written by John Garvey, Primate of Armagh, and Dean of the said Cathedral.

The convert's speech.

"It is usual upon confession to shew some sorrow for sins committed, and also to promise an amendment for the future. But that sorrow without a performance is the committing of sin afresh, besides the committing of the sin of lying, when the party performeth it not: these sorts of sorrows and promises be odious both to God and man. But my confession is not auricular, as I publicly here declare it, therefore I hope to be the more credited; and it would redound to my disgrace from henceforth, to dissemble either with God or man: so that I shall not make a rash vow, that I will not return to my evil ways, yet with prayer I shall seek my God for his assistance, lest I be led into temptation, reserving within myself this saying in my mind: Teach me, O Lord, to number my days, that I may apply my heart unto godly wisdom.

"It was not want drove me hither, for had I complied, at Paris, where I abode about eight years, I might have been entertained: yet my frailties were such, I here openly declare, for two years and upwards, before I departed from thence, I dissembled with the society called the Society of Jesus. But spending my time partly in learning the language of that kingdom, and also by searching the records and libraries of the Universities there, I found out variety to dissuade me from that impious way of living. Therefore I have come hither to acknowledge both mine ignorance and perverseness when I was of a contrary opinion for to embrace the truth which I have for a long time scandalized and rejected, hoping all here present will be pleased, as Christians, to take this my Recantation, for a real and true one. So the Lord of his mercy recal sinners to his Church daily from henceforth.Am n.'

"After this Recantation of Mr. Mason's, Sir Henry Sidney, then Lord Deputy, took him for one of his Chaplains, after which Adam Loftus, after Primate of Armagh, upon the resignation of Hugh Corwine, Archbishop of this See; Adam our Primate resigning up the Primacy to succeed Hugh Corwine in this diocese, he preferred this convert to the parish of Finglas, two miles distant from this City of Dublin.

"After the recantation of this convert upon the feast of St. Bartholomew, soon after his conversion, he presented Sir Henry Sidney with this narrative following: "The covetousness of the Bishops of Rome for these several hundreds of years past have increased more than ordinary: first, their covetousness caused them to forget God, by neglecting his will and commandments. Secondly, it hath caused them to accept of the earthly pleasures of the world, which Satan offered to our