A censorship of the press is kept up, and it is a curious sequel to the history of M. Malan, that M. Cheneviére, who had been a principal in his persecution, having published a small volume in which he ventured to reprobate the reestablishment of the Jesuits in Fribourg, found its circulation interdicted by the Council of State, who feared that it might shake the firm Helvetic Confederacy.

FRENCH PROTESTANTS.

In making a survey of the religious character of a people, some fixed standard is required; and as I am a Christian, I profess, in my judgment of men and their opinions, to be governed by the Christian's law. Receiving myself, as far as I am acquainted with its principles, the Bible, as the rule of faith and practice, if I censure other men's doctrines or conduct, it is no fault of mine, but theirs who differ from the infallible standard.

So much may seem necessary to be said, since the world has advanced so wondrously in the science of liberality, that if a man be not a disorganizer in society, he may profess what principles of rebellion he pleases against the King of Heaven; and they are in great danger of

being accounted persecuting bigots who dare to censure unfaithfulness to the truth. The disavowal of party motives and persecuting rancour is due to myself, since these are not consciously cherished; and is of importance, when in sorrow, not in anger, we declare what we have found in churches fallen from their ancient purity.

It is but a preparation for deep disappointment when the Christian traveller studies the history of the Reformed Churches of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, before he goes forward to visit the lands which were once the glory of Christendom. We see so much devotedness and earnest zeal in the cause of God, in those who then raised the standard of the Cross in spite of opposition, chains and death, that after our sympathies have been set to such a tone, we cannot easily feel in accordance with common men. So long as we indulge merely fanciful vagaries, we may hope that the succes

sors of Calvin, and Beza, and Claude, inherit largely of the primeval spirit. But we soon come back to sounder notions; for we need not cross the Atlantic to learn, that station does not always confer ability upon its occupant, nor the spirit fall with the garments of the inspired prophet.

Man so acts upon man, and the philosophy of the age upon Christians, that we should not expect a favourable report of the present state of the French churches.

There is enough in their history, since the revocation of the edict of Nantz, to confute Mr Gibbon's explanation of the cause of the success of Christianity in the fact of its being persecuted. If God be pleased to leave events to their natural consequences, persecution will certainly be ruinous to any body, if it be continued and bloody, so long as suffering and death are the objects of human dread.

The laws of Louis XIV., of infamous memory, as they destroyed all confidence among friends, and all communion between the minister and his people, were effectual, under Louis XV. and Louis XVI., in forcing the Protestants from Christian ministrations, and in depriving them of the service of enlightened mini

sters.

Notwithstanding the deserved encomiums upon the last named, and best of the Bourbon kings, he is to be included in the list of those whose agency has been fearfully active in breaking down the interests of true religion. I have myself seen, in the vicinity of Nismes, a spot consecrated by many recollections of confessors and martyrs, where the Protestants assembled so lately as the commencement of the Revolution for their religious duties. They took refuge, even in the reign of this ill-fated monarch, in a quarry, where the rocks were their

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