We think that we can discover, in the midst of much error, the indications of a wish even yet to separate himself somewhat astutely from the full-blown profession of that semi-Romanism which so complacently teaches and excommunicates from the Episcopal chairs of the north.

Such nice steering, however, is always difficult; and we do not think that Dr. Terrot has been successful. He evidently doubts that he shall satisfy the clergy with whom he is now associated; and we are sure that he does not come up to the standard of sound English Reformation theology. His sermons want manifestly that general unbroken harmony of sentiment which flows from a fully-persuaded, satisfied, and quiet mind; and the effect of that contest between two sets of incompatible opinions has been to weave a rather flimsy fabric of linsey-wolsey, in which the Puseyistic pelagianism is shot with the faint shade of evangelic reminiscence.

The first series of discourses amounts to little more than a detailed advice as to the mode of fasting in Lent; and touches very inadequately the great subject of Christian humiliation, and the evangelical motives which ought to breathe the spirit of humility, not only over the ascetic self-denial of forty days, but throughout every day of the year. The author is very anxious to show that, as a bishop, he has authority to command this Lenten fast, and a determination not to "sit in silent despondency over the decay of ecclesiastical discipline" in this matter; but when he endeavours to bring that authority to bear upon the country families who have come into Edinburgh, expressly to share the festivities which peculiarly characterise "the season" in that city, he finds it exceedingly difficult to enforce abstinence upon a people who, with a few exceptions, according to his account, will not even present themselves at the Wednesday and Friday prayers. Viewing, on the one hand, that desired proof of the efficacy of episcopal authority, in a people abstaining from daily food; and on the other his own liberal notions of needful comfort, and the selfindulgent spirit of the age, he finds himself in a practical dilemma, in which, after vacillating from side to side, the real amount of his teaching is little more than might be learned from a respectable old lady in the days of French wars and government fasts, who always "restricted herself to a plain joint and a pudding." He talks much and frequently of "the highest authority, the voice of the Catholic Church;" of "the deep and stern severity of Lent;" and that "in the enforcement of penance the Church acted neither irrationally nor superstitiously nor uncharitably," till he seems strongly disposed to strain a point of authority,

and to require that his people should be in this special matter "obedient children of the Church." Yet when called to admit that in his city "Lent is almost the carnival of the middle and higher classes of society," and that "instead of seeing a visible diminution of luxury and social festivity, and a visible increase of the outward marks of religious humiliation, we see around us a greater predominance of all fashionable luxuries and amusements, feebly balanced by the scanty attendance to be found in our chapels on Litany days," he finds himself driven to inculcate that which will be palatable, rather than that "ancient asceticism" which he believes to be commanded "by the authority of the Church universal, as the index and the witness of the will of God."

If this really is his view of the duty, then why does he not himself stand forth, a second "voice in the wilderness," clothed in camel's hair and girded with a leathern girdle, and call the people solemnly to "confession of sin before the bishop?" But if it is not, then why so much parade about the right of the Church to enforce these forty days of asceticism, when after all it ends in the recommending a little moderation in the midst of habitual festivity, as to the number of courses presented on the table, and the amount to be swallowed by each individual guest? Take as a specimen of the final result the following passage:

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Still, while I am forced to admit that the rich and varied banquets at which you so often assemble during the course of Lent are quite unsuited to the season, and to our profession as Catholic Christians (?), yet I have some doubts whether I have authority absolutely to recommend fasting"

This is a point on which he surely should have made up his mind before he devoted the mornings of six Sabbaths to such teaching.

"It is clearly the will of God that, to the utmost of the powers granted to us, we should keep a sound mind in a sound body; that we should neither cloud the mind by unnecessary and excessive indulgence of the inferior appetites, nor weaken it by the exhaustion that necessarily follows an injudicious restriction of the quantity of food."

This will afford a tolerably broad margin in the fulfilment of the duty.

"Now excessive eating, or even the deriving any great pleasure from such a source, is probably a fault that none of you can charge yourselves with (?); and yet it is clear that the great variety and sequence of food at a modern entertainment has a tendency to lead to excess, and is manifestly intended to afford a pleasure to the appetite much beyond the mere satisfaction of the natural want. Against such entertainments, in the season of humiliation, I have always protested; but further than this I am not prepared to go."

And further than this the bishop does not go, except that

in a subsequent lecture he recommends his people to sleep occasionally on "hard boards." that they may appreciate the habitual comfort of a feather-bed. But if the practical issue of the whole matter comes to this only, we really think that the Holy Scriptures would have readily presented lines of thought far more calculated to produce in the human heart the grace of Christian humility, than this vain-evidently vain-attempt to measure out the force of the apostolic instructions, "Touch not, taste not, handle not." We think it much to be regretted, seeing the boldness of the claim now put forward by the Episcopal body to be the "Catholic Church of Christ" in Scotland; and that the whole glad tidings" of the Divine word are preached in almost all the national pulpits around him, in all the fulness of its privilege, in all the power of its peculiar motives, and the elevation of its holy practice, that the bishop's discourses should have been, at such a season, limited to the discussion of a questionable duty; and with respect to which, after all the threatening developement of Church authority for a serious attack, he is compelled to beat a hastily-compromised retreat.

The under-current of theology, which runs parallel with this instruction upon fasting, is but jejune and meagre. The bishop's estimate of the advantages of the Reformation is sadly low. He gives the following summary :

"The Reformation was absolutely necessary. It was necessary, that the tyranny and the exactions of one Italian bishop, over the whole Christian Church, should be abolished; it was necessary, that the sole sufficiency of Christ's death for the expiation of sins should be maintained; it was necessary, that he should again be recognised as the only mediator between God and man."-(p. 18.)

This is well as far as it goes; but it seems, in the bishop's opinion, to have been bought at a high price, if the asceticism of Lent is to be lost sight of. Again, the general aspect of the bishop's practical motives adduced for self-denial savours a good deal of the morality of the heathen writers. He says

"If, then, we naturally lay too great a stress upon worldly enjoyments, is it not a reasonable exercise voluntarily to interrupt those enjoyments: at any rate to try the experiment how far our happiness is dependent upon that which any day may be taken from us, and to endeavour, by the repetition of the experiment, to brace our moral constitution, so that we may be capable of entertaining a grateful love to God for his mercy ?”—(p. 37.)

And again :

"We may thus, my brethren, by simply submitting ourselves to the rule of the Church in the observance of Lent-by one act and its immediate consequences-wean our own affections from the world, and thereby facilitate the setting them upon those better things which are above."-(p. 39.)

Dr. Terrot's teaching on the subject of repentance is, that it is "the condition upon which depends the application of the merits of Christ to the forgiveness of sins; "" that in consideration of a change, God will not be extreme to mark what has been done amiss; "that general forgiveness takes place as soon as a man turns from the general service of sin to a predominant resolution of serving God;" that a man must first "lay down his arms, and return to obedience," before he can ask for pardon. It is to be feared that statements so very different from the aspect of gospel mercy, are not likely to produce much fruit. In the conclusion of his sermon on faith, in which he says little about faith, but occupies himself chiefly with the inquiry, How much a man can do towards his own repentance, seeing that he can do nothing? he thus speaks :

"So long as there is one sinful passion or evil temper which has not been completely subdued, so long as there is one Christian grace in which you come short of the scripture model of perfection, it is still possible that you should return closer and nearer to the Lord than you now are; and it is only so long as you are making this return your first and highest object, that you can have full assurance, that whatever you may have been, and however imperfect you still may be, nevertheless your heavenly Father will abundantly pardon."

Now, we do submit it to the bishop, that however he may suppose this to be an useful way of screwing up his people to a higher state of devotion, it will be found practically to fail him. It is not the spirit in which the gospel message approaches the sinner. It is rather calculated to throw him down in the recklessness of despair, because it postpones the assurance of his pardon till after his complete victory. If he can obtain "the end of the commandment which is charity" without the grace, that grace is little needed afterwards; but if the comfort of that grace is indefinitely postponed till he has done without it; if, in fact, he must see the good of the appointed remedy wrought in him before he takes it, he must lie down in hopeless distress. Thank God, his invitation is broader, and fuller, and more adapted to our real necessities. "Come unto me, all ye that are weary and heavy-laden (i. e. with the evil, misery, and dissatisfaction of sin and separation from God), and I will give you rest."

Most cordially do we wish that the bishop's mind were turned more entirely from a mode of preaching which will never profit— from an impartation of absolution by the priest, and of grace only through the sacrament, and a low unwarranted struggle for life through the asceticism of a Lenten self-denial. It is quite evident that he is not satisfied with its results, and he never will be. He will still find an eager rush to the banquet and

the ball, with a "scanty attendance" on devotional opportunities: a six weeks' ardent pursuit of the dissipations of the metropolis, ending in a week of cumulative religious services, before an approach to the table of the Lord; and then a turning of the faded cheek and the languid eye toward the opening beauties of the country, without having made one effectual step of advancement toward "that peace which passeth all understanding." And this sad round, renewed from year to year, is the characteristic of the Episcopal communion in Edinburgh, with very little comfort either to the pastor or the people. We think that the simplicity of evangelical truth would yet " show him a more excellent way."

In

The latter series of sermons is on "the city of the living God;" and the chief object of them appears to be the magnifying before men, of that visible community over which, according to a certain school, the hierarchy exercises so prominent and powerful a dominion; and the impressing men's minds with a high notion of the extraordinary powers wielded by the prelatic order. aiming, however, to accomplish this, Dr. Terrot has very much misread and misinterpreted the splendid passage of scripture selected for his text, Heb. xii. 22-24. Those verses surely have reference, as they distinctly state, to the heavenly, not the earthly, Jerusalem; to the city of God glorified; to that glorious assemblage which shall ultimately, by the complete and final gathering of those souls whom the Father has given to the Son, and whose names are already written in heaven, be perfected before the throne of God, and made one with him. Dr. Terrot has referred them to the mixed assembly of saints and sinners, who have either been baptized by episcopally-ordained clergy; or whom, having undergone any baptism, however in his estimation irregular, he, like his Romanist neighbours, claims indirectly as properly subject to Episcopal jurisdiction. He thus unites together, in one strange and motley association, the nominal and the real, the godly and the merely formal, the tares and the wheat, with the angels, the perfected spirits, and the eternal and ever-blessed Trinity,-and asserts what he calls "the federal saintship" of all who are by baptism admitted into this wide and continually varying community.

With a good deal of mystification, which in fact comes to nothing, though occasionally it looks like liberality, he yet evidently unchurches all who are not in communion with him; and though admitting at one time-what it would be rash indeed to denythat there is not a direct exclusive authority for diocesan episcopacy, he assumes it elsewhere, claims the right of the Church to command it as a law, requires obedience to it, and declares at once