“These writers have followed step by step the example of Rome in their downward progress. They have descended by the way of tradition, as a joint rule of faith; justification by inherent righteousness; interpretation, or rather misinterpretation, of holy Scripture by the contradictory glosses of the fathers; reliance on the sacraments, and not faith, for salvation; depreciation of the preaching of the blessed Gospel; magnifying of forms and ceremonies; denying almost communion with God, except by means of the Eucharist; wishing for the restoration of Latin prayers; maintaining the necessity of reserve in proclaiming the atonement; insisting that implicit faith is enough for salvation and talking constantly about apostolical succession, church principles, and catholic doctrine, as if our Reformers had not settled for us in our Articles, Liturgy, and Homilies, their determined definition of what to us is catholic, and what is not. They have been aiming also, in the mean time, at the external show, gaudy display of crosses, genuflections, and other pageantry of Rome." (p. 274.)

:

We desire also to give prominency to the following opinion. "Dr. Pusey's letters on the case of Mr. Oakley, breathe more decidedly the very spirit of Rome than anything that had before appeared.

66

Mr. Newman, Mr. Oakley, Mr. Ward, and thirty or forty other clergymen of the Tractarian School have gone over to the Church of Rome. DR. PUSEY HAS NOT; but his four letters on the subject prove abundantly that he ought in common honesty to follow their example. His heart is already with Rome if ever a man's was!"

We summon the attention of the Christian world to this affirmation. This is no light scandal, no hasty penning of a youthful and rash controversialist ;-let the calm deliberate judgment of an aged bishop, one not accustomed to speak unadvisedly with his lips, whose opinion has ever carried weight in the Christian world, be heard. It resolutely demands from Dr. Pusey in the face of Britain,-aye, of Europe,-that only course of conduct which can save him from the overwhelming accusation of a Jesuitical hypocrisy. He holds the extreme views of his disingenuous sect. They have, however, declared the impossibility of holding those views with Anglican preferment; and now the eyes of all Europe are on the richly-endowed chair of the Hebrew professorship at Oxford. We place in juxta-position with this solemn judgment by the bishop, the following apposite passage.

"Two things constantly attend this crime (of saint and image-worship), a stupefaction of conscience, that renders men insensible to their guilt, and quite unaware of the gulph into which they have plunged, 'having their conscience seared as with a hot iron,' according to the Divine threatening, and a laxity of morals as to all great points, with an austerity as to petty observances which sinks into a debased superstition among the common people and a secret infidelity among the higher classes."

The twenty-fourth lecture enters on very important matter,the development of that presumptuous spirit of intrusion into unseen and secret things, which is the consequence of angel and saint worship. It is opened with an apology for the resolute maintenance of this controversy.

"I would here pause to observe that some appearance of controversial discussion is unavoidable in the progress of our high argument. We must place the monster abomination in the full blaze of Scripture light. We must not allow general objections to theological debate, and cunning demands for peace, to prevail on us to give these evils, by our silence, time to work themselves again unobserved into the minds of our younger clergy. The peace of Christ must be founded on the truth of Christ. It is otherwise treachery to our Master's cause. The Jesuits have been complaining for three centuries that they have been misunderstood. Dr. Wiseman does the same up to this moment. We are not, therefore, to wonder that the Tract divines follow them in this, as in everything else. But shall we suffer the general reluctance to controversy which pious men most justly feel, to repress our boldness for Christ on a great occasion like the present? God forbid. We must, as Elijah with the priests of Baal, or as the prophets with their idolatrous contemporaries from Isaiah to Malachi, or as our blessed Lord with the Scribes and Pharisees, or St. Paul with the Galatians, stand forth on the Lord's side,' and quit ourselves like men.'

"We must take care, indeed, in doing this, not to exaggerate facts, not to impute motives, not to proceed on mere reports or rumours, not to be betrayed into personality or acrimony; much less to shut up the way of a return to the paths of the Gospel to those who have been partially drawn aside. On the contrary, we must ever 'speak the truth in love.' And, above all, we must connect what we say in condemnation of error with a a direct and clear exposition of the person and glory of Christ as the only Mediator and Intercessor. We must then commend in a spirit of humble prayer, our contending earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints to God's grace and blessing. It is the crisis of our Protestant Church. The Reformation was gained by a public and decided avowal of the truth of the Gospel, and an unshrinking protest against the idolatry of Rome. Human enactments followed in the wake of this faithful testimony; but did not precede it. It was the tone of the public mind, awakened by the prophecies of Scripture, that led to the laws which established the Reformation in various other countries, and, above all, in our own. The pulpit and the press must retain what they then won."-(pp. 284, 285.)

The Bishop then proceeds to shew with a masterly pen that such teaching about "the mediation of saints and angels" led men out of their province to invade the inscrutable sanctity and darkness of the invisible world; whilst the whole theory on which it is based was merely " a speculation of men thrusting themselves into the unseen world which God had purposely concealed from them."

"And yet," he says, "to read their writings, you would suppose they knew everything concerning angels and the capacities and employments of dead men and women, and of the blessed virgin, and the nature of purgatory, and the benefit of the invocation of saints; and had been actual spectators of what they describe.

"But all they have feigned concerning the number and ranks of saints and angels; their beholding in the mirror of divinity what is doing upon earth; their receiving the communication of knowledge from God, their offering of intercessions for men and hearing their prayers; the acceptableness of those intercessions when made; the possibility of their being present with men in all places; their acquaintance with the sincerity and desires of all men's hearts, all over the world at the same moment; and their thus filling up the intermediate gulf between the glory of Christ and the weakness of sinful men,-which are amongst the theories which are put forward by the schoolmen;-all this was nothing more than 'old wives' fables,' a most daring

speculation on the supposed state of things in the invisible world, and a substitution of man's arrogant conjectures for divine revelation and divine wisdom.

All this is a mere idle tale' about things not seen;' and this to the neglect of things seen and revealed. For this is to be most particularly noted, that the real revelation of the Gospel is virtually put aside when once this intruding curiosity into secret and unrevealed matters takes possession of the mind. Christ is dishonoured; his humbling of himself to take our nature upon him, accounted insufficient; his complete and most condescending mediation as God and man declared inadequate; the prohibition of making any likeness of anything that is in the heaven above,' or bowing down to it or serving it,' daringly violated; and the actual measure of instruction given us by Almighty God as to things unseen,' pronounced defective.”—(pp. 288, 289.)

The rest of the lecture is occupied by pointing out the two evils which result from this unscriptural and unholy habit of mind. First: "Such a bewitching of the fancy and the heart, and an inflation of the carnal mind as renders it incapable of being instructed and subdued again to the simplicity of the Gospel by human means." And, secondly, that "the invocation of saints, adoration of the virgin, and religious honour paid to images, relics, and the host, with the vast congeries of attendant superstitions, cuts men off from Christ the head,--breaks up the living union between Christ and the Church, and leaves men dead and lost, not holding the head."

"He that depends on Christ alone, that knows he is his 'hope of glory,' that sees in him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,' that discerns in him all the fulness of the Godhead bodily,' that confesses that he is 'reconciled to God by the blood of his cross' alone, that he has no other Saviour, High Priest, Intercessor, Lord, Mediator-he holds the head.'

"On the contrary, he who acknowledges another lord, other mediators and advocates, whether among men or angels, another source of vital influence than Christ, another righteousness besides that which is by faith of him, other means of holiness than those which Christ has commanded, another rule of faith than his word, other springs of strength than his grace, and other ways of access to God than his mediation-such an one 'holds not the head;' he has let it go; there is an abruption; he is severed and torn from it; and all the springs of life and salvation are cut off."—(p. 294.)

And again

"The difference between Popery and the Gospel seems to the fleshly mind to be slight no denial of Christ is intended-the corruption is not introduced as a corruption, but with 'beguiling and enticing words.' The terms of Scripture are retained-distinctions are made between mediation of redemption and mediation of intercession-idolatry is stoutly denied-supreme religious worship is pretended to be still reserved for Christ, and 'due honour only and veneration' are attributed to the Virgin and the saints-the piety of Fathers is appealed to-books of devotion are cited-the humility and poverty of monks is vaunted-the Sisters of charity are extolled-the beneficence of eminent bishops is quoted-and doubtless many pious and awakened souls hold in substance to Christ the Head,' still, notwithstanding the errors of their education and of their church. But this is nothing; the great mass of an ignorant people, from whose hands the Bible is withdrawn, and

who are taught to rely for justification in part on their own works, place, of course, their main reliance on these idols, from the mere corruption of human nature, and hold in no sense by Christ, the Head;' as has been proved for fourteen or more centuries."-(pp. 297, 298.)

6

The whole line of thought in this lecture is original and valuable, and well worthy of the consideration, if it could be fairly given, of those who have been brought seductively under this ruinous, if not fatal, hallucination. Could but their eyes be opened, what a gulf of horrors would they see before them!

The Bishop in the twenty-fifth lecture enters upon the consideration of a third and deeply serious corruption,--viz., the introduction into the Church of" the mere traditions and commandments of men, which never had an original authority from Almighty God."

He thus paraphrases the apostle's indignant remonstrance:

"Wherefore, if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances? In this indignant remonstrance, the apostle supposes the Colossians to be disciples who admitted the grand scheme of redemption as opened in its various branches in the preceding parts of his Epistle. And he asks them, Why, if they were really dead with Christ' to the law, to the old covenant, the merit of works, and all the handwriting of ceremonial sacrifices, as they professed to be; and if they really believed that Christ had 'blotted out' the deed and obligation to guilt and punishment, and nailed it to his cross,' and had made a show of principalities and powers openly' in his glorious triumph; why did they allow a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels' to sever and cut them off as idolatrous worshippers from Christ, the Head? If, in a word, they professed to be 'dead with Christ' after the example and by the virtue of his sufferings, from the rudiments of the world,' or the feeble and introductory, and now 'beggarly elements,' of a worldly and external economy; why did they, as though still living in the world' of the old dispensation, subject themselves to usurping ordinances and impositions of men, without any divine command? If they acknowledged that Christ had cancelled the bond, and had vanquished Satan and all his hosts; why did they not act as persons really 'dead with Christ,' both from the ceremonial law and from pagan superstitions and idolatry? Wherefore did they conduct their worship of God by the ceremonies of Moses, and by saints and angels as joint-mediators with Christ? Wherefore proceed as if they were not 'complete in him, and must still have recourse to the aids of an abolished worldly sanctuary? Why remain unsatisfied with the real, spiritual, exalted service of the Gospel? Why submit to those who dogmatically imposed, as legal observances, human traditions, which never had a divine sanction at all? Why permit Judaizing teachers in league with heathen philosophers to creep into the church and beguile them of their reward,' and dogmatize amongst them; and thus cut them off from Christ, the only and all-sufficient Mediator between God and man?”—(pp. 301, 302.)

And then he proceeds to show that all such superstitious teaching, laying stress on "prohibitions, abstinences, a forced celibacy, the unlawfulness of animal food, the possibility of attaining perfection by neglect of the body," placing religion in external and perishing things," which pertain not to the spiritual kingdom of

God," but "proceed from human authority merely, and not divine;" are ordinances respecting petty, miserable, perishing things, not pertaining to the real spiritual design of Christ's salvation;" and do therefore in fact "make void the death of Christ, and reduce men to a servitude from which his grace and mediation were designed to deliver us.”

We refer with much satisfaction to the whole line of argument; but we cannot refrain from quoting the following valuable passage:

"Which things have indeed a shew of wisdom in will-worship, and humility, and neglecting of the body: not in any honour to the satisfying of the flesh. Here the apostle meets an objection and detects the false colours with which the worship of angels, and a system of scrupulous abstinences, were decked out. The Romanists and Tractarians can allege nothing for their unscriptural invocation of saints and angels, their purgatory, indulgences, prayers for the dead, celibacy, and superstitious abstinences, but what is struck down as by a thunderbolt by this verse.

"These things have a 'shew' and pretence, indeed, 'of wisdom' to 'the natural man' who understands not the mystery of the gospel, and knows not that we are complete in him.' They have an air of wisdom to those who forget the infinite folly and guilt of departing a single step from God's revealed will. They have a show of wisdom to those who can insult the unspeakable majesty of the one living and true God, and trifle with his unutterable hatred of all idolatry.

"No doubt, putting all the great matters of revelation aside, and judging by the admiration men have for their own inventions in religion, for their own notions of worship, their own ideas of humility, and of not sparing the body,' these things have a shew of wisdom,' but nothing more; not the reality, nor the truth of it; nothing of the wisdom which is from above;' nothing of the wisdom and spiritual understanding,' which the apostle had commended in an earlier part of his epistle; nothing of the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God appointed before the world for our glory.' No; this 'shew of wisdom' is foolishness with God.''If any man seem to be wise in this world,' this worldly way, let him become a fool' in the esteem of false teachers that he may be truly wise.'

"Three pretences to wisdom are here exposed: will-worship, humility, neglecting the body '-the very points in which the Romanist, and those who follow him, boast themselves. Will-worship' charms fallen nature; the follies and impositions it invents are pleasant in comparison with the holy, humble, adoring worship of God through the blood of the one Mediator. ‘Ä voluntary' and 'wilful humility' also gratifies the corrupt human heart as a substitute for real prostration and abasement of soul before God under a sense of guilt, and a simple faith in the inspired word revealing the salvation of Christ. An uncommanded and excessive neglect of the body likewise attracts the admiration of the natural man, as a proof of extraordinary selfdenial; and the three make up a splendid appearance of wisdom' in religious worship in the estimate of an ignorant and superstitious multitude. The apostle refutes them all by a single word-they have the show,' and only the show, of wisdom.'"-(pp. 307, 308.)

6

When, in fact, we look at the growing evil of a half-concealed and unconscientious preference to Romanism among the younger clergy; and the masterly manner in which the Bishop of Calcutta has availed himself of the warnings of inspiration in this epistle, to meet and condemn it, we yield most reluctantly to the pressure