1. Sixteenth Annual Report of the Trustees of the Per- kins Institution and Massachusetts Asylum for the 2. A Blind Man's Offering. By B. B. Bowen. 3. Treatment and Cure of Crétins and Idiots, etc. By - Ware's Aurelian, Follen's Birthday, Hours for - Waterston's - Farley's - Lunt's Discourses Everett's Eulogy on John Quincy Adam's Dedication Sermon, Parker's Sermon on Sun- Le Christianisme Expérimental. Par Athanase Coque- II. DOCTRINAL INSTRUCTION IN SUNDAY SCHOOLS The Nineteenth Annual Report of the Sunday School A Collection from the Newspaper Writings of Nathaniel Life of Jeremy Belknap, D. D., the Historian of New Hampshire; with Selections from his Correspondence Channing's Ordination Sermon, - Farley's Sermon on a Business Life, - Whitney's Sermon on the Death of Little Children,― Richardson's Farewell Discourses,— Bellows's Ordination Sermon, Gannett's Sermon on the Good Judge, - Briggs's Convention Discourse, — Giles's Sermon on the Guilt of Contempt,-Waterston's Dedication Sermon ; - Sedgwick's Discourse at Sche- Religious Intelligence. -Ecclesiastical Record, -Memo- THE CHRISTIAN EXAMINER AND RELIGIOUS MISCELLANY. JANUARY, 1848. ART. I. COQUEREL'S EXPERIMENTAL CHRISTIANITY.* It is a common opinion, and one which we regret to see so prevalent in our own country, that the French nation is a nation without religion, and even without religious aspirations. If any horrible crime is committed in France, there are hundreds to be found who will exclaim, What else could be expected in a country where there is no religion? These are grave imputations, and, as it seems to us, require some proofs to support them. That the French do not willingly accede to the present religion of France is a fact which we would not even wish to deny, for it is on this fact we found our belief that religious feeling is not extinct in that country. The time when Catholicism could exercise any real influence over the French people has passed away, never more to return. Catholicism is but nominally the religion of the majority of the French nation. Does it, however, follow, that in the hearts of those who have deserted the altars of the Church of Rome the pure flame of religion has become extinct? By no means. It is, indeed, impossible for man to eradicate from his breast that religious instinct which God himself has implanted within it. He may, for a time, seem no more to hear its voice, but he will sooner or later be again obliged to acknowledge its existence. So, too, a nation may, during a period of religious * Le Christianisme Expérimental. Par ATHANASE COQUEREL, l'un des Pasteurs de l'Eglise Réformée de Paris. Paris. 1847. 12mo. pp. 527. VOL. XLIV. 1 4TH S. VOL. IX. NO. I. and social convulsion, no longer obey the dictates of this impulse, and abandon itself entirely to all the uncertainty and horror of skepticism and materialism. But when the revolutionary storm has subsided, when a nation has obtained that political or social freedom for which it struggled, it will feel, that, to enable man to bear the sorrows and disappointments which await him in this world, a cold and lifeless philosophical system is inadequate. It will then, once more, seek for an altar where it may offer up its prayers to God. This has been the case in France. Since that revolution, which was caused, perhaps, as much by the skepticism of the eighteenth century as by the vices of the Regent or of Louis XV., the French begin to feel the necessity of a religion in harmony with their real spiritual wants. If this view of the present condition of France is not often taken, it is because we are apt to form our idea of the moral and social condition of a people from the extremes of society. This is unjust. It is not by what we see among a gay and heartless aristocracy, or in those classes that are plunged into the depths of misery, and of vice, the necessary companion of misery, that an opinion of this kind is to be formed. If such were the only means of judging of the morality of a people, how low would England stand in our estimation! It is from the condition of the middle classes, that is to say, the majority of the nation, that we must judge of the whole nation. If these classes are content with their imperfect form of worship, or if they are devoid of religious sentiment, then, and then only, may we despair of the future religious progress of a nation. If we look at the middle classes in France, we shall not, however, find any cause of despair. We shall there find many thousands of Catholics, who, were it not for that mysterious sympathy which binds every man to the faith of his fathers, and to that mode of worship which he was taught to profess when a child, would abandon their religion and become members of some Protestant church. We have ourselves known some who, although truly religious, never had taken the sacrament, because they were unwilling to conform to the usage of their Church preparatory to this ceremony, unwilling to confess their sins to a sinner like themselves. We have known others, again, who did not believe in the Trinity, or who denied the infallibility of the Pope. And yet all these persons sincerely and honestly believed themselves Catholics. Tranquillize the conscientious anxi |