Review of Matthew's Sermon, and of Remarks upon it.

The opportunities which are placed in the power of every individual for advancing the kingdom of Christ upon earth must be left to each man's own conscience to determine, and to each man's own zeal to improve. Our sphere of action may not be as wide, or our success as great, as that of Dr. Buchanan; but if we adopt the same principle, we may also humbly hope for a similar reward, and take for our motto, with the proper latitude of application, the remark already cited: "If I can by nine hours' study a-day serve my heavenly Master faithfully, I think he will give me my hire." Vol. I. p. 65.

The Churchman dissuaded from becoming a Member of the Bible Society: And the Extent defended, to which Education is carried in the Schools of our Church: a Sermon, preached ut Bridgwater, before the District Committee of the Society for promoting Christian Knowledge, on Friday, the 6th of September, 1816. By JOHN MATTHEW, M.A. Rector of Kilve and Strings ton, Somerset, and late Fellow of Balliol College, Oxford. Bridgewater: printed for the Author. 1817.

The Churchman upheld in his Support of the Bible Society; and Schismatical Representations of the Gospel detected: or, Remarks, addressed to a Friend, on two Sermons recently published by the Rev. J. Matthew, A. M. Rector of Kilve and Stringston, Somerset; and late Fellow of Balliol College, Oxford. By one of the Secretaries of the County of Somerset Auxiliary Bible Society. London: Hatchard. 1817.

IT is not often that a single sermon, and particularly a charity sermon, furnishes an object of sufficient magnitude or interest, to demand the labours of the critic; but the discourse before us is so incor

rect in many, if not most, of its positions, as well as so uncandid in its animadversions, that we should scarcely do our duty, if we did not notice it for the sake of exposing its mistatements. The chief, and indeed only, claim which it possesses on our attention, is the circumstance, that, faulty as it is, it was delivered before the District Com. mittee of a Society which not even'" the errors, the bigotry, and, in the present case we may add, the calumnies of some of its professed defenders, shall make us cease to venerate. In perusing a discourse like the present, we could almost imagine that the writer delibe rately wished to disgust and repel all sensible, moderate, and spiritually-minded churchmen, and thus to gain over to party a society which

was intended for the general benefit of the world; besides incidentally furnishing a plausible argument against the orthodoxy of those members who, though most anxious for promoting Christian knowledge, may not sition laid down by a controversial

choose to countenance every po

partizan.

We can account in no other way for the circumstance of such a discourse as the present being pub. lished, as the title-page states, "at the request of the Committee," than by supposing either that the Board did not distinctly enter into its merits or demerits during its public delivery, and therefore wished to bestow on its arguments a more deliberate examination; or, what is more probable, that the publication of the annual sermon is a customary ceremony from which they could not depart without a breach of delicacy and decorum. It is, however, quite unaccountable by what process of persuasion the author prevailed upon himself to dedicate his philippic to his muchrespected diocesan, the Bishop of Bath and Wells; a prelate of manners so amiable and so notoriously averse from the noisy jarrings of controversy, that he must doubtles s

We pass by the curious phraseology of the last sentence, to state the contents of the next paragraph, in which our author infers the great obligations of the public to the Bartletts' Buildings' Society for its useful labours; and after giving his opinion, that "the religious sentiments and moral conduct of our country have been in a state of uniform (he might have said accelerated) progression," adverts to the "hardly credible" distribution of the Scriptures at home and abroad, to the extensive distribution of the Liturgy, in order" to prevent their being wrested to the destruction of the unlearned or the unstable reader," to the "millions of religious books and tracts, the pious labours of orthodox divines," and, "to crown thewhole," to the Bible now issuing under the auspices of the Society. Now we admit, as fully as our author, the many claims of the Society to respect and gratitude; but we think it but fair to remind him, that after all, to use his own words, it is but "a part" of this "happy change" which can be attributed to any one of the many beneficent institutions which adorn the British dominions; and we would particularly whisper, for his information, that the "hardly credible" dissemination of the Scriptures, of which he speaks with so much pleasure, has been pre-eminently the work of those very persons and that very Society whose measures he so severely reprehends. It is, however, amongst the anomalies of this strange controversy, to find men professing to exult in the universal diffusion of the Scriptures, while they dissuade the world against the means by which such a desirable end can best be attained. We also rejoice with Mr. Matthew that our revered Liturgy has been circulated with snch laud. able diligence; though we have some little doubt how far he will feel it right to rejoice with us in return, that the once almost obsolete Homilies and Articles are be

CHRIST, OBSERV. No. 188,

ginning, as they deserve, to obtain an almost equal circulation. Of the Society's tracts we say less, because, although composed by " orthodox divines," we are not sure that the effect of the many which are good has not been greatly impeded by the counteracting influence of the few which are either indifferent or decidedly bad; and, at all events, we have not the same unquestionable guarantee in this part of the proceeding, as in those parts which refer to the distribution of com positions of allowedly correct and Church-of-England tendency.

Our author next proceeds to inform his readers, that there are persons

"who think the cause of religion best promoted by circulating the Scriptures in their native simplicity, without litur. gy, creed, or comment;-who maintain, that the interpretation of the Sacred Volume may be safely left to the unassisted efforts of the untutored mind. And we all know," he adds, “that on these principles, a Society, consisting of Christians of every description, has been formed, which members of our' own Church are, with earnest importunity, continually solicited to join." pp. 6,7.

The former of these two remarks may be very true; but we strenuously deny that it is on "these principles," that the Bible Society has been constructed. No man is

called upon by the Society to adopt as an article of his faith, that the distribution of the Scriptures, without liturgy, creed, or comment, is the "best" method of advancing the cause of religion; it is enough if he believe it to be a lawful and useful mode, as it is undeniably the only mode in which, as things are at present coustituted, the object can by any concurrent' efforts of the Christian world, be, generally or even extensively attained.

In order, however, to render his arguments more convincing, by means of ocular demonstration, the preacher invites his auditors to proceed with him—

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“I mean," he suddenly ejaculates, ain imagination only," (a most wholesome caution,)-" to one of the assemblies of this confederation, and there to observe, in succession, the several characters that will present themselves to our view." Matthew, p. 8.

The first of this motley group is the Socinian, whose awful creed Mr. Matthew narrates in terms very descriptive, but which, we fear, partake far more of theatrical display, with a view to excite horror at the Bible Society, than of that holy grief and Christian pity which ought to have been awakened by so sad a spectacle. But again, and again, we would ask, What has the Socinian's creed to do with the orthodoxy of the Society's Bibles, which are, word for word, the same with those which Mr. Matthew doubtless distributes in his own parish-Bibles translated by our own Church, and accompanied, which is the only infraction, if it may be so called, of the neutrality of the plan, with headings to the chapters, totally inconsistent with the Socinian views and doctrines? We are more surprised than grieved that Arians and Socinians countenance the Society; and, in fact, the churchman is the only person who concedes nothing in eulisting beneath its banners. Our author might attend every Bible institution in the kingdom, without having his ears once offeuded with so much as an allusion to the obnoxious tenets which he mentions. If in his excursions he witnessed any apparent infringe ment on the neutrality of the system, it would probably be on the part of the members of his own church, who, from being constantly goaded with their want of orthodoxy and zeal for the Establishment, think it sometimes necessary to trespass a little upon the patience of their Dissenting friends, by avowing their opinion upon subjects not strictly necessary to the business of the meeting, and which therefore ought perhaps in general to be avoided. It is not by going “in imagination" but in reality

that our author can hope to correct the numerous misconceptions which he appears to have formed upon the subject of the Bible Society.

The next portrait, not to say caricature, is that of the Quaker. We omit the unmanly allusion to his garb and exterior, (which assuredly were not fit subjects for introduction into a Church-of England pulpit, and would scarcely have been tolerated in a provincial conventicle), to give, and we blush while we give it from the pages of a clergyman, the following unkind and uncandid remarks, which we certainly should not quote, except for the purpose of exhibiting the result of our author's speculations upon baptism.

“This man abhors the ministry,-he derides both the blessed sacraments of Jesus. He ridicules with opprobrions names that holy baptism,-that mystical death unto sin and resurrection unto righteousness, which we know to have been ordained by Christ himself, and to have been enjoined, with the most tremendous sanctions, on all believers,

that sacred rite, in which every true, spiritual member of the Church believes, that he was PARDONED, JUSTIFIED, SANCTIFIED, GLORIFIED. — He rejects, with disdain, that holy supper, which was instituted, almost in his ex

piring moments, by the great Saviour of mankind, to be the perpetual memo. rial of his death, the pledge of his faithful love;-that supper, in which we trust that we spiritually eat the flesh of Christ, and drink his blood, receiving thus every benefit of his passion;—that supper, in which we are assured, that all the graces, and all the promises of baptism, are continually renewed to fallen, but repentant, sinners.-This is the man, who, on principle, on religious principle, robs that church, which we regard with more than filial veneration;

who thinks every species of resistance sinful,-even a resistance to the victorious enemy of his country,-except that which he opposes, with a pertinacity the most inflexible, to the lawful demands of the man of God, the minister of Jesus.-This is he, who, with a

presumption bordering on blasphemy, attributes to the immediate, the plenary inspiration of the wise and Holy Spirit

of God, those incoherent, those convnlsive effusions, which nothing but a feeling of compassion for poor humanity thus degraded, nothing but a senti ment of veneration for religion, even when so ridiculously distorted and burlesqued, could prevent our receiving with the loudest laughter of derision." pp. 10, 11.

These are not the passages in an author's works which tend most to render his death-bed easy, and the anticipation of eternity welcome. Whatever may be the errors, the heterodoxy, or even the heresies of a body of men like the Quakers, is this the mode in which they are to be spoken of by a frail and fallible mortal who is taught to remember that he is himself also in the body: and especially by a minister of Christ, who is commanded "not to strive," but to be peaceable and gentle, "in meekness instructing them that oppose themselves?" We honestly put it to our author's conscience whether the expressions abhor, deride, reject with disdain, ridicule with opprobious names,&c., are fairly applicable to the mode in which the Quakers are accustomed to express themselves relative to those matters of religion in which they differ from their neighbours. Does he not know that they profess to acknowledge both the sacraments, at least spiritually; so that though we are far from palliating their erroneous and unscriptural views on this important subject, we cannot consent to allow that they deserve the treatment which they have received at our author's hands? Yet we are not sure, after all, whether their ideas respecting baptism are half so dangerous or absurd as those of our author himself; who, far outManting Dr. Mant, asserts, that, by means of this sacrament, every true spiritual member of the church believes, that he was PARDONED, JUSTIFIED, SANCTIFIED, GLORIFIED"!! If this be the case, we seriously think, and devoutly hope, that the rector of Kilve and Stringston *is the only true spiritual member

of the church" in the whole county of Somerset or province of Canterbury. Pardoned! justified! sanctified! GLORIFIED! What would our Mants, and Bethells, and Laurences, and Tomlines, say to these expressions? We do begin more than ever to hope, that in proportion as the venerable Society in Bartlett's Buildings perceive the ignorant and unhappy mistakes of some of their humble imitators and admirers in the country, they will feel the necessity of avoiding the adoption of such tracts as may give occasion, however remotely or undesignedly, to such direful misconceptions. Nothing, surely, but the awfulness of the subject will prevent the friends of the Society receiving "with the loudest laughter of de rision" the doctrine of baptismal glorification; and if even a respectable divine, a rector of two livings, a master of arts, and late fellow of a college in the university of Oxford, can thus unbappily wander into such unscriptural ab surdities, misled by the supposed opinions of a few controversial bre thren, how great, how irreparable must be the evil of circulating such tracts as those of Dr. Mant, &c. among the lower orders of the community! We have no words to express half what we feel upon this subject.

The next portrait is that of the Calvinist, which affords a tempting opportunity for the display of a still worse spirit, if possible, than that which marked the description of the Quaker. Whatever we may think of Calvinism, specifically so called, we are sure our author's description of it is as incorrect as it is intemperate. The mode also of expression, even when the idea is not substantially false, is such as we conceive no man of deeply religious feeling, or who was jealous for the honour of God, could possibly venture to adopt. The whole paragraph seems to have been modelled from the disgusting pages of "The Barister," with a ew decorative

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