I like the taxes, when they're not too many;
I like a seacoal fire, when not too dear;
I like a beef steak, too, as well as any;

Have no objection to a pot of beer:
I like the weather when it is not rainy,

That is, I like two months of every year.
And so God save the Regent, Church and King!
Which means that I like all and every thing.'

Art. V. The Conduct of the Clergy in supporting the Bible Society vindicated from the Charges brought against them by the Rev. Richard Lloyd: in a Letter to that Gentleman. By the Rev. Edward Cooper, Rector of Hamstall-Ridware, and of Yoxall, in the County of Stafford, &c. 12mo. pp. 72. London, 1818.

NOTHING better can be desired for any cause, than to have

such a man as Mr. Cooper as its advocate, and such a man as Mr. Lloyd as its adversary. No good man would wish to find the one his opponent; no wise man would retain the other as his apologist. Hitherto, the Bible Society has been singularly fortunate in both respects. It is very satisfactory to observe the striking contrast of style, manner, and temper, exhibited in the present instance, between the letters of the reverend assailant, and this mild dispassionate rejoinder. Mr. Cooper writes in the style of a true gentleman; this is saying something more than could be pronounced of the letters of every controvertist; but, what is more, his courtesy is the evident result of the unfeigned spirit of Christian charity.

I enter indeed on this work,' he writes, with fear and trembling. I have a dislike to controversy, and I am afraid of it. I have seen, by experience, the difficulty of conducting it in a Christian spirit, and with Christian weapons. And I will frankly acknowledge, that the perusal of your book has neither increased my partiality to this kind of warfare, nor diminished my fears of its consequences. I hope, however, that in the following pages no word will drop from my pen, which can be construed into a breach of real charity.

And in the spirit of these remarks, I will begin with thankfully acknowledging the Christian regard which you profess to feel for me. From the tone and spirit displayed in some parts of the note in question, I should have been fearful that your feelings towards me were not of that description; but since you assert the contrary, I most readily admit your assertion, and beg leave to return you my Christian regard, with the same sincerity with which I trust you have offered me your's.'

Mr. Lloyd's objections against a Clergyman's uniting himself to the Bible Society, are reducible, he conceives, to five, and are in substance comprehended in the following arguments.

1. By so doing he associates with avowed infidels and heretics on religious grounds. 2. He belongs to a society among the members of

which prayer of any kind is inadmissible. 3. He compromises the dignity of his sacred and apostolical office, together with that of his church, by mingling with teachers and ministers of other persuasions. 4. He helps to inflame the sects against the Church, and to divide the Church against herself. 5. He commits all this sin merely for the sake of an object, which in itself is both unlawful and mischievous."

We think that Mr. Lloyd himself cannot complain that his objections are mis-stated.

To the first objection, Mr. Cooper replies, that the Bible Society is not associated on any religious ground, but has strictly a charitable object; that to speak of an avowed infidel joining a society for distributing the Bible, almost amounts to a solecism; but that if all the Dissenting members of the Society were even avowed infidels and heretics, he should not deem it unlawful, as a minister of the Established Church, to associate with them for such a purpose.

The second objection, Mr. Cooper shews, in brief, to be as weak as it is partial: it was scarcely worth notice, on account of its palpable hypocrisy.

From his reply to the third objection, we have great pleasure in transcribing the following manly and liberal sentiments:

You ask, "Is it no sin to amalgamate, even in appearance, the Episcopal and Apostolical Constitution of the Church with every dissenting form, and to reduce the Clergy of the nation, who hold their divine commission in regular succession from the Apostles, to a level with every vain upstart, who substitutes spiritual gifts for learning, and a strong impulse to preach the Gospel, for a divine call to

do so?"

On this point I must despair of giving you satisfaction There is involved in it a discrepancy of principles so wide and fundamental, as prevents the possibility, while our respective sentiments continue as they are, of our ever approximating the one to the other. Happily, however, for myself, and for the other Clergy of the Establishment, it is not your conscience that we are required to satisfy, but our own. And as our Church admits not within her bosom, a self-appointed Teacher, so likewise it excludes any self-appointed Pope. In this Protestant sentiment, I feel you will accord; and should a thought obtrude itself on your mind, which would tend to abridge us of our Christian liberty, and in the spirit of self-sufficiency or intolerance, to impute to us an erroneous judgement, or a deluded conscience, I trust it would be instantly dismissed by the recollection of the Apostle's words: "Who art thou that judgest another man's servant? To his own Master he standeth or falleth? Yea, he shall be holden up; for God is able to make him stand."

The whole force of your argument in the objection now before us, appears to me to hinge on the following question. Is Episcopal ordination, though primitive, though apostolical, yet the only, the exclusive way in which God has provided, or does at this time provide pastors and teachers" for the perfecting of the saints, for the

work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ?" If I should infer, from your mode of stating the objection we are considering, and from other parts of your publication, what your answer to this question would be, I should suppose it would be in the affirmative. But as you have not expressly made such a declaration, I will not take the liberty of making it for you. Indeed, Sir, it is wise to pause before you venture affirmatively to decide a question which the Scriptures have not decided; which the articles of your Church, with her characteristic modesty on points unsettled in Scripture, have not de. cided; which the laws of the British empire, by establishing the Church of Scotland, and declaring it in the Act of Union, to be a true church of Christ, have in fact decided negatively. It is wise to pause before you venture to predicate a conclusion, which necessarily involves in it such tremendous consequences, which would at once unchurch the Church of Scotland, and many other of the Reformed Churches; which would assign the names of upstarts and intruders to men, on whom God has fixed the broad seal of his sanction and authority, on such men as Howe and Henry, as Watts and Doddridge; and would consign over a large portion of our present population to the uncovenanted mercies of God. I say, Sir, that you act wisely in pausing before you venture to decide on such a question, and to predicate such a conclusion. And yet till you do predicate this conclusion, it appears to me, that your argument loses the only support on which it could have pretended to stand. For if there be other lawful modes of ordaining ministers, than that which our Church retains ; and if, as the 23d article of our Church declares, "We ought to judge those lawfully called and sent, which be chosen and called to this work by men, who have public authority given unto them in the congregation to call and send ministers into the Lord's vineyard;" then I would ask, Who is to be Judge in these matters? Within the pale of our own Church, we know who are the persons that have public authority given unto them for this work; and hence, we are confident that such as they ordain to the office of public preaching, or ministering of the sacraments in the congregation, are lawfully called and sent to execute the same. But with respect to those who are without this pale, who, I ask, is to be the Judge? Who is to decide on the lawfulness or unlawfulness of those proceedings by which any individual, who dissents from the form and discipline of our Church, claims to have been chosen and called to the work of the ministry? I know that if he has separated himself from us without a sufficient plea, and has thrust himself into the sacred office without a lawful calling, he is on these accounts a sinner before God. But who is to decide on his plea, or on his calling? Am I to erect myself into a judge, and to summon him to the tribunal of my feeble and perhaps prejudiced judgment; and having condemned him for a sin, of which God who seeth the heart, may possibly acquit him, am I, in proof and vindication of my dignity as a minister, episcopally ordained to say, "Stand by thyself: come not near to me, for I am holier than thou?"

Sir, I am not advocating the cause of dissent; I wish from my heart that there were no divisions in the body of Christ: but that all

were" of one spirit and of one mind, striving together only for the faith of the Gospel." But these things cannot yet be; and since God has thought fit in his Providence to place me in these troublous times, and to call me to the high and important office of a minister of his Gospel, in our apostolical church; I would endeavour, as much as in me lieth, to live consistently with that sacred character, and in reference to it," with simplicity and godly sincerity, to have my conversation in the world." I wish so to steer my perilous and diffi cult course, that while, on the one hand I magnify my office, I may not, on the other hand, degrade the exalted character of my religion. I would not seek needlessly to associate in public with those who differ; but in the way of duty I would not shun all occasion of intercourse with them. And such an occasion the Bible Society presents to me, and enforces upon my conscience. In giving my feeble support to this Society, I believe that I am doing a work pleasing to the Almighty. I believe that I am fulfilling a duty which I owe to my Church, to my country, and to the world at large. In the course of discharging this duty, I occasionally associate, for a short time, with those who profess themselves ministers of Christ, but not of the calling with which I am called. On such occasions, I regard them in the character in which the laws of our country, and, consequently, the laws of our Church, regard them, as persons laying claim to holy orders, tolerated by our statutes, and licensed by them to the office of ministers. Whether these claims be right, or otherwise, falls not within my province, or my power to decide. If they are erroneously made, my presence cannot sanction an error, in a point on which I am wholly incompetent to determine; and the determination of which has not the most distant connection with the object on which I have met them. No doubt, no imputation is cast on the validity of my episcopal ordination; no recognition is required from me of the va lidity of their ordination. On going to the committee-room, or to the hall, I make no compromise of principle, even in appearance, in any way. I offend not, either in letter, or in spirit, against any one article of my Church. I break no law, or canon, which I have subscribed. I violate no duty, which I owe to my ecclesiastical Rulers. I am countenanced by many of my superiors, by some of the highest authority in my Church. And when I have transacted the business on which I have attended, I leave the assembly, I trust, uncontaminated by the work in which I have been engaged; or, by the persons with whom I have associated. My feelings of affection and gratitude towards my own apostolic Church, and of the duty and allegiance which I owe to her, are not diminished by the circumstance of having been for a season in the company of those who dissent from her communion; perhaps they are strengthened and increased by a tacit comparison, suggested by this very circumstance to my mind, of the superior privileges which, through the mercy of God, I enjoy within the precincts of the Established Church; and of the authorized and undisputed right which she confers on me, to preach the Gospel of the grace of God.'

The fourth objection is fully met. in our Church,' says Mr. Cooper,

That there is a division. I both know and lament.

But it existed before the Bible Society appeared; it would equally survive its dissolution. The nature and grounds of this "division are not matters which fall within my present discus'sion. It is the fact alone to which I appeal!

As to the fifth objection- Is it not sin to inflame all parties against the Church and to divide the Church against herself, for the sake only of distributing the Scriptures in one parti'cular mode, and that mode repugnant to the practice of the 'primitive Christians and of our venerable Reformers, and implying that the Bible can do its own work, and virtually encouraging every man to be his own divine?'-Mr. Cooper first exposes the disingenuous sophistry by which a distinction is attempted to be supported between the mode of distribution adopted by the Bible Society, and that of other societies, which has no foundation in fact. He admits that there is a sense in which, greatly as he disapproves of the phraseology,' it is implied that the Bible can do its own work,' and in which the Society does encourage every man to be his own divine;' but he challenges a comparison between the practice of the clerical members of the Bible Society, and the clerical non-subscribers, in all the branches of ministerial duty.

Objections, however, unsound, untenable, irrelevant as these, never can, Mr. Cooper justly maintains, have had any real weight with the clergy in general.

That some vague and indistinct apprehensions of danger to the Established Church from the operations of the Bible Society, may have in several, perhaps in many instances, produced an unwillingness to support it, I am ready to admit; and wherever such apprehensions have been conscientiously entertained by any individuals, I would be very far from indiscriminately involving them in the conclusion in question. But even in respect to these persons, I am not altogether without my fears. Being fully convinced, that a zeal for the Established Church is of itself no certain and conclusive criterion of a zeal for true Christianity, and that there may possibly be a great deficiency of just and lively feeling for the spiritual interests of mankind, in hearts which are tremblingly alive to the interest of their particular Church; I would still, with all deference and humility, repeat my former admonition, and "submit it to the conscien tious consideration of every individual who is indisposed, from whatever professed cause, to the Bible Society-whether at the bottom of his indisposition, there may not be a latent and an unsuspected portion of indifference to the great and general cause of Christianity?"

I feel this admonition to be the more necessary and seasonable, because while I learn from your publication, that one objection to the Bible Society consists in its sending Bibles to Heathen Lands, without undertaking to furnish Preachers to explain and interpret them; I perceive also, in the same publication, an eagerness to VOL. IX. N. S.

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