وو they have done this, they have, however, refused to pronounce with Calvin on the decrees of God, in regard to human salvation, directing, in the conclusion of the seventeenth article, that we should "receive God's promises in such wise, as they be generally set forth to us in holy scripture.' They borrowed from the Genevan reformer what appeared necessary for completing and correcting the earlier work of the reformer of Germany; but they refused to follow him into curious and unauthorised speculations on the divine counsels. Concerning your next topic, the twenty-third article, Of ministering in the congregation, agreeing with you, as I do, in maintaining the doctrine of the apostolical succession of our episcopacy, I would not think it necessary to offer any remark, if you had not incidentally introduced two observations, in neither of which can I concur with you. "We wish," you say," "to set forth no new doctrines; we would only revive what circumstances connected with the sin of 1688 have thrown into a partial oblivion." Now what is this sin of 1688, even of the revolution of England, to which we have been accustomed to look back with reverence and gratitude, as the auspicious epoch of both our civil and our religious liberty? Are we here directed to regard that great crisis of our history as stained with guilt against God, because the alle 6 Page 182. giance of our fathers was transferred from a sovereign, who had fled from his throne amidst the general indignation of his people, to another prince, who, by the acquiescence of that people, possessed the powers of government, and was able to afford protection to those who obeyed him? But I have learned that it is the duty of a Christian to yield a willing obedience to the existing authorities, the powers that be; and this, not for fear of punishment, but for conscience sake. Or is it rather that the nation refused to avail itself of the opportunity then afforded for healing the schism of the reformation, by effecting a reunion with the church of Rome? As I cannot admit our reformers to have been guilty of schism, in separating themselves from that accumulated corruption, which had grievously tainted the ministrations of Rome, so neither can I acknowledge that their successors committed sin in declining to be any longer the subjects of a prince, who laboured to reduce them to that enslavement, from which they had been by the former happily delivered. I respect the conscientious integrity of the nonjuring bishops; and I can even consider their conduct with gratification, as having practically favoured the cause of the revolution, by proving the perfect disinterestedness of the prelates, who gave by their firmness the immediate impulse to the change of the government. But their scruple I cannot regard as founded in a just notion of their duty of allegiance. Their oaths could not impose any obligation at variance with that which bound them, as Christians, to practise a dutiful submission to the existing government. This other obligation it might strengthen, but it could not discharge. The nation had chosen to change its government, and it was their paramount duty, as they were christian ministers, to acquiesce. I think, indeed, that I clearly enough perceive, why you should be very kindly affected towards them, when I read that their distinguishing tenets were the doctrine of the real presence in the eucharist, and that of the propriety of praying for the dead. Again, in treating of the objects of the Tracts for the Times, you have specified, "the holy catholic church (our belief of which we daily confess), and the ordinances of her Lord, committed to her keeping, whether his sacraments, or rites, practices, and observances (such as fasting, ember-days), which she has ever observed, and which are essential to her well-being Here you speak of rites, practices, and observances, such as fasting and ember-days, as ordinances of the Lord, committed to the keeping of the church, and essential to her well-being. Now, I have learned from our thirty-fourth article, Of the traditions of the church, that "it is not necessary that traditions and ceremonies be in all places one 8 7 Cardwell's Hist. of Conferences, &c. p. 390. دو and utterly like; for at all times they have been divers, and may be changed according to the diversities of countries, times, and men's manners, so that nothing be ordained against God's word." This article, in ranking traditions of ceremonies among those things which may, according to diversity of circumstances, be different in different places, and be changed from time to time in the same place, is wholly repugnant to your representation of them, as ordinances of the Lord, committed to the keeping of the church, and essential to her welfare. 66 9 case Of the two remaining topics of your vindication, prayers for God's departed saints, and celibacy," "have been in no you say, indeed, they insisted upon, or inculcated by us, but, at most, simply introduced in the course of treating upon other subjects." But it may fairly be asked why, if they find no authority in our creeds or articles, should they be introduced at all? You have told us,' that "the great object which runs through the whole (of the Tracts for the Times), was to bring up men's practice to the standard of their church, as it is; to remove ill-founded objections to it; to develope to them points, which they had not apparently considered; to realise more the system, in which we actually live, to live up to what we have." Why then should prayers for the dead, which you admit to have "been excluded from the English ritual," be even incidentally mentioned in connexion with that object? This, surely, was not any part of a plan "to bring up men's practice to the standard of their church, as it is ;" nor "to realise more the system, in which we actually live." On the contrary, it was to combine with that object a practice, which had been formally excluded from the ritual of the system. 3 If you have not expressly advocated such a combination, the mention of these things must at least be understood to indicate the habitual tendency of your thoughts, and thus to give confirmation to the opinion of those who consider you as, if not inclined towards an actual reunion with the Romanists, yet disposed at least to assimilate the observances of our church to those of Rome. "A formal restoration (of prayers for the dead) would,” you admit, "in the corrupt state of modern manners, probably lower still further the standard of holiness; men would probably abuse these prayers as a ground of carnal security, and, by a worse corruption than that of Rome, look to them as available for those not departed hence in the faith and fear of God. In order to have with impunity all primitive ordinances, we must have also primitive purity and discipline. To restore privileges before we restore strictness of life, were to begin at the |