Oldalképek
PDF
ePub

PUSEYITE THEOLOGY.-On a recent occasion, a Puseyite clergyman, not twenty miles from Devizes, who occupied a high position among the Evangelical Clergy a few years ago, when preaching from the 12th verse of the 90th Psalm: "So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts to wisdom;" recommended his hearers. to obtain correct copies of Moore's Almanack, which would be found of the utmost service to them, in finding the proper days on which to celebrate the festivals of their holy church and of the saints, the pious observance of which, would have the tendency of inclining their hearts to wisdom!-Wilts Independent.

STATISTICS OF THE NONCONFORMISTS OF ENGLAND AND WALES, FOR 1844. We extract the following table of the number of Members in each of the Nonconforming Denominations, from the Report of the Home Missionary Society:

[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

Which, if added to the supposed number for the Congregations, 3,600,000, and the number of Sunday-scholars, 768,628, would amount to 5,268,628, or about one-third of the whole population of England and Wales.

ITINERANT SOCIETY. On the 22nd of October a Meeting of the Committee of the above Society was held in the vestry of Zion Chapel, Bradford. Its object was to place the secretaryship and management of the Society in the hands of Mr. Burton, who has recently come to Bingley for that purpose, and to consult with him as to plans of operation. The meeting, though small, gave hope of better days for the society than it has lately known. Handsome sums were offered by the few friends present, that want of money might not hinder a good commencement:-Mr. M. Illingworth, £20, Mr. Aked, £20, Mr. J. Town of Keighley, £10, Mr. W. Stead, £10.

CANADA. We regret to learn that in the last act of the Canadian legislature to

secure independence at elections, amongst other persons prohibited from voting at elections, under a penalty of five hundred pounds, Ministers of every denomination, Episcopal, Romish, and Dissenting, are included. Of course, there is no apparent inequality, but the motive must be to lessen the influence of Catholic and Dissenting Ministers, who are, in Canada, by far the most numerous. It is surely contrary to all religious principle, that Ministers as such, should be forbidden to vote. The State may prohibit its own hireling clergy if it sees fit. They are its servants. But on what ground can it violate the civil rights of those whom it neither appoints nor pays? The painful issue of a small departure from principle at Tahiti, should arouse Dissenters to the iniquity of keeping down Popery, and Dissent with it, by such means.

THE FREE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND.— In ten months, the Free Church raised by voluntary subscriptions, for religious purposes, the noble sum of £418,729 14s. 3d. Who, after this, will decry the voluntary principle?

THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH DOCTRINES HONESTLY SET FORTH.- -The following advertisement appeared recently in a Lincolnshire newspaper:-"To the Clergy.Wanted, a Curate for five or six Sundays, beginning with the Sixth Sunday after Trinity. The stipend to be £2 per Sunday. None need apply but those who preach the Church Doctrines honestly, showing a full regard for their oaths, and who expose in their preaching the diabolical origin and tendency of Dissent, its errors, and its wickedness.-Address, the Reverend the Vicar of Gedney, Gedney, Wisbeach."

TITHES! TITHES!-It is estimated that the Tithe Income of England and Wales will this year amount to £5,000,000 sterling! What a most capacious maw has "our holy mother the Church" of England!

BAPTISMS. On the first Lord's-day in October, four persons were baptized in the Westgate Chapel, Bradford.

Leeds:

PRINTED & PUBLISHED BY J. HEATON, No. 7, Briggate;

To whom all communications for the Editors are to be addressed, Post-paid.

THE CHURCH.

"Built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner-stone."-Eph. ii. 20.

No. 12.]

DECEMBER, 1844.

[PRICE 1D.

ECCLESIASTICAL COMMOTIONS.

The spirit of inquiry is aroused. Christianity, and the wood, the hay, and the stubble, with which men so ignorantly, and ofttimes so wickedly, build on her foundation, are undergoing a searching scrutiny. The cause of truth will not suffer, but the hostility to some truth is increased, and will continue to increase, and even amongst Nonconformists, and many of them good men too. The struggle was foreseen by some. It will not be of short continuance, and will probably extend to all the kingdoms of Europe. The supporters of exclusiveness and of religious despotism, will make many an effort, and sacrifice many a martyr, before they will yield their stronghold in the wealth and power connected with churches united to the kingdoms of this world; but the weapons of the Christian's warfare are not carnal, though mighty.

Several clergymen in the Established Hierarchy, having been first drawn aside by Puseyism, have recently discovered that honestly they cannot any longer continue in the Church of England under a Jesuit's garb, and have joined the Church of Rome. Many others are expected to follow. Other clergymen and a considerable number of laymen, have established a "Free Episcopal Church" at Totness, in the diocese of the bigoted Bishop of Exeter. Mr. Walter, formerly the Representative in Parliament for Nottingham, has attacked the minister of the Parish of Hurst, for having introduced the Offertory, that is a weekly levy on the Sabbath, into the parish. Three

columns of the Times newspaper have been occupied by Mr. Walter's address to his fellow-parishioners; civilians have been consulted, who consider that there is no legal remedy for such innovations, unless the Bishop will interfere; and the Bishop sanctions the proceeding. The disputes at Ware in Herts, at Tottenham in Middlesex, at Helston in Cornwall, and at numerous other places, arising out of Puseyite innovations alleged to be founded upon the Canons and Rubrics, are creating much dissention, and lengthened columns of discussion in the newspapers. Many will become infidels, not distinguishing between genuine Christianity, as promulgated by our Lord, and the wood, hay, and stubble so much applauded by priests.

A review of what is passing leads to the remark: No State Church trusts the people, except in solitary cases, with the appointment of their own pastors. Why? Because no State Church could maintain its authority against the power of the people thus increased. Consequently, in such a Church, the people either exhibit the stillness of despotism, or an indignant resistance against abuses, which they have no power to redress or reform. Dissenters rejoice in your freedom and increase it!

We now turn to the Dissenters, and ask: Are you really in the enjoyment of the liberty wherewith Christ has made you free? We suspect that many of our Dissenting churches have surrendered their rights, or rather it should be said,

have sacrificed the rights of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Great Head of the Church, and are living in a state of bondage dishonourable to them, both as men and as christians.

Many pastors, and many deacons, are altogether forgetful of the fact, that the Church of Christ is an unmingled democracy, acknowledging Jesus Christ its Spiritual Head. His law for the government of his Church is simple. "Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority among them, BUT IT SHALL NOT BE SO AMONG YOU." "All ye are brethren.”

The pastors, sometimes alone and sometimes in combination with the deacons, by management of the churches, by intellectual power, by discouraging discussion at church meetings, by nominating the deacons to be elected, by discountenancing lay preaching and lay agency, and by various other expedients, have destroyed the democratic power of the churches, and obtained a complete ascendancy over the people.

In other cases the deacons, who are only the servants of the churches, and ought to bear the name of servants, and who have not power to take a step until first authorized so to do by the people, have lorded it over both pastor and people.

Happily multitudes of the private members of our churches are more enlightened, both as to religious liberty generally, and as to "freedom in churches," than the pastors and deacons to whom we have referred, and therefore we hope that true principles will advance among us. But the people must be looking around them, for the pastors are already in action, under a vague and undefined apprehension of the loss of power.

The straightforward and truth-searching papers on Nonconformity, published in the Eclectic and in the Nonconformist, have produced great alarm, and the establishment of the Anti-State-Church Association is represented by timid Dissenters to be a most fatal proceeding, in its bearing on nonconforming interests. They do not affirm that the opinions put forth are opposed to truth. The complaint in substance is, that the truth is too broadly told, too often told, and too perseveringly told.

The remedies proposed are threefold: One proposes to establish a Quarterly Review, to be called the British Review, which will be much more moderate in its opinions than the Eclectic. Another proposes to establish an Ecclesiastical Office in London consisting of three persons, one of whom is to be a Stipendiary, to have the inspection of all the Congregational Students leaving the Colleges, all the Pastors wanting appointments over Churches, and all the Churches destitute of Pastors. A third party proposes to discourage lay preaching, or probably he would say, to place it under such regulations as would prevent abuse.

Dissenters be upon your guard. If you wish to hear such truths as will uphold the Churches in their freedom, and the exercise of that democratic power which Christ gave to his people, read the Eclectic and the Nonconformist, and thus learn the whole truth. If you wish to retain your power of selecting and electing your own Pastors, a power which you have no authority to delegate to others, forbid the establishment of a small despotic body in the Metropolis to control, directly or indirectly, your freedom of selection. If you wish to spread the kingdom of Christ, give encouragement to every member of your Churches, whom you believe to be qualified, to preach the Gospel of the kingdom, without any regard to the opposition which is now engendering against lay agency. A. D.

BAPTIST WORTHIES.No. 7. THOMAS GRANTHAM may be ranked amongst the most zealous and useful ministers of the gospel during the seventeenth century. He was born in the year 1634, and descended from the noble family of the Granthams in Lincolnshire. His immediate connexions were much reduced in circumstances. He feared the Lord from his youth, and joined the Baptist Church in Boston, when about nineteen years old. Not long after he had made this profession of love to the Saviour, his christian friends became aware of his rising talents, which they encouraged him to devote to the work of the ministry.

So early as the year 1644, some godly persons in the South-marshes of Lincoln

shire, had been gathered into a christian church, making the word of God their rule of faith, and desirous of doing all things according to the pattern showed them in the New Testament. Persecution soon became their lot; slanders and fines followed them, because they rejected the use of sponsors, and of the cross in infant baptism. Differences of opinion now arose among them, about the extent to which they should carry reform in religion, and these differences led to a rent in the little church, which was reduced to four persons, who agreed to follow the scripture rule, by using immersion on a profession of faith in the Son of God.

Grantham found out these witnesses for the truth, cast in his lot among them, preached to them in private, and procured ministers who taught them the way of God in public. In the year 1656 he became their pastor. In his twenty-second year, when he undertook the superintendence of this little flock, the times were dark and stormy, the land had been overrun with hostile armies, and persecution had sent thousands out of the country, or to a better world. But our Worthy was not the man to consult with flesh and blood, when civil rights and religious liberties were in jeopardy, and therefore he went forward in the path of duty without fearing them that kill the body, and leaving circumstances to the God whom he served.

His attachment to truth, his love of liberty, and his reverence for divine authority, were much tried during his eventful life. Success in the ministry, and the flourishing state of the church under his care, roused the evil passions of some neighbouring clergymen, who summoned him and his friends before the magistrates to answer for their offence in forsaking the altars of the venerable Establishment. In addition to this kind of annoyance, they received much rude treatment from mobs, composed of "certain lewd fellows of the baser sort," who disturbed their meetings, and sometimes stoned them in the streets. Happily for the honour of religion, "in their patience they possessed their souls."

After the Restoration, storms of persecution overtook Grantham and his flock. Sham plots were got up in many parts of

ers.

the kingdom by Clarendon and his party for the purpose of ruining the Nonconformists; amongst whom, the Baptists were the most hateful to the ruling powGrantham continued to preach the gospel wherever he had an opportunity, after Charles and the Bishops had forbidden it on pain of their displeasure; for which offence he was taken before a magistrate, who bound him over to the assizes, and fined some of his friends twenty pounds a month, for not going to hear the drunken Clergy of the Restoration. Groaning under these severities, they resolved to lay their complaints before the King, by means of a petition and a confession of their faith; and it is due to the memory of Charles to state, that he protested against their persecutors, promised them liberty, sent forth a declaration in their favour, and thus secured their acquittal in open court, amid the shame and rage of their enemies.

On the pretence of fresh plots in the North, their sufferings were soon renewed; some of them were fined, others were imprisoned, and all were exposed to the tender mercies of the wicked. The pastor and two others were taken by force from a meeting, and kept all night at an inn, amongst drunken and swearing soldiers. In the morning they were conveyed to Lincoln jail, where they remained till the assizes, without any charge being brought against them. Forbidden to preach, our Worthy employed some of his prison hours in writing books for the refutation of error, and in defence of truth. Two of these were called "the Baptist against the Papist," and "the Prisoner against the Prelate; or a Dialogue between the Common Jail of Lincoln, and the Cathedral." At the end of fifteen months these sufferers for conscience' sake were set at liberty for want of accusers.

When the Conventicle Act passed into law, Grantham was placed under the ban of Ecclesiastical displeasure, and involved in fresh troubles. Separation from the Established Church was a greater sin, in the eyes of law-makers, than drunkenness, cursing, adultery, or any kindred vices; and for this presumed offence, dragoons rifled his house, and forced him away from his wife and children. After dragging him from town to town till night

came on, they put up at an inn, where the accommodations were of the most wretched kind, while the oaths and drunkenness of the soldiers, made the place more like hell than anything else. In the morning he was taken to Louth, and committed to the house of correction; afterwards he was sentenced to six months' imprisonment, for refusing conformity to the Established Church. Unable to subdue his spirit, or to quench his zeal by prisons, his enemies now brought an action against him for damages, which they laid at one hundred pounds, on the pretence that he had used the wife of a certain person "uncivilly, because he had baptized her!!" but when the case came on for trial, it was thrown out as a malicious prosecution.

In the year 1672, Charles suspended the Penal Laws against Nonconformists, and conceded the right of meeting for the worship of God, provided their ministers were licensed, preached no sedition, and assembled with open doors. The Lincolnshire Baptists deputed Grantham and another, to wait upon his Majesty with an address, thanking him for his declaration in their favour; but showing him some points in which it infringed their rights, and assuring him that "no less liberty than the scriptures expressed, would satisfy the church of God." Reader! dwell upon this fact for a moment. Behold these injured, but heroic men, in the presence of the king; and, having thanked him for the suspension of persecuting laws, they proceed to say, “Sire, your declaration is, in sundry particulars, at variance with the principles of civil and religious liberty, and we declare to your majesty, that we shall never be satisfied with any thing short of that freedom which the word of God has given to us." All honour to their memories!

Some idea of the sufferings of these people may be formed from the following passage in "the Baptists' Complaint against the persecuting Priests :""We have sustained the imprisonment of not less than one hundred persons. We have borne the

trial of no less than three hundred levies of sixty, forty, twenty, or ten pounds. Indictments at the assizes and sessions, for twopence per week, and twenty pounds per month, we have had not less than a thousand. Presentments and excommuni

cations in the Commissary Courts, we have had some hundreds, with many other vexations not here inserted."

This eminent man survived the Revolution, and saw the last of the Stuarts driven out of the kingdom. His last days were spent at Norwich, where he founded the General Baptist Church. When dying, he said to friends, "Do not mourn for me; though I die, I shall rise to glory, where I desire we may all meet, and see one another's faces in the last day." died Jan. 17, 1692, aged 58.

He

Thus lived and died Thomas Grantham -a Worthy of the Baptist denomination— a confessor in the dismal times of the Stuarts-a sturdy Nonconformist who endured ten persecutions for conscience' sake -a man "equalled by few, and exceeded by none in his day." Thousands attended his funeral, and mourned his loss. "Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord."

T. P.

THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND AND THE
CHURCH OF CHRIST.
(Extracts from the Circular Letter of the West Kent and
Sussex Baptist Association.)

"The contrast between the Church of Christ (using the phrase here in its most evangelic sense) and the Church as by law established, is very striking. Instead of being identical, they have scarcely any thing in common with each other. In the constitution and government of the former, there is nothing to recommend it to the carnal mind or the popular taste; in the latter, there is every thing agreeable to depraved human nature. The Church of Christ has no wealth to proffer, no honours to impart, no immunities to bestow, except such as are of too pure and spiritual a character to be appreciated by the unthinking world; but the Establishment has all these things, as so many allurements to parties to enter her priesthood, and to minister at her altars. By its oracles, the Church of Christ denounces the love of money as the root of all evil-declares covetousness to be idolatry, and the friendship of the world to be enmity against God. Not so the Church of England: by her enormous revenues,* her grasping mo

These are estimated at about seven millions per annum, £300,000 of which are annually consumed in

sinecures.

« ElőzőTovább »