he holds its benefits to be predomimant; and, as the main remedy of most of its attendant evils, recommends that we "provide useful moral reading for a population whom we first teach to read." Every person who can appreciate, soundness of Scriptural criticism, true elegance of style and manner, accuracy of thought and reasoning, and ardent, yet well-tempered zeal in the cause of Christian truth, will place a very high value on this sermon of Mr. Kenrick's. We are concerned that we were unable to introduce it at a much earlier period to the notice of our readers. N. ART. V.-The Importance and Means of Intellectual Improvement. A Sermon preached before the Annual Assembly of General Baptists, at the Chapel in Worship Street, June 1, 1819. By James Gilchrist. pp. 32. Eaton and Hunter. 1s. REGULAR critic would quar A 8vo. dered as a sermon, and he might be right according to the most approved rules for sermon making; but under what class of works soever it be placed, it may be confidently pronounced to be worthy of perusal, and, if the reader be young and above all if he be destined for the ministry, of study. Mr. Gilchrist considers I. the Importance, and II. the Means of Intellectual Improvement. It is important, he argues, as it raises in the scale of being, increases the power of doing good, is a source of enjoyment, and is a preservative from mental idleness and listlessness, vicious indulgence and its train of evils. The means of it which he considers are, learning, reading, observation, conversation and study. Under all these heads, occur observations which mark a superior mind, and a mind too conscious of its own powers to be retained in the beaten track of thought. The following passage has none of the author's peculiarities, but it shews that he is capable of competing (if we may be allowed a Scottish term) with other writers, scarcely excepting the best, in the legitimate English style: "Intellectual improvement is a source of enjoyment. One of the most efficient means of pleasure in the mind is its having interesting objects of attraction, which keep it steadily and cheerfully in action. Such objects that mind has constantly in view, which is progressive in knowledge and wisdom. At every advance, it discovers new beauties which delight, and fresh treasures which reward and enrich. As it prospect, and a clearer atmosphere. And ascends higher, it has a more extended what enjoyment can be equal to that which a mind experiences in the consciousness of surmounting the mists of ignorance and error and prejudice, and in ascending towards the regions of pure intelligence and perfect wisdom? "If intellectual progress had relation only to the present state of being, it would be valuable as an important means of enjoyment; but how much more important must it appear if considered as having relation to eternal progression; if the mind shall take all its store of intelligence with it into a higher state of existence; if it shall start from the same point hereafter at which it leaves off here, to run an endless career discovery intellectual delight. this view, mental improvement is so much and the pleasure flowing from it is but a preparatory fituess for the heavenly state; foretaste of that ethereal felicity which is great Fountain of Intelligence."-—Pp. 11, to be enjoyed in nearer approaches to the 12. ART. VI.-An Essay on a Future Life. By Richard Wright, Unitarian Missionary. 12mo. pp. 72. Eaton. WE E have borne a willing testimony to the merits of Mr. Wright's tracts, and can conscien tiously recommend this as a clear summary of the argument and evidence on the momentous subject of a life to come. The Essay is pervaded by a serious and devotional spirit : "Feeling the approach of the evening of life, and expecting ere long to become a tenant of the grave, the writer has been very anxious to get this Essay on a Future Life ready for publication. It contains his most mature thoughts on a subject, tion; exercised his deepest thought; and which has long engaged his closest attenbeen the object of his most serious inquiries and meditations. On no subject on which he has written, has he felt a deeper interest; indeed, all other subjects appear to be more or less interesting as they are connected with and have a bearing on this; it has pressed upon his mind the more forcibly, as he has felt his days rapidly passing away; and every thing has reminded him of the approach of the moment which will terminate his earthly pilgrimage."-P. 61. The Essayist views the subject in all its bearings, and gives in a few pages the substance of volumes. He believes in the total mortality of man, and consequently places his hopes of life future upon the resurrection. His statement of both, the evidence of the resurrection of Christ, and of the purport of the general resurrection is remarkably clear. And at the end are Six Meditations of a devotional character, which are as well calculated to affect the heart, as the former part of the work is to satisfy the understanding. The preacher takes for his text Acts xii. 1-4, making use of the last of these verses as an opening to his subject. The verse contains the word Easter as the name of a religious festival, and the English reader would hence infer that the church-holiday now known by that title is intended by the Evangelist and is of apostolic origin. No such thing. The term is thrust in by King James's translators to shew their anti-puritanism. There is no colour of reason for it. The word is passover, and is thus given in other parts of this very translation, and it had been so given in this place by preceding translators. Mr. Hawkes says, "It is rather curious to observe how a duces a very different mode of thinking, or at least of speaking and acting. When James was King of Scotland he could find no authority in Scripture for either Easter or Christmas. In a speech delivered in the Scotch General Assembly, held at Edinburgh, August 4, 1590, he is said to have used the following words: 'The Kirk of Geneva, what are they? They keep Pasch and Youle [i. e. Easter and Christmas]: what authority have they in God's word, and where is their institution And as for our neighbour the Kirk of England, their service is an evil-said mass in English; they want nothing of the mass but the liftings; but the Kirk of Scotland is the finest in all the world.' (See Calderwood's History of Scotland, p. 256.)"-Pp. 11, 12. In a note, p. 24, Mr. Hawkes gives the following passage from Turner's Hist. of Anglo-Saxous. II. 15: "Bede, in his History, mentions Eostre as the name of one of the Anglo-Saxon Goddesses, whose festivities were celebrated in April, which thence obtained the name of Eostre-Monath. Her name is still retained to express the season of our great paschal solemnity, and thus the memory of one of the idols of our ancestors will be perpetuated as long as our language and country continue." The preacher makes great use of Robinson's humourous tract entitled "The History and Mystery of Good Friday." While Mr. Hawkes vindicates to Dissenters the "liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free," and exhorts them not to be "again entangled with the yoke of bondage," he speaks with great candour of such as can seriously and profitably observe days and seasons. This is agreeable to Paul's liberal doctrine and benevolent advice, Rom. xiv. 5, 6, "One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord, and he that regardetb not the day, to the Lord he doth not change of circumstances sometimes pro- regard it." HYMN. POETRY. Father and Friend! Thy light, Thy love Beaming thro' all Thy works we see; Thy glory gilds the heav'ns above, And all the earth is full of Thee. Thy voice we hear-Thy presence feel, Whilst Thou, too pure for mortal sight, Involv'd in clouds-invisible, Reignest, the Lord of life and light. We know not in what hallow'd part Of the wide heav'ns Thy throne may be; But this we know, that where Thon art, Strength, wisdom, goodness dwell with Thee. And thro' the various maze of time, And thro' th' infinity of space, We follow Thy career sublime, And all Thy wondrous footsteps trace. Thy children shall not faint nor fear, Sustain'd by this delightful thought, Since Thou, their God, art every where, They cannot be where Thou art not. HYMN. A. If all our hopes and all our fears O who could then endure to live? Who dwell in darkness and in death? Yet such were life without the ray From our divine religion giv'n; 'Tis this that makes our darkness day! 'Tis this that makes our earth a heav'n! Bright is the golden sun above, And beautiful the flow'rs that bloom; And all is joy-and all is love,Reflected from a world to come. A. 1 PRAISE TO GOD. Great is our God, whose voice of pow'r divine The worlds created, and bade light to shine. All nature's tribes behold the kindled rays, Joyful with life, and active to his praise. Shall man forbear, blest with his kind directions, To sing the glory of his bright perfections! Wise is our God, who form'd the human mind, In one vast scheme creation's laws combin'd; Governs all nations with unerring skill, And guides the universe to work his will. His counsels deep, and high beyond all vision, And fix'd for ever his supreme decision. Good is our God, whose plenteous bounty pours Blessings in sun-beams, dews, and fruitful show'rs; Whose grace provides for men the living bread And lively hope of rising from the dead. Jesus from him proclaims a great salvation For penitents of ev'ry tongue and nation. R. F. Kidderminster. WOMAN. - [From Dramatic Scenes and other Poems, by Barry Cornwall. 12mo. 1819.] 'Gone from her cheek is the summer bloom, And her lip has lost all its faint perfume; And the gloss has dropped from her golden hair, And her cheek is pale, but no longer fair. And the spirit that sate on her soft blue eye, Is struck with cold mortality; And the smile that played round her lip has fled, And every charm has now left the dead. Like slaves they obeyed her in height of pow'r, But left her all in her wintry hour; And the crowds that swore for her love to die, Shrunk from the tone of her last faint sigh. And this is man's fidelity! 'Tis woman alone, with a purer heart, INTELLIGENCE. DOMESTIC. LEGAL. BEDFORD CHARITY. that it was represented that it might be either brought forward on the Act, which was commonly called Sir Samuel Romilly's- Act, or otherwise Right of Jews to share in Christian under the Act of Parliament which Charities. This case was, as our readers will recollect, reported at length (we believe) exclusively in the Repository [XIII. 586-594]. After a lapse of sufficient time for mature consideration a judgment has been pronounced, of which we subjoin a Report. Lincoln's-Inn Hall, Aug. 23, 1819. THE Lord Chancellor began by observing, that this case came originally before him in consequence of a petition presented to him by Levi Lyon and Sheba Lyon, daughter of the said Levi, praying that the said Sheba might be admitted to a participation of the benefits of the Charity, established in the town of Bedford by Edward VI. This petition was after wards followed by one signed by five persons, describing themselves as Elders of the Congregation of German and Dutch Jews assembling in the Synagogue in Duke's-place, and by several other persons, who also stated themselves to be Elders of the New Synagoguein Leadenhall-street, which petition prayed that this Court would declare that all the poor inhabitants of the borough of Bedford were equally entitled to the Charity, whether they were Jews or Christians, provided they had such qualifications as the deed of grant by the letters patent of his late Majesty Edward VI. prescribed, and that this Court would be pleased to order the governors, visitors and trustees to admit such children, and particularly Sheba Lyon, to enjoy the privilege of drawing her lot for the apprentice fee, as prescribed by the Act of Parliament, and that such fee might be paid to her father, the petitioner. Such was the prayer of these gentlemen, and when it was first heard before him, he (Lord Chancellor) had felt some considerable difficulty in the case, seeing had passed for regulating this particular Charity.—The difficulty on that point had been argued most ably by Sir Samuel Romilly, a lawyer whose name could not be too highly vene rated, and a man whose great talents, yond all praise. Under the original integrity and independence were be Act, as he would have occasion to state by and bye, much difficulty occurred as to the Chancellor having any power to act in a summary way when a petition was presented to him, unless, indeed, the trustees were the subject of complaint, they having conducted themselves not in a manner consonant to the spirit of the deed by which they were constituted trustees. Another difficulty had also presented itself, which was this, that if a Jew inhabitant of Bedford, properly qualified every way to be a partaker of this Charity was refused, then he of course had a right to apply to the Great Seal; but why should the elders of the Jewish Synagogues in Loudon be allowed to come here? That interested persons had a right to apply, he would not doubt, but then the elders of the Synagogue could not, because this would be giving a kind of corporate character to the ap plicants, which he would not, and could not, as a judge, in any degree sustain. By the Act of Parliament, the Court had the power of interfering in case of any misconduct; but this power did not surely mean that persons who had no interest in the Charity, who were living far from it, who in truth had nothing to do in it, were to have liberty whenever they chose to apply to the Great Seal. He must be allowed to say, that such never was the intention of the Legislature in the Acts passed on account of this Charity. Accordingly, he had suggested that the most expedient measure to be adopted would be, for the trustees to present a petition un der the provisions of the Act, which petition they had presented, and which prayed that the Court, by virtue of the powers with which it was invested by the Act of Parliament, would declare whether Jewish boys were equally entitled to be mixed indiscriminately with Christians in the enjoyment of this Charity, or that the Court should make such order as it should see proper. Such was the application nade to him, and he would now, on this highly interesting and most important question, go shortly into the facts and history of the case. This Charity was, it appeared, founded by letters patent by Edward VI., who founded it as a Grammar School in that town, as indeed, that young and amiable, but lamented monarch, did in many parts of the kingdom, and here the Grammar School was to be "pro instructione, institutione et disciplinâ Juvenum, in grammaticâ literaturâ et bonis moribus," (with regard to which expression "bonis moribus," there was considerable diversity of explanation, he believed, even in classical authors,) in addition to which certain lands were left for the sustentation of the master. There was an Act of Parliament in 1764, which recited all the letters patent, and then mentioned an agreement or indenture, entered into in the 8th of Queen Elizabeth, between the mayor, burgesses, &c. of Bedford and Sir Wm. Harper, which indenture related, that the said mayor and burgesses had erected a school to be perpetually called a Free School, and that there should be one master and one usher in the school for ever. Sir William Harper at the same time granted lands also for what he was pleased to call the "sustentation" of the master and usher of the school; and also, he had provided a suitable sum for the marriage of poor maids, &c., on his doing which, the mayor, aldermen, bailiffs, &c. covenanted that they, their heirs and successors, should employ the funds as directed in the letters patent of the King (Ed. ward VI.) and act as Parliament should farther direct them. The Act of Parliament then went on to say, that several streets had been erected in Bedford, that there had been a suit in this Court in 1725, and that an order of the Court had been thus obtained, by which the Warden and Fellows of the New College were appointed to elect the master and usher, who were to teach the children gratis, and that when the salary of the master and usher were paid, the proceeds, if any, were to be devoted to the other parts of the Charity. The Act, after stating the limited sum to be paid to poor maidens on their marriage, next referred to a decree of this Court in the year 1761, which decree referred it to the Master to ascertain what sums were due to poor maidens, to receive proposals for new leases, all to be referred to the Master to act as he should think proper. The Act of Parliament then declared the improvements already made, and about to be made in the grounds of the Charity, which would, in a short period, amount to £3000. It further stated, that the mayor, clergy, &c. should have the power of acting as trustees, but those persons who acted as trustees must have previously served as churchwardens. It declared also, that should any doubt arise as to the construction of the Act, the parties were at full liberty to apply to the Great Seal for redress, that is, to consider how the funds had been applied, as the orders of the Great Seal, it should be remembered, were final, and the children in such schools were to be instructed "bonis moribus," which plainly meant (though classical commentators had entertained different views on the subject) that the children in such school or schools were to be educated in religious and moral principles, as well as in general public duties. His Lordship detailed the other provisions of the Act, which had been repealed by an Act in 1793, which declared that the former Act had been repealed, it having been found quite inadequate to the very important purposes it was intended to accomplish, and containing provisions which occasioned infinite difficulty to the inhabitants, and which might be the source of endless litigation. However, the former Act was repealed, and the lord-lieutenant of the county, the members of parliament for the borough, &c. were made governors, with the others already mentioned in |
