cross, is "the fittest monument, for those who can afford it," to be placed in a churchyard. (Words to Ch. B., sec. 63, 2d ed.) Of these monumental crosses there are many beautiful varieties, both plain and enriched. Neither would their adoption necessarily preclude the use of inscriptions, which might take their place, as of old, around the border. If inscriptions of a questionable character, at least as to taste, cannot be precluded altogether, they would be less obtrusive on the plain dos d'ane than on any form of tombstone. One might be tempted to wish them in black letter. But to speak seriously: both monumental and all ecclesiastical inscriptions meant to be of use, (and what other ought there to be?) would be far better entrusted to the beautiful Lombard character, than to what is called black letter-far better to the plain, intelligible, Roman capital, than either. The periods which these three characters occupy during the age of our ecclesiastical architecture are very nearly equal, taking as our measurement the public document of the Great Seal; the black letter occupying little above half a century more than the Lombard; and the Saxon and Norman Roman, a sensible simple character, bearing a duration which is at least about an average between them. From the last real sovereign of the Saxon line, Edward the Confessor, 1042, it stood its ground till the second Plantagenet, Richard I. The graceful and almost equally legible Lombard was nearly coexistent with the early English and Decorated periods, while the black letter came in with Edward III., a little before the Perpendicular style, and went out a little before it, at the accession of the second Tudor, Henry VIII. In each of these cases, it is probable, as in that of the Lombard, that the monumental use of the inscription preceded its adoption on the royal seal; but it is sufficiently clear that the black letter was a mere intrusion-that it did not prevail in the best age of our church-buildingthat it was preceded and followed by styles similar among themselves, but dissimilar from the black letter-and that the Saxon, Norman, Lombard, and Roman type have therefore a claim to be considered as regular developements of one national system of inscriptional letters. In another paper we may be able to trace how, through the medium of inscriptions-so pointedly recommended by our Church, so unaccountably, for the most part, neglected hitherto-all that is really valuable in Symbolism may be retained for the contemplative mind, yet not locked up from imparting its instruction to the multitude at large. In this hope, we bid our reader farewell in the porch, trusting another pilgrimage to the holy house may be more beneficially employed in examining all within it.

ON THE BIBLE.

OUR dearest earthly friend
(The limit God himself defines)

Even as ourselves we love;

But He, our heavenly friend,

Who infinite in glory shines,

On whom we every hour depend,

Whose grace and goodness know no end,

Draws our whole heart and soul to Him above.

The brightest earthly light

Safely the soul then only leads,

Of God when given and blest;

But He the fountain bright,

From whom each perfect gift proceeds,

Who fills immensity with light,

And holds eternity in sight,

Unfailing guides to everlasting rest.

So is our Church's Book

Of Prayer-a bright but earthly light,
A dear but earthly friend:
But God's inspired Book

A friend in wisdom infinite.

Thence saints of old their counsels took,
Their power, that Satan's empire shook;

And such it e'er will give till time shall end.

The glory that belongs

To God's own Word, let none bestow
On works by man devised.

Be this the theme of songs,

Let zeal for this more fervent grow,

Discourses on the Festivals of the Church of England. With Notes. By the Rev. J. B. MARSDEN, M.A. Hamilton. 1844.

THE pious author of this very excellent work draws a distinction between the superstitious and proper use of the Book of Common Prayer. As ancillary to Scripture, and a help to the believer's aspiration, it is a mine of great wealth, which will bear to be frequently drawn upon. There are some eloquent passages in this work, which we should have extracted, but that it is not our present design

to review it (which we shall, however, do in our next Number), but to make use of some few paragraphs for a special object. There are, indeed, some notes interspersed, which are available to that purpose, and of great value in themselves. We are disposed to concede to the distinction that Mr. Marsden draws between history and tradition, applying the latter term to all that is not in temporary history. Thus, he says, a history of the wars of Charles the First, written in the present century, is a tradition. Such traditionary history may be true; but doctrine that bears a like traditionary character cannot be, for, unlike traditionary history, it has no earlier fact or document on which to establish its authority, since, if there be such fact or document, then the doctrine is no longer a tradition. Besides, no one rests in the dictum of a traditionary historian; so that, to demand credit for doctrines handed down by tradition, is to demand a degree of implicit and even unreasoning assent, which no man grants to mere facts that stand upon the like authority.

The traditions of the early Church concerning the ministry of St. Thomas in India, together with the confirmation they have received in modern times, are full of instruction. The Portuguese, under Vasco de Gama, arriving at Cochin, on the Malabar coast, in 1503, were surprised to find upwards of fifteen Christian churches. These Hindoo Christians maintained the order and discipline of a regular Church under episcopal jurisdiction, and for 130 years had enjoyed a succession of bishops, appointed by the patriarch of Antioch. A chapter of Roman Catholic horrors follows. The Portuguese invaded these tranquil churches, seized the Syrian bishop and sent him prisoner to Lisbon, established the inquisition at Goa, and devoted some of the clergy to the death of heretics. "Happily," says Mr. Marsden, “for the cause of truth, the heresy of these Christians, who were accused, is recorded by their persecutors. The priesthood had married wives; they owned but two sacraments, Baptism and the Lord's Supper; they neither invoked saints nor worshipped images, nor believed in purgatory, and they had no other orders or names of dignity in the Church than bishop, priest, and deacon." No wonder that such a standing protest was not endurable by Rome, and that they were called upon to abjure their tenets and submit to the Pope: some were compelled to do so, the rest fled into the mountains, and sought the protection of the native prince.

We are told by the Tractarians that we are guilty of heresy if, forsooth, we deny that Mary is the Mother of God; because the Council of Ephesus (A.D. 431) insisted upon the title, and anathematised those that refused to make use of it. Mr. Marsden contends that the Church of England does not receive the canons of any Council whatever as final and absolute decisions, and that our Reformers studiously avoided the title in question upon all occasions. Moreover, the design of the Council itself is misstated, it being assembled to put down the Nestorian heresy, which denied the proper deity of our Lord, and not to exalt the Virgin. Her, indeed, they declared to be ɛorокоg, but not μrvp rov Oɛov; meaning, by the former term, that "the Virgin bore Him who was God." The term, however, was, after all, not happily chosen. "We are," says Archbishop Usher, "to observe of our Melchisedek, that, as he had no mother in regard to one of his natures, so he was to have no father in regard of the other; he is without father according to his manhood, and without mother according to his Godhead." There is also an excellent note on grace in Baptism, which we shall consider in connexion with the next work reviewed.

Two Conversations between a Clergyman and One of his Parishioners on the Service of the Public Baptism of Infants: the first showing the Nature of the Blessing professedly sought in Use of that Service; the second, the Ground on which the Child is declared to be regenerate. By the Rev. HENRY MOULE, M.A., Vicar of Fordington, Dorset. London: W. Smith. 1844.

This is a very clever pamphlet. By an analysis of the baptismal service it arrives at the design and intention of it, showing that the word regeneration is used in the fullest and highest sense throughout, but that the imparting of it to the infant is, so

far as the service is concerned, made dependant on the faith and sincerity with which it is prayed for, and the repentance professed and promised by the parents and sponsors of the infant: thus it is that he accounts for the circumstance, that many children who have been made partakers of the rite, have, nevertheless, not been made, as their after lives show, partakers of the prints of regeneration which ought to accompany and follow the rite. Thus he says, "We cannot receive with real satisfaction and comfort the declaration that the child is regenerate, unless we have good ground to believe that the blessing of regeneration has been sought with earnest and faithful prayer. This may appear a very serious and tremendous view of the subject, and it is so. But so, also, is every correct view of the actual work of the salvation of a soul. That salvation is never sought aright, either for ourselves or others, if it be regarded as a matter of course, or dependant on the bare performance of a rite: nor is there anything in Scripture to lead us to suppose that a sacrament is of any efficacy without real prayer either by the party, or, as in infant baptism, on behalf of the party, to whom it is administered." There can be no doubt that the author has completely established his point, and as little that all the services of the Church are like the promises of God themselves-conditional. That all baptised infants are made partakers of external privileges, and that, "in a mere ecclesiastical sense of the term, they may be said to be regenerate," Mr. Marsden thinks feasible; but in any deeper sense, facts negative the assumption. "It is,' says Mr. Marsden, "an eternal principle, to which every doctrine that is really of God pays the profoundest homage, that without holiness no man shall see the Lord. Heaven and earth shall pass away, but one jot or tittle of this decree shall never pass away. It is not written in one text, but in thousands; it is the sum and substance, the motive and the principle, of all that is preceptive in the Bible." He then says that the doctrine will not bear this test. "Are," he asks, "all baptised persons-are the majority of them-holy persons, fearing God, and working righteousness? Are there not let it be written in tears!-hundreds of thousands of our countrymen baptised into Christ's Church who live and die ignorant, sensual, profane? Are there not hundreds of thousands, besides, who have no sense of Divine things-careless, worldly-minded, having little of the form of godliness, and nothing of its power? Are all these regenerate?" The question must be answered in the negative or we must contend that, all outward appearances notwithstanding, even the open sinner is, by virtue of his wisdom, a child of God; and call for a violent exercise of faith, to the extent, indeed, of believing, whatever our observation may teach us to the contrary, that the profligate, the swearer, the man of dishonest practices, having been baptised, is in a state of grace. No such doctrine, however, is taught in Scripture. Besides, it is Antinomianism of the rankest sort. Identifying baptism with election, it enables the baptised, and, ergo, predestined sinner, to boast-" True, my conduct is immoral; but I have faith, I am one of the elect, and know myself secure." And thus these Tractarian advocates appeal from the test of works to the test of baptism. This, contends Mr. Marsden, is to set aside the necessity for holiness.

Sometimes, however, it is contended that the grace conveyed in baptism has failed through subsequent neglect; that the notorious sinner, having been baptised, was once a child of God, but has fallen from grace. To this, Mr. Marsden replies, that it will not bear the test of Scripture, and that the children of God do not thus fall away from grace. Their general character, says he, is consistency, not apostacy from God. Whether or not the regenerate can, the fact is, that they do not, fall away. Apostacy is, to say the least, unusual, even if not impossible, amongst true Christians. We cannot, continues our author, reconcile with this a theory which allows a vast proportion of the regenerate to fall away, unless we admit that the regenerate, in a spiritual sense, are not necessarily of the number of the elect; and are therefore compelled to reject, as unscriptural, the doctrine that all baptised persons have received saving grace, and that those of them who die in sin were once the children of God.

The theory of charitable judgement, Mr. Marsden also shows to be untenable.

Nothing, therefore, remains but the theory, that the baptismal promises are made to children who are dedicated to God in faith and prayer. "Our Church," says Mr. Marsden-in this, agreeing with Mr. Moule-" our Church supposes that all children who are brought to the font are thus presented: a reasonable, nay, a necessary supposition, since the Church is supposed to contain none but faithful men. But as the Church now actually stands, there exists the painful necessity of teaching conversion both to the young and to the old, whether baptised or not." "The sad truth is," concludes Mr. Marsden, "our youth have not thus, for the most part, been dedicated with a lively faith to God in baptism. On the one hand, carnal men, not having the Spirit, confounded the sign with the substance, and mistook baptism for regeneration; satisfied with the washing of water, and careless about the renewing of the Holy Ghost; and on the other, men of God shrank, with unwise timidity, from a subject they saw so fatally abused."

Baptismal Regeneration. A Sermon, preached at St. Peter's Church, Walworth, on Septuagesima Sunday, 1844. By the Rev. PELHAM Maitland, M.A., Assistant Minister of St. Peter's. Pigott. 1844.

We must remind this gentleman that the question is not one of theory, but of fact. Baptismal regeneration is in all cases supposed, where actual faith is present in the adult, or, when an infant, in the sponsors; but without faith regeneration does not necessarily accompany the rite. Mr. Maitland seeks to give a lower meaning to the term regeneration than it bears either in Scripture or the Prayer-book, in order to accommodate it to the actual facts. But nothing is gained by this, and it is alien to the economic propriety observed in the baptismal service of the Church. The meaning, for which Mr. Maitland contends, is included in the higher meaning, implied in the Bible and Book of Common Prayer. It must, however, be confessed, that by regeneration Augustine did not mean what Calvin meant by the term, but used the word conversion instead. Mr. Maitland, like both Calvin and Augustine, holds that conversion is necessary after infant baptism, and, therefore, so far as he is concerned, the dispute is only one about verbal definition.

Experience of the Truth-the Preservative against Error. A Sermon, preached in the Chapel of Farnham Castle, at the General Ordination held by the Lord Bishop of Winchester, December 17, 1843. By THOMAS BROCK, M.A., CommissaryGeneral of Guernsey and its Dependencies. Published by His Lordship's Desire. London: Seeley. 1844.

The question of Baptismal Regeneration seems to us much better argued in a note to this excellent sermon; of which note, therefore, we extract the following portion:

"But as they are not all Israel, which are of Israel,' (Rom. ix. 6,) as there ever have been baptised infidels, as well as baptised believers, in the Church of Christ; it follows, that all who are outwardly received into the visible Church are not all spiritually ingrafted into the mystical body of Christ; having but the outward profession, they receive but the outward form of baptism. The inward grace they have not; and therefore, if the Church could discern that the parents are unbelieving, and that their infants are not, and never will be, in covenant with God, but will grow up in impenitency and unbelief, not only could she not declare them regenerate,' but she could not even deem herself authorised to administer to them the outward rite.

"This alone ought to satisfy us, that when the Church pronounces infants' regenerate with the Holy Spirit, and received as God's own Children by adoption,' she is speaking not absolutely, but in the spirit of Christian charity,' which directs us to presume good of every one, unless the contrary be shown.'

"But the Church is not contented with receiving the infant simply on the ground of the faith of his parents or sponsors. She also exacts the promise