and as Christians, we regard this volume as a most valuable gift sent us by our friends on the other side of the water. The work proves conclusively the rare qualifications of the author for his task; and the manner in which he has executed it places him at once among the acutest and most successful writers of the age. We have not for a long time read a book on which we can bestow heartier commendation. Mr. Tayler possesses, we think, peculiar powers of generalization and nice and profound analysis; and though, in a very modest preface, he speaks of the "inadequacy of his "materials" for fully developing his "idea" or leading principle, his acquaintance with the facts of the past appears sufficiently intimate and extensive to secure him against any important error in his results; and he is certainly a clear, discriminating, fresh and animated writer, capable, we should say, of rising to strains of no ordinary eloquence. He writes, too, in a delightful spirit. There cannot be one particle of bitterness in his nature; he is no narrow sectarian, no mere partisan, no bigot; and they, who may find it necessary to dissent from some of his opinions, will still give him credit for vigor and acuteness of intellect, while they honor the nobleness of his nature and his evident love of truth. As the work has not been reprinted among us, we shall be somewhat liberal in our extracts, for which we doubt not we shall receive the thanks of our readers. The design of the work is thus stated in the preface. "The idea which possessed my mind, when I first sketched out the plan of this volume, was the desirableness of embracing in a common point of view, the phænomena of the different religious parties, whose unintermitted strife and sharp contrast of manners and opinions, have given such a deep and varied interest to the spiritual history of England, especially during the three centuries which have elapsed since the Reformation. In pursuing this idea, I have tried to discover the governing principle and understand the characteristic working of each party to apprehend their mutual relation to shew how they have occasionally passed off into each other—and out of their joint operation, to trace the evolution of a more comprehensive principle, which looks above the narrowness of their respective views, and, allying itself with the essential elements of the Christian faith, may in time perhaps devise some method of reconciling an unlimited freedom and variety of the religious 1846.] Progress of the Reformation. 287 life with the friendliness and mutual recognition of universal brotherhood."-Preface, pp. iv, v. The author finds, in the history of religious parties in England, three distinctly marked periods: first, "that of Lollardism the name given in the fifteenth century to the disciples of Wycliffe-extending from the reign of Edward III. to that of Henry VIII.; secondly, that of proper Puritanism, from the Reformation to the extinction of the Commonwealth on the restoration of Charles II.; thirdly, that of Protestant Dissent, from the Restoration to the present day." In these different periods he discovers only "different manifestations of a common principle, tempered by the condition of society and the vigor of opposing tendencies." "In the ensuing pages," he tells us, "an attempt has been made to discover the distinctive principles, and contrast the effects on our national mind and character, of the English hierarchy and of Puritanism-to exhibit their mutual relation and to trace out of their joint influence the evolution of a third principle, distinct from each that of free religious inquiry." -P. 10. We pass over his section on the "external history of religious parties in England," which of necessity presents only a rapid "sketch" embracing prominent principles and incidents, and come at once to his chapter on the "Church." During the reign of Henry VIII., little change was made in the constitution of the Church, except what necessarily resulted from "dissolving the connexion with Rome, and transferring the ecclesiastical supremacy to the Crown." Articles, however, were framed, explained and illustrated, for fixing the national standard of faith and worship, and a small catechism was issued "by royal authority," called the "King's Primer." An Act was passed for "abolishing diversity of opinions" in religion, called the "Six Articles," which was, in fact, a re-enactment of the old religion, hailed with joy by all who were averse to the progress of the reformation." The public service of the Church, with some few exceptions, was still conducted in Latin. A Liturgy was set forth, founded chiefly on the "Use of Sarum," but in many churches the Roman breviaries and missals continued to be used as before. The King gave his sanction to an English translation of the Bible, but by an Act of 1542, the reading of it was prohibited to all " under the degrees of gentlemen and gentlewomen;" and the King himself declared that "the reading of the Old and New Testament was not necessary to the laity, but that liberty or restraint in this matter must be referred to the laws and government." The whole is thus summed up by Mr. Tayler. "At the close, then, of Henry's reign-notwithstanding the separation from Rome, and notwithstanding the strong Protestant tendencies of Cranmer - the Mass was still celebrated in Latin; the authorised confession of faith differed in no essential particular from the ancient creed; and the papal canons were still in force in other words, the Church, though it had changed its head, was in doctrine, ritual and discipline, as Romanist as ever, and much less free." - pp. 58, 59. During the short reign of Edward VI., the Reformation advanced. Homilies were published, the "Six Articles" were repealed, and the injunction to set up the Bible in the churches, "accompanied now by a translation of Erasmus's paraphrase of the New Testament," was renewed. "Their next object was to draw up a Book of Common Prayer and other devotional offices. That the establishment of a form of public Service should have preceded the publication of articles of faith-so contrary to the practice of the conti nental Reformers- - is a significant fact in the history of the English Church, and was owing to the caution of Cranmer and the judgment of Ridley, who thought it desirable to reconcile the bulk of the nation to the changes that were proceeding in religion, by the use of a liturgy not too widely divergent from the forms they were accustomed to, before they set forth a public declaration of belief. It is said, that Cranmer had prepared a Service of a more decidedly Protestant tone, but that the Romanist influence was too powerful in the committee charged with the business, to admit of his procuring its adoption. Many of the more zealous Protestants and the Calvinistic Reformers generally (though there were exceptions) disliked a liturgy; and the course taken by the divines of Edward's time, while it conciliated numbers who were attached to the old religion, distinguished the Church of England by a broad external sign from the Reformed Churches of the Continent, and has had a lasting influence on its constitution and character. In the composition of the Prayer Book, a respect for antiquity. and established usage. characteristic from the first, of the measures of the Anglican Reformation-largely predominated. A great part of it was translated from the Latin of the previous Catholic Service, enriched by selections from the ancient lit 1846.] Church of England. 289 urgies of the Gallican, Spanish, Alexandrine and Oriental Churches."- pp. 62, 63. Edward's first Service Book was issued in 1549: some revisions afterwards took place, chiefly at the instigation of foreign Protestants, by which it parted with something of its Popish character, but in its essential features it remained unchanged. After some account of the origin of the Thirtynine Articles, which, as well as the Homilies, Mr. Tayler pronounces Calvinistic, though the Church itself has been often, we believe we may say for the most part, Arminian, he thus states the "general characteristics of the Anglican Church." "Such, then, are the elements which enter into the composition of the Church of England, as exhibited separately in its Prayer Book, its Discipline, and its Articles. It remains to inquire, what has been their operation, combined as an organic whole, and viewed in the course of their historical development. How shall we express the individuality which has marked the Anglican hierarchy, since it acquired a fixed character and subsistence, and which still distinguishes it from other religious societies? If I mistake not, we find its distinctive attributes in a certain assumption of national independence and ascendancy, kept in check by the power of the State, and often greatly neutralized by the influence of enlightened and moderate men within its pale-but still manifesting itself, when circumstances have thrown it forcibly back on its inherent tendencies, and allowed it free scope for action, in a spirit of domination and exclusiveness in a haughty and aristocratical bearing, fitly represented by its episcopal constitution which betrays equal impatience of the foreign jurisdiction of the Pope, and of democratic pretensions at home. Herein we discover the reason of its reluctance to acknowledge the Protestant Churches of the Continent, and of its instinctive aversion from the popular elements entering so largely into the movements of the Reformation, to which those Churches owed their origin. Such tendencies may no doubt be ascribed in part to the circumstances of a wealthy and powerful establishment, but partly also they have their source in the spirit of the Prayer-book itself, and in the very nature of episcopal government, for they do not entirely cease, where, as among the Episcopalians of Scotland and the United States, the peculiar influences of an establishment are wanting. The Church of England displays the kind of pride which belongs to an ancient lineage, and has many sympathies with the recollections of feudalism. She claims a high descent and the prescription of a long-established title; and, while exulting, in the very spirit of the old baronial independence, at the thought of having cast off a foreign yoke, and purged herself free from the grosser corruptions of Popery, she holds herself aloof with an air of conscious superiority, from the sects of more recent origin that have rapidly shot up into consequence at her side. She takes her stand on the principle of authority; for, although in the fundamental charter of her reformed constitution, she appeals to Scripture for her right, she nevertheless authoritatively defines the sense of Scripture, and in her practice forbids any one to dispute it."- pp. 84-86. The sections which treat of the "High Sacerdotal and Regal Doctrines and Prevalence of Arminianism under the Stuarts," of the "Influence of Low Church Principles after the Revolution," and of what the author calls the "Modern Period," embracing the eighteenth century, Methodism, and the Puseyite movement which has its root in the past, deserve an attentive perusal, and had we room would furnish some good extracts. In the retrospect of the history of the Anglican Church, the author finds demonstration of the "utter inutility of Creeds, Articles, and a settled form of Prayer, to preserve agreement in belief, or even harmony of feeling, among its members." We proceed now to Puritanism. "Absolute freedom of inquiry," Mr. Tayler considers as "one of the latest results of advanced intellectual culture." It is rather the consequence of Puritanism than one of its essential and characteristic features. "The fundamental idea of Puritanism," says he, “in all its forms and ramifications, is the supreme authority of Scripture, acting directly on the individual conscience as opposed to a reliance on the priesthood and the outward ordinances of the Church. To realise the standard of faith, worship and conduct, recorded in Scripture, has ever been the object of Puritanism; and to attain that object, in defiance of a hierarchy, requires no small degree of self-reliance and decision of purpose. But with Puritanism the range of inquiry is shut up within the limits of the written Word; it does not venture to sally forth beyond them, and survey the Scripture under a broader aspect, from some point of view external to it. Where, as in the case of Baxter and some others of a later period, the principle of rigid Scripturalism was less firmly grasped, they approached the confines of the Latitudinarian system, and ceased, to that extent, to be proper Puritans." pp. 131, 132. - Again, |