superstition. It is also certain that at the very dawn of this happy revolution in the state of CHRISTIANITY, and even before its salutary effects were manifested in all their extent, pure religion had many sincere and fervent votaries, though they were concealed from public view by the multitudes of fanatics with which they were surrounded."

As we quit the subject of the REFORMATION, it may not be improper to add a short account of the Lutherans. It has been already said, that the Protestants were at first divided into the Lutherans, who adhere to Luther's tenets, and the Reformed, who follow the doctrine and discipline of Geneva. In other words, Luther was at the head of one party; Calvin, the chief of the other. The tenets of the latter have been specified; those of the former, therefore, are the present subject of inquiry.

LUTHERANS.

THE Lutherans, of all Protestants, are those who differ least from the Romish church, as they affirm that the body and blood of Christ are materially present in the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, though in an incomprehensible manner; they likewise represent

some rites and institutions, as the use of images in churches, the vestments of the clergy, the private confession of sins, the use of wafers in the administration of the Lord's Supper, the form of exorcism in the celebration of baptism, and other ceremonies of the like nature, as tolerable, and some of them useful. The LUTHERANS maintain with regard to the divine decrees, that they respect the salvation or misery of men in consequence of a previous knowledge of their sentiments and characters, and not as founded on the mere will of God, which is the tenet of the Calvinists. Towards the close of the last century, the Lutherans began to entertain a greater liberality of sentiment than they had before adopted, though in many places they persevered longer in despotic principles than other Protestant churches. Their public teachers now enjoy an unbounded liberty of dissenting from the decisions of those symbols of creeds, which were once deemed almost infallible rules of faith and practice, and of declaring their dissent in the manner they judge most expedient. Mosheim attributes this change in their sentiments to the maxim which they generally adopted, that Christians were accountable to God alone for their religious opinions; and that no individual could be justly punished by the magistrate for his erroneous notions, while he conducted himself like a virtuous subject, and made no attempts to disturb the peace of civil society. Luther's works, collected after his decease,

were published at Wittemberg, in seven folio volumes.

It may be added, that Luther's opinions respecting the sacrament, is termed Consubstantiation; and he supposed that the partakers of the Lord's Supper received, along with the bread and wine, the real body and blood of Christ. This, says Dr. Mosheim (himself an eminent Lutheran divine), was, in their judgment, a mystery, which they did not pretend to explain. But his translator, Dr. Maclaine, justly remarks, "That Luther was not so modest as Dr. Mosheim here represents him. He pretended to explain this doctrine of the real presence, absurd and contradictory as it is, and uttered much senseless jargon on the subject. As in a red-hot iron, said he, two distinct substances, viz. iron and fire are united, so is the body of Christ joined with the bread in the eucharist. I mention this miserable comparison to shew into what absurdities the towering pride of system will often betray men of deep sense and true genius."

Such is the account given of the LUTHERANS in a respectable work, and it appears to be founded in truth. I shall only remark, that, according to the above sketch, Luther differed considerably from Calvin respecting election and reprobation; and as to the principle, that Christians are accountable to God alone for their religious opinions, it is a sentiment worthy of a great and elevated mind. It is the

corner-stone on which THE REFORMATION has been raised. It is the true foundation of religious improvement, and wherever it is embraced, will check uncharitableness and persecution, and forward the blessed reign of love and charity amongst the professors of Christianity.

A volume appeared some time ago in vindication of LUTHER and the REFORMATION, written with candour and ability. It is entitled An Essay on the Spirit and Influence of the Reformation, by Luther. The author of the work, C. Villers, obtained the prize for it from the national institute of France. It closes with a note by Dr. Maclaine, taken from the fourth volume of Mosheim's Ecclesiastical History, who shews that the reflections on the selfish and ignoble motives of LUTHER, made in Hume's History of England, must be pronounced a calumny invented by the enemies of the Reformation. The reader shall be introduced to a character of LUTHER drawn

*In Swift's well known Tale of a Tub, he satirises three distinct classes of religious professors-the Church of Rome, under the appellation of Peter, whose keys for an admission into heaven are supposed to be in their possession-the Church of England, under the name of Martin, because its reformation originated with Martin Luther-and the Dissenters, under the name of Jack, on account of the principles of John Calvin being so prevalent amongst them. It is fraught with that dry sarcastic wit for which the writings of the dean of St. Patrick are distinguished.

up by the elegant pen of Bishop Atterbury. "MARTIN LUTHER'S life was a continual warfare; he was engaged against the united forces of the Papal world, and he stood the shock of them bravely, both with courage and success. He was a man certainly of high endowments of mind and great virtues; he had a vast understanding, which raised him up to a pitch of learning unknown to the age in which he lived; his knowledge in scripture was admirable, his elocution manly, and his way of reasoning with all the subtility that those plain truths he delivered would bear; his thoughts were bent always on great designs, and he had a resolution fitted to go through with them; the assurance of his mind was not to be shaken or surprised, and his self possession before the diet of Worms was such as might have become the days of the Apostles! His life was holy, and when he had leisure for retirement, severe; his virtues active chiefly-not those lazy sullen ones of the cloister. He had no ambition but in the service of God; for other things, neither his enjoyment or wishes ever went higher than the bare conveniences of living. He was of a temper particularly averse to covetousness or any base sin, and charitable even to a fault without respect to his own occasions. If, among this crowd of virtues, a failing crept in, we must remember that an Apostle himself had not been irreproveable; if, in the body of his doctrine one flaw is to be seen, yet the greatest lights of the