XII. 7, 8.] The Chronique cannot be compared with our English magazines; but it is compiled with ability and displays some spirit, and has now and then some interesting articles of intelligence. The design of the Abbé Gregoire and his associates, is to uphold the liberties of the Gallican Church, against the Ultra-montane, or Popish faction; to expose the bigots in the church of France, who are disposed to introduce the doctrine of the Infallibility of the Pope and the habit of unconditional submission to Rome; to defend and protect the clergy who took the liberal side in the Revolution; and generally, to oppose and correct superstition, and to encourage as much freedom of thinking and acting as is consistent with the Catholic religion in its most liberal form. The Gallican is, in some degree, a Reformed Church. Such, at least, it appears in the eyes of the Pope, and, we are sorry to say, of some of the English Catholic priests. Dr. Poynter, Vicar Apostolic of the London District, has lately adopted a measure of some severity towards the French priests residing in his province, who amount in number to nearly 400. He has required them to sign, under pain of interdiction, a declaration of absolute subjection to Pius VII., and Pius himself, by a bull, dated September 19, 1818, has approved the Vicar's proceeding. He de clares the nonsubscribers schismatics. A papal bull is, however, not what it once was: while some of the French priests, within the titular see of London, have subscribed unconditionally, others have done so only with qualifications, and the majority have refused all subscription whatever these are suspended from their functions. The new Concordat, proposed in 1817, had, in the middle of last year, given rise in France to about thirty publications, pro and con. The controversy is yet warm and appears likely to continue. Since the peace, Schools for all have been introduced into France, and, though the oldest is not yet three years old, there are already eight hundred of them! These schools propagate themselves to establish one in a province, it has been well said by our benevolent neighbours, is to sow the seed of more. They have had to encounter in France the same objections which have obstructed their progress in England, but the press ensures their success. The French call them Schools of mutual Instruction. The Society which promotes them have individually and collectively issued many publications relating to them: they have now established a Monthly Journal of Education to give information of the success of the new method. To crown all, a Bible Society has been established at Paris, under the sauction of the government. The Duke de Richelieu has lately shewn a degree of disinterestedness and generosity which is not common with statesmen. On his retirement from office, to make way for the present ministers, the two Chambers, on a message to that effect from the king, passed a law creating in his favour a majorat of 50,000 francs (upwards of £3,000 per annum). Whilst the law was in progress, he signified his intention of not accepting the proposed grant. The gratitude of Louis XVIII, however, to a man who had contributed so much to the restoration of the Bourbon family, which was also felt or feigned by the ministers and the chambers, urged on the measure. It is now law; but the Duke, adhering to his resolution (a resolution differing from that of a royal English Duke, on a recent occasion) of not adding to the burdens of the state, has signified to the mayor of Bourdeaux, that the pension, so honourably granted to him, shall be devoted to "some establishment for the relief of humanity" in that town, with which his family was formerly connected. Whatever may be thought of the Duke de Richelien's services to the people of France, his patriotic and benevolent example deserves to be recorded for the admonition of statesmen and in honour of human nature. Several sanguinary and fatal duels have lately taken place in France, in conse quence of which the Attorney-General in the royal court of Paris, (M. Bellart,) has instituted prosecutions against the surti vors. He states that this measure has been adopted "not on account of any violation of the rules consecrated by usage in cases of single combat, but because voluntary homicide, according to the laws of France, is a crime, even though the result of a duel, unless the duel is unpremeditated and engaged in solely from the necessity of self defence; because a pre-concerted duel is an insult to the laws, which gives no one the right of avenging his own cause; because the public ministry, specially appointed to enforce the execution of the laws, would betray all its duties in not prosecuting the known authors of ascertained homicides; and because the maintenance of public security, and the peace of families and society is deeply interested in preventing the propagation of the fatal and anti-social error, that human life may be destroyed, provided it is in a duel, without the fear of incurring any kind of punishment." Marriage appears still to be regarded as a civil contract. The inferior tribunal of Louvain has condemned the Sieur Vansoens, parish priest of Cortenaeken, in a due of 100 francs, for having given the nuptial benediction to persons not married before the civil magistrates. There lately appeared at Paris, in three Volumes, 12mo., Psalmi ad Hebraicam veritatem translati et in ordinem naturalem digesti, attributed to a modest and virtuous magistrate, who has studied profoundly the original language, and who, in 1809, pub. lished a French translation of the Psalter. M. Maillet-la-Coste, professor of eloquence in the royal college of Montpelier, already known by works which shew fine talents, has just published at Paris, an eulogy on Rollin, an essay for the prize proposed by the French Academy. In vindicating Rollin, the professor launches his thunders against the Jesuits, Rollin's enemies. The bodies of Descartes, Montfaucon and Mabillon, have been removed, with becoming funeral pomp, from the Musée des Antiques, and interred in the Church of St. Germain Desprès. Exclusive of a separate inscription on a coffin of each, the following has been engraved as common to the three:-" Quorum cineris religiosè primum loculis suis conditos, dehinc communi fato per xxv, annos inter profana exules, cum terræ sacre renovatâ piarum exequiarum pompâ redderentur, regia inseriptionum et humaniorum litterarum academia, titulis adscriptis, serioribus ætatibus, commendavit." SPAIN. The late rising at Valencia [p. 133] was more serious than was at first imagined. Eighty individuals, many of them distinguished by rank and services, have been arrested; and the number liable to arrest throughout Spain, from a supposed connexion with the same plot, amounts to the alarming number of 4700 persons. Elio, the governor of Valencia, has received a letter, threatening revenge from "a thousand poniards” for the blood lately shed. devoted, not to dangerous matters of politics and religion, but to bull fights! It is proposed in this work, so fitted to Spain in its present state, to give the detail of every encounter, the genealogy of every animal, who is its master, the names of the Toreadores, Picadores, Matadores, &c. the arms employed, the wounds received, the dogs let into the ring, the number of horses killed and also wounded, and whether slightly or mortally. Worthy studies for the subjects of Ferdinand, man-milliner to the Virgin Mary! The reader has probably had enough of this prospectus; but it may add to his stock of knowledge to be informed, that the projected magazine will detail the operations of two important personages, necessary to the getting up of a bull-fight, according to etiquette: the one is the hangman, who has his box on one side of the arena, in order to be ready, if any toreador break the rules of this noble contest, to inflict upon him the prescribed punishment, namely, two hundred lashes; the other is a priest, a father confessor, who is in another box at hand, with his consecrated oil to administer supreme unction to any of the toreadores who may be mortally wounded! Whilst the intelligence from every other country of Europe shews the progress of the human mind, and at ouce excites the hopes and gratifies the desires of the Christian philanthropist, the news from Spain, whether political, ecclesiastical or literary, only raises a sigh over poor human nature. The Madrid Gazette announces, for instance, that the general of the Capuchins, in his quality of Grandee of Spain of the first class, has had the honour of being covered in the presence of the king: at the same time appears the decree of the Grand Inquisitor, prohibiting certain books, such as Annales de l'Inquisition, by M. Llorente. [See p. 91.] All reading, however, is not suppressed: the prospectus of a weekly journal has reached us, which is to be VOL. XIV. 2 F ITALY. Rome. The Diario di Roma, or Journal of Rome, announces that an Englishman, M. Sams, has recently bought upon the continent a complete manuscript of the Hebrew Pentateuch, of very high antiquity. It is written upon skin, thought to be goat-skin, and forms two volumes, or rolls, two feet broad, and one hundred and sixty-nine long. It is said to have been obtained from a reduced Jewish family, who, having given it in pledge for a limited time, had not the means of redeeming it. This valuable manuscript is not unique, (says the Chronique Religieuse, if, indeed, it be not the same that was in the possession of M. de la Serna Santander, at Brussels, which we once saw at his bonse, and of which he gives a description in the learned catalogue of his library, Vol. I. p. 8; he believed it the most ancient in Europe. This manuscript, formed of fiftyseven skins, sewed with threads of the same material, is a hundred and thirteen feet long, the characters large and handsome, without vowel points. A Leipzig literary journal announces the discovery of a treasure in ecclesiastical literature. The celebrated Ulphilas, the Arian bishop of the Goths, who flourished about the year 365, had, it is well known, translated the Holy Scriptures into his own language, called Mesogothic. This translation was wholly lost, until the year 1597, when a considerable part of the four gospels was found in the library of a monastery in Westphalia. The manuscript is called the Codex Argenteus, from the letters being in silver and gold It is in the library of Upsal, and is highly valued by the Swedes. There have been three editions of it, the first at Dort, in 1665; the second at Stockholm, in 1672; and the third at Oxford, in 1750. The Oxford edition contains the observations of Benzelius, and remarks, together with a Gothic grammar, by the learned editor, Mr. Edward Lye. Long afterwards, a discovery was made of a manuscript in the library of Wolfembutel, which contained fragments of the Epistle to the Romans: this was published in 1762. Such is the history of this famous work down to the present times. The account from Leipzig is, that the Abbé Ange Maio, one of the librarians of the Ambrosian Library of Milan, to whom we are already indebted for the recovery and publication of several inedited fragments of ancient authors, lately discovered, on examining some manuscripts, that under the Latin writing there was another writing of a different cast; this writing thus disguised by the superficial manuscript, he has found to be Ulphilas's Mesogothic Translation of the Thirteen Canonical Epistles of Paul, which was considered to be entirely lost. The Abbé proposes to publish this translation, for which already Ulphilanian types, of different sizes, have been founded. This publication, which will throw new light over the sacred writings, is said to be impatiently expected by the learned. An edition, by subscription, of the com. plete works of M. Tamburini, is projected at Milan, to make thirty-four volumes in octavo. Tamburini is one of the professors of the university of Pavia. His productions, Latin and Italian, are accounted the classical books on their several sub jects. In advanced age he preserves, it is said, all the energy of his intellectual faculties and of his character. He is quoted as a proof that Italy is not the seat of prejudice and superstition; having displayed throughout the whole of his lengthened life exemplary zeal in opposing licentious casuists, flatterers of power, and abettors of ultramontane prejudices, and in promoting the triumph of the true prin. ciples of religion, which always engaged both his understanding and his affections. A new Latin translation of the Psalms has been lately published at Genoa, by M. François Ricardi, who had previously published in the same language a trans lation of the Canticles. A royal decree has been issued at Naples, for the establishment of an asylum for the poor blind. It is announced on authority that the episcopal sees of Piedmont, to the number of fifteen, have been recently filled. The superseding of some of Bonaparte's bishops, and particularly of Marentini, is regretted by the liberal journalists, they being described as able and excellent men. As a compensation, however, they state with much satisfaction, that the Sardinian government, at the desire of the Pope, has raised some parish priests to the episcopal rank, much to the chagrin of the noblesse, who had, until the French Revolution, appropriated the bishoprics to their own order. The elevation of M. d' Angennes, formerly a priest in the diocese of Turin, is a measure much extolled, he being a declared foe to tyranny. He is bishop of Alessandria. His pastoral letter on enter. ing upon his office is published, and extracts from it are before us, which fully justify the praise that has been bestowed upon him. In Piedmont, feudal titles are kept up, and the new bishop addresses the order of noblesse with great faithfulness, on the rights of the poor. The pastoral letter is in Latin, and yet a part of it is directed to titled females. Another pastoral letter is much spoken of, that of M. Bigez, bishop of Pignerol. This is in French, which appears to be generally used in the diocese. One great object of the letter is to reclaim the Protestants of the valleys of Vaudois, which are in the diocese of Pignerol: the tone of it is said to be mild and affectionate. The Protestants in the valleys amount to about 18,000; they are under the superintendence of a dozen ministers, to each of whom the Sardinian government allows an annual salary of a thousaud francs, about forty guiness. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. The legislature of the United States has given great umbrage to the politicians of Europe, by their refusing, contrary to the report of one of their own committees, to censure General Jackson for his conduct in seizing two of the Spanish posts, and putting to death, as spies, two Englishmen of the names of Ambrister and Arbuthnot, who were found fighting on the side of the Indians at war with the United States. One of these unfortunate men was executed in defiance of the verdict of a court-martial. The transaction appears to be contrary to the law of nations, and is certainly marked by cruelty. But America will be punished by loss of character: the British government will, we dare say, seek no other revenge than that which it finds in public opinion. The United States have gained a great accession of strength by the purchase of the Floridas from Spain. The price is 5000,000 of dollars, and these are to be paid to citizens of the United States, as an indemnification for alleged Spanish spoliations. Spain finds herself too weak to hold these colonies, and therefore resigns them under a colourable pretext: a part of the price is, no doubt, the stipulated nentrality of the United States with regard to the South American Republics. East and West Florida are estimated to contain a population of 40,000 souls. They abound in the productions of the West Indies. Under the protection and encouragement of a wise and powerful government, they will become every year more valuable. To the United States, this territory is of the greatest importance, as the possession of it secures them in the south from contact with European powers. It lengthens too their line of sea-coast, and gives them complete command of the mouth of the Mississippi, and of the Gulph of Mexico. In war with this country, the United States would now possess increased means of an noying the trade of our West-India Islands; this we lament, but we hope that the interests of both nations will long keep them in a state of peace. The American newspapers have lately published the following letter to General Washington, from Lord (then the Hon. Thomas Erskine, in the blank leaf of a presentation copy of his "View of the Causes and Consequences of the Present War with France:" "Sir, I have taken the liberty to introduce your august and immortal name in a short sentence, which is to be found in the book I send to you. "I have a large acquaintance amongst the most valuable and exalted classes of men: but you are the only human being for whom I ever felt an awful reverence. "I sincerely pray to God to grant a long and serene evening to a life so gloriously devoted to the universal happiness of the world." "T. ERSKINE. “ London, March 15, 1797.” The government of New York adopted in 1817 a custom long established in New England, that of setting apart a day after harvest to thank the Almighty for bis bounties. This is at once a festival of piety and of benevolent gaiety. Collections are made on this day in the churches; and in addressing to Heaven thanksgivings for the Divine blessings, care is taken to share them amongst the necessitous. ST. DOMINGO, OR Hayti. Our notice of this country in the last Number, p. 125, was scarcely correct. Instead of saying that it is divided into two "sovereignties," we should have said that the government of the northern part of the island is an absolute monarchy, and that of the south-west a republic. Christophe is, therefore, a king; Boyer, the successor of the lamented Petion, a president. Both governments are zealously promoting schools for all. In both, establishments are formed for the advancement of literature and science. And, in the republic at least, the assistance of distinguished foreigners is eagerly solicited in the province of education, Here, too, the press is active, and blacks and men of colour are emulating the whites in the display of intelligence. They have several newspapers and magazines. One of the latter, 'Abeille Haïtienne, The Haytian Bee, is both political and literary. No. 21 contains a poem on the immortality of the soul, against Materialists and Sceptics. In No. 24 is inserted a law of the 26th of June 1818, discussed and adopted by the Chamber of Representatives of Communes, adopted by the Senate, and published by the President, decreeing the establishment, in every department, of an hospital, where the sick and infirm may receive assistance, kindness and the consolations of religion. NOTICES. Mr. Ashworth, of Rossendale, announces that there has been received for the New Unitarian Chapel, Rochdale, from Liverpool Unitarian Fellowship Fund, £20 Sheffield Unitarian Fellowship Fund, 5 Several contributions have been received for the Meeting-House, Colchester, which will be duly acknowledged by an Advertisement, when the account is closed. Ir is expected that the Seventh Anniversary of the Scottish Unitarian Association will be held at Edinburgh, the last Sunday in April. THE Annual Meeting of the Southern Unitarian Fund Society will be held at Portsmouth, on Wednesday, April the 7th, the morning service at the General Baptist Chapel, Thomas-street; and the evening service at the Unitarian Chapel, in the High-street. The Rev. Abraham Bennett, of Poole, will preach in the morning, and the Rev. John Fallagar, of Chichester, in the evening. On Wednesday, April 14, will be held at Bridgwater, the Second Meeting of the Half-Yearly Association of Ministers and Friends residing in part of Somersetshire and Dorsetshire, who are united on the important principle that God the Father is alone the object of worship. The Rev. Samuel Fawcett, of Yeovil, is expected to preach. Divine service to begin at eleven o'clock. NEW PUBLICATIONS IN THEOLOGY The Christian Reformer, or New Evangelical Miscellany. By the Editor of the Monthly Repository. Vol. IV. for 1818. 12mo. Boards 6s. 6d. Religious Liberty and the Rights of Conscience and Private Judgment grossly violated by an anonymous Writer in the Gloucester Herald; with Replies to his Letters and Additional Remarks. By the Rev. Theophilus Browne, M. A., Minister of the Unitarian Chapel in that City. 12mo. The Trinitarian's Appeal Answered, in a Letter to the Rev. Samuel Newton of Witham. By A Layman. 12mo. 6d. A View of the Intellectual Powers of Man; with Observations on their Cultivation, adapted to the Present State of this Country. Read in the Literary and Philo. sophical Society of Liverpool, 20th November, 1818. 8vo. The Essentials of a National Church briefly explained, scripturally enforced, and humbly recommended to the Consideration of the Legislature. By a Friend to more Comprehensive Liturgy. 8vo. a 2s. 6d. The Deity of Jesus Christ subversive of his Sonship and Mediation; and inconsistent with the Common Faith of Christians. By Richard Wright, Unitarian Missionary. 12mo. 3d. (Single) 14s. Preached in St. George's Meeting-House, Exeter, Nov. 15, 1818, occasioned by the Death of Mrs. Nation, Relict of the late Hellow Nation, Esq., who died Nov. 3, in the 88th year of her age. By the Rev. Thomas Jervis. 1s. 6d. The Grace of God to Britain, preached at the Female Orphan Asylum, Dec. 13. By S. Piggott, A. M. Candidate for the Office of Morning Preacher. 1s. Preached at the Consecration of St. James's Church, in the Island of Guernsey, August 6, 1818. By John, Lord Bishop of Sarum. 1s. CORRESPONDENCE. Communications have been received from Messrs. L. Holden; H. Taylor; J. Jevans; J. II. Bransby; Holbrook Gaskell, and W. Harrison; and from Philalethes; Matthew Moderation; C, M.; D.; Selrahc; P. K.; An Occasional Reader; A Tyro; Brevis; X; Homo, and Angelica, whose sex we must take the liberty to doubt. Our Intelligence takes up so much room, that although we are extending our Magazine beyond the limits which prudence prescribes, we are obliged to try the patience of some of our Correspondents. May we add, that the length of their papers sometimes tries ours? We beg leave to suggest to our friends who supply us with Obituary accounts, that many of our subscribers object to the unqualified panegyrics of which they often consist. It is difficult, we are aware, to repress on these occasions the tender enthusiasm of friendship, but would it not be better to restrict these communications to a brief statement of facts, and a delineation of the leading features of character? Dr. Charles Lloyd wishes to avow that our reasons (pp. 129, 130) for regarding, without sympathy, the case of the hooksellers who are under prosecution for selling the "Age of Reason," are to his mind altogether insufficient; and an anonymous Correspondent from Liverpool considers our remarks "uncalled for, ungenerous and cruel." Be it so. We have nothing farther to say on the subject, except that we are amongst the few Christian writers that have pleaded the right of unbelievers to publish their opinions, and that it would be hard if after this we were not allowed to judge of the expediency of using the right in any particular case. |