parents, with all its peculiarities, so also he derives his moral and spiritual life from the same source. The organic connexion does not cease at birth, but is continued until the child becomes an intelligent, conscious, self-determining agent. Its forming period is prior to that event, during which it is in a great measure the passive subject of impressions from the parent, whose inward, spiritual life, of what sort it is, passes over or is continued in the child. Such is the condition in which men are born into this world, and such the power of the life of the parent, that natural pravity may be overcome by Christian nurture, and a real regeneration effected by parental character and treatment as an organic power.

Every one sees there is a great deal of truth in this, and that most important duties and responsibilities must grow out of that truth. But at the same time it is both defective and erroneous as a full statement of the case. It rests on a false assumption of the state of human nature, and of the power of Christian nurture. It assumes that men are not by nature the children of wrath, that they are not involved in spiritual death, and consequently that they do not need to be quickened by that mighty power which wrought in Christ when it raised him from the dead. The forming influence of parental character and life is fully adequate to his regeneration; education can correct what there is of natural corruption. In answer to the objection that this is the old Pelagian, Rationalistic theory of human nature and conversion, it is said, the Spirit of Jehovah fills all worlds, and every thing is due to his presence and power. This, however, is only saying that second causes owe their efficiency to God; a truth which few naturalists, and even few infidels, deny. This, therefore may be admitted, and yet all supernatural influence in the regeneration of men denied.

It can hardly be questioned that the Bible makes a broad distinction between that agency of God by which the ordinary operations of nature are carried on, and the agency of his Spirit in the conversion and sanctification of men. The same distinction has always been made in the church. In all controversies concerning grace, the question has been, whether apart from the influence of natural causes considered as the ordinary modes of the divine efficiency, there is any special and effectual agency of the Spirit in the regeneration of men. Dr. Bushnell may choose to

overlook this distinction, and claim to be a supernaturalist because he believes God is in nature, but he remains on the precise ground occupied by those who are wont to call themselves Rationalists.

We have already adverted to the difference which may exist between what a book teaches and what its author believes. This book to our apprehension teaches a naturalistic doctrine concerning conversion. The author asserts that he holds to the supernatural doctrine on that subject. He is of course entitled to the benefit of that declaration. All we can say is that he seems to use the terms in a different sense from that in which they are commonly employed, and that there is enough of a rationalistic cast about it to account for all the disapprobation it has excited, and to justify the course of the Massachusetts committee. For although it contains much important truth powerfully presented, and although it inculcates principles, considering the source whence they come, of no little significance and value, yet a book which in its apparent sense denies everything supernatural in religion, could hardly be expected to circulate with the approbation of any orthodox society.

Having presented what we consider the true ground of the admitted connexion between believing parents and their children, and considered Dr. Bushnell's views on the subject, it was our purpose to call attention to the church or ritual doctrine. This however, we can barely state. The church doctrine admits original sin, and the insufficiency of nature, or of any power operating in nature, for the regeneration of men. This power is found in the church. As all men partake of the life of Adam, by their natural birth, so they are made partakers of the life of Christ by their spiritual birth. He by his incarnation has introduced a new principle of life, which continues in the church which is his body. And as baptism makes us members of the church, and therefore members of the body of Christ, it thus makes us partakers of his life. Just as a twig engrafted into a tree partakes of its life, so a child engrafted by baptism into the church partakes of the life of Christ. It is this life thus supernaturally communicated, which is to be developed by Christian nurture, and not any thing in the soul which it has by nature. This doctrine is presented in various forms more or less gross or philosophical, according to the character and training of its advocates. It is however everywhere essentially the same whether

propounded at Rome, Oxford, or Berlin. The German philosophical form of the doctrine bids fair to be the popular one in this country, and is advanced with the contemptuous confidence which characterises the school whence it emanates. Every thing which is not ritual and magical is pronounced rationalistic. Nothing is regarded as spiritual but grace communicated by external acts and contacts. The true doctrine of Protestants which makes faith necessary to the efficacy of the sacraments, is denounced as Puritan, which is rapidly becoming a term of reproach. This doctrine rests on a false view of the church. The external body of professors is not the body of Christ, which consists only of believers. Transferring to the former the attributes and prerogatives which belong to the latter, is the radical error of Romanism, the source at once of its corruption and power. It rests also on a false view of the sacraments, attributing to them an efficacy independent of faith in the recipient. It assumes a false theory of religion. Instead of the free unimpeded access of the soul to Christ, we are referred to the external church as the only medium of approach. Instead of the life of God in the soul by the indwelling of the Holy Ghost, it is the human nature of Christ, the second Adam, of which we must partake. The whole doctrine is nothing but a form of the physical theory of religion. It is a new anthropology palmed upon men, as the gospel. We are constantly reminded of the remark of Julius Müller that all attempts to spiritualize nature, end in materializing spirit. A remark which finds a striking illustration in the new philosophy in its dealings with religion. Its most spiritual theories serve only to reduce the principle of divine life to the same category with animal life, something transmissible from parent to child, or from priest to people. There is great reason to fear that religion, under such teaching, will either sink into the formal ritualism of Rome, or be evaporated into the mystic Rationalism of Germany. Schleiermacher, whose views are so zealously reproduced, and between which and his own Dr. Bushnell seems often at a loss to choose, taught that Christ introduced a new life-principle into the world. Human nature corrupted in Adam, was restored to perfection in Him. That life still continues in the church, just as the life of Adam continues in the race. Christianity is the perfection of nature, as Christ was the perfection of manhood. It is not with the historical, personal Christ that we have communion, any more than it is with Adam as an individual man with

whom we have to do. Both are reduced to a mere power or principle. Christ as the Son of God is lost. So also in his system the Holy Ghost, is not a divine person, but "the commonspirit," or common sentiment of the church. The Holy Spirit has no existence out of the Church, and in it is but a principle. In this way all the precious truths of the Bible are sublimated into unsubstantial philosophical vagaries, and every man pronounced a Rationalist, or what is thought to be the same thing, a Puritan, who does not adopt them.

Though we have placed the title of Dr. Tyler's Letter to Dr. Bushnell at the head of this article, the course of our remarks has not led us into a particular consideration of it. This is not to be referred to any want of respect. The subject unfolded itself to us in the manner in which we have presented it, and we should have found it inconvenient to turn aside to consider the particular form in which Dr. Tyler has exhibited substantially the same objections to Dr. Bushnell's book. Dr. T. however seems to make less of the promise of God to parents than we do, and to have less reliance on Christian nurture as a means of conversion. We are deeply impressed with the conviction that as to both of these points there is much too low a doctrine now generally prevailing. And it is because Dr. B. urges the fact of the connexion between parents and children, with so much power, that we feel so great an interest in his book. His philosophy of that fact we hope may soon find its way to the place where so much philosophy has already gone.

ART. IV.-The Apostolical Succession.

In opposition to the doctrine, that Presbyterian ordination is invalid because not derived from a superior order of ministers, there is a twofold argument, negative and positive. The negative argument is founded on the fact, that there is no order of church-officers existing by divine right superior to Presbyters; that no such order can exist as the successors of the primitive Bishops, for these were identical with the primitive Presbyters; nor as successors of the Apostles, for these, as such, had no suc

cessors. The positive argument is founded on the fact, that the primitive Presbyters actually exercised the highest powers now belonging to the ministry.

There is only one ground left, on which the validity of Presbyterian ordination can be called in question, viz. that it is not derived even from true Presbyters, that is to say, from the regular successors of the primitive Presbyters. This ground has commonly been taken by the advocates for the necessity of Bishops as an order superior to Presbyters. It is through such Bishops that the succession has been usually traced. The two doctrines are however not identical, nor even inseparable. Even granting what we have alleged-that there is no superior order, and that Presbyters have always rightfully exercised the highest powers now belonging to the ministry-it may still be said that this, at most, only proves modern bishops to be nothing more than Presbyters, and as such authorized to govern and ordain, but that these powers may not be claimed by those who cannot, like the Bishops, prove themselves to be the successors of the primitive Presbyters.

This argument against the validity of Presbyterian ordination, we propose to examine; but before we do so, it will be necessary to define the meaning of certain terms continually used on both sides of the controversy. The necessity of this arises from the fact, that much confusion has been introduced into the subject by the abuse of terms and by confounding, under one name, things which are materially different. The substitution of a sense in the conclusion wholly distinct from that used in the premises, must vitiate the argument, although the effect may pass unnoticed. Hence have arisen many current fallacies, the popular effect of which has been to give a great advantage to that party in the controversy, by whom, or in whose behalf, the stratagem is practised. Thus when the question to be agitated is whether apostolical succession is necessary in the Christian ministry, the term employed admits of two distinct interpretations. It may be said to be necessary, in the sense of being convenient, useful, desirable, and therefore binding under ordinary circumstances. The necessity here predicated of succession is an improper or a relative necessity, from the admission of which it would be most unfair to argue the existence of an absolute or strict necessity, as of a condition sine qua non, without which there can be no