known me and my sentiments and habits, from my earliest youth, knows this to be the case; and, I trust, my writings contain unequivocal proofs of it. Indeed, I believe, I am generally thought to carry my lenity towards those, who have the misfortune to differ from the Church of England, a little too far. I have certainly always treated them with gentleness and courtesy, considering them, as they certainly are, fellow Christians, fellow Protestants, and fellow members of that Holy Catholic Church, that universal Church of Christ, which we repeatedly pray for in our admirable and charitable Liturgy.

"Yet, notwithstanding this, whenever the occasion requires it, I will vigorously resist the invasion of unauthorized preachers upon our parish churches. I will not shrink from the duties of my

station,

station, but will maintain the discipline and good order of that Ecclesiastical Constitution, of which I am bound to be a vigilant and faithful guardian, and to exercise that authority, with which the laws of the land and the Canons of the Church have invested me for that purpose.

"With respect to the pamphlets you mention, which have been written against me on the case of Dr. Draper, I have read none of them, nor ever shall. I am not to be frightened from doing what I conceive to be my duty, by such contemptible assailants as these. Every man in such a public and ostensible station as mine, must be prepared for attacks of that sort, and must have firmness and fortitude enough to despise them. Otherwise, he is unfit to fill the situation which he occupies."

After

After reading this letter, it will be utterly impossible for any candid man to suppose for a moment, that the Bishop was not a strenuous supporter of the established discipline of the Church of England. But, at the same time, as this letter proves, he had a mind too liberal, too noble and enlarged, not to treat, as he says, "with gentleness and courtesy" those who differed from him in religious opinions. Provided they held the fundamentals of Christianity, he considered themas fellow Christians, fellow Protestants, and fellow members of the universal church;" and he could never tolerate the thought, that on account of a mere diversity in outward forms, they should be avoided as foes to religion, excluded from the covenant of mercy, and thrust with acrimony and scorn beyond the pale of salvation.

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Such language

language and conduct he held to be at open variance with the text and spirit of Scripture and he therefore uniformly manifested in his own practice the utmost liberality and candour to every denomination of Christians. He would have been glad to have brought them over to his own way of thinking; but he did not break off all intercourse with them, merely because they chose to think for themselves. On the contrary, he gave them credit for sincerity; he was anxious to shew them any kindness in his power; and, instead of widening the breach by contending about points in which they varied from each other, he laboured with them in promoting those great essential truths, and that unalterable moral Law, in which they all agreed.

I know indeed, and he knew it himself, that he was thought by some to entertain

lax opinions upon this subject, and that he fell under the common, sweeping imputation of Methodism. But he was not to be deterred from pursuing the calm determination of his own mind by any calumny whatever; and much less by the stigma of a name-a name, devised by the enemies of religion for the worst purposes, and which, as generally used, attaches indiscriminately to the ignorant, raving fanatic, and the sound, learned, pious, and even orthodox divine. He was, in fact, neither a Methodist, nor an encourager of Methodism: but he was the advocate of religious liberty, the friend of moderation and concord. He deprecated, as the greatest injury to Christianity, all violence and animosity; and it was the fervent wish of his heart, that, if men cannot be brought to think together, they would at least endeavour

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