DEAR SIR,

We now arrive at the real and substantial points of difference between Churchmen and Dissenters; and the whole question, in all its bearings, opens to our view. The second reason of the author we are examining, is certainly worthy of our most serious consideration. It justifies dissent, "because the Church of England does not appear to be a true and proper church."

We might fairly object to the loose and vague character of these expressions, and ask what is meant by "not a true and proper church: "-whether it is intended to call the Establishment a false church, or to attribute to it fundamental heresy. But the author thus explains himself:

"I prove this from the Articles of the Church itself; which say, that the visible Church is a congregation of faithful men, in which the pure word of God is preached, and the sacraments be duly administered according to Christ's ordinances. Now the Church of England is a congregation of all sorts of men; a large proportion of its ministers are men without religion; the pure word of God is very far from being preached in many of the churches; and the sacrament is indiscriminately administered to the most wicked and profligate persons, as a qualification for civil offices. Secondly, I prove it from Scripture, Christ says, My kingdom is not of this world. But the Church of England is altogether of this world; the King is its head, all its laws are made by Parliament, and lords and squires have the appointment of nearly all the livings."

6

We have here a variety of par

ticulars, all intended to establish the position, that the character of a Christian church cannot be "truly and properly" assumed by the Church of England. Let us examine them separately.

I." The Church of England is a congregation of all sorts of men.”. This objection fails in a very common way-by proving too much. It is granted, that, as hearers, "all sorts of men" may find admission into the congregations of the Establishment. It is granted, that her ministers, not possessing the attribute of omniscience, cannot exclude hypocrites from an external participation in all the privileges of churchmembership. All this is conceded: but then it is obvious, that the same circumstances exist in every dissenting church in the kingdom. In all, the doors are open; in all, false brethren may be received. If, therefore, the Establishment is declared, on this ground, not to be a "true and proper" church, it follows of necessity, that no such thing as "a true and proper church" is to be found on earth.

"A large proportion of its ministers are men without religion." Here, as in the last instance, the charge may be retorted. Scandals to the Christian ministry may be found both among the established and dissenting clergy. Our antagonists may, perhaps, imagine, that the proportion of slothful and irreligious men is greater amongst us than with themselves; but this they cannot prove. And even if it were proved, the argument is not affected by it. The question is, does the existence of this evil deprive the Establishment of the character of a Christian church. If it does, it follows, that as it ex

ists also amongst the Dissenters, they must likewise fall under the same condemnation.

The pure word of God is very far from being preached in many of the churches." Again we have to remark, that this evil is not confined to the Establishment. Nay more, it is better provided against in the Church of England, than it can be amongst Dissenters. For with us, as I formerly remarked, "the pure word of God" must be constantly read in all the churches; and if any parish should unhappily be placed for a time under the care of one who disregards the engagements he has entered into, the next choice must bring another who has entered into the same solemn engagements, and subscribed the same pure and scriptural doctrines, and who may entertain a juster sense of the duties of his important office. But with a meeting-house the case is different. A perverted minister there either scatters his congregation, or leads them astray. The very place of their worship is devoted to other purposes, or retained for the use of the worshippers of Reason. And are these things to teach us a preference for Dissent?

"The sacrament is indiscriminately administered to the most wicked and profligate persons, as a qualification for civil offices. This statement, my dear Sir, is -rather highly coloured; but still I have to repeat, that the blame, whatever it is, must be shared by the Dissenters themselves.

The use of the sacramental test, as a public profession of the Christian religion-whether proper, or improper-is not to be charged upon the Church. It is a mere legislative enactment of the State, to which the Church is no party. Her ministers very commonly administer to persons qualifying for office, without knowing that such is the purpose of the communicant.

As to the general charge, I reply, that the rules of the Church of England, on the point of admission to the Lord's Supper, are quite as strict as those of any dissenting body. The observance or non-observance of those rules, is a matter on which the clergy, individually, may be blameable, or otherwise, without the Establishment itself being justly liable to censure. The discipline of some dissenting congregations may be in a better state than is common among us-with others it is not so. On the whole, it is not to be disputed, that irreligious men do obtain admission to this Sacrament both in the Establishment and among Dissenters; but in which body this evil is most common, none but the great Searcher of hearts can determine.

We have now gone through the four points contained in the first part of the proof, that the Church of England is "not a true and proper church." And we should bear in mind, that these points are brought forward to establish one "Reason for Dissent." And it is quite obvious, that no one can rationally bring forward these objections against the Church, who has joined another body of Christians which is equally open to the same complaints. Now the writer we are examining, very absurdly states all these matters, which are equally true of Dissenters as of Churchmen, and reasons from them for leaving the Church and joining the Dissenters. This is perfectly illogical.

Proceeding, however, to the second part of the proof adduced in support of this second reason, we come at last to the grand and never-ending theme with all Dissenters-their main and fundamental objection to all Ecclesiastical Establishments.

"2. I prove it from Scripture. Christ says, My kingdom is not

of this world.' But the Church of England is altogether of this world; the King is its head, all its laws are made by Parliament, and lords and squires have the appointment of nearly all the livings."

I am glad to have the opportunity of meeting this argument in a condensed form, and stated with simplicity. For this one solitary text, or rather half-text, has been the theme of volumes, and has been expanded and amplified into a magnitude and importance altogether ludicrous. The foundation of every thesis, the beginning and end of every pamphlet on the side of dissent, for many a long year, has been furnished by these seven words. And little wonder need arise, when we remember, that this fragment of a text is the only passage in the whole Bible that can be in any way brought in to the assistance of the Dissenter's argument. No other passage, even of seven words disjointed from a sentence, can be found in all the Scriptures to help out the failing logic of Independency. The anxious parade of a certain domestic bird, when followed by a single offspring, is proverbial; and very similar is the solicitude with which the Dissenters are constantly displaying this their solitary biblical axiom.

But let us look a little closer at this passage, by which the Church of England is to be proved, in a short seven words, so plainly antichristian. It is found in the 18th chapter of St. John's Gospel. Pilate is examining our Lord on the subject of his pretensions to the sovereignty of the Jews, with aspiring to which his accusers had charged him. He is asked, "Art thou a king, then?" and as a 'part of his reply, we have these words: My kingdom is not of this world; i'my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered unto the Jews; but now is my kingdom not from hence."

Be

And these words, so explicitly referring to the charge brought against Jesus, of aiming at a temporal sovereignty, are now held to be perfectly decisive against the. right or propriety of a provision being made by a Christian government for the religious instruction of the people under its care. cause Jesus Christ did not come upon earth to reign King of Judea, therefore a British Parliament ought not to provide for the building of churches, or the endowment of their officiating ministers. Admirable reasoning! Will not the days come when it shall be thought incredible, that the educated and sensible Nonconformists of the nineteenth century could use such arguments, and use them, seemingly, without being conscious of their utter absurdity?

But the Church of England is altogether of this world; the King is its head," &c. In other words, it is a human institution, and administered by human and fallible authorities. If any one will show us how to erect a National Establishment, into which errors in practice shall never enter, and in the management of which worldly men shall have neither the will nor the power to interfere, we will thank him. In the mean time, the question to be determined is, whether it is better to have national institutions for religious instruction, under human direction and subject to human errors, or not to have any?

Here I shall go a step farther, and ask, before we argue the question of expediency, whether it is not a duty incumbent on all professedly Christian governors, to provide for all classes of their subjects, at least such a degree of religious instruction as will not leave them to perish without the possibility of learning the way to heaven. What meaneth, will the Dissenters tell me, that prophecy of the bright approaching days of the

66

Church, in which it is said, that Kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and Queens thy nursing mothers?" What are we to understand from the parable of the talents; in which a return, proportioned to the means bestowed, is plainly shown to be due? How are we to interpret the praise so frequently bestowed in Scripture on David, on Solomon, Josiah, Nehemiah, and others, who constantly taxed their subjects to raise the temple of God, and issued their own regulations respecting the order of the worship of that temple?

Briefly, too, I would remind you, that Dissenters themselves are continually erecting chapels, and then coming upon the public for the expense. I, though a Churchman, am frequently subjected to these demands. You will say that what is given to these cases is voluntary. And doubtless this is true; but the applicants and your preachers, nay yourself also, will join in assuring me that it is the duty of every man to contribute to such cases so far as his circumstances will allow. If then every private individual has a duty of this kind to discharge, does not his responsibility increase with the increase of his influence and power? Should he become a legislator, has he no responsibilities as a legislator? Does it not continue his duty to forward that cause with his increased influence, which he held himself bound to assist when his power and means were more limited?

No, my dear Sir, common sense will never deny, and you cannot find even half a text fairly to discountenance the principle, that kings and legislators, professing Christianity, are bound by that profession to concern themselves in making known those truths to their subjects upon which the eternal happiness of all men depend. They are bound to see that the ост. 1824.

Christian religion is preached to the people. It may happen, that in course of years their own views of the truths of Christianity may be in some degree obscured, and that they may sanction the propagation of an alloyed divinity. But still they were not the less right in at first concerning themselves in such matters, or in afterwards continuing to support religious establishments. If errors have crept in, those errors affect the detail— the practice-not the first principle on which such institutions are founded.

If I have in any degree succeeded in establishing the point, of the moral responsibility of governors for the religious instruction of their people, it cannot be necessary for me to return to the minor consideration of the expediency of such a line of conduct. Nevertheless, as this will afford me an opportunity of considering the remaining part of this second reason, I shall resume the discussion of that part of the question.

"Now the Church of England," it is said, " is altogether of this world; the King is its head, all its laws are made by Parliament, and lords and squires have the appointment of nearly all the livings." In other words, the Establishment emanates from the Government, and is regulated, as every thing else must be, by the Legislature. It is perfectly obvious that this is necessarily the case; that it is a necessary consequence of the relation the Church bears to the State. No government ever would, or indeed ought, to erect and endow a national institution of this kind, without preserving some control over it, so as to be able to ensure its answering, in some measure, the original intention of its foundation.

In objecting, therefore, that the Church of England is modelled and governed by the ruling civil authorities, this writer in effect ob

3 D

jects, and no doubt intended to object, to all national establishments whatever. Now, to bring the question to a short issue, I might ask, whether England would have had Christianity at all, humanly speaking, without an establishment founded and protected by the civil power?-whether England would have had the Reformation, but for the encouragement and assistance of Henry's, Edward's, and Elizabeth's government?and whether England would have possessed the best translation of the Scriptures extant, but for her ecclesiastical establishment, acting under the authority and direction of the sovereign and legislature? I might multiply such questions as these; but I will rather come down to the present position of things, and put a question which every man of sense and candour can answer; namely, What would be the effect of immediately putting an end to the present system, destroying the Establishment, and leaving the people to supply themselves with religious instruction in their own way, and at their own individual cost?

In large towns there would probably be little immediate difference. The people would not be content to lose their ministers, but would speedily make arrangements for the continuance of their services. But we are not to look to the cities alone. The observance of the Sabbath, you probably still wish to be maintained by law. What then would be the state of things among our villages, and over the country, if you shut up our churches and dismissed our clergy? Their maintenance, let it be remembered, is borne by the landowners; and a discontinuance of tithes would not benefit the tenant, whose rent would be proportionably increased. From whence then could a voluntary contribution be expected, in a country parish, sufficient to maintain a cler

gyman? Not in one case out of ten would it be raised. At once, then, you would deprive nearly the whole of our country villages of the means of religious instruction; turn the inhabitants out, every seventh day, to waste their hours in sloth, and revelling, and vice; and obliterate, as far as possible, all knowledge and remembrance of religion, worship, heaven, and hell. At present, the benefit may in many instances appear small; but it is not really so. There stands the church, daily and hourly reminding the people that there is a God and a future state. Every se venth day they are discharged from labour, and the sacred doors are open to them, warning them of their duty and their accountableness. Within the venerable edifice, around which their fathers lie buried, the voice of the Gospel sounds from week to week, making known to them their real condition, their duties, their sins, and the only refuge which remains for sinners. The minister may not be, in every respect, exactly what he ought to be; but the Church has provided for his shortcomings, and omitted in her services nothing necessary to salvation.

Now in all this there may often be occasion of grief to the Christian, that so little fruit is visible, and that so little effectual and spiritual good is done; and yet there may be, at the same time, ground of congratulation to the statesman, that the public morals are so far promoted, and the minds of the people so far influenced towards good. The one may justly lament, where the other reasonably rejoices; for they are taking two different views of the same matter. The one grieves that England is not what it ought to be; the other is happy that it is not what without a public support of religious institutes it would be.

To the objection, therefore, that "the King is its head, and its laws