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but to endeavour, by every means in our power-which a due regard for the rights of conscience and of private judgment, and the full demands of Christian charity and Christian liberty will allow-to extend among our fellow men a knowledge of that faith which thus "worketh by love," and which we believe was once delivered to the saints;" for which we are commanded earnestly to contend, and by which we hope to "stand in the evil day; and, having done all, to stand." Such was the train of thought in which I involuntarily indulged after a careful perusal of "The Church ;" and which, I hope and trust, originated in a fervent love of the great principles of Christian charity and Christian liberty, so ably and so attractively pourtrayed by Dr Channing; and, in heartfelt desire to see these kindred spirits of Christian benevolence spreading their sacred and salutary influences through all hearts, until they shall " cover the earth, as the waters cover the channels of the great deep."

But, I may yet be told, that the design of the discourse in question was, not to encourage the extension of any particular form of doctrine, or to favour any particular church, however consonant to the great principles laid down, but to promote such a unity of the spirit in all churches, as should prompt them to extend the right hand of Christian fellowship to all, without exception," who profess and call themselves Christians;" to acknowledge, contrary to the 18th article of the church of England, that "they are [not] to be had accursed that presume to say, that every man shall be saved by the law or sect which he professeth, so that he be diligent to frame his life according to that law," and that, "in every nation, he that feareth God and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him." Vain hope! as well might we expect to "gather grapes of thorns, and figs of thistles," as expect the religious professor who insists on the belief of certain, or rather uncertain, dogmas, as the only means of acceptance with God, to extend the hope of salvation to those who conscientiously reject those dogmas. So long, therefore, as the great body of the Christian world persist in substituting faith in certain mysteries for works of righteousness and

C

charity; so long as the presumed heresy of an erroneous faith is held to be less venial than the positive heresy of an evil life; so long (while cause and effect maintain their relative connection) so long will the universal church be any thing (at least for practical purposes) rather than a living reality. We may, indeed, in the fulness of our fond anticipation, talk of it, but it must be as of a thing not enjoyed, but hoped for, as the great desideratum-the one thing needful of Christianity. It is vain to expect that the effect will depart, while the cause remains. Is it not then clear, that the interests of the universal church will be best consulted by zealously endeavouring to remove the misconceptions, to disprove the misrepresentations, and to promote the extension of those principles which acknowledge charity to be the end of the commandment? By diffusing the principles of his particular church, the Unitarian Christian excludes none from the universal church, inasmuch as those principles impose no restriction upon others; he does not narrow the entrance to the universal church, but throws open her doors for the admission of all without exception who believe that "Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God."

Neither Christianity nor human nature have ever yet had fair play. The tyranny of civil and ecclessiastical domination has endeavoured to crush the one, and to corrupt the other. During the early age of the Christian church, the powers of this world presented a too fatal obstacle to the free and extended influence of its benign spirit. Since then, indeed, the governors of the earth have become its patrons! Kings have become its nursing fathers, and queens its nursing mothers; but alas! their protection in its manhood, has proved more fatal to its purity, than their opposition in its infancy had been to its power.

In concluding these thoughts, I shall take the liberty of quoting a passage written upon another occassion. "We are taught that Unitarian Christianity exhibits the government and atributes of the Deity in a more lovely and endearing light than any other form of faith ; that it represents the Creator as the universal Father, and consequently proclaims the universality of his love; and that it is peculiarly fitted to create in the minds of

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men that perfect love which casteth out fear.' I know its value; I feel it is a pearl of great price. I know it is capable of universal application to rich and poor, bond and free;' that, while it fears not the criticisms of the learned, it asks not their aid to unravel its mysteries; that its simple, heart-searching truths are manifest to the humblest capacities, yet glow with greater effulgence as those capacities are enlarged, and the understanding cultivated; and knowing this, I would that the poorest outcasts of humanity might have the consolation of knowing and feeling that its great truths are theirs as well as ours. And, when I reflect on the noble examples of heroic virtue that may be found even in the lowest walks of life-when I think of those who, through enlightened views of God's providence and man's destiny, have burst the bonds of poverty and ignorance, and become the master minds of the age in which they have lived, shedding abroad on our path the bright lights of knowledge and example,-I ̃feel there is a worth in the human soul which, however debased, however scorned, however trampled on-no power of adverse circumstances can take away; and I look around for the best means the present state of the world affords of bringing forth its dormant energies and its hidden beauties. And, when I find the popular modes of faith calculated rather to repress than to aid its struggles, I turn to Unitarian Christianity as best fitted to enlighten the soul on the great subjects of human duty and destiny. Nor can I consider it as suited only to the fastidious tastes of the rich. I would not, therefore, willingly exclude any portion of the human family from the benefit of its abounding consolations. The great truths which I value above all price I do wish to teach; not, indeed, with fiery, fanatical fierceness, but with a calm, yet earnest zeal, founded on knowledge, tempered with discretion, and guarded by charity. Not, indeed, for the vain and unworthy purpose of increasing the numbers of a sect, but as a means of accelerating the progress of human improvement, and of increasing the amount of human happiA LOVER OF TRUTH AND CHARITY.

ness.

BRISTOL ROAD, BIRMINGHAM.

POPULAR OBJECTIONS TO TOTAL ABSTINENCE FROM INTOXICATING DRINKS.-No. 1V.

WE are aware that many recommend education, and the ministrations of the pulpit, as the remedy for drunkenness, in preference to the system of total abstinence.

It is granted that, if men can be interested in the pursuit of knowledge, in the gratification of refined and improving tastes, and, most of all, in the cultivation of the Christian character, there is a powerful guarantee against the debasing indulgence of intemperance. But we must take society as it is, and we find that the people are not educated, religion is not in its self-denying . purity practised. And they cannot be educated, nor rendered religious, unless they place themselves under the direction of the schoolmaster and the Christian minister; but the prevailing intemperance prevents them from so doing to an alarming extent. There are at this time thousands of poor children in our land who are debarred attending day-schools from want of the means of paying the school wage, and Sunday schools from want of suitable clothing, and all caused by the intemperance of their parents. And while the ministers of religion are proclaiming the glorious gospel of the everblessed God from their pulpits, the slaves of alcoholic drinks are gratifying their low appetite in sinks of iniquity, or in the more respectable way in their own homes, or they are dreaming away the precious hours in consequence of excess. And how is it possible they can derive any benefit from ministrations they do not attend. They cannot be at the church and at the drinking table at the same time. When they have been prevailed upon to desert the one, they will be more likely to frequent the other. Abundance of instances can be adduced of men reclaimed from drunkenness to total abstinence beginning to educate themselves, and procuring the means of instruction for their hitherto totally neglected children, and not only so, but joining themselves in membership with the Christian church. Let the money spent in intoxicating drinks be directed into the walks of education, benevolence, and religion, and the

world might in a few years be almost universally enlightened and evangelised. Fifty millions thus devoted every year to the direct promotion of knowledge and true religion, we should feel that the rays of millenial glory were bursting upon us.

Education consists, not in mere school-instruction, or the imparting of general knowledge, but in all the influences which form the mind and character. And the present system, the present customs and rules of society, in reference to the use of intoxicating liquors, are effectually educating the people to the practice of intemperance and too well they learn their lesson, and we have the unenviable notoriety of being the most drunken nation on the face of the earth. The Total Abstinence Society is a great anti-usage society, with the view of giving a better training to our population; it is a great agent of the education of the people, and aims, by improving their morals and their circumstances, to further among them effectually the cause of knowledge, religion, true refinement, and happiness. Let not the friends of popular education, then, object to the Total Abstinence Society, which is so valuable an ally in the great work in which they are engaged. The following remarks, delivered by one of the speakers (Mr Duffy) at a public meeting in Newry, in honour of the illustrious, benevolent, and moral regenerator of Ireland, Father Matthew, evince the views and feelings of the advocates of total abstinence in reference to popular education. "When total abstinence ends in merely redeeming a man" (he remarks)" from the vice of intoxication, it stops far short of the point which its propagator intended it to attain, and which it is capable of attaining. We have not only bad appetites to restrain, but great faculties to eultivate, and the latter is not the least important portion of our duties; for the man whose heart and imagination are not opened and exalted by cultivation, is no more the perfect creature that God intended him to be, than if eyes and hands were wanting in his physical organization. I think, then, that tee-totallers ought to be found assiduously cultivating the intellects which they have been taught to rescue from the fogs and mists of intemperance. You, Father Matthew, have taken from the