of the sixteenth article, which treats Of sin after baptism.

In regard to that part of your letter which treats of this article, I have to remark that the object of the article, as appears especially from its concluding sentence, is to maintain a doctrine of forgiveness, moderated between two extreme opinions, the one teaching that it is impossible to fall from the faith, the other denying that there is place of forgiveness to such as truly repent. This place of forgiveness, however, you deny to the penitent while he remains in this world; for you have said, "There are but two periods of absolute cleansing -baptism and the day of judgment. She (the church) therefore teaches him (man) continually to repent, that so his sins may be blotted out; though she has no commission to tell him absolutely that they are." How you can have conceived that this is a fair representation of the meaning of the article, I am unable to imagine. The article says, "The grant of repentance is not to be denied to such as fall into sin after baptism;" and in the conclusion, "they are to be condemned which say they can no more sin as long as they live here, or deny the place of forgiveness to such as truly repent." This place of forgiveness, for which the article contends, must have reference to the present

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life, this being the reference in the other and preceding part of the same clause, especially as it is inferred from this consideration that "by the grace of God we may arise again (when we have fallen into sin) and amend our lives." You, however, tell us that the church has no commission to tell the sinner that his sins are at any time, on his true repentance, actually forgiven.

It is, indeed, true, that our church has directed that we should pray for forgiveness, even after the absolution of the priest has been solemnly pronounced. But why is this done? Because it belongs not to mortal men to read the heart of a penitent, and so to determine whether repentance has been in any case sincere and effectual. Of this the penitent must, with all humility, judge for himself; and especially by considering whether in his conduct it has been duly followed by amendment of life. But when a sinner has truly repented of his sin, and has proved his sincerity by a thorough reformation, the church has solemnly declared that God has pardoned and absolved him, not that he will do so at the day of judgment.

In the letter addressed to the bishop of Oxford by a clergyman of the diocese and resident member of the university, numerous authorities have been adduced to prove, that your opinion has not been held by any of those eminent persons, whom you have yourself mentioned with respect Hooker, Jackson, bishop Andrews, bishop Hall, bishop

Pearson, and Bingham while you have not adduced any in its support. You have, indeed, as that able and respectable writer has remarked, attempted to draw an argument from scripture in its favour, alleging that "peace is uniformly represented by the sacred writers as the direct gift of God;" whence you infer that it is to be sought, "not from men's declarations," but "directly from God." But to this he has well replied, by asking, "who ever denied that God is the God of peace, any more than that he is the God of all grace?" And he adds, "But as the one consideration does not warrant us in withholding the precepts of the gospel, because he alone can enable us to perform them, so neither does the other in withholding the promises of the gospel, because he alone can enable us to avail ourselves of them. The ministry of the gospel is a ministry of reconciliation. It is the office of the ambassador in God's stead to come preaching peace by Jesus Christ.

One other topic, reserve in communicating religious knowledge, has been ably discussed by this very judicious writer, as, in the words cited by him from a charge delivered by the bishop of Chester, threatening "a revival of the worst errors of the Romish system." To him, however, I will leave it, because my object is to examine your vindication, of which this topic does not properly constitute a part, having been only introduced by an allusion in a note. I will, therefore, proceed to that part of

your letter which relates to the twenty-fifth article, Of the sacraments.

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In treating of this article you begin with saying, "two sets of charges are brought: one, that we unduly exalt the sacraments of our Lord; the other, that we are not disinclined to ascribe a sacramental character to other rites, which the church of Rome has defined to be sacraments in the same sense as baptism and the holy eucharist." In the former I do not at all concur. But I do observe in your letter a strong propensity to ascribe a sacramental importance to other rites, which have been added to the ordinances of our Lord. Strong indeed must the propensity have been, when you could think that you perceived in this article that the church "implies or asserts that there are more" than two sacraments. "The caution of our church on this subject" is, as you have observed, "very remarkable;" but it is the caution which shuns to give unnecessary offence by an unqualified condemnation of prevailing opinions. The article expressly states that the other five, commonly called sacraments, "are not to be counted for sacraments of the gospel," assigning as the reason of this exception, that they are "such as have grown partly of the corrupt following of the apostles," on which account, it may be inferred, some should be wholly rejected, "partly are states

of life allowed in the scriptures," but which yet "have not any visible sign or ceremony ordained of God," and therefore are not to be esteemed sacraments.

You, indeed, have relied for your authority on one of the homilies. But even the But even the passage which you have quoted, attributes the name sacrament to those other rites in a very vague acceptation, as to holy things, and not at all in the sense in which it is attributed to baptism and the eucharist; nor could any authority be ascribed to a homily, if it could be shewn that it was really at variance with an article of the church. Our observance of the rite of confirmation, it may be added, is no exception to the principle; for it is maintained only a fit supplement of infant baptism, and not as a distinct ordinance.

In regard to the sacrament of baptism, I have not any objection to urge, holding as I do with you, that baptismal regeneration is the express doctrine of our church. But it is otherwise in regard to the eucharist. And here I must remark some unfairness, as it appears to me, in confounding together the Zwinglian and Calvinistic doctrines of this sacrament. Zwingli, doubtless, understood the sacramental elements to be mere emblems; but it was the merit of Calvin that he introduced the doctrine of a spiritual, though yet a real presence, of our Lord, in distinction from the Lutherans, who in their doctrine of consubstantiation maintained a