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every church to ordain its own ministers, ordained for them, in their successive journeys or visitations, elders in every church. When, from the extension of the church, the apostles' own personal superintendence was partly precluded, for there were not such facilities of intercourse then as there are now, and when advancing years reminded the apostles to proceed yet farther, and, as their Lord had authorized them to do, hand on their commission to others, that, at their death, the governors of the church might not be extinct, then Paul ordained Timothy and Titus, as bishops of distant churches (Crete and Ephesus); merely reserving to himself that sort of paramount control, which resides in our archbishops, and the palpable existence and exercise of which for many years is, to my mind, so utterly incompatible with all modern notions of independency.

"To these persons only he sent the instructions before alluded to, about ordaining presbyters and deacons, saying to one of them, ' Ordain elders in every city, as I had appointed thee;' to the other, Lay hands suddenly on no man;' and without the remotest insinuation, in either case, of it being competent to the people to become ministers of one another, without the intervention of apostolic, or (which is the same thing) episcopal authority; however holy and well-qualified they might, in their self-sufficiency, suppose themselves to be, or really might be."-Pp. 130-132.

ART. II-1. A Letter to the Right Rev. Father in God, Richard Lord Bishop of Oxford, on the Tendency to Romanism, imputed to Doctrines held of old, as now, in the English Church. With an Appendix, containing Extracts from the Tracts for the Times, and other Works. By the Rev. E. B. PUSEY, D.D. late Fellow of Oriel College, Regius Professor of Hebrew, and Canon of Christ Church. Oxford: Parker and Rivington. 8vo. Pp. 239. 1839.

2. The Church of England defended against the Church of England Quarterly Reviewer. A Letter to the Laity. By a PARSON. London Burns. 8vo.

1839.

3. The True State of the Case considered; or, the Oxford Tracts, the Public Press, and the Evangelical Party. By G. P. DE SANCTA TRINITATE. London: Pickering. 8vo. Pp. 60. 1839.

4. Dr. Hook's " Call to Union" defended: a Reply to Fraser's Answer. London: Burns. 8vo. Pp. 38. 1839.

5. Tracts of the Anglican Fathers. Part II. Jewell and Nowell. London: Painter. 8vo. Pp. xv. 112. 1839.

WHATEVER may be the reflecting reader's own opinion on the subjects treated of in the Oxford Tracts, he cannot fail of being delighted with the Letter of Dr. Pusey. Religious controversy has usually been carried on with so much rancour and ill-will, that we turn with pleasure to the writings of a minister of Christ, who, mighty in the Scriptures, reasons rather as a man whose heart is impressed with the precepts of Christianity, than as one whose temporal interests alone are bound up in the promulgation of his views. Right or wrong, Dr. Pusey comes forward

in his sacred office of an ambassador of God, calmly to defend, boldly to advocate, his particular opinions, to argue fairly with his opponents in theology. This manly and noble bearing will at all times be attended with the admiration of the good, nay more, it will ever be rewarded with the approval of the Deity. But it is more than ever to be valued when, as in the present case, it is in answer to attacks in which truth forms no prominent feature: the authors of which, charity would have led us to suppose, did we not from experience know it to be the case, have never even read the works they calumniate. Well would it have been for divine truth had controversialists ever exhibited in their arguments the fairness and forbearance so conspicuous in this volume. Strange is it that writers can overlook the fact, that the cause of Christianity must always be retarded by the exhibition of unchristian feeling; calm investigation must result in truth. Let those who differ from our author remember, that reasons do not lose their force from being couched in courteous language. We ourselves have no leaning towards popery, nor have we, perhaps, much towards this Oxford party; but we are anxious to see so interesting a discussion continued. Though some of the points it has raised seem trifling, there are many of much importance. These last ought to be settled. At all events, it will appear to him who is more desirous to elicit truth, than he is to advocate particular opinions, that the men who have produced the Oxford Tracts have too much religion to be hastily condemned, are too talented to be lightly esteemed.

In the "Letter" before us the author sets himself to answer the three chief objections which can be gleaned from the writings of his adversaries :

The charges, (he says,) brought against us are heavy disaffection to our own Church, unfaithfulness to her teaching, a desire to bring in new doctrines, and to conform our Church more to the Church of Rome, to bring back either entire or modified Popery.-P. 10.

It would be impossible to give even a correct outline of this work in our present limits, as it is more argumentative than verbose; we cannot, however, too highly recommend its perusal to all who are interested in a subject which is daily becoming more and more engrossing. Our author's view of the common notions of Popery is striking; and the nice distinctions people are in the habit of making respecting religious forms are ingeniously put forward in the following passage:

Time was when the use of the surplice, the cross in baptism, the very use of the Lord's Prayer in the same part of the service which it occupied in the ancient ritual, to bow at the name of our Lord, to stand during the reading of the gospel, to administer confirmation, to turn his face at any time from the people, or, before service ended, remove from the place where it was begun, and the like, were accounted popish by those of the extreme reformation, whose principle it was, that in nothing they may be followed which are of the Church

VOL. XXI. NO. VIII.

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of Rome. Whither that principle leads, our Church has once had but too unhappy experience. But the principle, though modified, is not abandoned; it is not now popish to bow at the name of our LORD in the Creed, but it is popish to do so at any other time; the cross in baptism is not popish, but for any privately to retrace that mark upon himself, though a practice of the early church, is popish; to baptize infants is not popish, but to hold that all infants derive benefit from baptism is altogether Popery; to bow to the altar, where such (as in some cathedrals) is the received custom, is not popish, but to speak of it with respect is so. The title "Altar" is not popish in the coronation service, because it is part of the ritual of our Church, but (though a scriptural and primitive title), used by any private clergyman, it is an indication of Popery. To kneel towards the east is not popish in a cathedral, or in the ordination service by a bishop, but, in a priest (although no innovation) it is so. Again, it was not so accounted in Hooker's time, in the Church; but that has become popish in the nineteenth, which was not in the seventeenth. It is not popish, if any one taking one alternative offered him by his Church, "all priests and deacons are to say, daily, the morning and evening prayer, either privately or openly, not being let by sickness, or some other urgent cause," shall say them by himself in his own house; but if any one taking the alternative enjoined to the parochial minister, unless reasonably hindered, say the same in the parish church, or chapel, where he ministereth, and from any cause none come to pray with him," then to pray by himself in the church is popish, and partakes of the nature of "private masses."-Pp. 10—12.

Dr. Pusey thinks that the 8th and 20th articles of our Church should be taken together in order to be correctly understood. These articles, on the Sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures for Salvation, and the Authority of the Church, are elaborately and ingeniously considered. The widedrawn distinction between the words "Holy Scripture contains all things necessary to salvation;" and "Holy Scripture teaches all things necessary to salvation ;" savours, perhaps, slightly of that special pleading which in sacred subjects should be avoided; and which in the work before us, from its general character, at stumbling on we felt rather startled. But this is not long dwelt on. Our author quickly lays aside cavilling, and proceeds to reason. He is a forcible and effective writer. The passage on the dread some manifest to the study of tradition, and the scorn in which others hold it, is truly eloquent.

It is scarcely uncharitable to suspect, that, beneath this professed and conscious dread lest an appeal to tradition should give Rome an advantage, there lurks also a secret and unconscious, or half-conscious dread for themselves; they have good reason to suspect, if they do not absolutely know, that christian antiquity is against them, and so they would anticipate the blow by stifling it; they fear that her voice should be listened to, and so would drown it by their outcries against her; and while they close the ear against her, as if she would give witness for Rome which she would not give, they hope to escape bearing the testimony which she would give against the anti-sacramental system of Geneva.

But this is an alarming course, and the irreverential spirit in which it is begun, bodes but ill of its termination. It were an ungrateful task were any to set themselves systematically to show that christian antiquity were not to be trusted; yet this would require patience and research; but what must one think of the piety and reverence which would make sport with the supposed defects of the fathers of the Church, and discover their fathers' shame; which would repeat from mouth to mouth the one or other saying, which themselves had first misunderstood and distorted, in order triumphantly to ask what

could be thought of the judgment of men who could so speak? Truly, it seems like the Philistines making sport with the mighty man whose eyes they had first put out, and likely to meet with their end. It was scarcely in so irreverential, but in the same sceptical spirit, that Semler, the parent of German neology, began unravelling the belief of his country; but the criticisms of the fathers mounted up to the criticism of the apostles, and the criticism of the apostles to that of their Lord; and the disbelief in their Lord, is, in its last stage, become a dethroning of God, and a setting up of self-a pantheism which worships God as enshrined in self.—Pp. 58, 59.

Dr. Pusey enters into the subject of prayers for the dead, and refers to the judgment of Sir Herbert Jenner in the case of Breeks v. Woolfrey, which is given fully in the British Magazine, vol. xv. p. 91. We earnestly recommend this chapter to those who say that the doctrine of praying for the dead is necessarily interwoven with that of purgatory. This tenet seems only to have been alluded to in the course of argument, and not brought forward in the Oxford Tracts with any intention of having it introduced into the public service of our Church. It has been dragged to light merely to be abused by those who are unfavourable to it; as it was thought, that since Romanists consider, or affect to consider, it identical with purgatory, it would afford a good handle by which Popery might be fastened on the authors of the Oxford Tracts. These latter (we rejoice to say it) put no shackles on a practice which had its rise in the hearts of the early Christians, and which was engendered by adoration towards God, and affection towards man. They would not tell the christian child, as he bends over the lifeless form of a beloved parent, that he must not look up to God, and pray for that spirit which never again will beam forth with kindness from those glassy eyes. They would not check the disconsolate husband, bereaved of the wife of his bosom in her youth and beauty, in praying for one he so intensely loved; at the same time they think it so solemn and sacredso connected with feelings of private devotion, and the tearing up of the heart's affections, that they would not bring it forward to the public gaze, and make it a rival to the undertaker's pomp, though they feel bound to speak of it with interest and love.

We conclude, at present, our observations on this powerful Letter, by giving an extract on the practical character of catholic truth :-

Catholic truth is so intrinsically practical, that it is less exposed than any human system, however apparently spiritual, to be received as a mere theory. Even where it has been embraced without any consciousness of sacrifices involved, it has, in well-prepared minds, gradually drawn towards the shore those whom it had inclosed in its net-they contentedly found their liberty circumscribed. The submission to rightful authority, characteristic of the true catholic system, repressed too individual tendencies; it wound itself round them; encircled them with its solemn rounds of duties, and devotions, and abstinences, thwarting the natural will, and subduing self, calming the passions, and elevating the affections; not acting turbidly, but rather unloosing limb by limb from their enthralments, and gently moulding and fashioning them to perform the fuller measures of the duties of the gospel.-P. 235.

Much as we regret leaving Dr. Pusey so soon, our limits now oblige us to consider other works which have appeared in furtherance of the same cause of which he is so eloquent a champion.

The next which stands at the head of this article, is "A Letter to the Laity, by a Parson." There is a certain quaintness of style about this pamphlet; and though it contains a great deal of point, and may be said to demolish the Church of England Quarterly Reviewer, there is much in its composition we do not altogether approve. First, it is an anonymous publication; and we confess ourselves to be of so oldfashioned a school as to like to see the name of the man who would instruct us. The author states he is a Parson; and why then, we not unnaturally ask, when he only means to write in defence of the doctrines of the Church, should he wish to conceal himself from the eyes of churchmen? Were there no talent displayed in his method of treating the subject he has chosen-did he not in these few pages show that he certainly understands his subject, we should tell him that the most approved course of study is to learn to read before one writes, and recommend obscurity as his most proper sphere. As it is, we would tell him, he possesses that which should make him scorn to attack anonymously an insignificant reviewer, and boldly press forward to a nobler arena. There is wanting, too, in this pamphlet that christian feeling for which Dr. Pusey stands so pre-eminent. And this we would especially notice, because, coming from a man professedly in this public office of "Parson," there is almost a degree of flippancy in this method of addressing his brethren of the laity, and this is ill-judged. Nine out of ten of the laity, and there are some who, if summoned to a synod to debate the truth or falsehood of doctrinal statements," might have good sense enough to leave the meeting, were they to be "decided by loudness of clamour," -would consider there was something too arrogant about the Parson's manner. We think, however, that all who have read the Church of England Quarterly Review, would do well to read this Letter, and hope the author will, for the future, choose a subject more worthy his abilities.

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"The True State of the Case considered," is a cleverly written production; though, on reading it, we cannot exactly agree with the author in thinking" he belongs to neither of the two parties concerned in this controversy." Every bystander, at any rate, would think he has a great leaning towards the Oxford divines. There seems, too, no reason why, holding the sopinion he evidently does on the conduct of the evangelical party, and the views of their opponents, he should not boldly censure the one, and at once espouse the cause of the others. Far from a man, who is altogether neutral, having more weight than he whose opinions are decided; the contrary is in faith the fact. The man who halts between two opinions from necessity, can neither write nor act

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