of the bishop of Milan. The one says-Let us not put our trust or confidence in the saints or martyrs that be dead'—the other says-Cognoscant omnes quales ego propugnatores requiram, qui propugnare possint, impugnare non soleant: and again, speaking either of the martyrs, or of their relicsTales ego ambio defensores, tales milites habeo! and again-patronos habebamus, et nesciebamus!

"To what purpose then may Ambrose be adduced, as disallowing the invocation of saints, or the practice of confiding in their protection? He himself habitually invoked them-he himself professes his confident reliance upon their merits and intercession!

"So saith Chrysostom, an ancient doctor of the church.' But what is it that Chrysostom saith?-not that which the homilist affirms; but the very contrary! I need not here repeat or add to the citations already made from the undoubted writings of Chrysostom, in proof of the fact that this Father warmly, and on all occasions, recommended the practice which the writer of the Sermon on Prayer' as warmly and constantly condemns.

"The opinions of the Fathers concerning purgatory, and the possibility of relieving souls therein detained, by prayer, are so confused and contradictory, that passages sounding for and against the doctrine may easily be (and have often been) produced. I shall not therefore stay to note the instances of this sort, occurring in the third part of the 'Sermon concerning Prayer;' but merely observe, that it is a lame defence of Protestant doctrine which rests on testimonies so easily counterbalanced by contradictory evidence. Nothing is gained on the side of apostolic truth by such modes of argumentation.

"Let us not therefore dream either of purgatory, or of prayer for the souls of them that be dead.' But there is no fact of ecclesiastical antiquity more certain than this, that the ancient Church did universally 'pray for the souls of them that be dead;' and this usage is alluded to very frequently, and approvingly, by Augustine. It is, then, one might almost say, an outrageous impropriety to bring him forward as one who condemned it."-(pp. 37—39.)

We apprehend that our readers will by this time be prepared to adopt Mr. Taylor's supposition, that the writers of our Book of Homilies, in thus citing the Fathers, must have relied chiefly on their common-place books, which furnished them with divers passages, noted down in reading the Fathers, but which did not exhibit, at the same time, the context, or the general bearing of the writer's argument. The danger of so employing these selected passages is now apparent. In this particular it is impossible to defend the Homilists. Our consent, then, to our Church's Homilies must be confined to the plain words of the XXXVth Article, -that they "do contain a godly and wholesome doctrine." To which we may add with truth, that their primary appeal, for the establishment of that "doctrine," is always to Holy Scripture. But in that they went further, and sought to enlist the Nicene Fathers on their side, in condemnation of penances, purgatory, and prayers for the dead, we must frankly admit their authors to have been in error, and to have involved themselves in divers inconsistencies.

Another topic, equally calculated with the first, to moderate any blind and excessive attachment to every word and thing pro

tected by the Church's sanction,-is that of THE CALENDAR, which is placed at the beginning of all our Prayer-Books.

True, it may be said, that this document is quite harmless, inasmuch as no one ever thinks of referring to it, or of pleading it as the justification for any absurdity he may wish to practice. But on this point Mr. Taylor observes :

"The question arises-When do'small things' cease to be such?-and when do they become of grave consequence, and call for reprehension and resistance? The answer is obvious-Whenever, by the means of them, and because they are small, and likely not to excite alarm, insidious, maturelydigested, and extensive endeavours are making to bring back upon us the worst corruptions.

"How harmless a matter was the Calendar, twelve years ago! and how absurd would then have appeared any expression of anxiety, lest the Saint Crispins and the Saint Dunstans of the almanack should start into life from their niches, and exert anew their long-abrogated and forgotten influence over the hopes and fears of the people of these islands! And even now one is fain to think oneself dreaming, when one hears the sad fact declared, that a body of the clergy of England, favoured, if not urged on, by their superiors, and zealously sustained by accomplished lay editors and witty journalists, are labouring to induce the people to accept, as religious realities, the monstrous lies of the medieval saint-worship!

"With what shame-pungent shame for humanity-with what humiliation and distress-with what dark anticipations, does a man find the task, imposed upon him at this time, of denouncing and exposing the follies, frauds, and impieties of that polytheism of which the Calendar (by a deplorable mistake) keeps alive the recollection!

"Those who, at this time, are endeavouring to revive the obsolete saintworship, avail themselves, in so doing, of an ambiguity which opens the door to just so much of the ancient polytheism as it may be thought that the people will, from time to time, admit. Whenever these endeavours are resisted, the ready reply is- We wish only to carry out the Church system, and to do that which the Church has enjoined.' But the speaker, by a mental reservation, intends something very different from that which the hearer supposes, or would surmise. Even if some vague explanation be vouchsafed, the real facts are kept out of sight.-The 'Church' thought of, in this instance, by the restorers of antiquity, is very far from being the Protestant Church, as by law established:' it is the Catholic Church; '-the Church of the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh centuries! Thus regarded, and thus standing forth in shadowy radiance before those of the clergy who are knowingly carrying forward church principles, the dead names of the Calendar brighten into life: these saints and martyrs, one and all, are bestirring themselves, and are snuffing the wind for that incense of which they have, in these Islands, so long been defrauded."—(pp. 69, 70.)

Let us look, then, at the Calendar a little. We shall find the objections to it to be of two classes; 1. That we commemorate persons of whom we know nothing; and, 2. That we commemorate things, or persons, or events, to honour which is a species of idolatry. For instance, of the first class :

"FEB. 3. BLASIUS, Bishop and Martyr. In this, as in other instances, I have submitted to the humiliation of making a search for evidence connected with a point so ineffably trivial. I do not find that this saint is mentioned by any one of the earlier historians—those who, if any, might have known some

thing about him. His name I have not succeeded in finding (he is said to have suffered before the council of Nice) in Eusebius, Socrates, Sozomen, Evagrius, Theodoret, Philostorgius;-nor yet in Augustine, or Jerome, or Gregory I., or Bernard. Not a word about him occurs in the later writers of Church history, Cassiodorus or Nicephorus. He does not appear in the copious Index of bishops given by Hardouin; nor is he mentioned in the Acta Conciliorum. Of what ingredients this saint's apocryphal history consists, and from what sources is derived all that can by any means be known of one whom the Church of England 'delighteth to honour,' on the third day of February-the reader shall judge.

"The four modern different Greek acts of this saint,' says the modest Butler, are of small authority-we might shrewdly guess, they are of none. Whither, then, are we to look?- Bollandus has supplied this deficiency-by learned remarks!'-'His festival is kept a holiday in the Greek church, on the eleventh of February. He is mentioned in the ancient Western Martyrologies, which bear the name of St. Jerome.... In the holy wars his relics were dispersed over the West, and his veneration was propagated by many miraculous cures, especially of sore throats. He is the principal patron of the commonwealth of Ragusa. No other reason than the great devotion of the people to this celebrated martyr of the Church, seems to have given occasion to the woolcombers to choose him the titular patron of their profession: on which account his festival is still kept by them with a solemn guild at Norwich. Perhaps also his country might in part determine them to this choice; for it seems that the first branch, or at least hint, of this manufacture was borrowed from the remotest known countries of the East, as was that of silk: or-the iron-combs, with which he is said to have been tormented, gave occasion to this choice.'"-(pp. 81, 82.)

"FEB. 5. AGATHA, Virg. and Mart. This is another instance of apocryphal canonization, in authenticating which the Church of England-at the cost of her consistency, attaches her sanction. Among the many Christians who suffered in the Decian persecution, nothing forbids us to suppose that a Sicilian young lady, of this name, was one. But what of this? All we can now know of St. Agatha is what is found-mingled with fables, in the writers of the seventh, and following centuries. Why should the Church of England mix itself with legends of this sort? The original story may have been genuine; but no one can say, at this time, whether it be so, or not. I find no mention whatever of Saint Agatha in the authentic early writers; nor even in those later historians who follow authentic materials."-(pp. 82, 83.)

"FEB. 14. VALENTINE, Bp. and Mart. Inauspicious choice! In the first place, there is an utter destitution of authentic records concerning this alleged saint-bishop and martyr. If the Calendar is to be enjoined upon us anew, what a humiliation is it to be sent to church to commemorate those who, for aught we know, never suffered at all, or never lived at all! Wherever any genuine materials are extant, they are industriously produced by Romanists; -let us hear then what account Butler gives of his authorities in the instance of St. Valentine. His acts (memoirs or legendary life) are commended by Henschenius, but objected to by Tillemont, &c.'.... That is to say-the only existing account of this personage, whom the Church of England selects, and affirms to have been-a bishop, and a martyr-is found among legendary lore which better-informed Romanist writers reject as spurious!"-(p. 84.)

"APRIL 23. ST. GEORGE, Martyr. By the confession of his most devoted admirers, the forgeries of the heretics have been so blended with the truth, in the history of this holy martyr, that, as we have it, there is no means of separating the sterling from the counterfeit.' (Butler.) If it be so, and if, as well the sterling as the counterfeit portions of this noted history are equally offensive, a Protestant Church would do well to shake herself from these apocryphal legends. If they are false, they disgrace her, as seeming to credit them; if they be true, they condemn her as heretical.'-(p. 88.) “JULY 20. MARGARET, V. and M. An unknown-as to any authentic

memoirs. What is told of this virgin and martyr is in the customary style. From the East her veneration was exceedingly propagated in England, France, and Germany, in the eleventh century, during the holy wars,' and therefore the Church of this century is bound to maintain the 'religious usage' of paying her an annual compliment!"-(p. 91.)

JULY 26. ST. ANNE. Are St. Anne and St. Joachim (the alleged parents of Mary) Scripture personages?-Assuredly not. These names serve to head legends the most ridiculous, and they recal nothing but the recollection of the blasphemous absurdities that have attended the worship of this pair of divinities. In the year 710 (how pure an era!) the body of St. Anne-undoubtedly genuine!-' was brought from Palestine to Constantinople, whence some portions of her relics have been dispersed in the West; where, as F. Cupar, the Bollandist, assures us, a great number of miracles have been wrought through her intercession.' Such is the English Calendar! Here is a saint, entirely fabulous, and known to us in no other way than as the object of the fraudulent impieties of the worst age of the Church-that of the second Council of Nice, and yet the Church of England must solemnly recognise these-worse than inanities-as genuine!"-(p. 92.) "SEPT. 7. ENURCHUS, B., or properly EVURTIUS. Butler, in the reign of Constantine the Great, and died about the year 340. His name is famous in the ancient Western Martyrologies; but his history (is) of no authority, as Stilting complains. Three translations have been made of his relics.' So much for this saint, and the cogent reasons which recommend him to our devout regards, once in every year!"—(p. 94.)

'Flourished,' says

"Nov. 25. CATHERINE, V. Her acts,' says Butler, are so much adulterated that little use can be made of them; and the learned Joseph Asseman thinks that all the account we have of the particulars relating to this saint, upon which we can depend, is what we meet with in Eusebius;-though that historian mentions not her name!'"'-(p. 98.)

The second class, however, is of a still more objectionable character. There are some of the fictions of the Nicene and the Middle Ages which ought not even to be spoken of without a warning, or an expression of abhorrence. For instance,—

"MAY 3. INVENTION OF THE CROss. The Reformers, occupied as they were with other cares, did not inquire, and little surmised, what it was to which they were tacitly pledging the Church in this, and the corresponding instances. Among the many shameless frauds by means of which the ancient Church sought to extend and maintain its empire over a besotted populace, not one was more impious-considering the subject it stood connected with, -or more deliberately wicked in the contrivance and execution, than this of the Invention of the Cross." I need add nothing to what has already been advanced, in this work, on this revolting theme. But is it not time that the record of so blasphemous an impiety should be erased from the formularies of a Protestant Church? It is time, if we think only of the state and the progress of opinion in the Christian world; and is it not time, if we think of Him whose anger is proclaimed against those who love, and who make—a lie! The Church cannot now plead ignorance, or profess that the facts are ambiguous. A concurrence of testimonies-that of travellers, and that of scholars-English and foreign, has placed beyond a doubt the character of these facts. No instance can be more clear, and the call is urgent upon the Church to clear itself of so foul a stain. If no such cleansing be effected, it will not be long before the wonderful history' of the Invention of the Cross,' newly edited, will be listened to in factory schools, as well as in private families. The Festival of the Invention of the Cross,' say the editors of the Ecclesiastical Almanac, copying Butler, has been solemnized in the Latin Church ever since the fifth or sixth century.' Why, then,

should not so ancient and Catholic' an observance be revived among ourselves? The reader may smile at the supposition that any such endeavour should be made. Would he not have smiled-incredulous-years ago, if some things which we have lived to hear and see within a Protestant church had been then prognosticated as likely to happen?"-(pp. 88, 89.)

JUNE 20. TRANS. OF EDWARD, King of West Sax. These commemorations of the translation of relics' are an offensive inconsistency in a Church which denounces the worshipping of relics as a fond and foolish superstition. If these things mean nothing, they are most unsightly excrescences: if they mean anything, they stultify a Protestant Church."-(p. 91.)

JULY 4. TRANS. OF MARTIN, B. Twice (July 4 and Nov. 11) does the Church of England do honour to St. Martin of Tours! Little do the Protestant members of that Church, at large, imagine what sort of personage it is, so far as the only genuine memoir of him informs us, whom they are thus taught to recognise as a Christian bishop. The Life and 'virtues' of St. Martin, by Sulp. Severus, is an insufferable farrago of lies and absurdities. But even if the name of this worthy had been allowed a place among the gods,' what imaginable reasons, or what reasons which Protestants could listen to, can justify the iteration of it for the purpose of recognising the 'translation of his relics?'

"JULY 15. TRANS. OF SWITHIN, B. Another translation of holy relics! About one hundred years after (his death), in the days of King Edgar, his relics were taken up by St. Ethelwold, then bishop of Winchester, and translated into the church in 964, on which occasion Malmsbury affirms that such a number of miraculous cures of all kinds were wrought, as was never in the memory of man known to have been in any other place, through the intercession of this saint."-Butler.”—(p. 91.)

"SEPT. S. NATIVITY OF V. MARY. The simplicity of the uninformed members of the Church is sadly abused in these instances. The time will come when its intelligent members will bitterly regret its implication in these, and. similar instances, with the Mariolatry of Rome.

"SEPT. 14. HOLY CROSS D. And here again a compliance, equally disgraceful and dangerous, with the impostures of an age of fraud, has led the Church into a grievous inconsistency. If nothing else in the calendar were reformed, these recognitions of the worst of all impieties-the manufacture of miracles, should be erased from the Prayer-Book."-(p. 94.)

DEC. 8. CONCEPTION OF VIRGIN MARY. If English Protestants were conversant with the history of the controversy concerning the miraculous conception,' they would look with shame and horror upon this name of blasphemy' in the almanac. It is amazing that the principles of the Reformers, or their mere feelings as Christian men, should not have prompted them to cut off from the Reformed Church every vestige of impieties so offensive!"(p. 98.)

A doubt will naturally be entertained by many, whether this neglected and almost forgotten thing, the Calendar, was worthy of so much notice. Mr. Taylor assigns his reasons for dwelling upon it in the following passage:

"Is then the Calendar, with its inauspicious commemorations, a matter of no moment? Are the many objections to which, unquestionably, it is liable, frivolous? I have already declared my belief that the subject, unimportant as it may have been years ago, assumes, at this time, a serious aspect; and that it will connect itself with the great course of events, now in progress. Christendom, as every one feels and sees, is hastening on toward a disruption, more signal, and more extensive in its consequences, than any that has heretofore had place. On the one side are the adherents of Biblical Christianity, and on the other, those of whatever is human in religion; the first advantaged 1844.

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