degree in which its hearers are indoctrinated in the essentia principles of religion. It is alike its office to impart a tone to the religious knowledge which the community possesses and its nature to be modified by those characteristics, wheth er of information or ignorance, which may happen to prevail Let the people from any cause become fond of light, superfi cial productions on religious subjects, and let their taste be modelled after such a form of writing, and the ministry will be in great danger of yielding to the pernicious fashion. It will be employed in spinning out fine sentences, when it should announce momentous truths; in culling flowers, when it should strike blows. Or, if it does not become warped by the prevailing taste, it will labor under serious disadvantages, and perhaps hardly obtain a hearing. On the contrary, let the people relish sound doctrinal investigations, and thoroughgoing reasoning, or let them submit to kind but searching appeals to their consciences, and they will find as much of this description of preaching and writing, as they shall choose to enjoy. The faithfulness and research of the ministry will be duly appreciated, and preachers will be encouraged to let their profiting appear to all. While, therefore, it is the duty of the clergy to preserve consistency, and by every means in their power to effect the illumination of the public mind, it is also the duty of the people to see that they do not, by indulging in a frivolous and fickle taste, bring down the ministrations of the sacred office to the level of their own degeneracy. If we do not mistake, there is in many of our congregations, however high they may have fixed their standard of ministerial qualifications, a commencing fondness for a mode of pulpit exhibition, which is the opposite of the full and labored doctrinal discussion of former days. It unwisely partakes of the melting, exciting, superficial, story-telling character.

Scarcely less connected, also, with a deeply studied and intellectual religion, is the perpetuity, not to say the existence of genuine practical piety in the world. A mass of loose, floating opinions, and lively ecstatic emotions, is quite insufficient to authorize the expectation, that the religion of which they constitute the principal part, can be permanent. To the interest of the christian community at large, and to the personal piety of the individuals who compose it, nothing can be more fatal than the neglect of connecting religion with serious thought and faithful study. The enemies of christianity could not desire a more effectual means for its destruction, than to introduce among professed christians a habit of fashionable dissipation as to religion. Persuade the latter to

forego the diligent study of the doctrines of the scriptures, and substantial theological discussions, and you go far towards demolishing the temple of holiness. It might not actually be swept away, so long as any knowledge of revealed truth remained; but it would stand a tottering fabric, encouraging, from its very weakness, the attacks of an enemy. In the body of nominal believers, a mere superficial acquaintance with the system of truth, leads to indifference in maintaining the forms of religion. The subject ceases to create an adequate interest; truth and error become incongruously mixed; and should the light of the gospel not be actually extinguished, it could throw but a feeble beam on the thick, surrounding darkness. With individual professors, it is surely a question of solemn import, how far their title to the christian character can be substantiated, while they neglect sufficiently to study the distinctive peculiarities of the system, of which they have avowed the belief.

But however the continuance and existence of religion in the world, may be affected by the degree of attention which is bestowed on its doctrinal and intellectual character, it is certain that its best manifestation in the temper and life, is inseparably connected with the degree of our acquaintance with it, in that character. Without a deeply serious intellectual culture, how can a consistent manifestation of religion exist. How can the heart and life be regulated agreeably to the divine rule, with even that exactness which may be hoped for on earth. It is in vain to expect a tolerable uniformity of character from the influence of feeling and emotion merely. Nothing is more productive of wavering and volatility than such an influence. It is because some professed believers are guided more by feeling and vivid impressions, than by conviction and principle, that they are so extremely inconsistent -inconsistent with themselves and their vocation,-now-apparently maintaining the strictness of religion, and now seduced into more than suspicious eccentricities of conduct and temper. On serious and settled views of scriptural truth, mainly depends that correspondence between faith and practice, knowledge and zeal, wisdom and inoffensiveness, prayer and watchfulness, which is essential to the consistency and even the reality of our religion. Without such a culture as is here intended, where shall we look also for a strictly pure and lovely manifestation of religion. We do not find it in the unsteady, easily moved, undisciplined mind of a professed believer. In such a mind we shall meet with passion, not purity, -with amiable natural sympathies, it may be, and occasional traits of goodness, but not with a uniform christian loveli

ness of conduct and disposition. We shall not meet with that peculiar conscientiousness, which always marks a mind well settled, well ordered, and deeply imbued with divine knowledge,--a conscientiousness,which is often ridiculed by the world as weakness or fanaticism, but which in truth is the genuine and most beautiful product of the gospel. That serious intellectual culture which we speak of, is essential, likewise, to the firmness of religion,--a quality which the world confounds with obstinacy, but which is a most valuable constituent of genuine christianity. We do not recognize such a manifestation of christian character in the professed believer, whose mind, given to impulses and conversant with light things, never institutes any prolonged and serious inquiry respecting the great truths of religion. It is only in thinking, reasoning christians, -men whose views are settled, and delightfully settled forever in the truth, that we discover a firmness of religious conduct which nothing can overcome,-a strength of attachment to the gospel, which nothing can weaken. This is the principle which has made christians in past ages willing to go to the stake, rather than give up the cardinal doctrines of the bible. We fear that numbers of fair professors would not endure such a test at present; and that it is the tendency of many of the opinions and speculations that are now broached, and of the mental habits that are now formed, by diminishing in christians a sense of the importance of evangelical truth, to render them more averse than they should be, to any severe trial of their faith. If there is such a tendency as we apprehend, it is time that their attention was called off from light and exciting productions, to those of a more substantial and instructive kind. And especially is it time, that they were urged to a more diligent and systematic study of those sacred scriptures, "which are able to make men wise unto salvation.

ว

It is obvious, finally, that a diligent study and enlarged knowledge of divine truth, are connected with the highest and the purest satisfaction of the mind. The importance of such study and knowledge on this ground, in comparison with the feverish pleasure afforded by religious tales and similar reading, we might urge at considerable length, and, we believe, with mnch effect. But our limits will not admit the multiplication of remarks, nor can this be necessary to establish the point. The rich enjoyment derived from such studies, and from enlightened views respecting the system of divine truth, is a matter of experience to thousands; and it is scarcely possible to heighten their appreciation of it by any description. To others it may be announced as a certain fact; and they may give credence to the declaration when they consi

der, that the pure and elevated satisfaction of a deeply studied theology consists in the serious and rational employment of the understanding, in the consciousness of exercising the best of faculties on the best of objects, in the effect which the discovery of important truth has upon the mind, and in the confidence of securing, by this means, the divine approbation and blessing. On each of these circumstances we might enlarge, as illustrating the topics before us, but we must pass them by. In conclusion, we would only ask the reader, whether the light writers of the age-the sentimental novelists, suppose them as religious as is necessary, and withal as voluptuous as possible in their productions, can present to men of serious piety and disciplined understanding any spiritual and intellectual offerings to be compared, in richness and in sweetness, with those which are found in the pages of Owen, Baxter, Doddridge, Hall, and Chalmers, or of our own Edwards, Bellamy, Davies, and Dwight. Let these, and other authors of a kindred spirit, be made familiar to our readers; and especially let the bible be their constant study, with the abundant assistance now offered, both to its learned and unlearned students; and let its truths, applied by the Holy Spirit, be received into good and honest hearts, and we venture to say, that in comparison with the ample and permanent satisfaction resulting from such a study, the novelist's page, and the whole mass of gorgeous religious paintings, can supply but a meager and ephemeral delight.

ART. IV.-REVIEW OF SPRAGUE'S LETTERS.

Letters from Europe in 1828; first published in the New-York Observer : New-York, published by Jonathan Leavitt, etc. etc. pp. 135, 12mo.

We are glad to see these letters of Dr. Sprague published in this form. They are in many respects too valuable to be left to the pages of a religious newspaper. Distinguished as their author is as a writer of sermons, his talent for writing travels equally entitles him to a welcome reception with the public; and the topics which he presents to our view in the little volume now before us, cannot fail to be interesting to the christian, and to the man of intelligence. The fluency and ease which are so characteristic of Dr. Sprague's pen, have enabled him to give such graphic sketches of the places and scenes through which he passed, that rapid as his journey was, we can follow him in his route with engrossing in

terest. But it is to the description which he has given of distinguished individuals, that we would particularly call the attention of our readers.

Having already enriched the pages of the Christian Spectator with the sketches of Mr. Wilberforce, Mr. R. Hall, Mr. Irving, Mrs. H. More, and others, we shall make no extracts; but we can assure those who have not met with the letters of Dr. Sprague in their original form, that they will find a high gratification in the perusal of this volume.

We are pleased to find, that when health or any other consideration invites our clergymen abroad, they feel inclined to profit the public by their travels. For ourselves, we feel much obliged to Dr. Sprague for this little volume; and hope that his example will be followed by his brethren, who may be placed in like circumstances, and who possess any thing like his talent for observation and authorship.

ART. V.-REVIEW OF WORKS ON THE RELIGIOUS STATE OF CANADA.

The Controversial Discussion between a Catholic Priest, a Catholic Lay man and others, and Rev. J. S. CHRISTMAS, CONSTAT and others. Extracted from the Montreal Herald, and the New Montreal Gazette: Montreal, pp. 64, 1827.

Valedictory Admonitions: or, a Farewell Letter, addressed to the American Presbyterian Society, of Montreal, L. C. By J. S. CHRIST. MAS, Pastor of said Society. New-York: published by the American Presbyterian Society. 8vo, pp. 36, 1828.

Ir "history is philosophy teaching by example," we may expect that the history of the American colonies will furnish the means of deciding many problems, and correcting many errors. Their origin and progress are diverse from that of every other people, and their early history is more full and more authentic. No other nations have had their origin under the influence of christianity, or laid their foundations with so much assistance from science and the civilized arts. These governments have, also, been commenced by different sects of religion, and by different nations; by classes of settler greatly diversified, actuated by different motives, and originally trained up under civil and religious institutions of almost every possible variety. Compare, for instance, in regard to their first settlement and early institutions, Peru, and Paraguay, and Brazil, and Canada, and Plymouth, and Rhode Island, and New-Haven, and New-York, and Pennsyl vania, and South-Carolina, and Kentucky, and Illinois.