siderable insight into human nature, and a profound sense of the inestimable importance of morality in all the relations of life.

ART. XI.-A Sermon on the Duty and Expediency of translating the Scriptures into the current Languages of the East, for the Use and Benefit of the Natives: Preached by special Appointment before the University of Oxford, November 29th, 1807. By the Rev. Edward Nares, M. A. late Fellow of Merton College, and Rector of Biddenden, Kent. 4to. Black and Parry. 1808. 甲

THE subject which the Reverend Edward Nares has chosen for his discourse is found in Acts ii. 7-11. The miraculous gift of tongues, with which the apostles were endowed for a specific purpose, Mr. N. considers as an argument for our propagation of the gospel in every part of the world.

"The great importance,' says he, of this miracle is, that it not only warrants, in the most indisputable manner, our interposition in such matters' (meaning an attempt to alter the religious belief of other states) but it enables us at once to pass by various objec tions which the perverseness of man's reason would oppose to our undertakings.'

We do not, we must confess, discern the justness of this conclusion nor the relevancy of this inference. If the apostles were favoured with the miraculous gift of tongues for a particular and temporary object, it does not follow that christians in all future times are to practice the same conduct. without having received a similar commission. The gift of tongues which the apostles received, was an injunction to them to attempt the conversion of the nations, whose. languages they were thus supernaturally empowered to speak. But can we produce credentials of similar validity? | When Mr. Nares adds that this miracle 'enables us to pass by,' we suppose he means that it invalidates various objec tions' which might be opposed to such an undertaking, we think that he carries bis conclusion far beyond what he is authorised by his premises. For those objections which might be removed by a miracle may remain in fall force where they are not repelled by a miraculous confutation. Our Saviour's direction, 'Go ye and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name, &c.' supposing that verse genuine, of which we know that some learned men have their

doubts, was evidently restricted to his immediate disciples. In the third paragraph of his elaborate discourse, Mr. Nares

says,

- We need not stop to inquire what impediments have heretofore hindered the propagation of the gospel, what causes have operated to retard the general conversion of mankind; but being possessed at any time of any means to promote an object, not only obvious to the understanding of any considerate person, but pointed out to us by an express miracle from heaven, we may not, I think, hesitate to do our utmost to accomplish the will of God, and to propagate by all possible opportunities, and to the remotest parts of the earth, the gospel of his blessed son."

Surely Mr. Nares does not mean by this sentence that if the propagation of christianity ought to be our end we are not to be scrupulous about the means!!! We are, we trust, as warm and as zealous advocates for the unvitiated doctrine of Jesus as Mr. Nares or any of his friends, but we are con vinced that the gospel of Christ is not to be propagated by barbarous compulsion nor by pious fraud. Yet if we are, in the language of Mr. Nares, to promote the object at any time by any means,' what cruelty and deception may we not soon practise without any hesitation? No truth in morals is more sacred nor more clear than this, that we ought not to do evil that good may come.

When Mr. N. intimates that the proselyting propensities which he wishes to inflame,' are pointed out to us by an express miracle from heaven' we must beg leave to suggest that there is no resemblance between an act which was performed by miraculous powers and a similar attempt by human means. If God himself did not suffer the first teachers of christianity to attempt the conversion of the heathen without supernatural aid, is it such a clear point, as Mr. N. supposes, that we are to prosecute the same work without similar assistance? We were not a little surprised to find a gentleman of such acknowledged piety as Mr. Nares, making use of the following sentence; 'Whatever,' says he, we may be disposed to think of the success of this miraculous assistance from the present state of mankind, I see not how it is possible to doubt of the intention of God's eternal providence.' Does Mr. Nares intimate that this miraculous gift of tongues, was not so efficacious as might have been expected, and that the intentions of God's eternal providence,' were greater than the performance? It may often truly be said of man that his performances are less than his intentions; but ought we, even in the most distant man

per, to ascribe this imperfection to the Deity? God never intends what he does not perform; and he always performs what he intends. His acts always correspond with his intentions and his intentions with his acts. The miraculous assistance, therefore, which God afforded to the first teach. ers of christianity was to the full as efficacious and successful as he intended that it should. It is impossible to think otherwise without evincing great disrespect to the attri butes of God,

Mr. Nares asserts p. 7. that the practicability of the future conversion of the Hindoos is proved by the many thonsands who have been already converted to the christian faith; We do not know whence Mr. N. derived this information; for Major Scott Waring, who is well acquainted with the subject, has told us that all the conversions, which have hitherto been effected by the industry of the missionaries are few; and that those few have been confined to persons of the most worthless characters, who would reflect disgrace on any cause; and with respect to whom consequently it matters very little what form of worship they profess. Perhaps when Mr. Nares boasted of his many, thousands of conversions before his admiring audience at St. Mary's, he imagined that the pious work which the munificent douceur of the evangelical Mr. Buchanan had incited him to per form, might well excuse a little rhetorical exaggeration. Mr. Nares says, p. 8, that the mere alarm of opposing preju dices can have nothing in it to deter us; but we trust that there is no sober-minded religionist in this country who would not shrink from the perilous attempt to crush the rooted, the fondly-cherished, the long continued, and the far-transmitted prejudices of fifty millions of men. Shall we in order to gratify the enthusiasm or the pride of a few visionaries and fanatics, risk the safety of an empire by en deavouring to subvert the ancient creed, and to crumble into dust the beloved and revered institutions of such a mass of population? Can he, who is rationally pious, justify such attempt to his conscience? or he, who is politically wise, to his country? But what is the doctrine which Mr. Nares proposes to impart to the natives of Hindoostan in exchange for their present religious rites? Does he urge us to disperse among them the simple morality of the gospel, enforced by the impressive sanction of a future life?-No; of this the learned theologue says little; and, though this comprizes all the religion that Christ taught, and all that is requisite for the natives either of Europe or of Asia, he

thinks it not enough. He must add the doctrines of incarna◄ tion, of the atonement, of hereditary depravity, of the moral incapacity of man, of justification by faith, &c. &c. which would only bewilder the minds of the people in the east as much as they do in the west. Indeed, for every moral purpose, the Hindoos might as well be left under the influ ence of their present superstitions, as have their minds perplexed, and their affectious chilled by that deleterious doctrine which the evangelical missionaries would instil. We see no objection to the circulation of the scriptures in the Janguages of the East; but we must consider any attempt to overturn the present religious institutions of the Hindoos and Mahomedans through a host. of calvinistic visionaries and fanatics, to be pregnant with infinite danger to our Asiatic sway. Let us spare no pains to moralize the people of India, to teach them the duties of truth, of justice, and of charity; let us endeavour to deter them from vice, to encourage them in virtue, and to console them in woe by the prospect of a life after death. All this may be done by ra tional and sober-minded christians with great benefit to the natives, and to the interests of the company. More than this we ought not to attempt: and, in attempting this, it will be necessary to respect the ancient prejudices of the people, and not to shew any contempt even for the most frivolous of their ceremonial rites. Let us leave these to the GRADUAL ABOLITION OF REASON, AND THE SLOW DESTRUCTION OF TIME. The religion of Jesus which is the boon of heaven, will finally triumph over every system which is the mere contrivance of man ; but let us not suffer the hot-headed votaries of methodism to traverse the peninsula of India not to dif fuse the moral light of genuine christianity, but only to sub stitute one species of superstition for another. All superstition may be accounted evil; but, of all the superstitions which were ever engendered in the mind of man, that which goes under the name of methodism, is the most opposite to truth, andthe most destructive of virtue and of happiness. The best things, when corrupted, become the worst; this may be said of the heavenly doctrine of Christ, when metamor. phosed by ignorance, hypocrisy, and fraud, into that shapeJess mass of pollation which is taught by the fanatics of the epangelical school. In exposing, as we shall never omit any opportunity of doing, the dangerous tendency of this subtle poison, though we are incurring the malignity of a host, we are conscious that we are acting as the best friends of that christianity which we revere, of that country which we love, and of the general interests of mankind, which, we should

not be christians, if we did not labour to promote. Mr. Nares appears to have bestowed considerable pains on the composition of his sermon, but he seems unfortunately to have viewed the subject in a wrong light; and we think that on more mature consideration, he will be induced to alter his opinions.

MONTHLY CATALOGUE.

RELIGION.

ART. 12.-A new Argument for the Existence of God. London: 12mo. Longman. 1808.

THIS new argument is founded on the Berkleyan hypothesis of the non-existence of matter. "The non-existence of matter" says the author is an irresistable proof of the existence of God." The writer enumerates eleven difficulties" which the hypothesis of a material world, involves and which he considers as so many argu ments against its existence. We will give a specimen of these diffi culties as they are called. It shall be the seventh.-"The common hypothesis supposes the substance of matter to be composed of atoms; and that those atoms are indiscernible, indivisible; yet a number of them put together will beget a divisible. One would think this was said by way of joke or mockery; and more than this that this indivisible is divisible ad infinitum-to an eternity of eternities (pass the hyperbole) without advancing one step towards annihilationThere is no other way of getting rid of this dilemma (I rather call it absurdity) no alternative but the non-existence of matter. The author says that the operations of nature are carried on in the most simple way; that God's doing every thing himself is the most simple way; and that consequently the apparatus of an external world is not so simple a way of producing effects as an immediate operation of the divine mind on the sensory of animals. We give the opinions of the ingenious author; but we do not state our own.

ART. 13.-The Importance of educating the Poor;-a Sermon preach ed July 18th, 1808, at the Black Friars, Canterbury, in Behalf of the Royal Free School,recently established in that City. To which is added an interesting Letter of Sir Richard Phillips, Sheriff of London, CRIT. REV. Vol. 14. August, 1808:

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