rance and barbarism, by the establishment of schools and the circulation of the scrip tures.

As the majority of the inhabitants of Ireland are Roman Catholics, it was of great importance to abate the exis ting prejudices against the people of that religion For this purpose the Preacher aimed to show that the spirit of popery, or that which constitutes the criminality of papists, is by no means confined to the people of that denomination; and he very justly believed, that if people were more in the habit of looking at home for the discovery of error, they would be more candid in their judgements one of another.

Such being the object of the Sermon, the Doctor selected for his text, Matt. vii. 3, 4, 5. "And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and behold a beam is in thine own eye ?-Thou hypocrite! first cast out the beam out of thine own eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye."

For the word "beam" in the text, the Preacher substituted "thorn," after the example of Dr. Campbell. The plan of the discourse is-First, a short application of the leading principle of the text, to the case of those judgements that we are so ready to pronounce on each other in private life;

-Secondly, that more general kind of judgement which we are apt to pass on the man of a different persuasion in matters of religion. Under each of these heads we shall allow the Doctor to speak for himself, by a selection of such passages as will give a correct view of his reasoning :

"I. Every fault of conduct in the outer man, may be run up to some défect of principle in the inner man. It is this defect of principle, which gives the fault all its criminality. It is this alone, which makes it odious in the sight of God.... For example, it is a fault to speak evil one of another; but the essence of the fault lies in the want of that charity, which thinketh no ill.

But though all evil-speaking be re- · ferable to the want of a good, or to the existence of an evil principle in the heart, yet there is one style of evil-speaking different from another; and you can easily conceive how a man addicted to one way of it, may hate, and despise, and have a mortal antipathy, to another way of it.. The forms of evil-speaking break out into manifold varieties. There is the soft insinuation. There is the resentful outcry. There is the manly and indignant disapproval. There is the invective of vulgar malignity. There is the poignancy of satirical remark. There is the giddiness of mere volatility, which trips so carelessly along, and spreads its enter-> taining levities over a gay and lighthearted party. These are all so many transgressions of one and the same duty; and you can easily conceivean enlightened Christian sitting injudgement over them all, and taking hold of the right principle upon which he would condemn them all; and which, if brought to bear with effica

cy on the consciences, of the different offenders, would not merely silence the passionate evil-speaker out of his outrageous exclamations, and restrain the malignant evil-speaker from his deliberate thrusts at the reputation of the absent; but would rebuke the

humorous evil-speaker out of his fan-

there may be among thousands and tens of thousands of its nominal adherents, all the soul, and substance, and principle, and piety of a reformed faith.

First, then, it is said of Papists that they ascribe an infallibility to the Pope, so that if he were to say one thing and the Bible another, his authority would carry it over the authority of God. And, think you, my brethren, that there is no such Popery among you? Is there no taking of your religion upon trust from another, when you should draw it fresh and unsullied from the fountain-head of inspiration? You all have, or you ought to have, Bibles; and how often is it repeated there, "Hearken diligently unto me?" Now, do you obey this requirement, by making the reading of your Bibles a distinct and earnest exercise? Do you ever dare to bring your favourite minister to the tribunal of the word, or would you tremble at the presumption of such an attempt, so that the hearing of the word carries a greater authority over your mind than the reading of the word? Now this want of dar ing, this trembling at the very idea of a dissent from your minister, this indolent acquiescence in his doctrine, is just calling another man master; it is putting the authority of man over the authority of God; it is throwing yourself into a prostrate attitude at the footstool of human infallibility; it is not just kissing the toe of reverence, but it is the profounder degradation of the mind and of all its faculties and without the name of Popery, that name which lights up so ready an antipathy in your bosoms, your soul may be infected with the substantial poison, and your conscience be weighed down by the oppressive shackles of Popery..

We tremble to read of the fulminations that have issued in other days from a conclave of cardinals. Have

we no conclaves, and no fulminations, and no orders of inquisition, in our own country? Is there no professing brother-hood, or no professing sister-hood, to deal their censorious invectives around them, upon the members of an excommunicated world? . . .

But again, it is said of Papists, that they hold the monstrous doctrine of transubstantiation. Now a doctrine. may be monstrous on two grounds. It may be monstrous on the ground of its absurdity, or it may be monstrous on the ground of its impiety. It must have a most practically mischievous effect on the conscience, should a communicant sit down at the table of the Lord; and think that the act of appointed remembrance is equivalent to a real sacrifice, and a real expiation; and leave the performance with a mind unburdened of all its past guilt, and resolved to incur fresh guilt to be wiped away by a fresli expiation. But in the sacraments of our own country, is there no crucifying of the Lord afresh? Is there none of that which gives the doctrine of transubstantiation all its malignant influence on the hearts and lives of its proselytes? Is there no mysterious virtue annexed to the elements of this ordinance ? Instead of being repaired to for the purpose of recruiting our languid affections to the Saviour, and strengthening our faith, and arming us with a firmer resolution, and more vigourous purpose of obedience, does the conscience of no communicant solace itself by the mere performance of the outward act, and suffer him to go back with a more reposing security to the follies, and vices, and indulgences of the world? Then, my brethren, his erroneous view of the sacrament may not be clothed in a term so appalling to the hearts and the feelings of Protestants as transubstantiation, but to it belongs all the immorality of transubstantiation; and the thorn must be pulled out of his eye, ere he can see clearly to cast the mote out of his brother's eye.

But, thirdly, it is said, that Papists worship saints, and fall down to graven images. This is very, very bad. "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only. shalt thou serve," But let us take ourselves to task upon this charge also. Have we no consecrated names in the annals of reformation, no worthies who hold too commanding a place, in the remembrance and affection of Protes tants? Are there no departed theo

logians, whose 'works hold too domineering an ascendency over the faith and practice of Christians?... We may not bend the knee in any sensible chamber of imagery, at the remembrance of favourite saints. But do we not bend the understanding before the volumes of favourite authors, and do an homage to those representations of the minds of the men of other days, which should be exclusively given to the representation of the mind of the Spirit, as put down in the book of the Spirit's revelation ?

But, fourthly and lastly,-for time does not permit such an enumeration, as would exhaust all the leading peculiarities ascribed to this faith, it is stated, that by the form of a confession, in the last days of a sinner's life, and the ministration of extreme unction upon his death-bed, he may be sent securely to another world, with all the unrepented profligacy, and fraud, and wickedness, of this world upon his forehead; that this is looked forward to, and counted upon by every Catholic,-and sets him loose from all those anticipations which work upon the terror of other men, and throws open to him an unbridled career, through the whole of which, he may wanton in all the varieties of criminal indulgence, that, when standing on the verge of eternity, he can cast a fearless eye over its dark and untravelled vastness, and that, for the terror of its coming wrath, his guilty and unrenewed soul is filled with all the radiance and all the elevation of its anticipated glories.

...

...

O! my brethren, it is piteous to think of such a preparation, but it is just such a preparation as meets the sad experience of us all. . . . Ah! my brethren, do you not `think, amid the tones, and the sympathies, and the tears, which an affectionate pastor pours out in the fervency of his soul, and mingles with all his petitions, and all his addresses to the dying man, that no flattering unction ever steals upon him, to lull his conscience, and smooth the agony of his departure? Then, my brethren, you mistake it, you sadly mistake it; and even here, where I lift my voice among a crowd

of men, in the prime and unbroken vigour of their days,-if even the youngest and likeliest of you all, shall, trusting to some future repen tance, cherish the purpose of sin another hour, and not resolve at this critical and important Now, to break it all off, by an act of firm abandonment, then be your abhorrence at Popery what it may, you are exemplifying the worst of its errors, and wrapping yourselves up in the cruelest and most inveterate of its delusions."

It would be easy to show how the reasoning of Dr. Chalmers, under the second head of his discourse, may be extended and applied to the conduct of different denominations of protestants, in their censures one of another.

But

we hope our readers have generally a sufficient share of discernment to see the bearing of the Doctor's remarks. We may however observe, that a censorious spirit is one of the most pernicious beams ΟΙ thorns in the eyes of Christians; and until this is "6 cast out" they never can see clearly to cast the mote out the eye of a brother. Compared with mere error of opinion, an error in temper is a very great evil. But this is seldom duly considered by men addicted to censure.

By the prejudices of educa tion by the undue importance attached to traditionary creeds, and by unfounded calumnies, Christians of different denominations have been really deceived in respect to the characters of each other. It is unquestionably true, that there have been bad papists and bad protestants, of every known denomination. It is

perhaps equally true, that there have been very good men in each of the several sects of Christians. But it has been too common for people of one sect to judge those of another by the very worst things to be found among them -overlooking what is truly excellent and lovely, or rejecting it as the fruit of hypocrisy. The mode of judging will be reversed when Christians shall first cast the thorn out of their own eyes.

Had Dr. Chalmers lived but one century earlier in Scotfand, and had he then publicly delivered the same favourable opinion of many of the papists which he has now published, it is questionable whether he would ever have been permitted to preach another sermon. But, as he has observed, this antipathy against the papists, for one or two generations, has been rapidly on the de

cline."

In applying his subject to the benevolent purposes of the Hibernian Society, the Doctor has suggested the humble feeling and

courteous

language, with which the members of the Society should approach their Catholic breth

ren.

A specimen of this will be given as an important part of the discourse, and as applicable in a great variety of cases. Having intimated that "the meek consciousness of that woful departure from vital christianity, which has taken place in the

reformed

countries of Christendom, will divest them"-the agents of the Society" of that repul

sive superiority, which has gone far to defeat the success of many an attempt," he gives the following as the kind of language which should be adopted:

"The whole amount of our message, is to furnish you with the Bible, and to furnish you with the art of reading it. We think the lessons of

this book well fitted to chase away the manifold errors, which rankle in the boson of our own country. You are the subjects of error as well as we and we trust that you will find them useful, in enlightening the prejudices, and in aiding the frailties to which, as the children of one common humanity, we are all liable. mongst us, there is a mighty deference to the authority of man: if this exist among you, here is a book which teils us to call no man master, and delivers us from the fallibility of human opinions. Amongst us, there is a delusive confidence in the forms

A.

of godliness, with little of its pow er here is a book, which tells us that holiness of life is the great end of al our ceremonies, and of all our sacraments. Amongst us there is a host of theologians, each wielding his separ

ate authority over the creed and the conscience of his countrymen, and you, Catholics, have justly reproached us with our manifold and neverending varieties,; but here is a book, the influence of which is throwing all these differences into the back ground, and bringing forward those great and substantial points of agreement, which lead us to recognize the man of another creed to be essentially a Christian, and we want to widen this circle of fellowship, that we may be permitted to live in the exercise of one faith and of one charity along Amongst us, the great with you. bulk of men pass through life forgetful of eternity, and think, that by the sighs and the ministrations of their last days, they will earn all the bless-edness of its ever-during rewards. But here is a book which tells us that we should seek first the kingdom of God; and will not let us off with any other repentance than repentance now; and tells us, what we trust,