indeed require a season of rest in the bosom of my family; but I dare not yet leave a post so unexpectedly visited, and which every hour proves to be the post of duty.

From the Same.

Manchester, Nov. 29, 1845.

I have just returned from the Depository, and find that the issues, from the 1st of November to this day, have been 20,525 Bibles and Testaments.

From the Same.

Manchester, Dec. 3, 1845.

How often has our want of faith been rebuked by the renewed mercies of our God!

I have this morning received a letter, of which the following is a copy, from the Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of Chester.

Chester, Dec. 2, 1845.

My dear Sir, I enclose an order for 500l. to be entered as follows:

"An Octogenarian Friend,
"by the Bishop of Chester,

"to the Manchester Bible Society, 500l."

This is intended to support the Society in its present important doings, and is one proof of the light in which the crisis is viewed by observers.

How thankful I am to belong to a Society so honoured! How thankful to have such confidence in the Divine Word, that I can look upon the present movement with unmixed and unfeigned gratification!

To C. S. Dudley, Esq.

Very faithfully yours,

I do indeed feel thankful for such a close of such a month.

J. B. CHESTER.

MEMORIAL OF THE COMMITTEE OF THE PROTESTANT ASSOCIATION TO THE ARCHBISHOPS AND BISHOPS OF THE UNITED CHURCH OF ENGLAND AND IRELAND, ON THE RECENT SECESSIONS FROM THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND TO THE CHURCH OF ROME.

To the Most Reverend the Archbishops and the Right Reverend the Bishops of the United Church of England and Ireland. WE, the Committee of the Protestant Association, beg leave most respectfully to represent to your Lordships that having associated for the defence of our Protestant Institutions, both in Church and State, we have, for some years, watched with some anxiety and alarm the progress and operations of a Romanizing party in the Church of England, who have not scrupled to declare that they "must recede more and more from the principles of the English Reformation," and whose conduct has been in but too strict accordance with that fearful and shameless declaration.

More recently we have beheld with deep feelings of grief and indignation the consummation of an apostacy from the scriptural truth maintained in the Articles, Homilies, and Liturgy of the United Church of England and Ireland in the open and avowed secession of some of the chief leaders of that party, with many of their deluded followers, to the Church of Rome; an event which plainly proclaims to all the world the true nature of their previous movements, which leaves no room for doubt as to the character of those pernicious principles upon

which they had from the first been acting, and which fully justifies the worst apprehensions that were entertained by those who lifted up the voice of warning against their un-Protestant course.

We took occasion to express to your Lordships two years ago, our "deep conviction of the imperative necessity of the exertion of all due authority, in all prudence, but with all energy, for the suppression of this fearful and rapidly extending evil." We must now express our deep lamentation that no effectual measures have been adopted to check its progress; that the evil has been suffered to go on unchecked in too many instances, to its natural and fearful consummation; that it is still permitted to work in many directions unrestrained, and especially to infect both our Universities, and thus to poison those fountains out of which the blessings of "sound learning and religious education " should flow to the replenishing of our Church with a body of faithful Protestant clergymen, who (according to their ordination vows) should be ready, with all faithful diligence, to banish and drive away all erroneous and strange doctrine contrary to God's Word."

This Committee cannot but consider, that the signing of the Articles of the Church of England in a confessedly "non-natural sense," which has been unblushingly avowed by some, and (there is too much reason to fear) unscrupulously done by many more of the clergy, is a practice which strikes at the very foundation of all honour and honesty among men, and that it cannot be too strongly condemned or reprobated in those who, by their office, ought, both by precept and example, to teach the principles of pure religion and sound scriptural morality, but, by such a practice, are inculcating principles of immorality and Jesuitism, which ought to be held up to the public abhorrence of all true Christians.

The Articles of our Church were agreed upon and set forth, "for avoiding of diversities of opinions, and for the establishing of consent touching true religion." The clergy are therefore called upon to sign them ex animo," in the literal and grammatical sense," in the "plain and full meaning thereof;" and as Thomas Rogers,* an old and valuable expounder of those Articles, well observes, "The purpose of our Church is best known by the doctrine which she doth profess, the doctrine by the Thirty-nine Articles established by Act of Parliament, the Articles by the words whereby they are expressed; and other purpose than the public doctrine doth minister; and other doctrine than in the said Articles is contained, our Church neither hath nor holdeth; and other sense they cannot yield than their words do import;" their true sense is known by their very words. This is the language of common sense and common honesty. No other view of the question can be reconciled with either. And most desirable it is for the best interest of the Church, that the whole influence of your Lordships' character and authority should be exercised to impress upon the minds of the clergy and of all who are preparing for the sacred office of the ministry, what common sense and common honesty require in this matter.

We feel ourselves called upon, by the principles on which the Protestant Association was founded, humbly yet openly to submit to your Thomas Rogers was Chaplain to Archbishop Bancroft.

VOL. VIII.-January, 1846. D New Series, No. 1.

Lordships this expression of our earnest desire, that the bishops and pastors of our Church "should perseveringly exert themselves to maintain and diffuse among every portion of the clergy a high and holy standard of conscientiousness, integrity, and faithfulness, both in taking upon themselves and in fulfilling their ordination vows and engagements, and to hold up to general detestation all Jesuitical reservation and evasion, in regard to an office so sacred and pledges so solemn and important." And we beg to assure your Lordships of our readiness to afford any assistance in the power of this Association to the fathers of our Church in their efforts to banish and drive away "those erroneous and strange doctrines to which we have referred, and we look to your Lordships "both privately and openly, to call upon and encourage others to do the same."

"And we devoutly pray, that the Spirit of the Lord may rest upon your Lordships, and direct and bless your pious endeavours for the purification and protection of our Church.

Signed, on behalf of the Committee,

JOHN P. PLUMPTRE, Vice-President.
JAMES LORD, Secretary.

CHURCH PATRONAGE.

It is high time that our bishops should do something to put down those Anti-Protestant doctrines and practices, by which the Church of England is so much distracted at present, and by which the minds of the simple are so grievously unsettled.

The question is, Why are they doing nothing? Why have they not long ago done something, and something energetic and effectual, to stop the progress of those who make no secret of their desire and purpose to unprotestantize the Church of England? Here are those who have solemnly subscribed the Articles of our Church; who hold the position of accredited ministers of our Church; who, in virtue of that subscription and as its accredited ministers, are receiving the emoluments of our Church; and, enabled by the position which they hold in our Church, to carry on their designs with a power and effect which they could not otherwise pretend to command; and, in the face of their subscriptions, in direct violation of their ordination vows and engagements, in contravention of the rules of common honour and honesty, they have been for ten years carrying on a conspiracy against the vital doctrines of that Church of which they are professed and accredited ministers! and thus endeavouring to overthrow "the Protestant Reformed Religion by law established in these realms!" By secret conspiracy first, and then by open and unblushingly avowed hostility, they have been, and are, undermining and assailing the best interests of that Church, whose bread they are eating, and whose doctrines, by the most solemn engagements, they are bound to preach and maintain! These things have been going on, and are still going on, and our bishops are doing nothing!-that is to say, nothing energetic or effectual to counteract these monstrous evils ;-the direct

tendency of which is to subvert our Protestant Church, and to eradicate all principles of truth and honesty from the minds of Britons! Why is this?

Two momentous questions occur to our mind on this subject. The first is, Do our bishops themselves really hold and love the doctrines of our Protestant Church, as they are set forth in the Thirty-nine Articles? Do we find that, in their sermons and charges, they plainly, unequivocally, and earnestly preach and maintain them? The second is, Are they qualified, as sound theologians, to detect, expose, and denounce the various forms of heresy which from time to time arise, and by which the truth of God is assailed ?

We are not speaking of individuals. The case requires that the bishops should act as a body. And the questions just proposed are proposed with reference to the whole body of them, and not with reference to this or that individual; though every individual among them might do well to consider them. It may seem bold to ask them. But the time is come in which they must be asked. The truth of God in our land, and the existence of our Church, are at stake; and it is no longer the time in which it will avail, either to mince matters, or to blink such questions out of professed or pretended respect for the stations which men hold. We would be among the very first to insist upon the apostolic precept, "to know them which labour among you, and are over you in the Lord, and admonish you; and to esteem them very highly in love FOR THEIR WORK'S SAKE." (See 1 Thess. v. 12, 13.) But, in this case, it is only too manifest, that THEIR WORK is not done. Error is not put down. Is it even, in good earnest, discountenanced? And, whosoever and whatsoever they may be who desire to be honoured in their stations, they must take care to do honour to their stations, by faithfully discharging the duties of their stations. And what can be considered as more immediately and imperatively the work of a bishop than this,-To maintain the truth of God, and "to banish and drive away all erroneous and strange doctrine contrary to God's Word?" To this the bishop is bound by his ordination vow as a priest, and by his consecration vow as a bishop. And in spite of this double vow, which is binding upon the soul of every bishop of our Church, here we have "erroneous and strange doctrine contrary to God's Word" stalking through the length and breadth of the land, and increasing and multiplying day by day without anything like effectual opposition !

The only shadow of excuse which can be urged is this,-that our bishops are so overworked with the ordinary routine of their official duties, that they cannot find either time or strength to attend to those extraordinary duties which peculiar emergencies require.

There is something in this, we are quite ready to allow. At the time of the glorious and blessed Reformation, we had in England two archbishops and four-and-twenty bishops: and now that the population has, we suppose, tripled, at least,—and therewith all the duties of the bishops are greatly increased, and a great portion of those duties actually tripled too, we have but two archbishops and four-andtwenty bishops still. In this, as in other respects, our ecclesiastical establishment has kept no sort of pace with our increasing population.

D 2

The one goes on increasing in geometrical progression. The other stands still. This ought not so to be.

But, readily making the fullest allowance that can be made on this account, we must ask the question, Are the bishops doing all that they can in this most important matter? Most important, we say: for what avails the diligent discharge of all those duties which have reference to the external order and discipline of the Church, if the truth of God be not maintained?—if sound doctrine be not preached? The bishops in our days have done nothing for which they can be more worthily commended, than for their exertion in promoting the building and enlargement of churches, and the multiplication of schools. But it is no purpose to build churches and multiply schools, if the Gospel of Christ be not truly preached and taught in them, and the instruction given be not truly scriptural. The multiplication of duties, therefore, is no excuse for preferring the less to the greater-for neglecting what is most important in order to attend to (comparatively) minor matters. Our Lord denounces a fearful wo against those who paid tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: and He adds, "THESE ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone." And so we must say, when the building of churches and schools is attended to, but the maintaining of the purity and truth of the Gospel is neglected.

Moreover, if the weight of other duties indeed be such, that the bishops cannot themselves do what they would in opposing the fearful inroads of Tractarianism, they countenance those presbyters of the Church who are willing to devote themselves to the work of opposing error and maintaining truth?-do they endeavour to place such presbyters in situations, in which they may have leisure, opportunity, and advantageous position, to give themselves to this important work? What is the design and purpose of our cathedral establishments? On what possible ground can they be defended but this-that they are establishments in which men of studious habits and sound theological attainments can both improve and employ their peculiar talents for the welfare of the Church at large? We ask, therefore, are they used for this purpose? Are men sought out for such preferments, and placed in such dignities, because of their manifest zeal and ability to refute heresy, and maintain sound doctrine against all impugners?

But this question would lead into the consideration at large, of the manner in which the patronage of the Church is bestowed. And this must be reserved for a second article, which will, we trust, speedily follow. V. D. M.

POPISH PRAYERS FOR THE RETURN OF THE ENGLISH
NATION TO THE ROMISH FAITH.

THE following notification is stated to be stuck up in all the principal churches in the city of Paris :- "At the request of the Bishops of England, expressed to the Archbishop of Paris by the Bishop of Melipotamus, prayers will be offered up to God during eight days, reckoning from the present day, on the occasion of the Holy