of God's law. It is one noble feature,-may not we say, a peculiar feature-of our Liturgy, that so large a portion of the sacred Scriptures is brought daily before our notice;

e

"The great care then (in the Church's earlier days) was to oblige men carefully to study the Scriptures in a practical way." Bingham, Antiq. b. vi. ch. 5. sect. 5. It is true of human writings as well as of the holy Scriptures, that the more practical we can make our studies, the better. "He had read the Fathers much, and gave me this notion of them, that in speculative points, for which writers of controversy searched into their works, they were but ordinary men; but their excellency lay in that which was least sought for, their sense of spiritual things, and of the pastoral care. In these he thought their strength lay. And he often lamented, not without some indignation, that in the disputes about the government of the Church, much pains were taken to seek out all those passages that shewed what their opinions were; but that due care was not taken to set out the notions that they had of the sacred function, of the preparation of mind and inward vocation, with which men ought to come to holy Orders; or of the strictness of life, the deadness to the world, the heavenly temper, and the constant application to the doing of good, that became them." Bp. Burnet's Character of Mr. Charteris. See Bp. Jebb's edition of Burnet's Lives, p. 298. 12mo. edition. Bp. Jebb's own views seem to have coincided with those of the above extract. He says in one of his Letters, "I particularly like the use made of the Fathers; they are quoted for moral and spiritual, rather than for controversial, purposes." Life, vol. ii. Letter 81, p. 420. See also Letter 52, in the same volume.

brought too, not at a time when we are disposed to view things in a cold and heartless manner, as if they were mere matters of speculation, but in the midst of prayers and praises, when, if ever, they are likely to find access to our hearts, and shed their genial warmth upon our understandings, and dissolve our prejudices, and unfetter our judg

ments.

With regard to the fifth Sermon: the author had often felt, that in such plans as he had heard proposed for effecting something more of union among the now estranged portions of the Christian Church, there was one point not brought forward with sufficient prominence the necessity of mutual humiliation and self-abasement.

It is the object of the Sermon in question to endeavour to press home these duties, and to shew the beneficial results, which, under God, might be expected to follow, if our Lord's precept, "first cast out the beam out of thine own eye," were to be generally complied with by the various denominations of Christians in their bearing towards each other. We have all sins, for which we have good cause to humble ourselves. And could we

but be persuaded to fix our eyes, each of us, on our own transgressions, and to endeavour to live, each of us, in accordance with our own standard, this would be one of the most promising signs of peace. But alas! as things now are, we seem to forget that we have faults of our own: we are loud in exalting ourselves and depreciating our neighbours, and we are so accustomed to the noise of strife, that our ears are not shocked.

It seemed necessary, in the application of the subject, that something should be said in the way of particularizing those faults, for which we, as members of the Church of England, have cause to humble ourselves. It was not without fear and trembling that the writer ventured to touch upon a point so delicate. He earnestly hopes, however, that what he has written, as it was not penned, at least he trusts not, in a self-complacent or irreverent spirit, so it will neither give needless pain to any of his own communion, nor afford a just handle of reproach to any who are of another persuasion.

There may be those, perhaps, who will think that the picture he has drawn of the state of our Church is too gloomy. He

would only reply, that his subject required him to point out faults rather than excellencies. That there is, notwithstanding, much cause for encouragement, he is deeply persuaded. Only let her not trust in an arm of flesh; let her not stay herself upon the thought, that she is entwined around the institutions of the country, or that she can command a majority of votes in our legislative assemblies, (frail and brittle hopes, as she has ere now experienced ;) but let her be true to her own laws, and, above all, to God's laws; let her keep the faith; let her priests be clothed with righteousness; let them be men of prayer, faithful and diligent in waiting on their ministry, burning with the love of souls, and with zeal for their Master's glory, and shining like lights in their respective spheres; and upon all her children, of whatsoever order, let there be poured a spirit of humiliation for past sins, and of sincerity in aiming at future reformation, a spirit of obedience and order and meekness and brotherly love and charity; and, by God's mercy, she will yet be continued a blessing to our land from generation to generation. The worst evil she has to

fear is, lest a time of prosperity should make her secular and slothful; forgetful that she is a pilgrim, and unmindful of her high duty; the duty of bearing witness to the truth, by word and by example, both at home and abroad; and of keeping inviolate, and transmitting onward from age to age till her Lord shall come, the sacred deposit which He has entrusted to her care.

• See Bishop Butler's Sermon before the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts. "God, if he had so pleased, could indeed miraculously have revealed every religious truth, which concerns mankind, to every individual man; and so he could have every common truth; and thus have superseded all use of human teaching in either. Yet he has not done this: but has appointed that men should be instructed by the assistance of their fellow-creatures in both..... Further still it being an indispensable law of the Gospel, that Christians should unite in religious communities, and these being intended for repositories of the written "oracles of God," for standing memorials of religion to unthinking men, and for the propagation of it in the world; Christianity is very particularly to be considered as a trust deposited with us in behalf of others, in behalf of mankind, as well as for our own instruction . And the more widely we endeavour to spread its light and influence, as the forementioned circumstances and others of a like kind open and direct our way, the more faithful shall we be judged in the discharge of that trust, which is committed to us as Christians, when our Lord shall require an ac-"