SPONSORS AT BAPTISM.

SIR,-The subject to which " A Country Clergyman" alludes is one of such importance, both theoretically and practically, as well to deserve serious consideration. If the twenty-ninth canon should ever come to be reviewed in a national, provincial, or even diocesan synod, (which last I conceive would be perfectly competent to the task, and may be convened for such purpose at any time by any diocesan desirous to afford relief to his clergy, without infringement of the tyrannical statute of Henry VIII., which makes our collective ecclesiastical discipline dependent (practically) upon Lord Melbourne, or Mr. O'Connell, should he come to be prime minister,) my own desire would be, that, while that part which relates to parents not standing should be put in the form of recommendation, the remainder, which forbids non-communicants being admitted, should be strictly enforced. It seems to me safer for priest and people, and more tending to edifying, to dispense with sponsors altogether, and to account the congregation sufficient witnesses of the covenant, and the priest sufficient surety for the right instruction of the child in the nature of that covenant, than to sanction and encourage men in the neglect of the holy eucharist by admitting them in that state, as though they who are either too ignorant, or too wilful, or too unbelieving, or too sinful, to worship the God of the Christians in His appointed essential act of worship, were competent to discharge the office of witnesses on such a solemn occasion, or as if the engagement of men who live in the wilful violation of their own covenant can be any surety to the church that those whom she admits on their responsibility shall be rightly instructed in theirs.

Through the defective state of our discipline, for which I trust the presbyters are not responsible, we are supposed to be under the necessity of administering some of our holy rites to persons in this condition, who, according to the discipline which was practised of old, and is contemplated by our canons to this very day, would be under ecclesiastical censure, and inadmissible to them; but, surely, where the plain directions of the church charge us to bear witness against their state, and none of the iron of civil enactment interferes to prevent our doing so, we ought to be glad to avail ourselves of an opportunity of pointing out, more plainly than words can, their position in the Christian church.

It surely is worthy of consideration, whether (independent of violating the rules of the church) we shall not do much more harm to the sponsors and the congregations, in sanctioning them in the neglect of the eucharist, by admitting non-communicants to be sponsors, than we shall do good to the children.

If our church be right in considering that the sacraments are not absolutely necessary, but generally,-i. e. where they may be had,then certainly the eucharist must be more necessary to an adult-who may receive it, but will not-than baptism can be to a child, with whom want of it is wholly unintentional. Besides, the provision which our church has made for private baptism, in case of sickness VOL. IX.-March, 1836.

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may relieve our minds from the fear that many would die unbaptized. Nor is it likely that parents, however ignorant and obstinate, will hold out long in refusing to comply with the rules of the church, which every intelligent person they consult will shew them to be most reasonable, when they have the prospect that if God should please to snatch their children suddenly away, they will have been the means of depriving them of Christian burial.

I can find no reason to believe that the difficulty in procuring proper sponsors, where people desire it, is practically so great as some of the correspondents of this Magazine seem to imagine,-least of all in small country parishes, where the proportion of communicants is apt to be larger than in any other, and I am persuaded that the insisting upon it is beneficial in many ways. "A Country Clergyman" may rest assured that none but the most ignorant and worthless will be "irritated" with a clergyman for his firm and consistent obedience to his orders, even when he cannot (which is not the case here) assign sound and good reasons for it. As to the fear of their going to the meeting-house, let them clearly understand that they cannot get at the meeting-house the grace which they refuse to receive at church, and the number of those who go there will soon be diminished.

I will venture to repeat here what I stated before, in reply to "A London Rector," on the same subject, in the February number last year, namely, the result of my own experience.

I have served the parish I am now in, a small country one, nearly twelve years; and when first I came, owing to a variety of causes, the number of communicants was very small; yet, in all that time, with an average of from ten to twelve baptisms annually, I have never in one single instance disregarded the twenty-ninth canon. I have only twice met with difficulty. Once, in early days, when the child was taken by stealth and baptized at another church,—a recurrence of which I took care to prevent; and the parents were so well satisfied with the reasonableness and propriety of the regulation, that on the next occasion they cheerfully complied with it. At the present moment I have another (the only other) instance of opposition,-the parents of a child, one of whom is not confirmed, the other not a communicant, insisting upon being allowed to stand. Even if it should please Almighty God, which yet I trust will not be the case, to remove the child through sudden illness before the office for private baptism could be administered, I should feel that I had acted as a more faithful steward of His mysteries, in being the unwilling and unintentional cause of the child's dying unbaptized, than I should be were I to encourage the parents in their improper conduct, and to scandalize my whole congregation by allowing careless, self-willed persons to trample upon the rules of the church and the custom by which for so many years our service has been ordered.

I have recommended those communicants who have consulted me upon the subject to stipulate beforehand, when applied to, that they shall be at liberty to discharge their office, and to remind the children for whom they stand of their duty, if need be. ALPHA.

P.S. When our superiors shall judge it expedient to recommend

uniformity of discipline, all the difficulties which are apparent will for the most part disappear. As long as it is left to the desultory efforts of individual presbyters, of course the difficulty is much enhanced. But temper, firmness, and consistency will have their weight, however adverse the circumstances may be.

CHANGING THE LESSONS.

DEAR SIR,-In your "Notices to Correspondents" last month, I find a question pertinently put to one whose communication (it is to be inferred) must have been in favour of "free trade" in the above particular:-"Does the Country Curate' not think that a wilful and regular departure from such authority, to suit an individual minister's sermons, deserves to be brought to the notice of those who are authorized to rebuke it?" Should your correspondent, or any of your readers, feel inclined to be offended by a seeming levity in my illustrative phrase of "free trade," I beg respectfully to assure them that I mean nothing careless or irreverent, but have employed the expression simply as conveying an admonitory hint upon a very solemn subject, at once most graphically and comprehensively. I envy those their innocent simplicity (if any there be) who can believe that feelings and practices of trade have not insinuated themselves into the department of religion among us.

Now, Sir, I most especially hate all manner of altercation, and have perhaps some odd notions upon the kindred subjects of "controversy" and "elicitation of truth." I do not myself believe that the latter desirable result is generally best obtained by direct discussion (according to the popular notion), or that the former is apt to be most profitably managed by retorts and rejoinders outright. If all men were honest enough to confess when they are fairly beaten, it might be so; but one often sees, in matters of direct controversy, that a champion even fights most stoutly after he is dead. I will not therefore provoke reply from the "Country Curate," but try the course of submitting to his fair consideration, not authorities (real or supposed) for meddling with the appointed lessons in church, but reasons sound and good (as they appear to me) for not being "given to change" in that particular. Indulgence must be requested for a certain unwilling air of egotism in what is about to follow.

Will the "Country Curate" be disposed to agree with me thus far as a foundation,-namely, that, speaking generally, it is of much higher importance to adapt our discourses from the pulpit to Scripture, than to accommodate Scripture to our discourses? And again, that incidental demonstrations of the wonderful and living power of the Divine word, of its uniform consistency and fitness as a practical guide, may offer more convincing evidences of the force of truth even than the most complete premeditated exhibitions of those qualities?

I will not ask more questions to a like effect, but at this point refer your correspondent to a former letter which you did me the favour

to insert in the "British Magazine" for October, 1834, where it happens to stand first among the "Correspondence" of that month. He there may find another strong consideration which I would submit to him, but which it would be a vain repetition to express at large here, in the short paragraph towards the bottom of p. 390. No such objection lies, however, against the statement of a fresh case, of late actual occurrence, calculated to stir reflection on the subject,—of possible advantage to be gained by making the most careful and best use of the routine lessons as they are. If, as I conclude, the "Country Curate" be a younger brother in the ministry, I would intreat him to consider first, and try what may be often done with existing means, before giving too ready countenance to innovation.

It will be recollected that among the chapters falling incidentally on the new-year's Sunday of this, year, was Romans ii. Perhaps no choice could have suggested one more appropriate to such a season; but that is not the special point in question. Undoubtedly the fourth verse of that chapter will be allowed to have supplied a fitting newyear's text:-"Despisest thou the riches of His goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not knowing that the goodness of God calleth thee to repentance?" What, then, had been heard in unison with this, by Sunday accident, only a fortnight before? It had been "read in the ears of the people," from 2 Pet. iii. 9, that "the Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." The promise here is of Christ's second coming; and, incidentally, it had been heard between these two foregoing admonitions, upon the festival of St. John the Evangelist," Behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give to every man according as his work shall be." (Rev. xxii. 12.) And should there have been anywhere a doubter, or a scoffer, disposed to ask "Where is this promise, after all; and can the Lord be rightly said to come quickly?"-that also had been well explained beforehand in the assurance, which must carry with it conviction to every reflecting mind, that "one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." So that, in these three incidental chapters, compared together, there was to be perceived a rich coherent store of Christian doctrine, peculiarly applicable "unto edifying" at the time of their occurrence.

Will, then, the "Country Curate" grant, that such a store, well handled, might have supplied a theme more powerful and every way better than any ordinary new-year's discourse, proceeding at once from the mere arbitrary choice of the preacher? But though he should allow this, he still perhaps might argue," that these are chapters only of the New Testament." Yet, had a wider range of still connected doctine been either manageable or desirable, were there no tributary rills to be derived from any concurrent chapters of the Old? Let Isaiah xli. and xliii. be properly compared, in some of their expressions, with Revelation xxii.; [as e. g. "I the Lord, the first and with the last;" or, "before the day was, I am HE;" not tediously to introduce other verses;] and with a general drift conspicuously

fitted to confirm the awful promise yet in store. My own belief is that we could not easily direct our own free thoughts so advantageously for spiritual improvement as they may here be found directed for us. But let each reader ponder, and then judge.

If he shall so arrive at a conclusion favourable to my theory, then I take leave to press the argument, that any common benefit of thus digesting and comparing Scripture conveniently for any given season springs from, and is essentially dependent upon, a dutiful acceptance of lessons set out for the church's use; and with a wilful change of those it is foregone, and very wrongly taken from his flock, by any individual clergyman's caprice.

It may, however, still be urged, that "none of these are of the kind of chapters in which any clergyman would wish for alteration, but he would only seek to change certain earlier chapters of the Old Testament." In that case I would earnestly refer the seekers for amendment to a most interesting number (No. 13) of "Tracts for the Times," by members of the university of Oxford, bearing the title of "Sunday Lessons;-The Principle of Selection." It may not carry absolute conviction in every particular, but if it be not felt to shew sufficient reasons against needless thirst for alteration, it must address itself methinks to very predetermined tastes and opinions. I cannot end this letter so forcibly or well as in the two last paragraphs of that very admirable composition. Wise words they are to such as will receive them :

"These reasons are respectfully addressed to those who, in their anxiety for immediate visible edification, appear somehow to overlook the fact that the church lessons are a series, arranged according to certain general principles. Scruples, and feelings of different kinds occurring to this or that person as to the use of particular passages, must be met of course on their own grounds, except so far as they ought to be silenced by the overpowering advantage which may appear to arise by adhering to the general principle of selection.

"At any rate, it is much to be wished that very free talking and very free publishing in behalf of such changes were carefully avoided. Is there not something even cruel in raising scruples, and niceties, and unpleasant associations of various kinds, among those who as yet happily have never dreamed of criticising the Bible? If change is wanted, let proper reasons be quietly submitted to competent authorities. But let us not appeal lightly, and at random, to the sense of an irreverent, presumptuous age, on one of the most sacred of all subjects."

I am, dear Sir, yours truly,

January 6, 1836.

R. B.

BISHOP MIDDLETON, ON THE GREEK ARTICLE.

MR. SHARPE's rule.

SIR,I was lately led, on remarking the expression Tv kλñoi kai Ekλoy, 2 Pet. i. 10, to recur to what Bishop Middleton has said on the case of several words, joined by conjunctions, being included under one article (Greek Art., pp. 76-89. Scholefield's ed.); and a careful consideration of the examples there adduced has given rise to the following observations, which I venture to offer to your notice, with a view to apply the result to the above expression, and others of the