fon injuftifying the ways of God to man.' The objections to prayer are fairly stated, and, few will doubt, fatisfactorily anfwered; while the pleafures arifing from devotion are defcribed in a manner that will convince every one in what a high de gree they were felt by the author, and muft excite an earnest defire of experiencing the fame fenfibility. After all, however, it is perhaps to be lamented that, both in this fermon and that we have before mentioned, the example of Chrift, the love and obligations of Chriftians to him, and the effects of his merits and interceffion, are not more infifted upon. The enforcement of duties for the example, and for the fake of that beloved mafter who went about doing good, and who laid down his life for his friends, is the ftrongest and most engaging tie a minif ter can-feel; as the command of our Lord, and his promise of acceptance, is the most powerful motive and encouragement to prayer. We mean not to cenfure the author, but only to exprefs a wish that he had dwelt more on a subject, which if enlarged on would have thrown additional luftre on the whole, and which would have derived fingular beauty from his hands. Of the foundness of his faith there is every reason to be convinced from various paffages in these Sermons, from his fentiments at the close of his life, and from his excellent prayer at the end of this difcourfe, part of which we on this account fhall transcribe:

Teach me to understand clearly, to believe firmly, to value juftly, and comply fincerely with that last and brightest revelation thou hast given me by Jefus Christ: give me a juft sense of the unmerited, unfollicited, and wonderful friendship of the eternal Son of God; who though he was rich, yet for the fake of apoftate fons of men, became poor, and was made flesh, and fuffered and died, that he might enlighten their darkened understandings, purify their corrupted hearts, exalt their debased natures, deliver them from the punishments due unto their fius, fet open the gates of immortality before them, and conduct them into the prefence of their God. Teach me to hearken to his divine inftructions; to copy after his fpotlefs example; to approach to thee by him, as my great mediator, and to expect the forgivenefs of my tins, on the terms marked out in his Gofpel! Let the ferious confideration of my need of such a Saviour, beget and preferve in me the deepest fenfe of my own unworthiness; and let the confideration of thy love and mercy in appointing him to be the Saviour of men, infpire me with the humble and modeft confidence of being restored by him to the enjoyment of thy favour and friendship."

The number of thefe Sermons in all is thirty-two. They are written on important and useful fubjects; four of them contain directions for youth, and were preached in the college-cha

pel

Fel of Glafgow. We venture to recommend them as compo fiations evidently flowing from the heart. Whoever reads them will greatly admire the amiableness of mind and fervent piety of the author, and it will be his own fault if he is not improved. We cannot give a better idea of Dr. Leechman's manner of writing than in his own words, refpecting the duty of ministers:

The inward feelings of a good heart have a natural eloquence accompanying them, which can never be equalled by laboured and studied ornament. The heart, really and justly moved, never fails to dictate a language plain and eafy, full of natural and continued vigour, which has nothing in it foft, nothing languishing. All is nervous and strong, and does not fo much please the ear as fill and ravish the soul.'

An Hiftorical Developement of the prefent Political Conftitution of the Germanic Empire. By John Stephen Pütter. Tranflated from the German, with Notes, and a comparative View of the Reve nues, Population, Forces, &c. of the respective Territories, from the Statistical Tables lately published at Berlin. By Jofab Dornford, of Lincoln's Inn, LL. D. 3 Vols. 8vo. 75. Boards. Payne and Son.

Τ

IT appears that the original of this work was undertaken at the express defire of our gracious queen, whofe request was communicated to profeffor Pütter in May, 1785; and, in the month of March following the production was published in Germany; when her majefty, we are told, was fo well satisfied with the treatife, that the condefcended to teftify her approbation of it in a letter to the author. We are glad to find, on a perufal of the work, that we can most readily acquiefce in the juftnefs of her majesty's favourable opinion; as the author has developed the fubject of his inveftigation with equal perfpicuity and difcernment.

The first book contains an account of the ftate of Germany from the earlieft times, until the decline of the Carlovingian race, in the year 8881 From the remoteft period to which hiftorical records afcend, Germany appears to have been inhabited by a variety of nations, which, though fprung from the fame origin, had each of them its own regulations, and enjoyed, exclufively, the most perfect liberty and independence. The Greek and Roman hiftorians, to whom we are indebted for the earliest accounts, mention the names of more than fifty German nations, fome of whom, to this day, ftill retain the fame poffeffions and defignations. Originally, however, thofe various tribes had no fixed habitations in towns and villages, but led a wandering life, in feparate hordes, whofe only objects were

hunting

hunting and pafture. The prodigious emigrations of the Ger mans, in the fifth century, made way for a fucceffion of new inhabitants, from the fhores of the Baltic, and the remoteft borders of Afia. Germany, with respect to the origin of its first inhabitants, is divided by our author into two claffes, the inhabitants of one of which were not originally of German, but of Venedic extraction; as Mecklenburg, Pomerania, Wagria, Lauenburg, Brandenburg, Mifnia, Lufatia, Bohemia, Moravia, and fince the feventh century, Stiria, Carinthia, and Carniola. The other clafs confifts of the districts the inhabitants of which were originally Germans; as Lower Saxony, Franconia, Swabia, and the greater part of Weftphalia,

The countries fituated on the left, shore of the Rhine, and on the right of the Danube, which, if we reckon from the time of Julius and Auguftus Cæfar, continued almost four hundred years under Roman government, were in the fifth century fully established as a province of that nation. They therefore univerfally adopted the Roman inftitutions, which, gradually spreading over the neighbouring countries, introduced amongst the Franks, Alemans, Burgundians, and others, the ufe of agriculture, the management of vineyards, and various improvements both of Roman science and polity.

That the Christian religion in the first ages, when it was still at a distance from the throne, and rather fuffered, at different times, the moft dreadful perfecution, was fpread by the Roman colonies and legions as far as the Rhine and Danube; and that during the reign of Conftantine the Great, after his conversion. there were Chriftian communities in the cities on the Rhine and Danube, are, our author justly obferves, facts not to be difputed; but the attempt to connect the lift of the first archbishops and bishops of the fees at prefent established in those countries with the time of the apostles, and continue them uninterrupedly from the time of Conftantine, can only arife from the fictions of the tenth century; in which the enlightened writers among the Catholics themselves no longer place any degree of credit. There are a few circumstances, however, in the state of religion of the first centuries, without which the ecclefiaftical conftitution of the fubfequent periods cannot well be understood.

Though, in the apoftolical times, the teacher and inspector of a church were confidered as equivalent, and only diftinguished from the deacons or minifters, who were to perform the public service; yet, at the time when Christianity first came into Germany, it was ufual for every confiderable city, as well as certain districts in the country, where the Chriftian communities had their particular priests, to have likewise a bishop, with whose rank a precedency was foon afterwards connected. Our author

explains

explains concifely, and in a perfpicuous manner, the important confequences which refulted from this inftitution.

As it frequently happened that several bishops, in the fame country, were in correfpondence with each other, or held a general confultation on matters which were interciting to the community at large; as even at the times of perfecution the Christians had reafon to keep together, and fupport each other as well by their counfel as actions; fo, before the time of Conftantine, principally in the eastern part of his dominions, it was ufual for feveral bifhops to meet at different times, and hold a confultation on the common concerns of their churches, or affemblies of the church, as they were called, (fynods or coun cils) fometimes of an extensive, and fometimes a narrower diftrict.

Conftantine had fcarcely made confeffion of the Chriftian religion, before fuch affemblies of the church were publicly countenanced. An affembly of this kind was held, in the year 314, at Arles, in Provence, and in 325 at Nicea; and both of thefe were frequented by the bishops of the countries of the Rhine and Danube. We inay trace the various effects of these inftitutions from thofe times; and their influence has evidently operated in the fucceeding ages, and in fome measure even to the prefent day.

To these affemblies none were admitted but the bishops; and in the decrees they made, the churches willingly acquiefced. The decrees came afterwards of themselves in ufe, as obligatory rules. Appeal was made to the example mentioned in the 15th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, where a meeting occurs of the Apoftles and the Elders, in whofe places the bithops imagined they fucceeded; but they forgot that this very decree was not made by the Apoftles and Elders alone, but approved of by the church in general (Acts xv. 22.), and in the name of the Apofties, Elders, and Brethren (Acts xv. 23). The bifhops began now to attribute the force of an obligatory law to their decrees; not only with refpect to their own fubordinate priests and ministers, but all the members of the community'; in fhort, the church in general. The bishops jointly confidered themselves as the reprefentatives of the whole church. Others, who were neither bishops nor minifters, were obliged to be fatisfied with what was publicly declared a decree of the affembly. Thus arose the great diftinction between the fpiritual and temporal eftates, as they were called; or more concifely, the priesthood and laity: fo that, in affairs which concerned religion and the church, the laity had no further concern, but, when the clergy thought proper to ordain any thing, referved to themfelves only the honour of obeying. From hence it fotlowed, that the laity were always removed further from the knowledge of things; and the clergy, on the contrary, monopolized whatever had the appearance of learning, and enforced

their pinciples with the hope or lofs of cternal falvation. Thus it may be conceived, how the fpiritual eftate was foon enabled to acquire fuch an afcendency over the temporal, that the equilibrium, fo neceffary to the perfection and welfare of every commonwealth with respect to the temporal estate, was irrecoverably lost.'

Not only the common priests and other minifters were confidered as fubordinate to the bishops, but when several bishops of the fame country met, they regulated the affembly and their own precedency according to the political divifion of the provinces; fo that the bishops who belonged to one province, when they found it neceffary to hold a particular provincial fyned, yielded precedency to the bishop whofe fee was in the capital city of the country. Hence rofe, in process of time, the order of precedency amongst the bishops, as now eftablished in the Germanic empire.

Our author next proceeds to trace the origin and progrefs of the Frankish monarchy. This monarchy owed its foundation to Clovis, the fon of Childeric, who, in the year 486, unexpectedly took the command of a part of the nation of the Franks. His first undertaking was an expedition against the Romans, whom he defeated in the neighbourhood of Soiffons. From this time he took poffeffion, as a conqueft acquired by his sword, of that part of Gaul which the Vifigoths and Burgundians had left to the Romans; and the new monarchy which, after his decease, was inherited by his fons and pofterity, has continued to the prefent time, only divided between the two crowns of France and Germany.

The original limits of this new monarchy eftablished by the Franks, comprehended in the beginning partly the district of France which formed the remainder of Roman Gaul, and partly thofe countries which Clovis, and that part of the nation of the Franks which was fubject to him, were in poffeffion of, in Germany and in the Netherlands. But thefe borders, by the fuccessful enterprises of Clovis and his fons were extended fo far as to include the whole of the prefent country of France, and a confiderable part of Germany. From this period is commonly dated the origin of the feudal fyftem which has fince had fo much influence on the conftitution of every state in Europe.

The frequent partition of the country amongst the grandfons of Clovis, was foon productive of pernicious quarrels and civil wars, which arofe during his reign, and that of his fucceffors, when affaffinations, poifonings, and various cruel outrages, ftain this part of the hiftory. Upwards of an hundred years elapsed without the occurrence of any new conqueft, extension of the empire, or any other glorious action of the Merovingian

race.