it may. Lord King, and Carlile, HENRY DRUMMOND. **We have stated, that it is not our intention to open a controversy with our correspondent upon the sentiments expressed in his letter. The follies at Mr. Irving's church will do more to enlighten the eyes of all sober-minded Christians as to the character and tendency of the whole system which Mr. Drummond advocates than a hundred arguments. At all events, we commit his letter in all fairness to our readers, and to those of our correspondents who may think that it requires an argumentative reply. With regard to what Mr. Drummond says of our having " dragged his name before our readers, in a manner uncalled for, and without much information as to his opinions, we need only reply, that we referred merely to what he has published with his name, and even in our own pages: we did not so much as allude to his speeches at public meetings, still less to all that is town's talk of books on "social duties," papers manifold and extraordinary in Morning Watches, and pamphlets multiform and of astounding portent; for we abhor and sedulously avoid the practice, now so common, of adverting in print to the gossip of drawing-rooms, dinnertables, committee-rooms, and newspapers, as to men's supposed opinions. But authentic published document is a just and proper subject for reference; and it were false delicacy, or worse, not to notice it, if requisite, in a spirit of truth and meekness. certain points so clearly that he cannot understand how other men can believe otherwise; and he therefore, without hesitation, charges on the great majority of his fellow-Christians, not merely a difference of opinion, or even a serious or fatal mistake, but " Now this is precisely what we have dishonest perversions." complained of again and again, both in the writers of the Morning-Watch sect, and some of their colleagues They are not content to confine in the attack on the Bible Society. themselves to arguments, but proceed to conjure up and impute motives-motives the most mean, selfish, and unchristian; carnal expediency, a desire to please Mr. Smith, or Mr. Wellesley, or his Majesty's ministers, or to accumulate" archdeaconries and chancellorships," or to court infidels, and Neologians-in short, in Mr. Drummond's own strong epithet, every thing that is "dishonest.' Mr. Drummond is safe in speaking thus of his "Evangelical" friends; but if he said as much of his secular friends in a matter of politics, he would be requested either to explain his words, or to eat them, or to adopt not inclined, however, to be much some other alternative. We are offended at his language, as we believe him to be honest, though very mistaken; and his hard words, and sincere conviction, and not from we can well conceive, flow from zeal any unkind feeling: nay, we doubt not but that the same charitable discrimination which could make Earl Grey addict himself to profligate measures without being profligate, and with no imputation of motive, to give pain, might equally absolve no personal reflection, or intention poor Christian-Observer of all dis"the Evangelical clergy" and the honesty in their "dishonest perversions," and leave them true believers standing all their "infidelity." If and servants of Christ, notwithwe thought otherwise, and that our und Remarks upon it. 1831.] correspondent really meant in serious mood to impeach motives, as well as to reprobate conclusions, we should consider his letter as undeserving of notice. We, however, wish that he would addict himself to a less ambiguous manner of expression; and the more so, because nothing so much prevents good men of different sentiments weighing each other's opinions with calmness, and a desire to arrive at truth, as this uncandid and not very Christian spirit. While we are penning these lines, the new Number of the Morning Watch has reached us; and as some of the matters in it link themselves very closely with what we have just written, we shall string them together. If we chose to follow the practice we have reprobated, of making individuals responsible on common, and even credible, report for what they have not actually put their name to, we should not hesitate to trace up to Mr. Drummond himself some of the most absurd, fanatical, and uncharitable papers, or parts of papers, which disgrace Morning Watches and Prophetic Dialogues. Nay, putting rumour aside, we might fairly ask, how is it that some of the papers in the very Number of the Morning Watch now before us contain, not only Mr. Drummond's own wellidentified statements and arguments, but actually his very words in expressing them? If, instead of exercising the delicacy which we have always evinced in this matter, we had thought fit," as he charges us, though in a very forgiving spirit, with doing, of gratuitously "dragging his name and supposed opinions before our readers, we fear we might have identified him, not merely by report, but by actual collation, as the real Junius in some of the most exceptionable papers in the Morning Watch. To give one instance among many; in the number of that work now on our writing-desk, there is a long article on Spiritual Gifts," which, for superstition, fanaticism, and violent invective upon faithful servants of Christ through the out the land who do not adopt the mark the curious identity of style. spiritualizing," and "moral incapacity,"-a jury would convict Mr. Drummond of writing the article in question. We, being more charitable, and not sworn to give a true verdict, only presume that some pilferer purloined the copy of his letter to us, and has availed himself of a good imitation of his style, to palm on the editor of the new Moore's Almanac * his own vaga * In twice using this appellation we speak gravely, and most painfully; for strange is it that, when the absurd predictions and superstitious fables of astrologer Moore have caused his pages to be superseded the very publishers being ashamed of them-by "British" and "Useful Knowledge" Almanacs, absurdities as great as his own (the motive and object of the publication only being different) are revived in a work professing to be grave and religious. Yet so it is, for some of the predictions in this very Number of the Morning Watch are as groundless and unauthorized as those in Moore himself; and some of the marvellous tales are quite as Who but a worthy successor of anile. Moore would, under the title of "The Progress of the English Revolution," have set himself seriously to glean out of the and elsewhere, as "warnings newspapers before the judgments," and portentous ries, thinking they might be mistaken for Mr. Drummond's. Now, if we listened to common fame, or even to internal evidence, and wished to" drag" our correspondent before our readers, this paper would furnish indications of the speedy approach of Christ in his corporeal presence to judge the world and set up a temporal kingdom at Jerusalem, a long catalogue of " earthquakes, storms, eruptions of burning mountains, fireballs, columns of fire, avalanches, meteoric stones, meteors, sea storms, inundations, hail-storms, and extraordinary heat, which have occurred during the last few years;" with "the signs in the sun, and zodiacal lights, and aurora borealis of last year;" the flood at St. Petersburgh in 1825; a shock at Venice and Parma last September, a mountain split the same month in Switzerland: the sun (not the moon) looking "green," and having " a singular and unpleasant aspect" at New York, on the 18th of last August; "a shade of rose colour, and then a delicate violet" on the sun at Genoa, in the month of August; with numerous similar prodigies? These things the Morning Watchman avers, are signs of the forthcoming judgments upon apostate Christendom; and he calls on his readers diligently "to look out for themselves" as to all such portents, that they may not be deceived in the matter, but be prepared to see Christ shortly appear. So much for predictions; then, as to anile tales: but here we know not where to begin or end, as the work is full of them; but we will give a specimen from the above-named notable paper on "Spiritual Gifts;" not by any means fathering them upon so good and judicious a man as Mr. Drummond, but only lamenting that the pilferer of his bureau has so shamefully imitated his style, and caught by anticipation not only his ideas and arguments, but often his very words. The pilferer thus writes: "A German clergyman, formerly a Popish priest, was converted several years ago, by a direct revelation from Heaven, to the doctrine of justification by faith. He was not disobedient to the heavenly vision, and immediately preached all that he knew on the subject. One day, while meditating upon whether he ought to continue his practice of extempore preaching, or whether he had not better write his sermons beforehand, seeing that the subjects on which he had to treat were now SO new to him, a supernatural fire suddenly descended upon his paper, and consumed it before his eyes. was still in great other branches of doctrine, and, amongst upon many others, disbelieved in the existence of the devil. In walking through a neighbour error He [DEC. For this pseudo Mr. Drummond has a very painful occasion for so doing. the effrontery to charge "Evange lical teachers," pious and zealous clergymen, the writers in our religious journals, and the friends of our ing town, he was seized hold of by a maniac, who with great strength threw him on the ground, then raised him up and dashed him to the ground again, crying out all the time, You don't believe in priest was moved to command the evil me, don't you?' On hearing this the spirit, in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, to come out of the maniac; when instantly the spirit obeyed, leaving the maniac quiet and in his right mind." France, there is an establishment for the "At Glay, near Montbelliard, in education of ministers and schoolmasters dull habits and small intellectual or phyThere was lately in it a young man of served to become insensible to every thing sical powers. On a sudden he was ob that was passing around him; and in that this whole period, instead of speaking little state he continued several weeks. During and with difficulty, he would pray aloud with the greatest fluency, and in beautiful veloped in a mode equally unusual; inlanguage. His physical powers were dewould ascend the scaffolding of the house, stead of being heavy and inactive, he which at that time was being built, and run along the parapets like a squirrel, to the terror and surprise of the workmen. His mother was sent for to see him: up nestness on the subject of religion: he to that period she had evinced no earpreached Jesus to her, and she became converted, and has continued a consistent pious woman ever since. renounced all religious observances, and however, is said to have subsequently He himself, profession of religion." at this present time scarcely makes any "A pious French minister, settled at of God in this country within the present and Remarks upon it. 1831.] their [the plural pronoun is used ungram- has seen them." "We have received an account of several visions seen by persons in Edinburgh, all of the lowest class except onenamely, the pious minister who transmitted it. An officer in the navy also, now on service, and distinguished for his coolness and intrepidity in the hour of danger, had a vision of the Lord Jesus Christ, as accurately seen by him, and when he was wide awake, as ever any other object was presented to his senses. The person who is above referred to as having been assailed by Satan, had also had visions predicting events to befal them in their private affairs, extremely improbable to be accomplished, but which they have faith to believe will come to pass." But it is time to cut short this long patience, and from a serious doubt whe- responsibly affixed to them, is not making 66 to the sword and to the deep, as it Again, if we had any wish to the dishonest; " for we will not follow some of our contemporaries in the base practice of imputing motives. Not then surmising that the author, who is his own reviewer, is Mr. Drummond, we shall only notice one among the many parallel passages and identical reasonings, which go to prove that the reviewer is the writer of the paper on Spiritual Gifts. We need only take for instance the passage in "Spiritual Gifts," in which the writer mendaciously asserts that Evangelical preachers" teach men that "not Jesus, but an ungodly rabble are the source of all power and authority upon earth." Now com pare with this the following declaration in the review of Social Duties: "The Lord is coming upon a swift cloud to judgment; and the especial cause [these Morning-Watch writers pretend to know the most secret purposes of the Infinite Mind], that provokes him to rise up and vindicate his insulted honour, is the blasphemous assumption of the ungodly rabble, that they, and not He, are the source of power and authority on the earth. This blasphemy the Christian Observer has done as much to inculcate as the People's Penny papers, the Birmingham Political Union, or Taylor and Carlile themselves." Now as two men could not have inverted at the same moment so far-fetched and preposterous a falsehood, and much less have clothed it in precisely the same words, we might conclude, from this one passage, and a score others might be adduced, that the reviewer of Social Duties, who is the author also, is further the writer of the paper on Spiritual Gifts, and that all three have stolen their matter out of Mr. Drummond's secret bureau, as proved by the dove-tailing in his own subscribed letter. Not that we shall make Mr. Drummond answerable for all the slanders, the fanaticism, and the anile stories in these papers; or for the unjust, ungentlemanly, and unchristian abuse of what the writer calls the "Evangelical party," and all who do not approve of the ravings of Mr. Armstrong and the absurdities enacting at Mr. Irving's church. Forbid it that we should lay these things to Mr. Drummond; but we wish he would keep his keys in his pocket in future, seeing that some pilferer thus steals scraps of his composition and the whole tenor of his argument, and weaves out of them a tissue which is disgraceful to a Christian, a gentle man, and a scholar. The writer who so roundly charges on us, and on many better and wiser men than us, "blasphemy," should in plain-dealing have put his name to his charge; and should he think fit to do so, he may be assured he shall neither be indict ed at law, nor called out into a field of forty paces, but shall be merely noted down in our tablets, as a monitory specimen of all that a Christian man should avoid when he sits down to pen a theological discussion, and all that common courtesy would shun even in a newspaper political warfare. The reviewer in the Morning Watch is a zealous defender of the writings of the late Mr. Vaughan of Leicester; and he seems thoroughly to have imbibed his sentiment, that in theological controversy the end is to vanquish your opponent, and that you need not be very nice about the mode of so doing. There is one passage farther which we must allude to; and it is so disingenuous that we shall not expose the author by dove-tailing, but leave the matter to his own secret conscience. The Morning Watch averred some time since, that "the Christian Observer has ever been the most active defender of that creature of Lord Brougham, the London University, and patron of a system of education from which God was rejected." By the truth or falsehood of this assertion, we remarked, in our Number for September, might we judge of the moral honesty of the Morning Watch, and of the sect who wish to bring into popular odium "the Evangelicals who cant about Bibles, tracts, and missions." Our watchword has ever so notoriously been SCRIPTURAL eduCATION, that it was impossible that the most cursory reader could mistake our sentiments; much less conceive us to be the most active of all the advocates for the contrary. The charge was a pure gratuitous invention, to bring us into disrepute, because we exposed the delusion about Miss Fancourt's cure being miraculous, and the absurdities, and, but for the motive, we should say "blasphemy," of those who are imputing to Christ a sinful nature, and to the Holy Ghost the shrieks and jargon called new tongues at the Caledonian Chapel. The writer in the Morning Watch, as a Christian and a gentleman, had but one plain course, |