His Lordship talks of the drudgery | When once the ancient faith-marks of of wading through ten pages of an- the Church are lost sight of and swers to his eighty-seven questions. despised, any misled theologian may Who has occasioned this drudgery, launch out on the boundless sea of but the person who means to be so polemical vexation. much more active, useful, and impor- The Bishop of Peterborough is potant, than all other Bishops, by pro-sitive, that the Arminian interpretation posing questions which nobody has of the Articles is the right interpretathought to be necessary but himself? tion, and that Calvinists should be But to be intolerably strict and harsh excluded from it; but the country to a poor curate, who is trying to earn gentlemen who are to hear these mata morsel of hard bread, and then to ters debated in the Lower House, are complain of the drudgery of reading to remember, that other Bishops have his answers, is much like knocking a written upon these points before the man down with a bludgeon, and then Bishop of Peterborough, and have abusing him for splashing you with his arrived at conclusions diametrically blood, and pestering you with his opposite. When curates are excluded groans. It is quite monstrous, that a because their answers are Calvinisman who inflicts eighty-seven new tical, a careless layman might imagine questions in Theology upon his fellow- that this interpretation of the Articles creatures, should talk of the drudgery had never been heard of before in the of reading their answers. Church-that it was a gross and palpable perversion of their sense, which had been scouted by all writers on Church matters, from the day the Articles were promulgated, to this hour that such an unheard-of monster as a Calvinistical Curate had never leapt over the pale before, and been detected browsing in the sacred pastures. The following is the testimony of "The Church has left a latitude of sense A Curate-there is something which excites compassion in the very name of a Curate!!! How any man of Purple, Palaces, and Preferment, can let himself loose against this poor working man of God, we are at a loss to conceive,- -a learned man in an hovel, with sermons and saucepans, lexicons and bacon, Hebrew books and ragged children- good and patient-Bishop Sherlock :a comforter and a preacher-the first and purest pauper in the hamlet, and yet showing, that, in the midst of his worldly misery, he has the heart of a gentleman, and the spirit of a Christian, and the kindness of a pastor; and this man, though he has exercised the duties of a clergyman for twenty years though he has most ample testimonies of conduct from clergymen as respectable as any Bishop-though an Archbishop add his name to the list of witnesses, is not good enough for Bishop Marsh; but is pushed out in the street, with his wife and children, and his little furniture, to surrender his honour, his faith, his conscience, and his learning-or to starve ! to prevent schisms and breaches upon Bishop Cleaver, describing the diffitaking as the formation of a national culties attending so great an undercreed, observes :— : "These difficulties, however, do not seem to have discouraged the great leaders in this work from forming a design as wise as it was liberal, that of framing a confession, which in the enumeration and method probation, and engage the consent of the of its several articles, should meet the apwhole reformed world. An obvious objection to these innovations is, that there can be no end to them. If eighty-three questions are assumed to be necessary by one Bishop, eight hundred may be considered as the If upon trial it was found that a comminimum of interrogation by another.prehension so extensive could not be re 66 6 duced to practice, still as large a compre- | Church of England has not gone the length hension as could be contrived, within the of asserting in her Articles; but neither narrower limits of the kingdom, became, for has she gone the length of explicitly contrathe same reasons which first suggested the dicting those opinions; insomuch, that idea, at once an object of prudence and there is nothing to hinder the Arminian duty in the formation and government of and the highest supralapsarian Calvinist the English Church.' from walking together in the Church of England and Ireland as friends and brothers, if they both approve the discipline of the Church, and both are willing to submit to it. Her discipline has been approved; it has been submitted to; it has been in former times most ably and zealously defended by the highest supralapsarian Calvinists. Such was the great Usher; such was Whitgift; such were many more, burning and shining lights of our Church in her early days (when first she shook off the Papal tyranny), long since gone to the resting-place of the spirits of the just."-(Bishop HORSLEY's Charges, p. 216.-pp. 25, 26.) After dwelling on the means necessary to accomplish this object, the Bishop proceeds to remark:- Such evidently appears to have been the origin, and such the actual complexion of the confession comprised in the Articles of our Church; the true scope and design of which will not, I conceive, be correctly apprehended in any other view than that of one drawn up and adjusted with an intention to comprehend the assent of all, rather than to exclude that of any who concurred in the necessity of a reformation. "The means of comprehension intended were, not any general ambiguity or equivocation of terms, but a prudent forbearance So that these unhappy Curates are in all parties not to insist on the full extent turned out of their bread for an expoof their opinions in matters not essential sition of the Articles which such men or fundamental; and in all cases to waive, as Sherlock, Cleaver, and Horsley as much as possible, tenets which might di- think may be fairly given of their vide, where they wish to unite." (Remarks meaning. We do not quote their auon the Design and Formation of the Articles of the Church of England, by WILLIAM, Lord Bishop of Bangor, 1802. pp. 23-25.) We will finish with Bishop Horsley. "It has been the fashion of late to talk about Arminianism as the system of the Church of England, and of Calvinism as something opposite to it, to which the Church is hostile. That I may not be misunderstood in what I have stated, or may have occasion further to say upon this subject, I must here declare, that I use the words Arminianism and Calvinism in that restricted sense in which they are now generally taken, to denote the doctrinal part of each system, as unconnected with the principles either of Arminians or Calvinists, upon Church discipline and Church government. This being premised, I assert, what I often have before asserted, and by God's grace I will persist in the assertion to my dying day, that so far is it from the truth that the Church of England is decidedly Arminian, and hostile to Calvinism, that the truth is this, that upon the principal points in dispute between the Arminians and the Calvinists-upon all the points of doctrine characteristic of the two sects, the Church of England maintains an absolute neutrality; her Articles explicitly assert nothing but what is believed both by Arminians and by Calvinists. The Calvinists indeed hold some opinions relative to the same points, which the thority, to show that the right interpretation is decided, but that it is doubtful-that there is a balance of authorities-that the opinion which Bishop Marsh has punished with poverty and degradation, has been considered to be legitimate by men at least as wise and learned as himself. In fact, it is to us perfectly clear, that. the Articles were originally framed to Marsh has used for their protection prevent the very practices which Bishop they were purposely so worded, that Arminians and Calvinists could sign them without blame. They were intended to combine both these descriptions of Protestants, and were meant principally for a bulwark against the Catholics. "Thus," says Bishop Burnet, was the doctrine of the Church cast into a short and plain form; in which they took care both to establish the positive articles of religion and to cut off the errors formerly introduced in the time of Popery, or of late broached by the Anabaptists and enthusiasts of Germany; avoiding the niceties of schoolmen, or the peremptoriness of the writers of controversy; leaving, in matters that are more justly controvertible, a liberty to divines to follow their private opinions without thereby disturbing the peace of the Church." (History of the Reformation, opinions upon other people. The next authority is that of Fuller. "In the Convocation now sitting, wherein Alexander Nowel, Dean of St. Paul's, was Prolocutor, the nine-and-thirty Articles were composed. For the main they agree with those set forth in the reign of King Edward the Sixth, though in some particulars allowing more liberty to dissenting judgments. For instance, in this King's Articles it is said, that it is to be believed that Christ went down to hell (to preach to the spirits there); which last clause is left out in these Articles, and men left to a latitude concerning the cause, time, and manner of his descent. "Hence some have unjustly taxed the composers for too much favour extended in their large expressions, clean through the contexture of these Articles, which should have tied men's consciences up closer, in more strict and particularising propositions, which indeed proceeded from their commendable moderation. Children's clothes ought to be made of the biggest, because afterwards their bodies will grow up to their garments. Thus the Articles of this English Protestant Church, in the infancy thereof, they thought good to draw up in general terms, foreseeing that posterity would grow up to fill the same: I mean these holy men did prudently prediscover, that differences in judgments would unavoidably happen in the Church, and were loath to unchurch any, and drive them off from an ecclesiastical communion, for such petty differences, which made them pen the Articles in comprehensive words, to take in all who, differing in the branches, meet in the root of the same religion. "Indeed most of them had formerly been sufferers themselves, and cannot be said, in compiling these Articles, (an acceptable service, no doubt,) to offer to God what cost them nothing, some having paid imprisonment, others exile, all losses in their estates, for this their experimental knowledge in religion, which made them the more merciful and tender in stating those points, seeing such who themselves have been most patient in bearing, will be most pitiful in burdening the consciences of others."-(See FULLER'S Church History, book ix. p. 72, folio edit.) But this generous and pacific spirit gives no room for the display of zeal and theological learning. The gate of admission has been left too widely open. I may as well be without power at all, if I cannot force my What was purposely left indefinite, I must make finite and exclusive. Ques tions of contention and difference must be laid before the servants of the Church, and nothing like neutrality in theological metaphysics allowed to the ministers of the Gospel. I come not to bring peace, &c. The Bishop, however, seems to be quite satisfied with himself, when he states, that he has a right to do what he has done-just as if a man's character with his fellow-creatures depended upon legal rights alone, and not upon a discreet exercise of those rights. A man may persevere in doing what he has a right to do, till the Chancellor shuts him up in Bedlam, or till the mob pelt him as he passes. It must be presumed, that all men whom the law has invested with rights, Nature has invested with common sense to use those rights. For these reasons, children have no rights till they have gained some common sense, and old men have no rights after they lose All men are at their common sense. all times accountable to their fellowcreatures for the discreet exercise of every right they possess. Prelates are fond of talking of my see, my clergy, my diocese, as if these things belonged to them, as their pigs and dogs belonged to them. They forget that the clergy, the diocese, and the Bishops themselves, all exist only for the public good; that the public are a third, and principal party in the whole concern. It is not simply the tormenting Bishop versus the tormented Curate, but the public against the system of tormenting; as tending to bring scandal upon religion and religious men. By the late alteration in the laws, the labourers in the vineyard are given up to the power of the inspectors of the vineyard. If he have the meanness and malice to do so, an inspector may worry and plague to death any la- . bourer against whom he may have conceived an antipathy. As often as such cases are detected, we believe they will meet, in either House of Parliament, with the severest reprehension. The noblemen and gentlemen of Eng land will never allow their parish | be it known to his Lordship, have very clergy to be treated with cruelty, in- often very acute feelings; and a Curate justice, and caprice, by men who were trod on feels a pang as great as when parish clergymen themselves yester- a Bishop is refuted. day, and who were trusted with power for very different purposes. The Bishop of Peterborough complains of the insolence of the answers made to him. This is certainly not true of Mr. Grimshawe, Mr. Neville, or of the author of the Appeal. They have answered his Lordship with great force, great manliness, but with perfect respect. Does the Bishop expect that humble men, as learned as himself, are to be driven from their houses and homes by his new theology, and then to send him letters of thanks for the kicks and cuffs he has bestowed upon them? Men of very small incomes, Excluding Answer. "The fall of Adam produced such an effect on his posterity, that mankind became thereby a mass of mere corruption, or of absolute and entire depravity." " We shall now give a specimen of some answers, which, we believe, would exclude a curate from the diocese of Peterborough, and contrast these answers with the Articles of the Church to which they refer. The 9th Article of the Church of England is upon Original Sin. Upon this point his Lordship puts the following question: "Did the fall of Adam produce such an effect on his posterity, that mankind became thereby a mass of mere corruption, or of absolute and entire depravity? Or is the effect only such, that we are very far gone from original righteousness, and of our own nature inclined to evil?" The Ninth Article. Original sin standeth not in the following of Adam (as the Pelagians do vainly talk); but it is the fault or corruption of the nature of every man, that naturally is engendered of the offspring of Adam, whereby man is very far gone from original righteousness, and is of his own nature inclined to evil, so that the flesh lusteth always contrary to the spirit; and therefore, in every person born into the world, it deserveth God's wrath and damnation." The 9th Question, Cap. 3rd, on Free | to Scripture to say, that man has no Will, is as follows:-"Is it not contrary share in the work of his salvation?" matical sense of the Articles, as to vigorous understanding, which his new merit rapid and ignominious ejectment and arduous situation so manifestly from the bosom of the Church. Now we have done with the Bishop. We give him all he asks as to his legal right; and only contend, that he is acting a very indiscreet and injudicious part fatal to his quiet-fatal to his reputation as a man of sense-blamed by Ministers-blamed by all the Bench of Bishops-vexatious to the Clergy, and highly injurious to the Church. We mean no personal disrespect to the Bishop; we are as ignorant of him as of his victims. We should have been heartily glad if the debate in Parliament had put an end to these blamable excesses; and our only object, in meddling with the question, is to restrain the arm of Power within the limits of moderation and justice-one. of the great objects which first led to the establishment of this Journal, and which, we hope, will always continue to characterise its efforts. BOTANY BAY. (E. REVIEW, 1823.) requires. Ornamental architecture in Botany Bay! How it could enter into the head of any human being to adorn public buildings at the Bay, or to aim at any other architectural purpose but the exclusion of wind and rain, we are utterly at a loss to conceive. Such an expense is not only lamentable for the waste of property it makes in the particular instance, but because it destroys that guarantee of sound sense which the Government at home must require in those who preside over distant colonies. A man who thinks of pillars and pilasters, when half the colony are wet through for want of any covering at all, cannot be a wise or prudent person. He seems to be ignorant, that the prevention of rheumatism in all young colonies is a much more important object than the gratification of taste, or the display of skill. "I suggested to Governor Macquarrie the expediency of stopping all work then in progress that was merely of an ornamental nature, and of postponing its execution till other more important buildings were finished. With this view it was, that I re1. Letter to Earl Bathurst. By the Honour-commended to the Governor to stop the able H. Grey Bennet, M.P. progress of a large church, the foundation 2. Report of the Commissioner of Inquiry of which had been laid previous to my into the State of the Colony of New South arrival, and which, by the estimate of Mr. Wales. Ordered by the House of Com- Greenway the architect, would have remons to be printed, 19th June, 1822. quired six years to complete. By a change MR. BIGGE'S Report is somewhat long, vernor adopted, in the destination of the that I recommended, and which the Goand a little clumsy; but it is altogether new Court-house at Sydney, the accommothe production of an honest, sensible,dation of a new church is probably by this and respectable man, who has done his duty to the public, and justified the expense of his mission to the fifth or pick pocket quarter of the globe. What manner of man is Governor time secured. As I conceived that considerable advantage had been gained by inducing Governor Macquarrie to suspend the progress of the larger church, I did not deem it necessary to make any pointed objection to the addition of these ornamental parts of the smaller one; though I regretted to observe in this instance, as well as in those of the new stables at Sydney, the turnpike gate-house and the new fountain there, as well as in the repairs of an old church at Paramatta, how much more the considered by the Governor than the real embellishment of these places had been and pressing wants of the colony. The buildings that I had recommended to his early attention in Sydney were, a new gaol, a school-house, and a market-house. |