ards, the Westminster" Form of Church-government," and "Directory," are entirely excluded from the Basis. The general statement on the head of Presbyterian government is chargeable with ambiguity, and, unless inadvertency be pleaded, is evasive. The expression of veneration for our Reforming ancestors, and of a warm sense of the value of their efforts in the cause of civil and religious liberty," I have no doubt, is "unfeigned;" and the approval of "the method adopted by them for mutual excitement and encouragement by solemn confederation and vows to God," is so far good. But I must be allowed to add, that this is saying no more than has been often said, by those friends of civil and religious liberty whose system of religion was very opposite to that of our Reforming ancestors; and that it is a very poor substitute for that explicit approbation of and adherence to the Covenanted Reformation of Britain which Seceders formerly avouched. This is all that the United Synod have to say respecting our National Covenants; they 66 approve of the method adopted-by solemn confederation and vows to God;" but they have not a word to say on the present or continued obligation of these vows. For, surely, it was not expected that the public would consider this as included in the following declaration : "We acknowledge that we are under high obligations to maintain and promote the work of Reformation begun, and to a great extent carried on by them." Nothing, in fact, could be more disgraceful to these covenants than to attempt to bring them in under the cover of such an expression: and, after the open, decided, express, and repeated avowals of the perpetual obligation of the National Covenant of Scotland and the Solemn League and Co

venant of the three kingdoms, in the former profession, and in the Ordination-formula, of the two bodies now composing the Union, the omission of every thing of this kind, and the careful exclusion of the very names of these covenants, can be viewed in no other light than a practical renunciation of their obligation, and a rescinding of all former declarations in favour of it. If the United Synod were the same with the original Seceding body, how severely would they condemn themselves by the charge which they once and again brought against the Established Church after the Revolution, because " they did not, by any particu lar act of Assembly, assert the obligation of our Covenants, national and solemn league, and their binding force upon posterity*." On the provision made by the articles for the practice of covenanting, I have only to observe, that this exercise was all along viewed, in that part of the Secession by which it was observed, as the most solemn mode of sealing the common profession of the whole body; that as such it was engaged in at the express call of the supreme judicatory; and that, when the United Synod cannot say that "the circumstances of Providence require it," I can scarcely persuade myself that it is seriously contemplated to practise this sacred service in a manner which would discredit it, and which is totally irreconcilable with Presbyterian principles †. With respect to the religious clause in some Burgess oaths

*Act and Testimony, in Display, i. 90. Acknowledgement of Sins, ib. 231.

Formerly sessions were left to determine when the performance of the duty was suitable to the circumstances of their respective congregations; but now they must determine whether Providence is requiring the duty, or in other words, whether it be at all a duty incumbent on the church in the present times.

which occasioned the original strife, the preamble to the Basis supposes that there are some "towns where it may still exist," and all the provision it makes with respect to this is, that "both Synods agree to use what may appear to them the most proper means for obtaining the abolition" of it. No provision is made, that, if they shall be unsuccessful in their applications for an abolition of it, the oath shall not be taken in the united society; although it is well known that one of the parties had all along maintained that Seceders involved themselves in contradiction by swearing it, and continued down to the time of the Union, to require all intrants to public office among them to declare their solemn approbation of an act condemning it in this point of view. They are thus involved in a judicial allowance of what they hold to be sinful; and have recognized a principle which may be applied to an indefinite extent, and which ought to have been guarded against with the utmost care, as it enters into all the loose plans of communion which are so fashionable in the present day. This is still more evident from the engagement which they have come under, that they "shall carefully abstain from agitating in future the questions which occasioned" the separation. It is proposed that the united Synod shall prepare a Testimony," containing the substance of the Judicial Act and Testimony, the Act concerning the Doctrine of Grace, and the Answers to Nairn's Reasons of Dissent." What some may understand by the substance it may be difficult to say; but if the proposed Testimony really contain the substance of the first and last named of these papers, the basis will not support the superstructure. In answer to all this, some will say, We are at full liberty

to hold all our principles as formerly. But such persons should remember, that the question is not about their principles, but the principles, or rather the public profession, of the body; and that it has been chiefly by means of the latter, that the declarative glory of God has been promoted in every age, and his truths and cause preserved and transmitted to posterity.

It is painful to me to be obliged to speak in this manner of the terms of a union, which it would have filled my heart with delight to see established on a solid and scriptural foundation. But in such cases there is a duty incumbent on all the friends of the cause of the Reformation and the Secession: and this they must discharge whatever it may cost them, and regardless of the obloquy that they may hereby incur. They are sacredly bound to adhere to that cause, to confess it, and, according to the calls of providence, to appear openly in its defence. It cannot but be grieving to them to find that the attempt made to heal the breach among its professed friends has discovered that disaffection to it existed to a greater extent than they could have imagined. They may be accused as the enemies of peace and union. But they have this consolation, that they still occupy that ground on which their fathers displayed a faithful testimony for the truths and laws of Christ against prevailing defection; and that they are adhering, without any reservation, or any mark of dissent, to that testimony, and to those books of public authority which were formerly agreed on for settling and preserving religious unity and communion on the most extended scale. And they are encouraged to maintain this ground by the hope which they still cherish, that the

God of their fathers and of their vows, will yet, in his merciful providence, bring round a time of reformation; and that, when this period shall have arrived, the Westminster Standards may form a rallying-point around which the scattered friends of religion, in this land, shall meet, and again happily combine.

Caw & Elder, Printers.

THE END.