some of the gross misrepresentations, respecting the state of slavery in the West Indies, which they are calculated to expose? A large octavo volume has recently made its appearance in this country, entitled A Practical View of the present State of Slavery in the West Indies, &c. by Alexander Barclay, lately, and for twenty-one years, resident in the West Indies." Among a variety of very palpable mistatements, he gives us the following favourable picture of Negro improvement (p. xxii.):-"Twenty years ago, the churches were scarcely at all attended by the slaves; since then, the number of churches, or places of worship of one kind or other, has been more than doubled; in fact, nearly trebled; and yet, in the districts where I have had an opportunity of seeing them, they are fully attended, and principally by slaves." Now, the Bishop distinctly tells us, that in the whole island there are not places of worship belonging to the Established Church capable of containing more than eleven or twelve thousand individuals, the whole population being 400,000; and that "the parishes in the interior are absolutely without the semblance of the forms of religious worship." The Dissenting places of worship erected in the island have afforded some additional room to the slaves; but still, can any statements be substantially more at variance than those of Mr. Barclay and the Bishop? Again: Mr. Barclay affirms, that in Jamaica "Sunday is strictly a day of rest." Yet it is the marketday throughout the island; and the very Slave Law now in force there states, that slaves are to be allowed twenty-six days in the year, "exclusive of Sundays," for their provision grounds. (Act of 1816, §4.) The looseness with which similar statements are made is worthy of particular notice. At the late Surrey election, one of the candidates, Mr. Pallmer, is reported to have said, that he had been the instrument of introducing within the pale of the Christian church a thousand slaves, not nominally, but really. This statement, coming from that gentleman, surprised us not a little, because we can have no doubt whatever that it is altogether untrue, and that he has suffered himself to be deceived by his informant. Such an event as this, occurring in any one of the parishes where Mr. Pallmer's estates are situated, in which, until 1825, if even then, there had been little or no instruction, could not have escaped the notice of the Bishop, or of his eye, the Archdeacon. So desirous was his Lordship of collecting every fact creditable to the planters, that in October last, in giving an account of the very parishes in which this great religious revolution must have taken place, if it took place at all, while he notices the fact that on Halse-hall estate (belonging to Mr. De la Beche) a Methodist missionary attended once a fortnight, he says not one word of Mr. Pallmer's thousand new and real converts to Christianity. We should be glad to have some more distinct specification of this most extraordinary transaction-time, place, circumstances, and means, clearly pointed out;-for the facts, if true, deserve to be recorded in the most authentic form, and with all the requisite proof*. Tothe Editorofthe Christian Observer. HAVING read with considerable interest the very satisfactory discussion, with respect to the extent of episcopal power, in a recent Number of your Work (see Christ. Obs. for March, p. 149, &c.) and wishing to have the opinion of able judges on a further hearing of the same subject, I am induced to call the attention of your ecclesiastical readers to the question of episcopal power out of the British dominions, The above is taken from the Antislavery Monthly Reporter, No. XIII. that is, within the territory of a foreign power. You have apprised your readers of the appointment, by the Scots Episcopal communion, of what its prelates have thought proper to call, in their act of his consecration, a "Missionary Bishop" for the Continent; and who assumes the power of exercising his jurisdiction over the British clergy settled there (see Bishop Luscombe's Address, in a printed circular, in which he asserts this jurisdiction.) The points, therefore, for examination, I conceive to be comprized in these questions. 1. What power do the Scots, or any other episcopal communions, possess, to establish a delegated jurisdiction out of the territory or state wherein their church is by the ruling power authorized to exist? 2. In case of the existence of such a power in the first instance, what right would the delegated bishop of such communions thus have to act as the ordinary of, or exercise his jurisdiction over, a clergy ordained in, and being the licensed pastors of, another church, or branch of the church of Christ? 3. Would the Clergy of the English Establishment, in these cases even, thus be justified in rendering the allegiance demanded by such consecrated missionary, without the authorization from their own ordinary at home; or, in doing so, would they not be unwarrantably compromising their duty as faithful subjects of the church to which they belong? VIGILIUS. Tothe Editorofthe Christian Observer. IN reading over your review of Miss Kennedy's tale of "Father Clement," with a friend, it was objected to the picture drawn of that character by the writer of the work, that it was untrue to nature, and at variance with Christian charity, for that the Church of Rome no where requires that "blind obedience" to its dictates which would supercede the use of reason, and might even be made to justify crime. The truth of the matter seems to be as follows. The Church of Rome professes to be infallible; and it does require implicit, and therefore often blind, obedience to its dictates: the limit to this obedience is not stated. It is not supposed that the church can possibly urge what is wrong, and therefore no provision is made for a discretionary disobedience to her commands. The same principle of prompt, unreasoning obedience extends pretty much throughout the whole system; the mere will or mandate of an ecclesiastical superior being considered as imposing a corresponding duty of implicit obedience on the inferior. There must, however, be in practice a limit to this obedience, even amongst the strictest classes of devotees; and it does therefore seem a most improbable and revolting supposition, that such a man as Father Clement is described to be, should have been induced to commit virtual murder, under the most flagrant circumstances of perfidy and cruelty, in submission to the command of his superior, and for the honour of the church. Still, such a result, all things considered, is not impossible. A sense of supposed duty, humility, honour, fear, and various other motives, may have given birth to actions of a similar kind, and equally atrocious, in real life. But it may be justly doubted whether the exhibition of such fictitious portraits is the best method of opposing the influence of Popery; for while Papists feel themselves calumniated by such representations, well-judging Protestants are not convinced by them. If the lion had drawn the picture instead of the man, the representation would have been correspondingly altered. In points of this nature, as I presume in all others, fact is a much better teacher of truth than fiction; and facts, I fear, might be collected, that would fully bear out all that is essential to Miss Kennedy's argument. The remarkable submission of Monsieur de Noailles, bishop of Fenelon to the decision of the Châlons, afterwards archbishop of Pope respecting his "Maxims of Paris; Bossuet, bishop of Meaux ; the Saints," though most beautiful and Tronson, superior-general of as an instance of humility, was as the seminary of St. Sulpice, assemabject and irrational as any thing bled at Issy to examine the books that fiction could invent. His cha- of Madame Guyon, without the racter, in all its good qualities, knowledge of De Harlai, the archgreatly resembled that of Father bishop of Paris, whom they wished Clement; but there is this most im to exclude from these secret conportant difference between the fact ferences on a doctrine which had and the fiction, that the "blind arisen and spread through his dioobedience" of Fenelon affected only cese. After having condemned the himself; whereas Father Clement is doctrines of Madame Guyon, these made to sacrifice another. Still, as prelates set forth thirty-four propobefore remarked, it would be diffi- sitions, to explain what they concult to say how far an implicit de- sidered the true' doctrines on the votion of mind, an utter prostration subject of prayer, without assigning of reason, to human authority, might to them any connexion with the not carry a conscientious zealot of Maxims of the Saints." But the Papal communion. The annals Fenelon constantly declined the of the Inquisition; of the several Ca- verbal discussions which Bossuet tholic orders, particularly the Jesuit; proposed to him, or only consented and of the persecutions carried on to them on conditions which were against Protestants in various coun- not accepted; and himself referred tries, and often by men of naturally his work to the Pope. Madame de kind and amiable feelings; will serve Sevigné remarked on this occcasion, to shew, that there is no cruelty that M. de Cambray well defended which may not be perpetrated by the cause of God; but that, as M. de persons who think that they do God Meaux defended better that of the service while obeying the orders of church, he must succeed at Rome. a bigoted and persecuting church. Bossuet wrote a long letter to InnoBut even supposing that this were cent XII, in which he opposed the not the fact, and that no instance doctrine of Fenelon. Notwithstandmore exceptionable of this blind ing the instructions sent by the obedience could be adduced than bishop of Meaux, and the urgency that of Fenelon himself, enough of the Abbé Bossuet, his nephew would still be proved to condemn and agent at Rome, the Holy See the spirit and proceedings of a was in no haste to pronounce senchurch so opposed to every dictate tence. Louis XIV. was given to of common sense, as to require a understand that the Pope would man to believe upon compulsion never condemn the archbishop of what he absolutely disbelieves upon Cambray, while he retained the argument. Yet Fenelon did this, situation of preceptor to the chiland with an august self-abasement dren of France. This monarch, inwhich places the incident among duced by fear of the respect which the most pathetic passages of hu- was paid to Fenelon at Rome, on man biography. The Jesuit editors account of his being supposed to be of Newton's Principia were but pre- honoured with the royal confidence, tended or ironical concessionists; banished him to his diocese, took but Fenelon was a real one: his al- from him his office of preceptor, most saintly character forbids the and himself solicited his condemthought that he acted either from nation from Rome, when he was fear or favour: no, he thought it assured that the treatise of the his duty to sacrifice his reason to Maxims of the Saints, which was his church. announced as a preservative against the delusions of Quietism, tended, on the contrary, to justify many of the absurd visions of Madame Guyon. Before his departure for Cambray, Fenelon wrote the following letter to the Duke de Beauvilliers, his virtuous colleague and most intimate friend. "Do not be uneasy about me, sir; the affair of my book is referred to Rome. If I am mistaken, the authority of the Holy See will undeceive me; which is what I desire, with humility and submission. If I have expressed myself badly, it will correct my expressions. If the subject should require more enlarged explanation, I will joyfully give it by additions. If my book contains only pure doctrine, I shall have the consolation of knowing precisely what we ought to believe, and also to reject. I shall not, however, omit any addition which, without weakening the cause of truth, might edify the most scrupulous reader. But finally, sir, if the Pope should condemn my book, I shall be, if it please God, the first to condemn it, and to send forth a decree to forbid the reading of it in my diocese We must defend disinterested love only with sincere disinterestedness. We must not think of the point of honour, or the deep humiliation which human nature may fear from bad success. I think that I act uprightly. I am as fearful of being presumptuous, obstinate, and indocile, as I am of being weak, time-serving, and timid in the defence of truth. If the Pope should condemn me, I shall be undeceived; and by this means the conquered will enjoy all the fruits of the victory. If, on the contrary, the Pope should not condemn my doctrine, I will endeavour, by my silence and respect, to appease those of my brethren whose zeal is excited against me, by imputing to me a doctrine for which I do not feel less horror than they do. Perhaps they will do me justice when they see my sincerity. Let us humble ourselves; let us be silent: instead of disputing about prayer, let us endeavour to use it." He waited in his retreat for the decision from Rome, defending himself against the Bishop of Meaux with wonderful readiness, and with an eloquence which gained him every heart. As soon as he received the Brief of Innocent XII. which condemned him, he wrote to the Bishop of Arras: "I deeply feel, but I do not hesitate;" and himself read from the pulpit of his metropolitan church the following declaration : "François, by the grace of God, &c. We owe ourselves to you without reserve, my very dear brethren, since we are no longer our own, but belong to the flock which is confided to us. It is with this conviction that we feel ourselves obliged here to open our heart, and to continue to communicate to you what affects us concerning the book of Maxims.' At length our holy Father the Pope, by a brief of the twelfth of March last, has condemned this book, with the twenty-three propositions which have been extracted from it. We will simply, implicitly, and without reserve, obey this brief, my very dear brethren, both as respects the text of the book, and also the twentythree propositions. We shall be comforted, my very dear brethren, under this humiliation, provided that the ministry of the word, which we have received from the Lord for your sanctification, be not weakened; and that, notwithstanding the humiliation of the shepherd, the flock grows in grace before God. It is with the utmost sincerity that we exhort you to perfect submission, and to an unreserved docility; lest insensibly we should swerve fromthat simple obedience of which, by the grace of God, we wish to set you the example, until the last breath of our life. May God grant that we may never be spoken of but as a shepherd who thought that he ought to be more docile than Given the humblest of his flock! at Cambray, April 9, 1699." Some months after his compliance with the Pope's Brief which had condemned him, Fenelon wished to perpetuate in his metropolis, the remembrance of his perfect submission to the decree of the Holy See. He presented to his church, a very beautiful veil. The angel which formed the standard supported with upraised hands the glory in which the boly sacrament was contained, and trod under his feet many heretical books, the titles of which could easily be read. Among the works of Luther, of Calvin, &c. Fenelon had caused to be placed his own volume of "the Maxims of the Saints." When Fontenelle heard that so great an archbishop had given during his life-time such a bequest to the chapter of his cathedral as this monument of his retractation, he said that it was "impossible to carry the affectation of humility farther." But Fenelon was incapable of affectation. He was a devoted, though a pious, child of Popery; and in prostrating his understand ing at the shrine of his church, he only did what that church prescribes to all who enlist themselves under her banners. PASTOR. Tothe Editorofthe Christian Observer. As it may be interesting to your readers, without wading through the Apocryphal controversy, to be come acquainted with some of the leading points of fact established in the course of the argument, I request that you will record in your pages, in addition to the various particulars which have already appeared in them on the subject, the following brief results of Mr. Gorham's inquiries, contained in his amicable controversy with Dr. Leander Van Ess. 1. That in the ancient form of the Bible, from the fourth century till the Reformation, the inspired and apocryphal writings, though intermingled, were invariably distinguished from each other, by the prefaces, or notices of interpolation, connected with each book. 2. That subsequently to the Reformation a new form was introduced, and these barriers were removed; at first, cautiously and rarely; then, after the decree of the Council of Trent, more freely and frequently; and at last, under Papal sanction, boldly, and almost universally. 3. That this change of form was intended to advance the credit of the apocryphal books, and to obtain for them the estimation of inspired writings, by removing the impediments to the acknowledgment of their canonicity. These particulars not only form important circumstances in the pending controversy, but are worth insertion, by the Biblical student, amongst his Apocryphal memoranda. CLERICUS. |