too frequently followed on both sides of the Atlantic, by Englishmen and Irishmen, as well as by Americans. He loves his country, without loving its faults. He admires the institutions of his native land, without being blind to their defects; and believes in their general adaptation to the circumstances of the people, while yet he perceives and acknowledges, that, in some respects, their moral influence is unfavourable. We do not make the citations which we are about to transfer to our pages, for the purpose of covertly assailing a form of civil government differing from that which happily is established in our own country; but for the sake of those lessons-we had almost said, those invaluable lessons-which they inculcate. Dr. Wayland is evidently one who believes that on all moral subjects, whether they refer to individuals or nations, the way to obtain the largest measures of the highest and purest wisdom, is to "sit at Jesus's feet, and to hear his word." There are too many persons, both in England and America, who seem to suppose that in all political matters they are beyond the limits of either religious teaching, or religious obligation. They speak and act as if it were a demonstrated truth, that "the Bible has nothing to do with politics." To individuals such notions are always injurious. He who says, in respect to a large class of moral questions, and only to such political questions do we now refer, -that scriptural truth has nothing to do with their decision, has already entered into temptation. Deciding one sort of moral questions without referring to the word of God, he will be prepared for deciding others in a similar manner; and thus will be in danger of contracting a habit of indifference to religious truth altogether inconsistent with its supreme authority and paramount importance. And when the politics of a nation become thus atheistic, and the members of the state are, in their corporate character, without God in the world, their circumstances in relation to divine Providence are as full of danger, as their

condition in relation to moral principles is unhealthy and declining. He who "must reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet," is not called the "Prince of the Kings of the earth" by an empty, meaningless title; and when it is said, "For the nation and kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish, yea, those nations shall be utterly wasted," (Isai. Ix. 12,) no vain and powerless denunciation is pronounced.

We think that those of our readers who will not have the opportunity of referring to the entire article, will thank us for giving to select portions of it a permanent record in the volumes of the WesleyanMethodist Magazine.

The opening paragraphs of the Essay are full of the most instruct ive significance.

"Among the consequences which flow from the rapid developement of the democratic principle, no one has failed to observe the increased energy which it has conferred upon public opinion. Great and increasing power is always an object of apprehension; especially so when we can scarcely divine the direction in which it will be exerted. Every man is conscious that he can accomplish little, and may suffer much, by resisting, single. handed, the leviathan of Hobbes. Hence he too frequently hastens to make his peace with a despot which will be pacified by nothing but submission; and, having surrendered up opinion, belief, nay, common sense itself, at the feet of this mysterious divinity, he becomes, in the language of one of our philosophers, absorbed into its essence, and imme. diately unites in hunting down to the death the most distant living thing that refuses obedience to the universal will.

"Foreigners have frequently remarked, that this blind devotion to the popular voice, this sad want of mental and moral independence, is more prevalent in this country than in any other. It is natural that it should be so. In no country that ever existed has the whole power of soci

ety been so directly in the hands of the whole population. In no other country, probably, has property been so equally divided; never has so large a portion fallen to the lot of every individual; never was the ability to read and write so universally diffused; and nowhere are the means of rapidly communicating

knowledge to every portion of the community so universally enjoyed. In other countries of great extent, an agitation at the centre has commonly died away before its last wave has reached the circumference. But here the whole surface, from centre to circumference, is in motion at once. The whole power, legislative and executive, and frequently judicial, is in the gift of the people. Public opinion is speedily aroused, either for good or for evil; and it requires but little skill, in a professed agitator, to direct the whole storm of its violence upon the head of any unfortunate wight who will not add to its clamour, and do homage to its infallibility. It is thus liable to become a terrific engine in the hands of unprincipled and ambitious men. What was intended by our constitution to be the terror of vice, may be the persecutor of virtue. What was designed for the purpose of abasing falsehood and annihilating folly, may become the direct enemy of truth, and the chosen instrument of thoughtless, daring presumption.

"In these remarks, however, we intend to utter no denunciation against the democratic principle; nor would we bewail the energy which recent events have conferred upon public opinion. We believe, fully, in the government of the people; but we believe, also, that the people, like any other Sovereign, must be restricted within the limits of constitutional law. Without such restriction, there can be no government but that of brute force; and soon there will be no society. We duly estimate the value of our energetic public opinion; but we believe that public opinion is neither omniscient, infallible, nor all-holy. The opinions of mankind, when they are expressed after due deliberation, and a full view of the merits of the case, are rarely erroneous. When they are expressed in the haste of popular excitement, on the motion of interested and headlong leaders, they are almost never correct. When men at home, in the solitude of the closet, or amidst the bland influences of the fire-side, come, unbiassed by external influences, to the same conclusion, their

* And here lies a chief excellence of the British constitution. Combining the three principles of political power, it makes each one to be checked by the other two. Each is at once stronger and weaker from its connexion with the rest. The problem is as far solved as human imperfection allows its solution, of recognising real power without making it absolute, and assigning to it real limits without making it dependent and inefficient.-EDIT. VOL. XXIII.

conclusions deserve, and they generally receive, universal respect. But when men assemble to decide all questions on the instant, by a show of hands; when they lend their ear to addresses to the passions, instead of appeals to the reason and the conscience; when they merge the character of citizen, of father, and husband, in that of partisan, political or religious ; THEIR DECISIONS ARE

COMMONLY AS VALUELESS AS THE BREATH THAT UTTERS THEM."

(Page 303.)

The conclusion which Dr. Wayland thus forcibly states is confirmed at once by general reasoning, and by the facts of universal history. But that he is not the mere student of books, is evident from the following extract, which shows him to be observant of the movements of living society on both his side of the Atlantic and ours. He says,

"It is by no means uncommon for the fanatic and the politician to unite their forces in an attack upon the Christian church. The former agitates until he has combined under his banner a small, but energetic and well-compacted, party. As soon as their number is sufficiently large to be of any importance at the ballot-box, he forms a union with the politician. The accession which he thus makes is, however, too powerful, and too well skilled in diplomacy, to be under his control. His success is, therefore, in the end, fatal to himself; and the fanatic and his party are liable to be lost in the political association in which they have been merged. They must soon be reduced to nothing, unless they can be useful as tools; and then they become the very instruments which the politician employs for the purpose of ensnaring the church. Hence, unless the church be true to herself, she is, at the present moment, both in England and America, in danger of becoming the mouth-piece of unprincipled and infidel demagogues; and thus, out of the perfect bond of charity itself, will be forged the chains by which she will be manacled to the car of a RUTHLESS AND INFURIATED PO

PULAR DESPOTISM." (Page 305.)

We would call the reader's attention particularly to the solemn warning thus given by this acute and Christian American observer. He well knows that Popery has no love

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for either evangelical principles or religious liberty; that, in fact, it mortally hates them both, as infidelity does the doctrines and commandments of revelation. But he knows, too, that both Papists and infidels are well aware, that neither in England nor America have they sufficient strength to obtain the domination they desire, unless aided by others. What, then, is their plan? They bait their trap with fine, high-sounding phrases about liberty; and they call themselves liberal, they who never yet had power but they employed it in putting down all who were opposed to their own principles. We mention this as an undeniable historical fact, obvious as the brilliancy of the sun at the noontide of a cloudless summer day. And what is the consequence? They find many simplehearted and sincere, but any thing rather than well-read, professors of religion, who, exasperated by the pride and exclusiveness of an ecclesiastical domination, which, possess ing the power of a Protestantism of which it repudiates the name, and to which it is a di-grace, forget that there are means by which it may be more efficiently resisted, and throw themselves into the arms of a party who will, indeed, help to avenge them of their adversaries, but who will do it by crushing them both. This is the warning, not of some English partisan, but of the American republican, Dr. Wayland, who believes, as we have seen, that at the present moment, both in England and America, this is the peculiar danger of the real church of Christ. Glorious are the bonds of true Christian charity; but let not those who wear them, allow Papists and infidels to forge out of them the chains by which the church will be manacled to the car of a ruthless and infuriated popular despotism.

Let

our Wesleyan readers be assured, that the aid of neither Papists nor infidels is required for opposing and putting down the anti-Protestantand, as we believe, the anti-scriptural -dogmas which just now luxuriate so rankly, and with such fatal influence, in the Anglican Church. Let

them only take care that this holy work-for we are verily persuaded that such it is-be not desecrated by the lowering admixture of human feeling. The cause is God's, not man's. For our own part, were the party in question to throw off all their haughty exclusiveness of manner, our opposition would not be in the slightest degree relaxed. Their behaviour may be even insulting, and human nature is not very patient under insults; but the enemy must not be allowed to take advantage of this, to make us willing to seek to put down one set of bad principles, by assisting to advance others equally as bad. We oppose these exclusive principles, because we believe them to be opposed to those very principles of the Gospel which are the origin of that delightful name which, by heavenly designation, it bears, and which alone make it "the power of God unto salvation." And for this very reason, that the cause is so holy, and so intimately connected with the salvation of men, it should be kept clear of those lower objects which, it may turn out, will be most effectually secured by the attainment of the higher. "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you," is a text of very extensive application. The defenders of the doctrine of faith ought not themselves to be practically unbelievers; nor should they listen for a moment to the suggestions of fear, even though their fidelity to truth should reduce them to comparatively a very small band. What were the three hundred men that lapped," against the hosts of the Midianites and Amalekites, which "came as grasshoppers for multitude?" And yet by these three hundred men did God save Israel. Let us take care that our cause be good, and seek to advance it by means that are obviously in strict accordance with it. Sooner or later, "the sword of the Lord and of Gideon" shall prevail.

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The doctrine of expediency (which is only another expression of the fearful maxim, that the means are

justified by the end) some have attempted to establish from certain points in the history and writings of St. Paul. Dr. Wayland devotes a considerable part of the paper to the examination of this attempt, and triumphantly exhibits its decided failure. The following sentences deserve especial notice :

"In a word, then, the scriptural question of expediency is simply this: 'In how far may I sacrifice my own personal convenience, and my own personal preferences, for the spiritual good of my brethren?' And the answer is, 'You may do it, and from love to Christ (not from obligation to your brethren) you are bound to do it, in every innocent thing; but you are forbidden to do it where, by so doing, you would by implication teach what is false, or become a party to what is wrong.'

"We cannot, then, fail to observe how widely the expedience of the Apostle Paul differs from that with which it is too frequently confounded. The latter allows us to modify, exaggerate, or attenuate the truth of God, for such purposes as we may deem advantageous to ourselves or to others. The former con

cedes no such liberty; but declares that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, we are to have our conversation in the world. The one allows us, for the sake of results which we anticipate, to encourage practices which, but for those results, our consciences would disapprove; the other allows us a choice of actions only in cases where both courses, in themselves, are alike innocent. The one teaches us

to sacrifice truth, and righteousness, and the best interests of the cause of Christ,

for our own convenience; the other commands us to sacrifice ease, convenience, nay, life itself, for the cause of truth, and for the good of souls who are perishing. The object of the one is to determine in how far I may become a party to what I believe to be wrong, for my own benefit; that of the other, to determine what self-denials I may undergo, in order to render the simple truth of God more acceptable to weak and prejudiced men. In short, the one is a sys

tem whose essential element is selfishness; while of the other the only element is self-sacrifice. The one is intended to instruct us in the most adroit means of escaping the cross; and the other to teach us where we may most readily find it, and how we may most

manfully bear it. Surely systems so diametrically opposite, in every possible respect, need not be, of necessity, mistaken for each other." (Page 323.)

We may once more observe, that the notice we have taken of this valuable and interesting volume will not, of course, be understood as implying a universal agreement with all its arguments and conclusions. Our object has been, in the first place, to call the attention of such of our readers to the work, as might be likely, from the character of the studies which they were pursuing, subordination to this, by means of to procure it for themselves; and in extracts and other notices, together with such observations as they might suggest, to construct an article not unuseful to the general reader, in whose way the book itself might never come. Of course, it is for biblical students, already somewhat advanced in their studies, that the work is chiefly designed; and these will find in it a rich treat. And more than this. Reading it with attention, and due discrimination, they will not only obtain much valuable information directly; but they will be the better for the perusal indirectly, by those habits of thought and inquiry which it is calculated to assist them in forming, and the formation of which will contribute to make them "workmen that need not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth." It is this

which, when connected with evident spirituality of character, and the prospering blessing of the Lord the Spirit, sought by continual prayer, shall give dignity and power to the pulpit, and bring the flock of Christ, who know his voice, and will not follow the voice of a hireling stranger, even though he come to them in sheep's clothing, to love and revere its ministrations. To higher service than the service of the sanctuary, mortal man cannot be called; and it is service which both demands and admits of the richest mental culture in that order of subjectssubjects than which the mind can conceive of none more exaltedwith which it is conversant. We

are obliged to Dr. Robinson and his esteemed coadjutors for thus contributing to the advancement of this culture. Though they belong to another country, and are ranged, too, in other sections of the universal church, we recognise the value of their labours, and shall be thankful if, by this notice of them,

we should extend their beneficial influence. Happy will it be, both for England and America, if a com. mon Christian literature should serve-as, we think, it is becoming more and more likely to serve-to cement the union between these two great nations, and to render it more friendly and enduring!

The Mirror of Infants: being a calm and serious Inquiry into the Relation of Infants to Christ; showing that, prior to Baptism, and independent of that Rite, they are all in a regenerated State, by the free Gift of God. By Abraham Watmough. 12mo. pp. 48. -We regret to feel ourselves under the necessity of noticing this tract; but we still more regret its publication. The broad assertion, that all infants, as such, in virtue of the mediatorial dispensation, are, independently of any religious ordinance, "in a regenerated state," is so obviously anti-Methodistical, so totally destitute of all scriptural foundation, that no alternative is left to us, unless we were willing to let it be supposed that we considered the subject as a matter of perfect indifference, and were willing that it should go forth among the churches of the land, if not as a statement of Wesleyan doctrine, yet as a statement of doctrine which Wesleyans are not concerned to oppose. The questions involved in the subjects here referred to, are too weighty to be examined in the space which can be allotted to these notices; and to examine them otherwise than fully, would be inconsistent with their importance: we therefore at present refrain from doing so altogether, and content ourselves with thus protesting against the supposal, that the sentiments advanced by Mr. Watmough are at all consistent with the doctrines held by the Wesleyan Methodists, and believed by them to be scriptural. We may, however, observe,

Jesus

that the question is not, whether, through the redemption of our Lord Christ, men are in a better condition than that in which they would have been, as guilty and fallen in Adam; but whether that advantage is a state of real regeneration, a regeneration, too, in which infants are actually born. One would have thought that Mr. Watmough would have first fixed the scriptural characters of regeneration, and then inquired whether, in Scripture, either the term or the characters are ever applied to children, as such. One instance, indeed, of his reasoning, will, we think, satisfy the reader. He refers to Psalm lviii. 3: "The wicked are estranged from the womb." "Now," he says, "to be estranged to do a thing, is to be turned aside to do it; and always implies an agent to do the estranging act.' We had always understood that "estranged" here was to be taken passively, not actively; the wicked are in an estranged, that is, alienated, state and condition. "No," says Mr. Watmough; "the wicked are estranged,' actively estranged; the wicked parent criminally estrauges his children to tell lies." But the Psalmist still says, "from the womb." Mr. Watmough easily gets rid of this by a simple denial: "Not from the moment they are born, which no man is able to do; but he does as early as he can, which is the true sense of the text. This is not the saying of the text, at all events; and it is an odd way of reasoning on a passage of Scripture,-first, to take a word in it in a new, unheard-of