*

and precision, within the compass of a single discourse, and must therefore lose their efficacy, when exhibited in a broken and disjointed form. Alarmed at the progress of scepticism, we ought conscientiously to adhere to the simplicity and purity of the gospel, and to avoid encumbering it with foreign and eccentric difficulties, which ill-disposed men will be ready to lay hold of for the disparagement of our faith.

"But still more formidable than the assaults of avowed enemies,' is the lukewarmness of pretended friends. The greatest danger, to which religion is exposed in our own times, arises from the decline of piety among many who still bear the Christian name. The public ordinances of religion are deserted by a great proportion of persons in the higher ranks of life; and they are not attended by the generality of professing Christians, with that punctuality, which many of us can recollect to have been observed a few years ago. Nor can it be doubted, that a corresponding laxity has taken place with respect to the duties of family-worship, and private devotion. Supposing a regard for divine ordinances to abate in the same proportion for half a century to come, the very form of religion will disappear. It is therefore more than ever incumbent upon preachers of the gospel, to inculcate the importance of social wor ship, and the necessity of piety towards God, in order to lay the foundation of every social and moral duty. How palpable, as is but two evident from experience, the imbecility of those motives, and the deficiency of those principles of morality, which have been substituted in the place of the love of God, and a reverence for his authority! P. 466.

ART. VIII. Church of England Missions. By J. W. Cunningham, M. A. Vicar of Harrow upon the Hill. Svo. Hatchard. 1814.

THAT it it is the duty of Christian nations to spread the knowledge of the Gospel in all countries to which their dominion is extended, and not merely to publish its glad tiding, but to take a special interest in the success of the publication, is a position too obvious to admit of deliberation. Scarcely less self evident is it, if the revealed counsels of God be allowed to enter into our speculations, that the measure is as unequivocally dictated by an enlightened policy as by religious obligation. Nor will a different result be the issue of the enquiry if experience be resorted to, and a comprehensive survey be taken of the vicissitudes of the universe, and the moral causes of those vicissitudes be searched out; for no proposition is more capable of demonstration, indeed noue has been more abundantly demonstrated, to those who have

eyes

eyes to see it, than this, that "the various revolutions of civil affairs, the rise and fall of empires, the progress, maturity and decay of arts and learning, the impetuosity of human passions, the refinements of politicians, and every movement of the national communities of the earth are adjusted and directed by the deter minate counsel and foreknowledge of God to the ultimate advancement of the Gospel of his Son." (Dean of Winton's Commencement Sermon.)

What thus appears to be at once the duty and the interest of this kingdom with reference to all its foreign possessions, and therefore specially to its Indian territory which has most contributed to its unrivalled greatness, and contains a population by far the most numerous and abject of all its dependencies, though not neglected altogether, has been prosecuted hitherto with an economy so niggardly, and by means so crippled and so obviously inefficient, that it can scarcely be said that we have maintained Christianity at our own Presidencies, much less that any thing in earnest has been done towards its further dissemination. We therefore cordially mingle our voices with those of the "wise and good men" referred to in the first paragraph of the pamphlet before us, in "thanking God, and congratulating each other that the nation, as by a sort of general impulse, has burst the bonds of political speculation and commercial prejudice by which it had too long been fettered, and has nobly resolved to discharge its duty to the prostrate millions of Asia."

But we go no further with Mr. Cunningham, for such a chaos of religious principles does the next passage contain, that Babel, is the only adequate similitude of the confusion. But our readers shall appreciate its merits for themselves.

"Under such circumstances, a question will naturally arise,— What part ought the Church of England to act in the great enterprise of evangelizing the East ?'-To this question we answer, in the first place, That, as the field it open to her in common with every other religious body, she will, doubtless, arise to avail herself of the propitious moment. Remembering the noble works done for her in the days of our fathers, and in the old time before them;' possessed, by her connection with the State, of a more commanding influence than any other body of Christians; she will esteem it her duty to place her troops in the van of the spiritual battle, and to spread her shield over the numerous emissaries of the Gospel.

"But the Church of England will not be satisfied merely to extend the general knowledge of Christianity. The Churchman has gladly co-operated with his Dissenting Brethren for the accomplishment of the end common to both-viz. the diffusion of the Religion of Christ. He rejoices in the zeal with which they prosecute that end he discovers, in the almost immeasurable plains of India, and mountains of Thibet and China, a sphere vast enough to employ all

the

the varied instruments of spiritual reform: but, nevertheless, he by no means surrenders his preference for the illustrious church of which he is a member. On the contrary, when he surveys the extent of the benefits conveyed by the Established Church to the country, and to the cause of general religion; when he contrasts her actual zeal and orthodoxy with the scanty zeal of some of the religious bodies contemporary in their institution with herself; when he reflects, that much of the permanence of her spirit and orthodoxy is, under the Divine blessing, to be ascribed to those formularies behind which they were intrenched, and in which their champions have continually both sought and found a refuge; he feels an imperious call, as far as it may be accomplished by mild, tolerant, charitable means, to endeavour to extend the institutions of the Church wherever the knowledge of Christianity itself is extended. Not to do this, is, in his judgment, not to supply to religion the best pillars on which her Eastern temple can be erected. It is even to deny other modifications of Christianity, a model and a protector, which have been found eminently serviceable at home. It is not to employ what are, in his conception, the best means for the prosecution of the common and paramount end-the general diffusion of Religion.

"Other bodies of Christians have their preferences, with which he does not interfere. But he must be allowed to have his own; a preference founded, in part, upon the collected wisdom of ages, and in part upon his individual experience of the character and energy of the religion which these formularies are calculated to perpetuate. He sees the titles of his church inscribed, not only on the monuments of his ancestors, but upon the ordinary tablets of national character and of domestic life." P. 1.

We have here our author's confession of Faith, and as he speaks the sentiments of a party who characterise themselves as the only true Churchmen within the pale of the Establishment, and further, as our readers when put in possession of his religious principles, will be better able to enter into the project in which he wishes government to embark, we shall attempt an illustration, availing ourselves of whatever may be gathered from other parts of his production to render it compleat.

Our author's notion of Christianity then is, that it is a religious system distinct from "the institutions of the Church." This is set. forth in the above citation, and is repeated frequently in the course of the pamphlet in different forms of expression. He further conceives of it as distinct also from " the peculiar forms or tenets to which all the different bodies of Christians are attached.” (p. 6.) so that what the Church and the several denominations of sect-ries hold in "common" is Christianity, and " their respective preferences," as well those by which the Church is distinguished from other religionists, as those by which they differ amongst themselves are its various " modifications." "His preference,"

ag

as might be expected, is for "the illustrious Church of which he is a Member," (for we conclude that the Churchman whom he introduces to say all that is advanced in favour of our own communion, persenates himself.) Of this Church, he conceives, (p. 12.) that its Rjormation was its infancy, that "its constitution, was then framed," and the rough outlme of its opinions sketched out," the men who built it (p. 11.) having the trowel in one hand, and the sword in the other." Consistently with this he deems its claim to pre-eminence, on the ground of prior institution unfounded, setung forth, (p. 2) "some religious bodies" as in this respect its "cotemporaries," and ascribing " the more commanding infinence which it possesses" beyond what they enjoy to its connection with the State.”

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Such are Mr. Cunningham's views of Christianity in general, and of the Charch of England in particular, from which we confess ourselves incapable of drawing any other inference, but that except on ten poral considerations, or as a matter of taste, it must be to him perfectly indierent to what religious body he belongs, or by which of them his missionary project is undertaken. Nevertheless, as before stated, he avows "his preference for the illustrious Church of which he is a Member ;" and, lest he should be suspected on the one hand of vacillation, or on the other of caprice, be, in the first place, assert, peremptorily that he will by no means surrender" it, and then proceeds to state the grounds of his predilection. These are all contained in the extract which we have made, and though each is sui generis, the first possesses singular claims to attention; for how the "Established Church" ean cacet in" orthodoxy," and other "religious bodies" be deficient in it upon the principle laid down by Mr. Cunningham, that Christianity is a thing distinct from their respective peculiarities, and is held in "common" by both, we profess it to be far beyond our skill in solving paradoxes to explain.

But it is sufficient for Mr. Cunningham that this and the other reasons alle dged--all eminently original-appear clear and con- . vicing to him, and at the same time that they sway his " prefurence" to "his Church,” and his "Modification of Christianity," so temper it with "mildness, tolerance, and charity," that he easily reconciles himself to the various deviations from it, upon the plea that " a:lowed to have his own preferences," "other 1 dies of Christians have their preferences also with which he is not to interfere." In two mstances, indeed, this amiable complacency forskes him. The Papal Modification unfortu match falls in Lis way, and with an harshness quite at variance with his plighol moderation he characterises it (p. 16) as a Faid in which the great principles of religion are too often compromised, and truth and error struggle for the ascendancy.”

Nor

Nor does he less violate the liberality which he professes in his remarks upon the Puritanical Modification as it existed" at the period of the Restoration;" for he charges it, (p. 14 ) with having "by its follies and excesses, brought religion into such general discredit, that every species of devout zeal was almost confounded with hypocrisy, fanaticism, and republicanisin." But he makes ample amends for his severe censure of the parent by his tenderness towards her offspring; for in Modern Puritanism he does not admit any extravagance, any thing mischievous or objectionable. It is the mere preference of the different bodies of Christians of which its various shades are composed, all of whom, as he sets them forth, (p. 16) are "fighing a spiritual cause, by spiritual weapons, not for themselves but for Ged."

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With these principles predominating in his mind, Mr. Cunningham turns his thoughts towards the propagation of the Gospe!; and assuming it as a generally received position, (p. 41) that the extension of Christianity, under any modification, is a paramount object," he gives the reins to his imagination, and transported by it to "the almost immeasurable plains of India, and the mountains of Thibet and China," he there "discovers a sphere vast enough to employ all the varied instruments of spiritual reform," and "rejoicing in the zeal of his dissenting Brethren," be would "gladly co-op rate with them in the accomplishment of the end common to both, viz. the general diffusion of the Gospel of Christ." The passing therefore of the new Act, for regulating the affairs of India, puts him immediately upon the alert; with singular felicity of description, he represents it, (p. 42) as the legislative institution of "a Missionary Race," and as the "throwing open of the field of India to the Church of England, in common with every other religious body" to run for the prize of "Evangelizing" it. He is quite aware, and uses no reserve in declaring it, (p. 7.) that the emissaries of dissent, "who may be expected under the new Act to embark for India, are likely to advocate almost every modification of re igion, with the exception of that which is professed and established by the Church of England:" nay, (p. 42) that they will be "conflicting bodies," when they reach the course where their exploit is to be undertaken, and yet without any hesitation he pronounces (p. 9.) their becoming "possessed of net: powers," for executing their Eastern enterprize, to be "important to the general interests of religion," nay, to be "the propitious moment" for "the Church of England to arise," and "unfurl her missionary baimer:" and, as if this were not enough, he proceeds to answer for her that " she will esteem it her duty to place herself in the Fan of the Spiritual Battle, and to spread her shield over the numerous emissaries of the Gospel," and that, for this among other reasons, that (p. 48) "she niay provide abroad