on

Marshall, and Coape, three clergymen of the Church of England, were Wednesday last received into the Roman Catholic Church at St. Mary's College, Oscott. The former is a member of Trinity College, Cambridge; the latter, one of Oxford. Mr. C. Woodmason, son of Mr. Woodmason of Littlemore, (who, with his lady, had been previously received), was admitted at the same time."-Globe. "Perversion.-The Misses Poole, of Bridgewater, while on a visit, last summer, to their brother-in-law, the Rev. J. S. Northcote, the late curate of Ilfracombe, were introduced to the acquaintance of Dr. Pusey, and went over to the Church of Rome. But the Protestant clergyman thought the transition so trifling, that he allowed the young ladies still to teach in the Sunday-school; and during the last week or two, Mrs. Northcote, too, has become a Romanist, and has written to her husband to say, that her church does not recognize their heretical marriage; and that if he wishes to consider her his wife, and his (expected) offspring legitimate, they must be married again by a Catholic priest. The disconsolate widower, it is conjectured, will follow her advice and example."-Western Times.

Pretty well for one day's news. The three young clergymen named in the first paragraph, were lately residing in and near Salisbury. The first, Mr. Glennie, is son of the Archdeacon of Ceylon. He was curate, first of Coombe Bissett, then of St. Martin's, in the abovenamed city; but, in the early part of the present year, was presented to the perpetual curacy of Mark, a populous parish in the county of Somerset, and diocese of Bath and Wells, then under the episcopal rule of the Bishop of Salisbury. The patron is the venerable Earl of Harrowby, whose excellent brother, the late Bishop Ryder, used, when Dean of Wells, to go over to Mark and Wedmore every Lord'sday to preach to the almost heathen population. Mr. Glennie's peculiar religious views and opinions have been well known, and long the subject of conversation and remark, in the neighbourhood of Salisbury. Through what interest he obtained this preferment, and the spiritual care of so large a number of souls, I know not; and how he could, and that so very lately, have declared his "unfeigned assent and consent" to the contents of the "Book of Common Prayer," I cannot even conjecture, unless he took Tract 90 for his rule and guidance.

Mr. Coape, or Coope, is well known in Salisbury for his fantastic writings and doings. Mr. Glennie and Mr. Marshall are, I believe, married, and consequently are now become mere laics; but Mr. Coape, I understand, is celibate, and may probably obtain in due time Priest's Orders, which he failed of procuring in the English Church, by his very erratic and eccentric behaviour and proceedings.

The second very painful paragraph, I leave for your own animadversions, except to observe, that as the one speaks of Littlemore, so does the other of Dr. Pusey.

I suppose the being received into the Roman Catholic Church, implies the being baptized therein. Alas! what then becomes of our own" Apostolic Succession," and of our "Baptismal Regeneration?" Are we poor deluded Anglicans, after all the brave and fine things that have been said to us, and all the great privileges pointed out to us, as members of an Episcopal Apostolical Church, no better than our Dissenting neighbours, and, like them, mere heretics and schismatics? If such is the case, it surely ill-becomes us as Protestants, to brand with hard names those of our fellow-Christians who differ from us, and are not in communion with us. Our Anglo-Catholic clergy preach much and loudly against heresy and schism, telling us that we pray against it in the Litany; and that to be consistent, we ought to do all in our power to prevent and suppress it; but do we not pray as well to be delivered " from all false doctrine," and from "all uncharitableness?"

Anglo Catholicism, and Roman-Catholicism, appear to be a distinction without a difference, being in essence and spirit the same. It is devoutly to be wished, that the laity of our Church should clearly see this, and not be led away by so flimsy a delusion. As for those clergymen who repudiate the name of Protestant, the sooner they go over to Romanism, the better will it be for the peace and honour of the Anglican Church, founded in the blood of the "noble army" of her Protestant "martyrs."

Are the formularies of our Church to be trampled under foot, and her scriptural doctrines contravened in her pulpits, by Romanising clergymen with impunity? For wherein do Dr. Pusey, and very many others, differ from Messrs Newman, Ward, and friends? Is the "candle," lighted at the funeral pyres of Bishops Latimer, Ridley, and others, about to be extinguished? Almighty God, of his infinite mercy and goodness, forbid.

It is rather a singular circumstance, that the Rev. Dr. Edward Bouverie Pusey, (whose father, the Hon. Philip Bouverie, brother to the first Earl of Radnor of that name, took the surname of Pusey), should be descended from a family which fled to this country, I believe, on the revocation of the Edict of Nantz, from the cruelties and persecutions of the Roman Catholic Church. The present head of the family, the Earl of Radnor, is Governor of the "Hospital or Asylum for poor French Protestants and their descendants," as his late father was before him, and as possibly others of the family were from its first establishment. The late Right Hon. Jacob Earl of Radnor was a strenuous opposer of Popery, and of what was called Catholic Emancipation; bearing in mind, no doubt, the hardships and sufferings his Protestant progenitors and their brethren underwent and experienced at the hands of their Romanistic oppressors.

A CONSTANT READER.

We almost invariably lay aside papers which enter much into matters of personal allusion. We suppose they are considered useful; we know they are popular; and a few columns of them in a periodical publication give to it winged speed; and not the less, should it be necessary in each successive Number to back out, to patch up, or to do everything but honourably apologise, and to feel deeply humbled for inserting false or improper statements, for want of due care in inquiring into the truth of what is proposed for publication, and the propriety of publishing it. The "Times" newspaper, that gigantic book of lies, illustrates the wickedness and hideousness of this practice.

But even when rumours are true, and stories to the point, our dealing is usually rather with principles than persons; except where the parties introduce themselves to notoriety by their writings or actions. This is our taste; it may be our weakness; but so it is.

Probably, therefore, we should have passed by the above paper as somewhat personal-though there is nothing in it that we have any reason to believe to be unfounded or offensive-but for the sake of the title, and of one of the remarks in it, on which we propose to hang a few observations.

1. The title suggests the importance of calling things by their right names. The Tractarians, in their fond tenderness for the papal apostacy, intreat good Anglicans to speak gently of their sister's fall; and they themselves obey this exhortation when they speak of the" conversion," or, at worst, the "secession," of Mr. Ward, Mr. Newman, Mr. Oakeley, and others; and Dr. Pusey goes so far as to represent these "revolters after subscription," as the thirty-sixth canon

calls them, as only being called to labour in another portion of the Lord's vineyard. The true word—and one not too heavy for the occasion—is “ perversion." Harm is done by using inadequate, or apologetic, phrases, to express what ought to be marked with the most solemn disapproval.

2. Our Correspondent remarks that "perversion" to Popery implies being baptized into the Church of Rome. There has been a good deal of "reserve upon this matter. According to the strict doctrine of the Church of Rome, baptism ought never to be repeated where water has been used, with dedication to the Trinity, by man or woman intending to do what the Church prescribes. If any doubt exists as to the facts, then re-baptism is to be administered hypothetically. This is also the policy, as well as the doctrinal opinion, of the Roman supremacy; for it thus claims all baptized persons as "its subjects;" only requiring that they should abjure their heresies, in order to be received into the papal communion. But in practice, with a view to frighten Protestants, and to draw a broad and dark line between them and Papists, it has been very much of late years the custom for Romish priests, especially in Ireland, to treat baptism not administered by a Papist as a nullity, and to baptize again, as if nothing had happened; their horror at the sacrilege of repeating a sacrament intended to be used only once, being diminished by the hope of terrifying Protestants into repairing to them for re-baptization. In the recent anabaptisms of Anglican clergymen, and other Anglican perverts to Rome, the hypothetical form has been used. The candidates were, perhaps, not prepared to admit, that though their baptism was erringly administered, it might not by possibility have been valid, on the ground that the administrators intended to do what the Church Catholic considered requisite ; and therefore they might feel some repugnance to absolute re-baptism. Every purpose was answered by the hypothetical form. The slight to Protestant baptism was sufficiently marked, without asserting an abstract dogma of

*This canon directs that "revolters after subscription" are to be first suspended; then, after a month's contumacy, excommunicated; and after another month, "deposed from the ministry." All churches have this necessary power of deposition; and all churches but our own exercise it. We said, years ago, in the case of the Hon. and Rev. G. Spencer, and others, that we could not understand why English clergymen are allowed to play fast and loose with their holy orders; to repudiate them by going into the Church of Rome as laics, and receiving popish orders; and then, if they please, at any time coming back without censure, after three years' probation, either with their last orders, or their old ones revived. We cannot think that this lax policy is wise or scriptural. Romanists and Dissenters of all kinds ridicule our holy orders, which may thus with impunity be laid aside, and resumed, and laid aside again, at the whim of any fanciful and vacillating clergy

man.

In what we wrote upon the case of Mr. Spencer and others, it may be that we were ill-informed; unaware of certain difficulties, technical or moral;

or inconsiderate as to the extent to which deposition must, or might, be carried, if godly discipline were revived; but till we are better advised, we repeat our conviction that such cases ought to be met with firmness; and we still submit that every Anglican clergyman who goes over to Rome, should be deposed from his ministry in the Church of England. A few examples at first might have prevented much mischief; but even now it is not too late to exercise this wholesome vigour. Canon 38 combined with Canon 122, would, we conceive, reach such cases; or a pertinent libel might be constructed, as in the matter of Mr. Oakeley.

We are not insensible to the difficulty of beginning where it is not easy to see the end; and we admit that it would not be wise to begin to act under the Canons in every case to which they apply; but the offence of an Anglican clergyman's seceding to Popery is one so distinct and flagrant, that it is easily marked off from many others. If this be not so, Mr. Oakeley and Mr. Ward had harsh measure.

exclusionism, which would not only have caused offence, involved doctrinal and practical difficulties, and have been contrary to the practice of all ages, but have been indiscreet, on the ground, as we said, that Rome assumes that all baptized persons rightfully belong to her jurisdiction.

Mr. Sibthorp, Mr. Ward, Mr. Oakeley, and the other perverts, ought to have refused even conditional re-baptism, though they of course consider the Church of England heretical; for the fourth Canon on Baptism of the Council of Trent says: "Whosoever shall affirm that Baptism, when administered by heretics, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, with the intention to do what the Church does, is not true baptism, let him be accursed." Cardinal Bellarmine, in a Treatise on the Sacraments, explains what is meant by "the Church" in this passage. "By the Church," he says, "is not meant the Roman Church, but that which the administrator considers to be the true Church; so that when a minister of the Church of Geneva, for instance, baptizes any one, he intends to do what the Church does; that is, the Church of Geneva, which he holds to be the true Church.” According, then, to the Council of Trent itself, as interpreted by Cardinal Bellarmine, these seceders ought to have refused re-baptism, even in the form, half declarative, half hypothetical, adopted in the case of Mr. Oakeley; “If thou art already baptized, then I do not baptize thee; but if thou art not, then I baptize thee."

We have felt much astonishment at the ecclesiastical ignorance of Mr. Henslowe, and other clergymen, who think that they maintain the opinions of "the Church Catholic" against "Puritanism," in refusing to bury persons baptized by non-episcopal ministers. When overthrown in the Court of Arches upon their plea that such baptism is baptism by a layman, they resorted to the plea that it is baptism by a heretic. Sir Herbert Jenner Fust decided the question against them upon Anglican grounds; but he would perhaps have eased their consciences if he had quoted the Tridentine declaration, and the comment of Bellarmine. As to the allegation that it is "Puritanical" to admit the validity of baptism, unless we are prepared to admit the validity of the orders of the administrator, be that opinion correct or otherwise, it is not a Puritanical notion. The dispute ran high between Hooker and his celebrated Puritan adversary, Cartwright, upon this question. Cartwright maintained that, "Upon the point, whether he (the administrator) be a minister or no, dependeth not only the dignity, but the being, of the sacrament." But what said Hooker? "The Church of God" (see Eccles. Pol. Book V. Sect. 62, where he argues the question at length,) "hath hitherto always constantly maintained that, to re-baptize them which are known to have received true baptism, is unlawful; that if baptism be seriously administered, in the same element, and with the same form of words, which Christ's institution teacheth, there is no other defect in the world that can make it frustrate."

Tractarian and Romanist Anabaptists must therefore resort to the Puritans for support, seeing they find none in the Church of Rome, the Eastern churches, or the old writers. The Church of England has avoided any dogmatic decision upon the point; but in her specification in the Rubric at the end of the office for Private baptism of infants, she mentions only as "essential parts of baptism" the being "baptized with water in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." If any uncertainty arises respecting these "essential parts of baptism," the child is to be baptized hypothetically; but nothing is here said respecting the "lawful minister;" though this was a part CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 98.

N

of the general inquiry. Do not the words "lawfully and sufficiently," in the first Rubric, point out an intended distinction?

The conversion, secession, or perversion, alluded to by our Correspondent, involves, not only re-baptism, but the withholding the cup in the Lord's Supper; and this even in the case of clergymen, who are degraded from their sacred function, and regarded as only laics, in their new communion. How unscriptural and fraudulent is this denial, has been forcibly pointed out by the very men who now submit to it. Thus, Tract 71, "On the Controversy with the Romanists," says, "The denial of the cup to the laity, considering the great importance of the holy eucharist to our salvation, seems a very serious consideration for those who seek to be saved. Our Lord says, 'Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you.""

. EPISCOPAL VIGILANCE;-SUPERSTITIOUS SYMBOLISM;-AND PRAYERS FOR THE DEAD.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

I REJOICED in reading the account at page 64 of your last Number, of the Bishop of Ripon's anxious care to prevent anything of a superstitious or unprotestant character in the new church at Leeds. The gorgeous description which was copied from newspaper to newspaper of the style and decorations of that church, and of the solemnities upon occasion of its consecration, was evidently drawn up by some symbolising ecclesiologist, or poperising Camdenite; and must have left upon the mind of every reader a conviction that there was a superabundance of medieval (that is, dark age) fantasy; and this with the apparent concurrence of the diocesan. It appears, however, from the account of Septuagenarius of Islington, that Bishop Longley altered much, and forbad much; that he visited and inspected the church three times in person during its erection; was engaged in a correspondence of more than seventy letters; and was firm and decided in rejecting whatever he considered of an unsuitable or unprotestant character; particularly the intended designation of St. Cross; and the continuance of a prayer for Dr. Pusey after his decease. There may still be two opinions as to whether, in some particulars, notwithstanding all his Lordship's vigilance, the Tractarians were not too astute for him; but there can be but one as to the zeal, diligence, and conscientious solicitude with which he discharged his duty.

But my reason for taking up my pen, was not to remark upon St. Saviour's Church, Leeds, but upon some external decorations which are being affixed to a chapel in London; Bedford Chapel, Bloomsburystreet. This chapel being in the line of New Oxford-street, it was determined to embellish it; and accordingly a considerable number, (I should suppose about fifteen) large conspicuous medallions are carried round it; symbolising generally the holy and undivided Trinity; and especially the Second and Third Persons. The holy Trinity is represented by equilateral triangles; the three sides being intended. to symbolise the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. to each medallion of the Trinity, there is "the mystic Lamb," holding a banner or cross; and next, a Dove; and then the series recurs; and so on all round the building. Gaping stragglers stand to stare and inquire what all this imagery means. I was one of a party in an

Next