manent standard or symbol of truth. The privilege of denying everything, if it shall so please them, of being bound by nothing, is the only tangible idea which runs through all their statements and arguments: this they hold to be the very essence of religion, even that 'liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.'''English Review,' No. xix. P. 133.

This description is at once true and untrue.

It is true that the object of the Anti-State-Church Association is destruction. That is its professed object. It seeks to destroy the connexion existing between church and state. That it does so, is not its fault, but its glory. It regards this connection as an evil,—a scandalous and dangerous wrong, and its members are but discharging their duty to society, when they unite together to remove that evil. That the principle on which they unite, is destructive, only tells to the discredit of those who have rendered destructive efforts necessary. Were there nothing which ought to be destroyed, this charge of destructiveness would amount to a just accusation; but as the case stands, the destructiveness is honourable, in proportion to the fidelity with which its measures are adopted and pursued. Does the gentleman who urges this objection, mean to say, that a course of action should be reprobated, merely because it is destructive, whatever be the character of that against which it is directed? If not, he has used the word destruction, in the instance before us, in order to deceive his readers as to the point of accusation he prefers.

But the most important part of his accusation is untrue. He represents the destructiveness which his opponents bring to bear against the state-church system, as characterising the religion they profess. Now this is not the case, and he knows that it is not the case. It is not consistent with fact, that they hold the privilege of denying every thing, if it shall so please them, of being bound by nothing, to be the very essence of religion.' This investigator may have looked in vain,' in attacks upon the establishment theory, 'for any elements out of which another, even though it were an erroneous system of religion, might be built up; but he must be well aware that this was not the proper place to look for anything of the kind. The advocates of the Anti-State-Church Association carefully abstain from introducing the interest of their own religious views as the ground of their advocacy. This is one of the avowed conditions on which that advocacy is conducted. No one could read their publications without being fully aware of the existence of this condition. The principle of voluntaryism is the only common principle of their society; and it is a misrepresentation of the

essential character of that society to pretend that it is responsible for the construction of any system of religion.' Bad, however, as this misrepresentation is, the one which transfers the negative rule observed within the pale of this society, to the religious opinions entertained by the members of the society themselves, is much worse. This latter misrepresentation could not have been made in ignorance. The writers and speakers of the Anti-State-Church Association are, for the most part, well known to possess distinctive religious views, which they do not hesitate to assert on all legitimate occasions. It is very evident to every one who knows anything about the matter, that the destructive efforts they direct against all state interference with religion, have, as to their destructive tendency, nothing to do with the nature of the religion they individually cultivate. A more shameless libel upon them could scarcely be stated, than that they regard such an absurdity as the privilege of denying everything,' to comprise the very essence of religion.' It may be the case with this writer, that every society to which he thinks proper to unite himself, directly expresses his sectarian belief, but he has no right to make his own illiberality in this respect the standard by which he judges of others.

There are two religious principles which our reviewer detects in the publications examined by him, and with which he is especially offended. The one may be called the anti-creed principle, and the other the anti-infallibility principle.

The former of these principles is thus expressed in a quotation given in the Review from Mr. Grant's Tract, entitled The Church of Christ-What is it?'

It is plain that the supreme tribunal to decide this cause, is a man's own private judgment, and that the Bible is to be the statute-book by which this decision is to be regulated. Every one's own conscience is to test all church pretensions by the standard of God's word.'

This principle is shown, by the aid of another extract or two, to result in a variety of development' as far as the church is concerned. The supreme tribunal does not pronounce the same judgment in all minds, nor, indeed, in the same mind at all times.' Upon this state of things we are treated with the following dictum :

Such is the painful vagueness to which men are reduced when walking by the light of their own understandings, they separate the word of God from the living witness to whose keeping he has committed that word, and from those life-giving ordinances by which he has made provision for the nurturing in oneness of faith and spirit, because in oneness of life with himself, those who are willing to seek the grace and

truth of God humbly, reverently, obediently, and by faith, in the way prescribed by God.'- English Review,' No. xix. p. 134.

So much for the anti-creed principle. The anti-infallibility one may be sufficiently gathered from the following statement, forming part of a quotation taken by the reviewer from a tract by Mr. Morris :

'It is impossible not to believe that we are in the right; but it is improper to believe that we cannot but be. Decidedness of belief is perfectly compatible with the stern denial of infallibility; and we are bound to cherish a constant and candid spirit of enquiry by the very grounds on which we have received, and do hold our actual faith. Whatever tends to check this spirit is a serious evil.'

The important part of the comment made upon this principle is contained in these sentences :

Viewing truth as all the professors of such doctrines do, as a production of the human mind, the material of which is taken from the Bible, but the fashion supplied by man himself, nothing, of course, can be more consistent than this perpetual scepticism underlying every conviction, even at the moment when it is most firmly entertained; nor can anything more clearly demonstrate the total absence of that which alone gives to religious truth, substance, and reality in the mind of man, the effectual operation, the conscious and abiding presence of the Holy Spirit.' English Review,' No. xix. p. 136.

We have taken some pains to give, by means of this selection, a fair, though it is necessarily an abridged representation of the collision of sentiment with regard to religion existing between this reviewer and the writers whom he assaults; and we shall now beg leave to make a remark or two of our own upon the merits of this case of religious opposition.

We have then, in the first place, to say, that if our author's principles were correct, and the principles he controverts were incorrect, this circumstance would be of no importance to the real question with which he has to do. Let it be conceded, for argument sake, that the word of God ought to be taken in connexion with a living witness to whose keeping it has been committed,' and that to be willing to adopt fresh views of religion, if they possess the necessary proof of being right views,' and thus to keep the heart open to every intimation of the Divine will,' is to demonstrate the total absence of the effectual operation of the Holy Spirit;' let this be granted, and yet it does not by any means follow, that the living witness' should De patronised by the government, or that 'the operation of the Spirit' should be assisted by legislative anthority. Those are the true points in dispute, and they are not touched by this talk in favour of creeds and infallibility. A church when discon

nected from the state may be constituted with every arbitrariness and arrogance which its members will sanction; and the most exclusive theory of ecclesiastical polity is reconcileable with an adherence to the Anti-State-Church Association. We are told in this paper that connexion with the state is by no means essential to the being of the church'- English Review,' No. xix. p. 129.—and we would add to that sentence, by way of corollary, that no assertion of the religious pretensions of the church will establish a right to connexion with the state.

We observe, in the next place, that the principles laid down by our reviewer, in opposition to his anti-state-church antagonists, cannot be sincerely held in the strictness here claimed for them. There is, in this number of the English Review,' an article on a Roman Catholic book, entitled, Loss and Gain.' In that article the Church of England is occasionally defended on much the same grounds as those denied to the writers of the Anti-State-Church Tracts, and concessions are made that destroy the force of the sentiments urged against those writers. A few extracts from this article will put the matter under our notice in rather an odd light :

Each man must answer for himself to his God, and not another, and scripture expressly charges us to call no man 'father,' in the sense of infallible judge, and absolute lord and master.'—Ib. p. 46.

The ultimate appeal for each individual must be to his conscience, which must be guided by the authority of the church; yet not despotically so'—Ib. p. 62.

There is a moral certainty, not an external absolutism in the church's manifestation of Christianity.'-Ib. p. 61.

'We shall be told, the Spirit does conduct into all truth. We reply, into all saving truth; such truth at least as shall suffice for salvation : but not necessarily to dogmatic infallibility; or what becomes of the doctrine of invincible ignorance,' which it is admitted may consist with the gifts of the Spirit.'-Ib. p. 49.

We leave these declarations with our readers, as a remarkable example of the manner in which a man may 'condemn himself in that thing which he alloweth.' It is not, indeed, within our knowledge that the article on 'Loss and Gain' was written by the same individual who wrote the article on the British Anti-StateChurch Association; but though this may not have been the case, we are perfectly justified in thus bringing the sentiments of the two articles face to face. It is one of the distinctive characteristics of this English Review,' that it prides itself upon the unity of sentiment it professes to uphold. It is devoted to the interests of a fixed ecclesiastical theory, whose exclusive truth is continually asserted. Such being the case, a comparison of one part of it with another, by whomsoever its dif

ferent parts may have been written, is not only fair, but obligatory upon us. The obligation especially applies to questions so important as those on which we are now touching. There is a spirit of compensation relating even to such a matter as editorial responsibility; and thus the inconsistency which would elsewhere call for no remark, is here a proper subject of grave accusation. A claim to superior deference exposes its author to a penalty proportioned to the haughtiness with which it is asserted.

We have, in the third place, to object most seriously to the inferences drawn by this reviewer from the principles on which he animadverts. We do not at all shrink from the adoption of those principles. We believe that the best way to secure religious progress and improvement, is to leave religion to the unfettered understandings, wills, and consciences, of men.'Tracts for the Million, No. 8.' quoted in the English Review-and we also believe, that possessed as all men are of the elements of fallibility, and surrounded as all men are with influences favourable to error, it is a mark of humility, as well as of honesty, while we are faithful to our present convictions, to be ready to receive others.'-' Religious Bearings of the Anti-State-Church Question,' p. 12, quoted in the English Review.' On the other hand we admit with the reviewer, the necessity of the effectual operation, the conscious and abiding presence of the Holy Spirit,' in order to give to religious truth substance and reality in the mind of man;' though we reject the authority of any ecclesiastical corporation, asa living witness to whose keeping God has committed his word.' In our agreement with him, as well as in our disagreement, we have the concurrence of the writers of the Anti-State-Church Tracts, as the tracts themselves will show. Now we think it is quite unwarrantable to deduce from such premises as these the following conclusion:- Viewing truth as all the professors of such doctrines do, as a production of the human mind, the material of which is taken from the Bible, but the fashion supplied by man himself, nothing of course can be more consistent than the perpetual scepticism underlying every conviction, even at the moment when it is most firmly entertained.'

This sentence is, in both parts of it, untrue.

Scepticism and free inquiry are very different things, and none but a person enclosed within the walls of a mere authoritative system would think of confounding them with each other. Not only is it the case, that a firm persuasion of truth may consist with a constant habit of investigation into the subject of that truth; but the investigation strengthens the persuasion, as far as it is a legitimate one. It is the nature of