"Sometimes the defpondence fortified by the fufpenfion of religious comfort is darkened by the gloom of erroneous doctrine. The wretched individual begins to apprehend that he is predeftinated to wrath and anguifh everlafting: that, if not exprefsly created for the purpofe of being rendered miferable, at least he is " paffed over" in the difpenfation of redeeming mercy: that he is virtually reprobated, being defignedly excluded by the fovereign will of God from the number of thofe, whom the Almighty is fuppofed fpecially to have elected to be fole partakers of his converting grace." P. 17.

"To the fervent piety and the practical holiness of numbers of our Christian brethren, who conceive themselves to read in the word of God the tenets in queftion, my teftimony, however unimportant, I rejoice to bear. But contrained as I have repeatedly been to know the terrors which thofe tenets have produced, it feems an act of duty, in addreffing perfons expofed to fimilar terrors, not to withhold my deliberate conviction, that the tenets are deftitute of fcriptural fupport: and that the detached paffages of Holy Writ, whence they are deduced, fairly admit, when confidered in themselves, and clearly demand, when taken in conjunction with the reft of Scripture, a very different interpretation. For the present purpose it may be fufficient to refer the defponding fufferer to fome plain paffages of the divine word, which teach that falvation, in every refpect unattainable but through our Lord Jefus Chrift, is through him open to every man: and that on every man of rational faculties the free mercy of God beftows, for the fake of the great Redeemer, a portion of antecedent grace fo far influencing the will, the understanding, and the heart, as, without intrenching on moral agency, to enable him, if diligent in the application of grace received, to obtain through the blood of the crofs an inheritance among the faints." Ibid.

This is as decifive as what the Bishop of Lincoln himself has written, and is fortified fimilarly by irrefragable citations from feripture. After these, and other arguments fuperadded, the paffage concludes: "Fear not, ye mourners. Every man may become one of God's elect. Go forth and profper. The way of falvation, unbarred to the whole world, lies before you. Enter it, purfue it, in the ftrength of your God." P. 20.

The latter part of the Sermon recommends, moft judiciously, the proper modes of cure, and concludes with activity and practical ufefulness, adding this jutt diftinétion. "The management of worldly concerns, when conducted in a worldly fpirit, is fin. But when kept wholly fubordinate to the great purposes of exiftence, the glory of God, and the falvation of the foul; when carried on from Christian motives, with Chriftian temper, and for Chriftian ends; it is a branch of fervice to God, it is one of the fruits of religion".

For masterly and extenfive views of one fubject, with found argument and fcriptural knowledge, all directed to that point, this difcourfe cannot easily be furpaffed.

ART.

ART. 23. A Sermon, preached before the University of Oxford, at Sta ary's, on Monday, November 5, 1804. By the Rev. Henry Phill poits, M A. of St. Mary Magdalen College, and Vicar of Kilmersdon, in the County of Somerfet. 4to. 18 pp. 1s. 6d. Cooke, Oxford;. Rivingtons, London. 1804.

This Sermon being adapted to the commemoration of bleffings chiefly political, is rather an elaborate effay, hiftorical and political, than a theological difcourfe. It is, however, the effay of a politician who is a ferious Chriftian.

After fag that of the two deliverances commemorated on the 5th of November, he should confine himself chiefly to the latter, the preacher gives a masterly history of the English conftitution from the Reformation; pointing out every fluctuation in it, with the caufes and the confequences of every ttruggle. He arrives, after much accurate and well-written deduction, at the period of the Revolution, on which his ideas are, in fome degree, original; but, at the fame time, in our opinion, perfectly found and worthy of attention. He denies, in the first place, that the term Revolution is properly applied to the change which took place at the abdication of James.

"A Revolution, properly fo called", he fays, "must be fome important change in the Conftitution; fome fubverfion of the established authority, not of magiftrates, but of the magiftracies themfelves; at leaft fome grave and momentous alteration in the balance of the Commonwealth, by which one divifion of the State is fo much increafed in weight and power, that the character and tendency of the Government is thereby materially changed." P. 14.

After fhowing that these characters do not belong to this transaction, it is to be hoped, he fays, that, infiead of being a Revolution," it will prove a lafting barrier against all Revolutions. It was at the very time devifed, and happily accomplished, to prevent a Revolution of the very worft kind: one, in which all the liberties of the subject, and by confequence the fecurity of the monarch, would have been loft in a gloomy and fanatical tyranny; a tyranny, wholly difcordant to the genius of that government, to which it was to fucceed; and abhorrent from every principle, and every feeling, of the people, over whom it was to be exercifed." Ib.

Mr. P. then expofes the infidious intentions of thofe who, by crying up that event as a Revolution, and as glorious in itfelf, endeavour to familiarize and recommend the idea of further Revolutions. This, we well know, has been a favourite artifice with the difaffected, who have Often attempted to exalt it into a precedent for cashiering kings. Much more truly and much more wifely the prefent preacher.

"Far be it from us to deny, that in the hiftory of this event there is much caufe for glorying. In the fteady, the difinterested, and, above all, the temperate patriotifm of many of the great characters of that age, the friend of his country will always glory;-but in the event itfelf he will not glory: widely different are the feelings which it will excite in his mind :-he will regard it as an awful crifis, when the or dinary line of duty was for once to be relinquifhed; when a neceffity, fuperior

fuperior to all law, or rather, impofed to fecure the objects of all law, made the facred duty of obedience to Government yield to the fall more facred daty of preferving that fociety, of which Government i felf is the first-born offspring, and the moit fteady and powerful upport: he will think with religious awe on the fearful refponfibility imposed on his ancestors, and he will tremble at the idea, that fuch a refponfibility fhould ever be impofed on himfelf." P. 15.

Infinitely more found is this, and more wife alfo, than the cafbiering. doctrine, and truly the language of our Conftitution. It is, however, only a small fpecimen of a difcourfe which is full of the foundest principles. It concludes by a reference to Providence concerning these events, and a proper thankfulness for them.

ART. 24. An Antidote to Infidelity, oppofed to the Anti Chriftian Stric tures of Mr. Gibbon; containing Expofitions on the Prophecies of our Saviour, in Matthew xxiv. Mark xiii. and Luke xxi. with other interefting Difquifitions to fimilar Effect; carefully selected and enlarged, with fome original Remarks. By a Lover of Divine Truth. 8vo. 182 pp. 45. Hatchard. 1804.

Since the title ferves to fhow that this work is chiefly a compilation, we have little more to do than to commend the diligence, and more efpecially the defign, of the editor. in bringing forward fuch clear and refpectable teftimonies to oppofe Mr. Gibbon's rath affertion, that the opinion of the kingdom of Heaven being near at hand was the univerfal opinion of the primitive church, and that it was countenanced by the prophecies mentioned in the title. Mr. Gibbon adds the authority of St. Paul, in his First Epistle to the Theffalonians, which perhaps is the boldeft of all his references, because exprefsly contradicted by St. Paul himself, in the Second Epiftle to the fame church. The prophecies indeed recorded in the Gofpel may be faid also to contradict fuch an opinion, as foretelling events incompatible with a speedy confummation of things. Thefe points are alfo noticed in the publication before us. The authorities chiefly cited on this occafion are, Dr. Doddridge, and Dr. Gill, Dr. Whitby, and Stackhoufe; and of liv ing authors, the Bishop of London, Mr. Whitaker, Mr. Kett, and particularly Mr. Nifbett, in his late publication on the Coming of the Meffiah.

ART. 25. Practical Difcourfes, by the Rev. Richard Warner, Curate of St. James's Parish, Bath. 8vo. 245 PP. 78. Robinsons. 1803.

When we gave an account of Mr. Warner's Diateffaron (Br. Crit. Vol. xxiii. P. 60) we complained that in his notes he feemed to manifeft a particular attachment to the names of Priestley, Wakefield, and other unfound authorities; though we did not then accuse him of taking any thing objectionable from their writings. The reafon of that preference is now declared. Mr. W. is avowedly one of she fame, or a fimilar fest: or rather, is of no fect, bat one of those rationalizers

rationalizers who have each a separate religion, according to the meafure of their own reafon or irrationality. The mafk is now thrown off, and the author declares boldly against "forms of human invention," and "creeds fabricated by the ingenuity of uninspired men ;" choofing to forget, that fuch creeds claim no real value, but as being fabricated (as he calls it) from the words of infpired men, or of God. Mr.W.declares that according to his " faculty of ratiocination," of the worth of which readers may judge by this operation of it, Chriftianity is a "fyftem neither veiled in mystery, nor involved in difficulty ;" and the fame ratiocination tells him, that the promifes of falvation are given to all who believe, according to the measure he thinks fit to lay down, "whether they be of Paul or Apollos, of Luther, Calvin, or Arminius; of the Romish pale, or the reformed Church: followers of Prefbyterianifm, or advocates of Epifcopacy.". How valuable a member Mr. W. muft be of a reformed Epifcopal Church, with this latitudinarian creed, we leave our readers to decide.

It would be far from a reproach to any preacher, that he fhould felect the evidences and the moral duties of Chriftianity, as the exclufive fubjects of a volume of difcourfes; if he did not, at the fame time, hold out fuch language; with infinuations of bigotry againft all who think more feriously of the doctrinal parts of the fcriptures. Such a religion as hi, is maintained, only by being confined to the very furface; for we defy him to have the leaft comprehenfion of his own faith, if he attempted to defcend at all into the explanation of it.

For those who may have any curiofity to know more of these Sermons, after this authentic declaration of the author's fentiments, by himself, we shall briefly mention the fubjects of them. The five first are on the evidences of Chriftianity, the first general, the fecond from prophecy, the third from miracles, the fourth from internal character, the fifth from its propagation. The Sixth Sermon is on Practical Religion. 7. On the Chriflian Spirit. 8. Faft Sermon. 9. Thanksgiving Sermon. In the two laft the political fentiments of the author will, to many readers, appear as unfound as his opinions in religion do to us. But we are not inclined to expatiate on the one or the other. We have told our readers, from the author himself, what they are to expect; and as they like the declaration, they will proceed or not to the perufal of the book.

ART. 26. A Manual for the Use of unlearned Perfons in reading the Pfalms, as printed in the Common Prayer Book, explaining the obfcure Paffages. By W. H. Rynell, M. A. Vicar of Hornchurch, Effex. 12mo. 25. Cadell and Davies. 1804.

This is a very useful and interesting Manual, which we warmly recommend to the attention of thofe for whofe ufe it is defigned; and the following extract from the Preface evinces the author well qualified for more important undertakings.

"The occafion of compiling this Manual arofe from my own obfervation, in reading the Pfalms, that the literal meaning of many paffages, the object in the writer's view, the allufions to the former hif tory of the Jews, to the prophecies, and to the Chriftian difpenfation,

were

were not immediately obvious; and therefore, that unlearned perfons muft neceffarily lofe, in great measure, the fpirit, and mifs the defign, of the text, for want of understanding its fenfe and application.

"To remedy this defect, I have here given, chiefly from the best commentators, a plain and concife illuftration of those obscurities that fell under my notice, in this important part of the Holy Scripture, without adverting to the allegorical or myftical interpretation of them, a work which has been completely and fatisfactorily performed by the pious and learned Bishop Horne.

"As the Pfalter is one of the first books put into the hands of children, by which they are brought gradually to that full inftruction in their religion which is round in the Old and New Testaments, I have principally, though not entirely, directed my attempt to the communication of that fort of knowledge which they, and the inferior order of the community, are capable of receiving. For when I confidered, that meditation upon heavenly things, the devotional exercifes of praver, praife, and thanksgiving, confeffion, and torrow for fin, together with the hope and confidence of being restored to God's favour through faith and repentance, are the common fubjects of all the Pfals, whether compofed by David, or by other prophets; it feemed to me expedient, that well-difpofed perfons in general, who are converfant with this book, fhould be relieved from thofe difficulties which obftruct their improvement in facred wifdom." P. iii.

ART. 27.

Reflections on the Exercife of private Judgment in Matters of Religion. A Difcourfe, delivered May 22, 1804, at Dudley, before the Annual Affembly of Diffenting Minifters, and published at their unanimous Requeft. By Jobu Corrie. 8vo. 30 PP. Is. Johnfon. 1804.

Mr. C. expreffes his hope," that there is nothing in the following Reflections which can afford juft ground of offence to perfons whofe opinions are most oppofite to thofe of the author, and of the religious denomination to which he belongs." P. v. We are glad to find that there is not much of this fort; the Difcourfe being a declamation more temperate, and better written, than we ufually meet with against “articles of faith and creeds". With the text, it has little or no connec tion. Subjoined to the Difcourfe, at p. 26, is a panegyric on Dr. Priestley; at once the glory of our country, and its fame." P. 30. Conftruing the laft words in our own way, we accord in the judgment which they express.

POLITICS.

ART. 28. The Claims of the British West India Colonists to the Right of obtaining neceffary Supplies from America, and of employing the neceffary Means of effectually obtaining thofe Supplies under a limited and duly regulated Intercourse, ftated and vindicated, in Anfwer to Lord Sheffield's Strictures. By G. W. Jordan, Efq. F. R. S. Colonial Agent for Barbadoes. 8vo. 119 pp. 35. Cadell and Davies. 1804. To the ability displayed by Lord Sheffield in his "Strictures on the Neceffity of maintaining the Navigation and Colonial Syftem", and the co

BRIT. CRIT. VOL. XXV. FEB. 1805.

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