keep not pace with the colossal grandeur of the empire which can be thus described! The bare thought is fitted to overwhelm the souls of all who give it access to their hearts. And who can with safety refuse access to it? The prayer" for the peace of our Jerusalem," must be the prayer of all who share her blessings and are protected by her power. And if, for their "brethren and companions' sakes," they wish her "prosperity," will they not, "because of the house of the Lord" their " God, seek" also "to do" her "good?"

We could not better introduce Mr. Anderson's work than by allowing him thus to speak for himself. Such are the terms in which he commends to us this first portion of his important work, and entreats his readers "to consider the vastness of that field of labour, to which their attention, their sympathy, their prayers are (therein) directed." He could not have made a more stirring appeal; and we sincerely trust that this awakening passage, which, we observe, has already become a sort of public property, will serve the important purpose, not only of directing attention to the author's work, but of exciting, as the eloquent announcement of a simple fact, a more lively interest than has ever yet been felt in the various missionary efforts connected with our Colonial Dependencies,— efforts which, we have reason to rejoice, are daily extending, and presenting a more hopeful aspect.

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It is the object of Mr. Anderson's work-" to trace the history of the Church of England in the colonies and foreign dependencies of the British empire, from the earliest period in which the attempt was made to acquire any of them, to the present day." The term "Colony" he employs in its widest sense, in the sense assigned to it by Johnson, namely, "A body of people drawn from the mother-country to inhabit some distant place:" he applies it, generally, as the most convenient appellation, to denote any foreign possession belonging to, or connected with, the British empire." Such is the wide field upon which he has entered, a field the vastness of which, be it remembered, is not to be measured by the present extent of the British empire, a considerable part of it no longer paying allegiance to the British crown. The design is a noble one, and worthy of all encouragement. The spirit in which it is undertaken, and the ultimate objects contemplated, will best appear, perhaps, from Mr. A.'s own statement. Having acknowledged the help which, from various quarters, has been so liberally extended to him, he adds-

"Notwithstanding all these aids, I am conscious that the path which I seek

1 Preface, pp. 17, 18.

to traverse has never yet been thoroughly explored: and that I need guidance, at every step, if I would walk safely unto the end. The guidance, therefore, which I may be permitted to receive from men, whose local experience or other opportunities of information enable them to supply it, will not, I trust, be withheld; and I can with truth say, that I desire only to employ their brotherly help in subordination to the legitimate objects which I have proposed to myself in the prosecution of this work.

"The nature of these objects, and the spirit in which I desire to attain them, will be better learnt from the tenor of the work itself, than from any professions of mine in this place. Thus much, however, I may here be permitted to state, that, whilst in accordance with its title, I am mainly employed in tracing the history of the Church of England throughout our various colonies, I never wish to pass over in silence, nor to speak in a jealous or controversial spirit of those who, separated from our communion, are labouring to promote the knowledge of Christianity in the same regions. I do not profess, indeed, to describe fully the operations either of the Roman Catholic Church, or of the various bodies of Protestant dissent. Such a work is obviously impracticable, and fit only to be classed with those of which Bacon says that they cannot be done within the hour-glass of one man's life.' But, as the history of the Church, in any and every place, is the history of her difficulties, and as those difficulties are greatest which arise from the unhappy divisions of the Christian world, the relation of them is unavoidable: it has occupied a large portion of the present volume, and must continue to occupy a portion of those which are to follow. I have said, in another part of this volume, that the record of these difficulties, however painful and humiliating, will not be without profit, if, by teaching us to form a true estimate of the services performed, the errors committed, and the perils passed through, by the men of a former generation, we may be the better prepared to endure the trials, and discharge the duties, and surmount the obstacles, which await us in our own. It is the desire to learn and to communicate this needful lesson, which alone has animated me to enter upon the present enquiry."--(pp. xv. xvi.)

Mr. Anderson's first volume, the only one which has yet appeared, brings the inquiry to the beginning of the reign of Charles the First, and besides reviewing the attempts towards colonization, and the progress made from the first voyage of discovery (1496), under the command of John Cabot and his sons, it contains a very important chapter (VIIth) on the "Condition of the Church in England during the reigns of Elizabeth and James the First." This, indeed, is but a small portion of the period which it is proposed to traverse, but the first volume is, in the main, preliminary, and enters into a variety of detail, the examination of which, the author judged would "tend greatly to facilitate his future progress." We think he might have passed a little more lightly over this opening period; but there are those, no doubt, who will feel themselves much indebted to Mr. A. for his preliminary matter, and we must be content to have lost a little time, if a certain class of readers are thus allured to traverse, with so able and instructive a guide as Mr. A.,-the inviting and all-important field upon which he has entered. We are glad to find that he hopes prise within his second volume, the whole of that sequel of the history which occurs between the commencement of Charles the

"to com

First's reign, and the establishment of our first colonial bishopric in Nova Scotia, in 1787 : and, in the third and concluding volume, to bring down the course of the narrative to the present day."

It will not be expected that we should follow Mr. A. through the general preliminary detail contained in this first volume; nor will our space admit of any copious notice of the more important portions. We have pleasure, however, in directing attention to a few particulars.

Having traced the progress of discovery, and of attempts towards colonization in the reigns of Henry VII. and Henry VIII., Mr. A. thus alludes to the Church of the Reformation, and the spirit which actuated our good Cranmer.

"It is important to observe," he says, “in the last place, that the protection afforded to Henry by those of his subjects whose pursuits led them beyond the coasts of England, was not confined to their temporal interests. Calais was, at that time, the sole foreign possession of the English crown: and, to the spiritual welfare of the inhabitants of that city, Archbishop Cranmer strove successfully to direct the thoughts and aid of his sovereign. He would not that the great work of the Reformation should be marred, by coldness and carelessness of heart towards those, who, although separated by a short distance of place, were yet to be made partakers of the same spiritual, as they already were of the same civil, privileges. That work..... (the Reformation) was the lawful and valid suppression of wrong, which an usurped authority had imposed upon the nation: the open vindication and restoration of truth, to which the Universal Church had ever borne witness. At such a crisis, we think it important to observe the course which England pursued, towards the only foreign possession which then belonged to her. In the year following that which witnessed the last and most important change.... (the putting an end to the papal supremacy).... we find Cranmer writing the following letter to Cromwell, and expressing his intention of sending two chap lains to Calais :

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Right Worshipful Master Secretary, I commend me heartily to you: likewise praying you to have in your good remembrance the contents of such of my letters, as I of late sent unto you, for the King's Grace's letters to be obtained and directed to the Lord Deputy of Calice, and other his Grace's counsellors there, in the favour of two such chaplains of mine, as I intend to send thither with all speed, to preach the Word of God; whom I would have sent thither before this time, if I might have had the said letters, for which this bearer doth only repair unto you for expedition therein, whom I pray you to dispatch as soon as you may. From Knoll, the 22nd day of January, (1535.) Your own assured ever,

"THOMAS CANTUAR.

"To the Worshipful and my very loving friend Master Cromwell, Secretary to the King's most noble Grace.'

"The same matter was urged by the Archbishop, in another form, in a second letter to Cromwell, towards the end of the same year :

"Right Worshipful, in my most hearty-wise I commend me unto you. And whereas among other of the King's dominions, within this his realm, there is no part (in my opinion) that more needeth good instruction of the

Mr. Anderson briefly sketches its progress as involved in the passing of various statutes- the concurrent act of the Church and of the State"-till the rejection of the Papal supremacy by legislative enactment in 1531.

Word of God, or aid of learned curates to be resident, than doth the town and marches of Calice, considering specially, not alonely the great ignorance and blindness, as well of the heads now resident there, as of the common and vulgar people, in the doctrine and knowledge of Scripture, but also having respect unto the universal concourse of aliens and strangers, which daily diverteth and resorteth thither, I think that it will no less be a charitable and godly deed than a singular commodity for this realm, to have in those parties at the least two learned persons planted and settled there by the King's authority in some honest living, whose sincerity in conversation of living and teaching shall shortly (no doubt) clearly extinct and extirpate all manner of hypocrisy, false faith, and blindness of God and his Word, wherein now the inhabitants there be altogether wrapt, to the no little slander (I fear me) of this realm, and prejudice of the good and laudable acts lately conceived by the King's Grace and his high Court of Parliament; which thing to reform lieth much in you, in case you will but move the King's Highness (forasmuch as the collations of the benefices there belongeth unto his Grace) to give them as they fall, unto such men as be both able and willing to do God and his Grace acceptable service in discharging of their cures.

"In consideration hereof, and inasmuch as I am advertised that the parsonage of St. Peter's besides Calice, is like shortly to be void, and in the King's Grace's disposition, I beseech you either to obtain the same for Master Garret, whose learning and conversation is known to be right good and honest, or else for some other as is so able and willing to discharge the same as he is. Wherein I assure you that you shall accomplish a right meritorious deed before God, and deserve condign thanks hereafter of your prince for promoting of so great a commodity for his realm.

"And whereas I am informed that the curate of St. Mary's within Calice, intendeth to make suit unto you for the said benefice, I pray you not to regard his suit, for I hear that he is nothing meet for that room, specially in this world of reformation. At Otterforde the viiith day of October.

"Your own ever assured,

"To the Right Worshipful and my singular

good friend, Mr. Secretary.'

T. CANTUARIEN.

"Similar evidences of the desire, entertained by the Archbishop to promote the welfare of Calais, may be traced in the efforts which he made, a few years afterwards, to appoint an efficient commissary, and to secure the proper reading of the Holy Scriptures, in that city: and also in the reasons which he urged in favour of the appointment of Nicolas Bacon, to the office of town-clerk of Calais, in 1538.”—(pp. 17—23.)

The reason, it seems, which induced Cranmer to recommend to the said office this Nicholas Bacon (afterwards, in the reign of Elizabeth, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal), was, that he knew him "entirely to be both of such towardness in the law, and of so good judgment touching Christ's religion, that in that stead he shall be able to do God and the king right acceptable service." "It is obviously a point of no little interest," as Mr. A. remarks, "to observe these instances of the anxiety and care with which the spiritual interests of the one foreign city possessed at that time by England, were regarded by the spiritual and temporal rulers of her Church." Mr. A. has, as we think, done well in laying his foundation here, and commencing his work on colonial Church

1 Namely, the various acts against the authority of the Pope, passed in the sessions of January and November, 1534.

policy with so bright an example as the father of the Reformation. We have here the germ of all our greatness; and to these principles and examples we must ever look, if we would preserve that greatness entire, and not forfeit our standing as a nation. This point is one of so much importance, and we deem it so satisfactory to have a clear and distinct recognition of the great principles which developed themselves at the period of the Reformation, that we shall not apologize for giving an extract of some length, illustrative of the spirit which actuated our sixth Edward, his counsellors, and servants ::-we are happy to add, illustrative too of the spirit and views which pervade Mr. Anderson's work. Having closed the reign of Henry VIII., he thus proceeds:—

"In the next and short reign of Edward the Sixth, a fresh effort was made to extend the intercourse and commerce of England with foreign countries. The plan then acted upon failed, it is true, to accomplish its ulterior and avowed object, namely, that of reaching the Asiatic continent by the NorthEast passage; and the leader of the expedition and most of his fellowers, perished. But as the character of enterprises such as these is not always to be determined by their results, so the issue, however disastrous, of any scheme of man's device, should not make us forgetful of the principles, from which it derived its origin, or of agents by whom its course of operation was directed.

"And certainly-when we call to mind the state of the Church and nation during that period, and remember that the struggles, experienced in effecting the various acts of Reformation, which the preceding reign had witnessed, were followed by a large share of those blessings which have survived the many trials which have since assailed them, and are the inheritance of our Church at this day,-it is matter of no ordinary moment to observe in what manner they who first shared the blessings, were mindful of the responsibilities which accompanied them. The abolition of the papal supremacy had been followed by the rejection of the doctrine of purgatory, of indulgences, of the worshipping of saints and images, and of the constrained celibacy of the clergy. The scriptures were translated, read, and expounded to the people; the cup was no longer withheld from communicants, in the administration of the supper of the Lord; in all the other offices of public devotion, the prayers and praises of the assembled worshippers were repeated no longer in a foreign, but in their native tongue.

We

"These were among the mercies which, after many a fierce conflict, were secured to the Church of England in that day of her Reformation; and we gratefully record them, yea, hold in affectionate remembrance, the names of those faithful servants of God who gained and transmitted them to us. dare not, in our own day of difficulty and strife, increase the weight of our burdens, by disparaging or reproaching the work of their hands. True, the record of that work is marred and blotted by many a token of infirmity, of fraud, of violence, on the part of some who directed its course; but if it be God's high prerogative to bring good out of evil, and to make even the fierceness of man to turn to His praise,' it is the accomplishment of that result which should lead us the more thankfully to cherish his gifts. True, the estrangement between Christian churches is most painful; yet we must remember that it is not the separation, but the cause, that makes a schismatic; and if, as we have already seen, the act or statute of our separation from the court of Rome did not create a new right, but only manifested and restored the old one; if the whole history of the contest shows that, in no one point, can heresy or schism be proved against us; if our separation from the