now used in the more ignorant Roman Catholic countries, so often becomes worship, that it may justly be termed in practice, that is, as it is now used in the Church of Rome, superstitious and idolatrous. In practice it is idolatrous: but does it therefore follow that the whole Roman Catholic Religion is to be branded as idolatry, that is as an apostacy from the worship of God and the substitution of some creature or creatures in the place of God, because one of its doctrines is superstitious and of dangerous consequence, and leads amongst the ignorant to idolatrous practice, not necessarily or designedly, but from its exceeding liability to abuse? If Popery be idolatry, it is not a true religion grievously corrupted, but a false religion altogether: nay, it is worse than Mahommedanism, for even Mahommedans worship one eternal, invisible, and spiritual God, the Maker and Preserver of all things visible and invisible. Now if this has been the language of some individuals in the Church of England, it has certainly not been the general sense of her members: they have held that the Church of Rome was a true Church, although griev ously corrupted; that the Church of Rome has "erred," to use the language of the nineteenth Article, "in matters of faith," like the Churches of Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch; but that it has not therefore wholly forfeited the character of a Christian Church, any more than they. I need hardly remind my readers of the sentiments of Hooker, which exposed him indeed to the censure of the Puritans of those days, that the Church of Rome is a Christian Church, and holds the foundation of Christian faith, although some of her doctrines deny that foundation by consequence. Such in my judgment is the true construction of the clause in the oath taken by members of the Legislature; they swear that they believe one of her doctrines to be in practice idolatrous, not that her whole system is idolatry.

But now admitting, for the sake of argument, that Popery is idolatry in Mr. Faber's sense of the term, still his conclusion, that the Catholic Claims cannot be granted without sin, would not follow from this admission. Indeed the conclusion in his two first Letters is throughout assumed, without even an a tempt to prove it; and it is only in his third Letter, when some friend had reminded him of this omission, that he endeavours to make out his case. He first of all appeals to the Old Testament, "in which an union of any description with idolatry is clearly forbidden to the Israelites, on the broad and general ground, that such union would infallibly seduce the people into the practices of their associates ;" and "the ground of this prohibition," he thinks, "is of universal application;" but as "it may be captiously said" that the case of the Israelites is peculiar, he forbears to press this argument, and "turns forthwith to the New Testament."

If I wished to avoid replying to any part of Mr. Faber's statement, I might content myself with observing, that the argument from the Old Testament is one which he does not himself press, although he still asserts that it is of universal application." But his admirers will perhaps believe his assertion, although he does not urge the proof of it; and if they are candid, I ought not to leave them in error without attempting to lead them out of it. Now amongst the Jews, idolatry was a capital crime; and every one who was guilty of it was forthwith to be put to death. This was also ordered on the general principle, lest the Israelites should be seduced by evil example. Would Mr. Faber recommend this method of settling the Catholic Question, by a general massacre of all those whom he calls idolaters, after the example of Elijah and Jehu? The Israelites were told that the practice of idolatrous rites defiled the land, and union therefore was out of the question with those who were not even allowed to live. So that on this principle we should renew the scenes of 1780; burn all the Roman Catholic Chapels, and do as the mob then gladly would have done, put to death those who worship in them. We are already polluted, according to the Jewish law; and if I may, without seeming irreverence state the conclusions to which Mr. Faber's reasoning leads, the curse of God can only be avoided by the perpetration of the most atrocious acts of persecution and murder.

The truth is that the principles of the Old Testament are eternal, but the application of them wholly different under the Jewish and under the Christian dispensation. When we read the 109th Psalm in our Service, the application of the wishes of evil there contained must be wholly spiritual, otherwise our very prayer will be turned into sin. Our "enemies" (v. 19.) are sin and Satan: for men, however sinful, are not to be so regarded by us, till Christ the Saviour shall come as Christ the Judge. Till that great day the most wicked man alive is our brother; and for him as well as for us Christ has died. Christians indeed when formed into commonwealths may use the sword as the ministers of God's moral government; that is, they may punish crimes against society which heathen governments may punish also for the sword is committed to them not as Christians but as men. But Christ's spiritual government has no sword, and the arms which they may use as Christians are wholly spiritual. And as idolatry is a spiritual crime, it may be opposed by us only with spiritual weapons; the penalties and restraints which we may use as men against moral offenders, we may not apply as Christians against spiritual offenders without presumption. "The Son of Man has not come to destroy men's lives but to save."

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I must now follow Mr. Faber to his argument from the New Testament which is grounded, as one might have supposed, on the command of the Revelation to flee out of Babylon. Here he first assumes that Babylon means "a principle or a community manifestly idolatrous," that is, idolatrous in the literal sense, as worshipping others than God. Now in order to fix the interpretation of the commandment to "come out of Babylon," it makes some difference whether Babylon signifies a principle or a community; because if it means the former, the "coming out of her" must signify "withdrawing ourselves from idolatrous principles :" a duty certainly which no Christian ever disputed. But let it signify a community, and let the "coming out" be taken as a command to have no intercourse with such a community, because, as Mr. Faber says, no penal plague or excision can descend upon the heads of the idolaters, which must not inevitably descend also upon the heads of the non-idolaters, their closely intimate and voluntary associates." That is, when idolaters and non-idolaters live in the same country, the visitations of war, pestilence, and famine cannot fall on the one without involving the other in their suffering. The conclusion from which is, that we should either separate locally from the Roman Catholics, or make them separate from us. Does Mr. Faber mean to recommend that we should migrate to America, or that we should adopt the milder alternative of the curse of Cromwell, and shut up all the English and Irish Catholics together, in Connaught? Or, to speak seriously, does he forget that we are nationally and politically associated with these idolaters already? that the Irish Catholics are already our countrymen, that they serve in our armies, man our fleets, practice in our courts of law, and pay taxes to our government? On his principle we should instantly banish them from amongst us: their presence must entail defeat on our armies, and shipwreck on our fleets; and their money certainly must be an accursed thing, which will bring down a judgment on us if we receive it. If this be his meaning, it would at least be honest. But to receive benefits from the society of idolaters, and yet to exclaim against the pollution of it; to get all we can from living with them, and only scruple about giving them any thing in return is something like the piety of Saul, who destroyed utterly all that was vile and refuse of the spoil of the Amalekites, but spared the best of the oxen, and of the sheep, to sacrifice unto the Lord his God in Gilgal,-to keep up Protestant ascendancy.

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Such are my answers to Mr. Faber's premises and his conclusion, so far indeed as I can make out what his conclusion is meant to be. My conclusion also shall be grounded on a precept in the New Testament, which, on the supposition that Catholics were idolaters, would be more

to the purpose than the quotation about coming out of Babylon. We are united actually in civil society with Catholics, and the question is, how we are to deal with them? Now St. Paul directs, that where Christians were married to unbelievers, that is, to idolaters, the Christian husband or wife should not propose to quit his or her unbelieving partner. "What knowest thou," is his truly Christian question, "whether thou shalt save thy wife or thy husband?" whether if you continue to live on affectionately with them, you may not be the means of converting them. But the parties thus continuing to live together, the terms of their union were settled not by their religious faith, but on principles of civil and social justice. The heathen husband must have had authority over his Christian wife, and must have had the supreme control over the education of his children; because natural and civil law declared that such were his rights as a man and as a citizen. So also should we be anxious to live on in peace with the Irish Catholics, as we are actually their countrymen. But this being so, our respective political rights must be decided on the universal principles of social and political justice, and not from the spiritual superiority which one party may possess over the other. Religion is not injured by our giving idolaters their rights as men and as citizens, but by our forgetting our own duty in either joining with them spiritually, or oppressing them politically.

I had purposed to make some comment upon the tone of Mr. Faber's Letters, and on the assumption which runs through them, that the advocates of concession to the Catholics are men who care little for religion. But instead of doing so, I have thought it better to look over my own answer, and carefully to erase every thing which might appear to be unkind or insulting in tone and expression there. Evil passions are never more apt to arise within us than when we are engaged in what we sincerely believe to be our duty; it shews strongly our corrupted nature, that it is so hard to keep our motives and feelings pure, even when our work is a good one.

Mr. Faber's opinions I think to be erroneous and mischievous; and as such I have done my best to answer him. Whatever he may think of the force of the answer, I trust that he will allow my sentiments to be as consistent with a sincere affection for Christianity as his own: and that a man may advocate the Catholic claims with other arguments than those founded on his interests or his fears.

THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND.

[This Essay is extracted from the Edinburgh Review, for September, 1826; in which it originally appeared as the critique upon a volume entitled "LETTERS TO AN EPISCOPALIAN."]

We have been suspected, we know, of being unfriendly to the Church of England. But we are not-at least on the present occasion. The causes which led to her great Reformation, we think indeed should still reform her more; and, with the fullest sense of the general soundness of her doctrines, and the benefits which her establishment has conferred on the community, it is impossible to look back to the history of that reformation, or round to the spread of sectarianism, and the infi. nite changes which have since been wrought on the whole frame of our society, without feeling that things may then have been necessary which are now prejudicial-and that much might be adopted in a hur ried experiment which it would be improper to retain in a mature institution.

The subject is familiar enough in the mouths both of capable and in. capable talkers :-but in reality it is little in their thoughts-nor do we hesitate to say, that we do not know any other, of nearly equal impor tance, on which the public mind is so ill informed, or to which it has been so little accustomed to direct a calm and scrutinizing attention, as the constitution of the Church of England, by law established. The author of the work before us is entitled therefore to our best thanks, for the vigorous effort which he has made to arouse this indifference, and to enlighten this ignorance. He has spoken out boldly, but yet temperately; and although we are far from agreeing with all his doctrines, we think that both the ability and the good spirit with which he writes are excellently fitted to open, with the happiest omens, that discussion which it is evidently his object to provoke.

The scope and object of his book may be stated in a single sentence. It is, to prove that all Religious Establishments, by which one particu lar form of worship is especially protected and favoured by the civil government, and in return is entirely subjected to its control, are at once contrary to the interests of religion and to those of civil society; that the consequences of what is called the Alliance of Church and State