The Portraiture of a Christian Gentleman. By A BARRISTER. 68. London. 1829.

OUR Christian barrister, Mr. Roberts, has many claims on the public attention, for his valuable professional works, for his laborious reports as one of the commissioners for investigating the public charities connected with education, and for other publications connected with morals, literature, and politics; particularly the British Review, which for several years he edited, and which deserved a larger measure of patronage than it received; and the failure of which proved either that the religious world were too little literary, or the literary too little religious, to tolerate the union of their respective topics. He now comes forward with a Portraiture of a Christian Gentleman-a character which he has evidently sketched with great delight, as its varied lineaments presented themselves before his observation; and he dedicates his performance to a Christian lady, Mrs. H. More,-wishing, he says, as far as possible, "to keep close to her views of moral and spiritual excellence."

The author's object in these pages is not to exhibit an analysis of Christian doctrine, or a code of Christian duties; these, he observes, are to be found in innumerable other quarters, and where so fully and clearly as in the Scriptures themselves? But he wishes to illustrate the operation of these principles in one particular department of human life. The principles which are to regulate the conduct of the Christian vary not; they are the same as applied to all ranks, ages, and professions: but the details of their application are diversely modified; and we see not, therefore, why it may not be as legitimate an office to point out the duties of the Christian gentleman, as of the Christian pastor, or any other class of the community. The

only objection we can conceive to be urged is, that the office of a gentleman is not a regularly defined class of human character, especially viewed in a religious aspect. Certainly a gentleman-Christian would not be a very satisfactory epithet; nor would even the juxta-position of the epithet Christian with gentleman, in our respected author's own collocation, be correct, if we were to include, in our idea of the character of a gentleman, the high bearing, the proud self-respect, the worldly honour, and the latent feeling of superiority to others, which are often associated with the term. But, when connected not with pride, but with duty; not with self-estimation, but with responsibility; it becomes a word fairly admissible even into a treatise on Christian ethics. There is a class of persons, whom, from the circumstances of their birth, station, education, and property, the world agree to call gentlemen; with a strong feeling that there is a certain well-understood line of conduct which becomes the legitimate owners of the appellation. Now Mr. Roberts goes farther; adding religious duty to conventional propriety; estimating the obligations of a gentleman who professes to be a Christian, not by the standard of the "broad stone of honour," but by the Gospel of Jesus Christ; and shewing him, that what, in the world's estimation, was but a title of courtesy and honour, was, in a higher view, a talent for which he is accountable, in proportion to the powerful influence which it involves.

Mr. Roberts first introduces to us his Christian gentleman conducting religious worship in his family; nor would he have him shrink from this important duty, because at first he may feel some embarrassment in the discharge of it.

"Where prayer is a novel exercise, it may, perhaps, exhibit itself in a family with a certain degree of awkwardness. On our first essay to proceed in untried arconstrained; and a consciousness or apmour, our gait may be ungraceful and prehension of this will be apt to embar

rass the beginner. This inaptitude may remain for some time after the false shame above alluded to has ceased to operate; but none have passed their first month of initiation in this good work with his family, without experiencing an internal sense of security that invigorates his hopes and cheers his prospects: his house seems more his castle; and an invisible guard encamps about his bed.

"Prayer flourishes and grows in beauty like a flower in a state of domestic culture. It has a small beginning, but a bright consummation; it is cradled in the clod, but crowned in the sunbeam. To accomplish it well, we have often to begin it ill, that is, as we can, in the midst of retardments and avocations; if not holily, yet humbly; if not with the unction of Divine grace, at least with a full feeling of human depravity; if not with assurance of success, at least with the conviction of need; finding the strongest motive to prayer in the weakness of our efforts to pray. Prayer thrives with repetition. All can try; all can ask; all can kneel." pp. 12, 13.

On this subject of family prayer, our barrister offers the following excellent practical observations:

"In the exhibition of domestic worship the Christian head of a family has a charge of great importance, and a task which calls for discretion. His primary object should be, as I reason from personal experience, to keep his own mind in an honest state, really occupied with that in which he professes to be engaged. In the style of our prayers, public and private, our language is usually suited to the urgency and solemnity of their objects; but often, while the lips are importunate, the heart is cold and unconscious; while the organs are busy, the thoughts are rambling over the fields of illusory hope and turbid anxiety. To keep the thoughts at home, and the sympathies alert; to sustain in the little circle assembled around him, an attention to the thing they are doing and the Majesty they are addressing, is the difficult task of the domestic officiator. Prayer should, on these considerations, have the precedence in the day's arrangements. The sacred duty should open freshly with the dawn, and drink in the dewy ray of the morning; it should meet the orient sun when he comes as a bridegroom out of his chamber, to refresh all things (and why not man's heart?) with new life and motion. Every day opens a scene of cares which surcharge and secularize the soul; so that, if the daily duties or pleasures, or even the first meal is begun before prayer, God takes only a share with the idols of the world in the mixed service of the heart.

"The great effort of the Christian master of a family should be to bring his little congregation together with minds so far vacant from business, and other disturbing influences, as to be the proper recipients CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 331.

of scriptural impressions, and sufficiently disencumbered for spiritual exercise.

"To preface prayer with a chapter of the Bible, or a psalm, judiciously selected, is much to be recommended, as the mind is thereby settled into a frame suited to the office which is to follow, of addressing the Divine Majesty through the Saviour; which is, of course, a duty to be performed on the knees; but which for its vital quality must depend, in no small measure, upon the devout carriage of him who, as the priest of the family, impresses his own character upon the performance." pp. 13 -15.

The whole of the directions in and excellent. We shall quote one this chapter are equally interesting or two illustrations.

"Family prayer should be preceded and succeeded by some moments of silence. It should have a character of distinction and separation; it should dissolve the continuity of earthly interests and engagements, and elevate the thoughts into a higher element. That confluence so apt to take place between the interests of the different worlds should be avoided as much as may be let prayer then have its proper and exclusive course; its own deep bed, and gentle current, bearing on its bosom the commerce of mind with eternity, and carrying refreshment to those whose souls are 'athirst for God.'

"The utterance of prayer is also a matter of great practical importance. It is not the less a rational, because it is a spiritual act: neither inflated nor familiar; neither rapid nor creeping; neither vapouring nor hallucinating; neither declamatory nor dull, it should indicate the predicament of a being in abject need before the throne of Omnipotent Goodness; of a being, however, who comes accredited by invitation, assured by promise, and having a privilege of access purchased for him by blood-the blood of incarnate Deity.

"The prayers of our church service are in general admirably adapted to the wants of the soul and body; and there are few of them that may not by slight additions, omissions, and alterations, be rendered sufficiently pointed and appropriate to suit the temporary and accidental circumstances of every family. They have besides the advantage of being familiar to the hearers, and consequently of being easily followed and participated by those in attendance. But a prayer selected from a spiritual collection is sometimes more profitably impressive, not only from its infrequency and freshness, but from a certain character of affinity which it holds with present feelings and things. They give a sort of spiritual poignancy to what might otherwise lose somewhat of its awakening influence by repetition, they open, as it were, fresh avenues of persuasion, capti 3 L

vate by a gentle surprise, and besiege the heart with a new and effectual artillery." pp. 16-18.

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"With respect to the attendance on this great family transaction, I doubt not that every good householder and amiable Christian must desire to make the circle as wide as convenience and opportunity will permit; for prayer is that transaction in which all have an equal concern. thing is so social, because nothing is of such common interest: it is the right of all, but it is the privilege of the poor. The servants, therefore, within the house should be expected, and the servants out of the house, whether their service be occasional or constant, should be invited to

attend. It is not a complete congregation without them. When accompanied by them we are united in a common bond of spiritual equality, courtesy, and charity, without the smallest disturbance of the principle of subordination by which society is organised and sustained....The master, kneeling beside his servant, is on the same floor with him as a sinner; the servant, kneeling with his master, is on the same eminence with him as a Christian." 19-22.

pp.

Our author's general views of prayer are thus beautifully expressed :-

"What the man of prayer wants, is to come so near the seraphic centre as to catch the cheering glimpse of God's infinite plan of reconciliation, its mysterious operation, its mighty work of love, its singularity of contrivance, its specific holiness. These are the characteristics of divine truth, which the man of prayer must incorporate in his petitions, or he does not pray to Christianity's God. If he prays not through the great Propitiator and Intercessor, he prays to an unknown God, to the phantom of a vain imagination, or to the spectre of a terrified conscience. Never, for a moment, can the Christian with safety depart in his devotional exercises from the great lines of Gospel divinity. The holy exigence of the Divine law, the desolation of a criminal world, the prevailing virtue of a vicarious atonement, in opening a new access to God, these teach us how to pray; the riches of Divine mercy, the regenerative power of Divine grace, the privileges of the Divine communion, and the promises of the Divine covenant, these teach us for what to pray; but these are not to the taste of an unspiritual nature: the intellect refuses the yoke of these disparaging thoughts, proud morality prefers a claim to what is freely proffered to conscious indesert. Man, the relic of a ruined world; man, under sentence from the decree of infallible Justice, claims to judge himself and others by his own variable and vicious standard. With the collar and decorations which belong to the fra

ternity of the good, so called upon earth, he challenges an equal distinction in heaven. He strengthens himself in a corporate resistance of opinion to the humbling decrees of Omnipotence. Our unhappy propensity to weigh our own actions without regard to the balance of the sanctuary, extends itself through every grade of social life; its rank luxuriance casts an unholy shade between man and his Maker, deeper indeed and darker, as moral character descends, but more or less hiding from some of the best and wisest, the pure irradiations of Divine goodness." pp. 34-36.

From prayer our author proceeds to thanksgiving; in the course of his remarks on which, he notices the general heartless and indecent "saying

manner of what is called " grace."

"The reluctant rising, the stifled utterance, the dispatchful haste, the frigid levity, the heartless indifference, the alacrity in sinking back into the half-relinquished seat, the anxiety to avoid the suspicion of being in earnest, are all sure to characterise this ceremony when performed by the mere man of the world, ecclesiastic or laic. The bounties of the Great Giver are to him δωρα αδωρα, giftless gifts, and his return is thankless thanks. Let the Christian gentleman well consider that Jehovah is insulted by unmeaning compliment; that his titles are not words of course; and that to mention him, much more to address him, without real homage, is constructively to blaspheme." p. 28.

The Christian Gentleman does not banish poetry and music from his family; but he watches with no unjealous eye over these powerful sources of good or evil.

"The Bible is replete with poetry and song. The plan of redemption, in all its depth, breadth, and altitude; the Man of Sorrows, the King of Glory, stricken, pierced, exalted; the Bridegroom of the church, the Warrior of salvation, the Conqueror of the last enemy, appear in their genuine colours and characters in the poetry of inspiration." p. 29.

Mr. Roberts is very anxious to Christian Gentleman guard his against the idea of religion being little more than decorum ; acts without sentiments, duties independent of principles. dent of principles. There must, as the foundation of all, be, he says, "faith which worketh by love."

"The right estimation of ourselves is at the bottom of all religious discipline and saving knowledge. We cannot love God until we know what he has done for us, and we cannot know what he has done for us until we know what we are,

and what we have forfeited. It is thus that faith lays the foundation of love. When we see the Deity only in his power and holiness, and clothed in majesty and honour, the terrors of his righteous anger overwhelm us, and fear casteth out lovethe fear of the Judge and castigator. But when we see the door of heaven opened, and the stupendous miracle of his mercy administering to his justice by a sacrifice as costly as even that justice could exact, and ponder that act of unutterable tenderness by which our ransom has been effected, love finds its argument in our nature, in so far, at least, as gratitude is a part of our nature. By this process, and to this extent, we may proceed somewhat in the work of spiritual improvement, and render ourselves, so to speak, more genial recipients of Divine grace. But the love that casteth out fear, that reacts upon our faith, and gives us peace in believing, is the proper conquest of prayer, and the gift only of the Holy Ghost." pp. 38, 39. Our Christian Gentleman is not ashamed to say, that he does not augur well from the changes which are very widely taking place in the system of popular education.

"The Christian philanthropist can prognosticate success from no plan of public instruction which cannot claim God for its patron. To him it will seem to be a sound principle, that man must be dealt with, not merely as a religious being, but as belonging to a peculiar dispensation, from which must flow all his maxims of moral truth; that the purposes of universal education can never be accomplished without a specific and perpetual reference to the one, supreme, authentic model; that as the best learning for the rich, is that which best qualifies them to be guides to the poor; so for the poor, that which soonest carries them to the sources of comfort and contentment, duty and peace; which asks for few intermissions of labour, but makes its pauses refreshing and improving; in short, that the wisdom for the multitude is not the wisdom of the porch or the academy, but that which ' uttereth her voice in the streets,' and opens her school to every variety of condition, without interruption, without disturbance, without excess; that the only proper impelling power for giving motion and effect to all the new machinery of public instruction must be, if any good is to come from it, the genuine purpose of educating the soul for another state, and widening the foundations of human hope." pp. 56, 57.

As little is he satisfied with the aspect of what is called "the religious world."

"The atmosphere of religion itself is full of vapours and false fires. However strong and steady its proper light, many

meteors gather round it and disturb its influence. In the midst of much activity, much moral ebullition, a singleness and integrity of purpose may be wanting. The mass and momentum of the public mind may be parcelled out till its force is frittered away. Societies, schemes, and institutions; committees and sub-committees may teem and swarm upon the floor of the religious world; charities may jostle and cross each other; there may be the dust and smoke and din of philanthropy: school may rival school, and teachers canvass for scholars; there may be the bazaar and the ball; much female commotion and fair impertinence; the daughters of Zion in all their bravery of attire, sitting at their stands and stalls, and forgetting to blush in their pious work of traffic and exposure: but still the crowning end and proper design of all this stir and agitation may be lost sight of, or scarcely mentioned, or faintly avowed. Talk of the soul's concern, and God's sending through a world of sin the healing glory; of making the Saviour known; of proclamation of the Gospel; of giving to the poor the learning that belongs to them by the charter of their spiritual destination, and you may find that you have touched upon a theme to which all this loquacious activity has little distinct referis valuable and sound in any religious or ence: a theme it is that comprises all that charitable undertaking; but it leaves out administers nothing to a mere negotiating the picturesque and captivating part, and and intermeddling egotism." pp. 61-63.

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Christian Gentleman through his We have not space to follow our politics, his literature, his family government, his exterior intercourse, his familiar talk, his worldly dealings, his education, his example, and various other appropriate topics; on all which our author forth the overflowings of his vigorous and high-principled mind, in the same chaste and nervous diction of which we have given our readers the above specimens. His censures are sometimes reasonably caustic; but even this is better than the smile of a flatterer; and we fear he has usually too much truth as the substratum of his strictures, even where they may be overcharged. His object is to make a keen impression on the heart, the conscience, the intellect, and the imagination; and this impression he is not willing to sacrifice to the love of honeyed cadences and dimpled