But we need not dwell on such suppositions-the whole stream of Scripture flows contrary to such a doctrine as that of the invocation of the saints or angels. The doctrine of the Scriptures is this, and no other, that all prayer must be addressed to God in the name and through the mediation of Jesus Christthat the interposition of none other but that of Him is required—that the service of no angels, or saints, or of the blessed Virgin, are requisite that no other advocate but Christ is necessary-that, in short, if any man sin-and this is the doctrine of cardinal importance and blessing to sinners" if any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and he is the propitiation for our sins!" And here the doctrine must rest on this pivot, and on this alone. Whatever men may advance, and churches may ordain, the pious and judicious believer, who is instructed in things pertaining to the kingdom of God out of the Scriptures, will here repose on this rock his confidence and faith, nor suffer them to be shaken therefrom by any plausible theories, or unauthorized interpolations of God's blessed Word. In apostolical language then, I say to one and all of you, "Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility, or senseless prostration of the body to images and pictures, and worshipping of angels, intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, and not holding the Head, from which, all the body by joints and bands having nourishment, ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God!" You will perceive from this passage-and the authority of St. Paul is not one to be lightly esteemed that the worshipping of angels even, who are a higher order of celestial beings, and ordained to minister in holier things, even to do service before the presence, and to attend at the altar of the Lord Jehovah in heaven, is prohibited. Who the angels are is a question to which no other answer can be given than such as is authorized by the written word; and the intimations respecting them are so slight, that it requires the reins of a sound and sober judgment, when we expatiate upon their nature, and describe their offices. In all probability they were created at the time, and within the period, in which the Almighty was engaged in constructing this fabric, and in completing this world of ours; and, at different periods since their creation, have they been employed as harbingers of peace, or as executioners of justice-and even at this moment their ministry is exercised, in a marvellous, but sufficiently intelligible manner, to give consolation and succour to the heirs of salvation, as they are winding their way among the vales, and ascending the hills, of this lower world, in which their guidance is so necessary to keep all of us from the briars and thistles which encumber our path, and their might is so indispensable to countervail the various mines, which the malice of the devil and the hand of mischief have fabricated at every turn of our path-way heavenwards. And, oh! who can doubt but that it is to the ministry of a holy angel, that the traveller heavenwards owes much of his guardianship by night, and of his preservation by day—much of the good thoughts he entertains, the good resolutions he forms, and many of the known and the unknown dangers from which he has

It is the judicious remark of Dr. Clark, that the earthly relations, and even the mother of our Lord herself, were constantly so treated by him after such a manner as to repel the idea that they were capable of doing, or suffering, or interceding, any way meritoriously for us, as if it were on purpose to guard against those gross superstitions, which our Lord foresaw would prevail in the latter ages of the Church.

been rescued? There is no man exercised in the ways of religion, but must have observed, that ofttimes on a sudden, he knows not how, most vigorous, powerful, affecting thoughts of eternity, and the great concerns of religion, have seized and possessed his soul; such affecting thoughts, as at other times, when he composes and sets himself to think of those matters, he cannot, without very great difficulty, if at all, command and retrieve.

But not to dwell on this delightful speculation, nothing can be proved from the ministry and employment of angelic beings with ourselves in serving God, that worship should be paid to these superior intelligences. And if not to them, assuredly not to others, who are called saints in the Roman calendar, and still less to the dead, who have been canonized as saints; to whom invocation should be made, and intercession offered. Dead? Yes, indeed, as death left, so judgment will find them; and if any canonization will happily take place respecting them, that must be adjudicated only at the judgment-day; for the Great Judge is not the Judge of the quick only, but of the dead; and if any of the dead now wear the crown, and have received the kingdom, methinks, much of the duties of the Judge will be, and has been, abridged, and he will be the Judge of the living only, or of such as shall be found alive at his second coming to judge the whole world. I cannot but think, that it is an error in doctrine to suppose that even the good receive their reward, when the mortal struggle with flesh and blood has terminated. It is cheering to the heart to people heaven with such as we loved and honoured on earth. But it is an assumption which is shivered to atoms, when we reflect in the cooler exercise of the judgment, and on the paroxysms of grief subsiding, that thus to people heaven with the objects of our endearment and veneration, is somewhat, and greatly too, to trench on the Judge's province, who alone can arbitrate in such a matter without partiality, and with justice tempered with mercy, and to whom, in the last day, when he shall come again in his glorious majesty to judge both the quick and dead, we pray that we may rise to the life immortal, through Him, who liveth and reigneth for ever and ever!

From the above reflections, then, and more particularly from the Scriptures, you will perceive that saint-worship has no authority by which it can be justified. To the worship and reverence with which the memories of departed saints were regarded, are owing many of the corruptions that grew up in the Church, and a" train of error and fraud ensued which ended in the grossest creatureworship." Yet, in its origin, this was natural and salutary. He, whose heart is not excited upon a spot which a martyr has sanctified by his sufferings, or at

the grave of one who has largely benefited mankind, must be more inferior to

the multitude in the moral, than he can possibly be raised above them in his intellectual, nature. Could the Holy Land be swept clean of its mummeries and superstitions, the thoughts and emotions to be experienced there would be worth a pilgrimage. But it is the condition of humanity, that the best things are those which should most easily be abused. The prayer which was preferred with increased fervency at a martyr's grave, was at length addressed to the martyr himself; virtue was imputed to the remains of his body, the rags of his apparel, even to the instruments of his suffering; relics were required as an essential part of the church furniture; it was decreed that no church should be erected unless some treasures of this kind were deposited within the altar. ana so secured there that they could not be taken out without destroying it, it

was made a part of the service to pray through the merits of the saint whose relics were there deposited, and the priest, when he came to this passage, was enjoined to kiss the altar *.

But upon the various abuses to which it gave occasion, it is not a pleasing, nor a necessary part of my office at present to enlarge, and here with one notice of this practice, to which the Romish communion hath given sanction and countenance, at a very early epoch of the Christian church, I shall draw to a close a discourse, which has been extended to a length much greater than I originally designed; though there are yet some other dogmas of the Papists, which I intended to subject to the test of the Scriptures, and respecting which I have no difficulty whatsoever in saying, they might very easily be proved to have no sanction from the Scriptures to be received as articles of a sound and orthodox Christian church. They are Purgatory, Justification by Works, the Refusal of the consecrated wine to the Laity, and some others of a less consequential nature, and which being not essential to salvation, it is indifferent whether they are observed or not, such as the signing of the cross, &c.: they only become reprehensible when abused, or are made to minister to superstition, or are considered as meritorious in God's sight, or supersede the performance of the more plain and practical duties of the Divine law. In conducting my examination, I have endeavoured to avoid all intemperate expressions, and all exasperating language; and simply to place in juxta-position the tenets held by the Romish church, and the words expressed in the Holy Scriptures; and 1 trust you will now be able to judge for yourselves on which side the truth lies. and to make your election accordingly. If on the side of the Bible, yield to it the whole assent of the understanding-give to it the whole affections of the heart, and let it be your ambition-the noblest that can warm and animate your bosoms-to live by it as a rule of life and doctrine, and become, not so much good Protestants, as good Christians. For we know that there has been made much abuse of that term good, and that it is frequently employed as one expressive more of the zeal and bigotry of a sectarian, than of the piety and consistency which should mark and adorn the whole of the temper and conduct of the Christian.

From the historical account which I have given of the primary translation of the Scriptures into the English tongue, and from the reflections in which I have indulged as to the advantages, which it is impossible to estimate too highly, resulting from their translation, from which myriads and myriads of our forefathers derived, and thousands and tens of thousands amongst us are now deriving, all that can impart comfort, encouragement, and support in the pathway to heaven-in travail and trial, in gloom and solitude, in sunshine and light, in clouds and darkness, then am I satisfied that you will concur with me in the conclusion, that the day on which we were so privileged and so blessed, should be a day of most joyful remembrance, and held in veneration and gratitude in this and in every other generation; and that the fourth day of October, not only on this its third centenary, but that ever in each succeeding year it should be commemorated as the first red-letter day of a consistent Protestant! Frequent commemorations of national blessings are due in gratitude; and frequent reviews of a national constitution are necessary in prudence. For these purposes, the deliverance of the Jews from Egyptian bondage, and the pian • See Southey's admirable work, "The Book of the Church."

of the Mosaical institutions, were commanded to be read over to the people every seventh year, in the year of release, that they might hear and learn to fear the Lord as long as they lived in the land, whither they went over Jordan to possess it. And it would certainly be dangerous in us to lose sight of the errors and slavery from which we have been delivered, or the truths and liberty to which we have been restored. The human mind is so framed, that it cannot long support itself without something of religion to rest upon; and if no public care is taken to instruct it in a reasonable one, it will lay hold on any delusion that the first impostor shall recommend. Our licentiousness has already driven multitudes into enthusiasm; and a conscience plunged into guilt may as readily catch at popery itself. We seem indeed but little apprehensive of danger from that quarter at present; yet the converts from our church to popery are notoriously increasing. The mine, not attended to, is more dangerous than the unmasked battery, which, while it threatens, puts us on our guard; and experience convinces us, that nominal professors, when unprincipled, may fly for shelter into the very jaws of that superstition which we have thrice happily escaped, from a religion to whose power and beauty they were entirely strangers *.

It is a just reflection, that "we often grow insensible of our blessings, merely from the long and uninterrupted possession of them. And this insensibility usually makes us careless of preserving them, till we are again taught to judge of their value, by their loss. Something of this kind, it is to be feared, is our own case at present with regard to the Reformation. We have possessed that blessing so long, that we have forgot to enjoy it. Ignorant of the servitude under which our fathers groaned, we know not how to relish our own deliverance the deformities of a superstition three hundred years ago are so far out of sight, as to make us less attentive to the beauties of a reasonable service. By these means, we not only reap less pleasure than we might, and produce less fruit than we ought; but we grow less apprehensive of the tyranny that watches to enslave us, and less zealous to maintain that liberty which our ancestors sacrificed their lives to purchase for us." In the truth and justice of these reflections, who will not acquiesce, and see in them additional reason for the pious commemoration of this day, and to let it be a kind of gracious remembrancer to stir us up to continued vigilance and wakefulness, lest we should see wrested from us that reasonable service, the maintenance of which in all its original purity and excellence, forms the firmest rampart against infidelity, is the surest bulwark of the throne, the best defence of liberty, and the most impregnable support to pure and undefiled religion. "Be watchful, then, Protestants! Strengthen, then, Christians! the things which remain. Remen ber how you have received, and heard, and hold fast and repent." Amen. Ridley's Life of Ridley."

See "

THE BIBLE THE TREASURY OF KNOWLEDGE.

REV. A. MAYOR, LL.D.

PARISH CHURCH OF GRAVESEND, KENT, OCTOBER 4, 1835.

"Search the Scriptures."-JOHN, v. 39.

On this day your ministers regard it as a sacred duty, to excite your gratitude to Almighty God for the great blessings of the Reformation, and particularly for that inestimable treasure, a Bible in your native language. By the Protestant churches on the Continent these important events have been celebrated with pious thankfulness each succeeding centenary since their occurrence. Of the public commemoration of these blessed privileges England has hitherto been negligent. In this country the struggle for emancipation from the tyranny and degrading superstitions of Popery was long and arduous. The Reformation was obstructed in its early progress by the infuriate rage of a bigoted queen. Contending for five years against the fire and faggot of a bloody persecution, its motion was apparently retrograde, and its holiest and bravest champions suffered martyrdom at the stake. These circumstances, probably, prevented the English from fixing any precise date as the era of the Reformation of their Church.

On the twenty-first of November, 1834, all the Lutheran churches in Germany, and the Moravians in this country, celebrated, with great solemnity, the third centenary since the publication of the entire Bible in German by Luther. This circumstance has excited the minds of the English Protestants of all denominations, to follow their laudable example.

For a similar blessing we have a precise, definite date. On the fourth of October, 1535, just three hundred years ago this day, was completed the printing of the first entire English Bible, translated by Miles Coverdale. This Bible was dedicated and presented to Henry the Eighth, who, though not half a Protestant, allowed it to be publicly read; and Coverdale was afterwards constituted bishop of Exeter by Edward the Sixth.

But these subjects have been anticipated in the former services of the day; and being unexpectedly called to address you, my intention is an attempt to shew you that the Word of God, the Bible, is an exhaustless store-house of the most invaluable knowledge; a fathomless mine, enclosing the richest gems of philosophy and science; that it contains the fountains of those perennial streams of wisdom, which the sceptic and minute philosopher, with painful toil labour to trace to other sources, and with aching eyes endeavour I. vain to discover in other spots; that the Bible communicates to us the know