of man. gentle aspect. The first symptom of the mitigation of its horrors appeared early in the fifth century, when Rome was stormed and plundered by the Goths under Alaric, Those bands of barbarians, as they were called, were Christian; and their conduct in the hour of conquest exhibited a new and wonderful example of the power of Christianity over the fierce passions Alaric no sooner found himself master of the town, than he gave out orders that all the unarmed inhabitants, who had fled to the churches or the sepulchres of the martyrs, should be spared; and with such cheerfulness were the orders obeyed, that many who were found running about the streets in a frenzy of consternation and despair, were conducted by the common soldiers to the appointed places of retreat. Nor was a single article touched of the rich furniture and costly ornaments of the churches of St. Peter and St. Paul. This, you will observe, was a thing very different from the boasted examples of Pagan manners, the generosity of Camillus, and Scipio's continence. In either of those examples, we see nothing more than the extraordinary virtue of the individual, because it was extraordinary, equally reflecting disgrace on his times and credit on himself: this was an instance of mercy and moderation in a whole armyin common soldiers, flushed with victory, and smarting under the wounds they had received in obtaining it. From that time forward, the cruelty of war has gradually declined, till, in the present age, not only captives among Christians are treated with humanity, and conquered provinces governed with equity, but in the actual prosecution of a war, it is become a maxim to abstain from all unnecessary violence. Wanton depredations are rarely committed upon private property; and the individual is screened as much as possible from the evil of the public quarrel. Ambition and avarice are not eradicated from the heart of man; but they are controlled in the pursuit of their objects by the general philanthropy. Wars of enterprise, for conquest and glory, begin to be reprobated in the politics of the present day.-Bishop Horsley. CONSOLATION. With these blessings, the mourner feels relief under the anticipations of death, under the loss of friends, the disappointments, separations, and sicknesses of this mortal life. The thought of Christ's death and resurrection takes off the fearful character of his own dissolution. The thought of pardon, peace, reconciliation; the thought of a brief sleep only, after the termination of this life; the thought of Jesus coming again, and bringing with him all them that have slept in him; the thought of all the faithful being united in one company, and entering the glorious abode with him; the thought of being for ever with the Lord; this softens and mollifies the otherwise fearful meditation of death and judgment. The humble foresight of the blessings on the other bank of Jordan makes him forget, like Moses on the mount of Pisgah, the intervening pains and separations, and long to pass over into the good land. Thus, the child of sorrow is in the way to obtain abiding consolation under the thought of death.-Dr. Wilson, Bishop of Calcutta. Poetry. PRAYER. (For the Church of England Magazine.) The following lines were suggested by a Prayer with which St. Thou art omniscient; all that I can know L. C. W. STANZAS SUGGESTED BY EZEK. Xxxii. 11. And shall I still reject the same, Ah, no, suffice it that so long I've trod the downward road, Unmindful of my God. Humbled before thy sacred throne I now devoutly kneel, And tell the grief I feel. Myself a rebel-worm to be, With sorrow, Lord, I own A heir of hell and misery; Still I betake myself to thee, And mention Christ alone. His blood can cancel every sin The leopard's spots, the Ethiop's skin, His blood I plead-that sacred stream Yea, make me wholly thine. Search, Lord, my heart, its secrets see; What's wrong do thou amend; My help, and strength, and guardian be, My portion to eternity, My never-failing Friend. : Miscellaneous. H. B. EVILS OF SEPARATISM.-A truly pious and eminent minister of the Church of England became harrassed with doubts, arising rather from morbid sensibility than from manly conscientiousness. Many parties were eager to claim him as their own; and his mind was soon filled with the doubts and cavils of others. The issue was, an effort on his part to found a church free from all imperfections, and entirely conformable to the Scriptural model. An old foreign church in the city of Dublin was rented for their meetings. A railing was drawn across the centre of the building the members were admitted within the railing; all others were to sit outside. The author was present at their first meetings in the year 1829. For a few weeks all seemed to promise well; but the scene speedily changed. Every one having equal authority (or, rather no authority), dissension and division soon reared their heads. One was for an adult baptist, another a pædo-baptist; one was for close communion, another for open communion; all had an equal right to deliver public addresses. The minister confessed to a brother minister, that many effusions were agonizing rather than edifying' to him, from the crude and erroneous views of the speakers. The most forward and the least qualified were the foremost to speak; the humblest and best instructed shrunk from a field already pre-occupied. But this was not all. They had meetings for the admission of members; these were usually held in the evenings, and, it is not too much to say, became coteries of scandal. Instead of the broad Scriptural rule of admitting all who call on the name of Jesus Christ the Lord,' the character of each applicant was minutely scrutinised; the shape of a bonnet, or the amount of ribbons upon it, became sometimes a deciding point; and a miserable spirit of judging, and seeking for faults, increased rapidly amongst the members. Some ladies came to the conclusion, that adult baptism was the only scriptural one. They formed a party, and accompanied by a gentleman (a member of the church), proceeded to a public bath, where they were dipped into the water by him. They returned home, and found themselves as unsettled as ever. A fresh difficulty was started, whether he had a right to administer the ordinance; and they thus unhappily added to the painful catalogue of "silly women... ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth" (2 Tim. iii. 6, 7). The minister himself was one day induced to receive the communion from the hands of a pious Presbyterian minister. On his return to Dublin he communicated this to the church. The members immediately quitted the room and separated from him, leaving him to his own bitter reflections upon the folly of building Utopian schemes. He who was eminently qualified to profit the church of God, is now in retirement, and (as far as we can learn) laid aside from all usefulness. The church separated into different societies; one party joined Mr. Kelly's church; another was (we believe) the origin of the Aungier-street or Plymouth church. Were the internal state of many a small body of separating churches made known, we are persuaded several equally humbling scenes could be described. TEMPERANCE.--Sobriety is by no means to be confined to the common and ordinary acceptation of the From "The Institutions of the Church of England are of Divine Authority." By the Rev. Joseph Baylee, A.B. Dublin, W. Curry, jun. and Co. 1837. pp. 174. term temperance in food and drink; to a freedom from gluttony and drunkenness, from uncleanliness and impurity, and from those fleshly lusts which war against the soul. But all this is necessarily included, and is an essential branch of the Christian's duty. If we would "be filled with the Spirit," we must take good heed to the apostle's exhortation, and "be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess." If we would invite and detain with us that divine Visitant who offers to come unto us and make his abode with us, we must not defile with uncleanliness and impurity those bodies which are the temples of the Holy Ghost; and if this high motive be not sufficient to influence us, let us remember that God has solemnly declared, that "drunkards shall have their portion in the lake that burneth with brimstone and fire for ever;" that "if any man defile the temple of God, him will God destroy;" that "whoremongers and adulterers God will judge." We should be careful that in no particular we abuse grace unto licentiousness, and render the Gospel "a savour of death unto death," by using its liberty as an occasion unto the flesh, and not as a privileged opportunity of holy selfdiscipline and self-denial. If any persons consider stated occasional fasting to be inconsistent with the spiritual nature of Christianity, even they should remember that there is a daily, habitual temperance, which is not only perfectly compatible with it, but which is the bounden duty of every Christian. It is true that our Lord declares, "It is not that which entereth into the mouth defileth a man;" but evidently he must be understood with this limitation, that what "entereth into the mouth" neither oppresses the faculties of the mind, damps the heaven-aspiring ardour of the affections, nor stimulates the evil passions of our corrupt nature. To give particular directions on the subject of temperance in food were impossible. But of this we may be assured, that we have transgressed the lawful use of even the lawful refreshments of the body, when their use does not leave us in a state-I will not say equally, but still more ready than before-for meditation and prayer. "We should eat to live, and not live to cat." We should nourish the body in order to render it a more active and obedient minister to the soul; and not so pamper and indulge it as to render the soul a slave to its appetites and passions. But much more than all this is implied in the sobriety here spoken of. It implies not only a freedom from gluttony and drunkenness, but also from the cares of this life; not only a bodily, but a spiritual temperance; not only a due regulation and control of the desires of the body, but also of those of the mind. We might be temperate in food, yet embruted in the spiritual sensuality, if I may so call it, of selfishness, of covetousness, of earthly-mindedness. We might be temperate in drink, yet intoxicated with pride and ambition, with vanity and the love of popular applause. But the sobriety here spoken of implies a weanedness of affection from all these things; a freedom from anxious and inordinate desire; a curbing of the mind in the too eager pursuit even of legitimate objects; a fulfilment of our ordinary duties, and a prosecution of our lawful business and calling, in a calm, tranquil, unhurried spirit of submissive resignation to the Divine will; a spirit which diligently uses the lawful means, then leaves the issue contentedly with God. In a word, to be sober is, in the apostle's mind, to put the whole heart into that daily prayer to God, "Thy will be done."-Rev. T. M. Hiffernan's "Watch unto Prayer." London: Published by JAMES BURNS, 17 Portman Street, Portman Square; W. EDWARDS, 12 Ave-Maria Lane, St. Paul's; and to be procured, by order, of all Booksellers in Town and Country. PRINTED BY ROBSON, LEVEY, AND FRANKLYN, 46 ST. MARTIN'S LANE. RESPONSIBILITY. SEPTEMBER 21, 1839. NOTHING can more clearly evidence the little ness and inability of man than the diversity of opinion, the factions, and the sects, into which the world is so unhappily divided. This truth will appear more apparent when we consider it with regard to the Bible, a book we know to be of divine origin, whose principle it is to spread "peace on earth, and good-will;" which teaches us to "be of one mind one toward another;" calculated to unite men in the fond embrace of brotherhood; whose doctrines and precepts are so plain, that even 66 wayfaring men, though fools, cannot err therein:" and yet what is more common than disputes and controversies on its sacred contents? Various, however, as are the opinions of mankind, most of them agree in the belief of a general responsibility. There are some, however, strange as it may appear, who, by their actions at least, do not acknowledge this important truth; they seem to suppose that they were sent into the world for no other purpose than to "do their own ways, to find their own pleasure, and to speak their own words." And why is this? Because Satan, knowing the inclinations and dispositions of the heart, is ever active to take advantage, to lay his plan, and to make use of the most plausible arguments, to alienate the mind from God, and to endeavour to delude them to forget their individual responsibility to him. These arguments are, alas, very successfully waged by our great enemy; but they are not so strong or so successful as that the Christian may not resist them; he has a 66 stronghold," whence he can obtain arms, and gird himself to the VOL. VII.-NO. CLXXXIV. PRICE 1d. battle: God's armory is ever open to all his "soldiers and servants;" they may "lay hand upon the shield and buckler;" they may at all times "bring forth the spear;" and going forth in the strength of the Lord God, " they shall be more than conquerors through Him who loved them." The Christian does not listen to the artful and designing suggestions of Satan; he does not study his own feelings; but he looks to God's revealed word, and makes that the standard of right and wrong, of principle and duty; and surely he cannot look very far into that blessed book without immediately perceiving that he is a responsible creature: the position in which we are placed by creation being with the world the work of God's hands, so that we are consequently his property. The Christian has yet a higher position to take than he obtains by creation, and that is, his condition by grace; he considers himself as a poor, lost sinner, under the curse of God, but redeemed from that curse, and its awful consequences, by the precious blood of Christ; and so he feels that he "is not his own, but bought with a price;" and with the feeling of being "bought," he is made sensible of the obligation under which he lies of "glorifying God in his body and spirit, which are God's" (1 Cor. vi. 20). How different is the feeling evinced on every occasion by the wicked, and by the Christian! The same event which gives uneasiness to the one, affords the greatest comfort and peace to the other. We have seen that it is an object of Satan to draw from men's minds the idea of responsibility; and so they persuade themselves that "the Lord doth not see;" or, if he does "see" their conduct, he [London: Robson, Levey, and Franklyn, 46 St. Martin's Lane.] " "doth not regard it." This reasoning, of course, limits the power of God; it takes from that holiness and hatred of sin, which God alone possesses; and it stifles those feelings of awe, which, even in the most ungodly, must sometimes be awakened by the thought that God is omnipresent. But the Christian not only believes, but delights in that truth, which, while it enlarges his ideas, and elevates his thoughts, of the majesty and "power" which belongs to God," gives a check to his conduct, and influences the whole tenour of his life. His "thoughts" will be pure, and "brought into subjection," by the knowledge that God "understands" them; and he will not presumptuously entertain any favourite and concealed sin, when he reflects that "the very secrets of his heart are known." The language of the former unto God is, "Depart from us; for we desire not the knowledge of thy ways" (Job, xxi. 14); while the latter derives infinite delight from the connexion between God and his people,-not only as the God who created and sustains them, at whose hands they receive all the good things they enjoy, but that they find, with the Psalmist, that "it is a good thing to draw near to God" (Ps. lxxiii. 28); they "rejoice with joy unspeakable," that they "have received that Spirit of adoption, whereby they cry, Abba, Father;" and from which they make the triumphant deduction," that if they are children, they are heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ" (Rom. viii. 15, 17). We are responsible for our actions; because God has himself given us an example, that we should follow his steps; and because he requires our whole heart. We are responsible for our time; because it is the only season afforded us of working out our salvation; for "the night will soon come, in which no man can work." We are responsible for our money; because God has entrusted us with it, as his stewards, to "do good unto all men," and as a means to advance his glory. We are responsible for our words and thoughts; because they should always be acceptable in God's sight. After a careful consideration of our position, and a review of the duties which it is incumbent upon us to discharge, we may well exclaim, "Who is sufficient for these things?" The soul would, indeed, be cast down under the weight of such a responsibility, were we not assured by a merciful God, who sees our necessities, and knows that "we have no power of ourselves to help ourselves," that we shall have grace and strength according to our need; for he is ever willing to give his Holy Spirit to all those who ask it. Our human nature, however, is so corrupt, that we too often fail in our duties. We continually "leave undone those things which we ought to have done, and do those things which we ought not to have done," how, then, can we expect to meet a just and holy God-a God who cannot look upon sin? We are told that in his Our Saviour describes himself under the sight " even the moon shineth not, the stars figure of "a man taking a far journey, who are not pure, and that he chargeth his angels left his house, and gave authority to his ser- with folly." We have-"thanks be to God for vants, and to every man his work, and com- his unspeakable gift!"-a way to escape; a manded the porter to watch" (Mark, xiii.). sacrifice has been offered, an atonement made, Every one has the particular duties of his a reconciliation effected, and that at no less station to perform; to each has been com- a price than the death of God's own Son ; mitted one, two, or five talents; and it is as through him our " iniquity is pardoned," our to the manner in which we have fulfilled our deficiencies supplied, and our nakedness duties, taken advantage of our mercies and covered by those white robes of his rightprivileges, and employed our talents, that we eousness which he has purchased for us. shall have one day to give account to Him, Let no one, however, suppose, that because "who shall judge the quick and dead at his salvation is not by works, but by grace appearing, and his kingdom." "What have through Jesus Christ, that he may therefore we," asks St. Paul, "that we have not re- "continue in sin;" such a supposition is ceived?" We do not possess one single contrary to the doctrines of the whole Bible: thing which has not been bestowed upon us we must be active in "working out our own by God; and that, not as a reward for acts salvation;" although "it is God which worketh of righteousness which we have done, but of in us both to will and to do of his good pleahis free mercy and grace: whatever blessing sure." It is the Spirit of God which inwe possess, we are dependent on him for the clines the heart to do good; but man is, present and the future enjoyment of it. So nevertheless, properly said to apply his own that if we offer any thing to God, we are heart (Ps. cxix. 112); he is said also to truly giving him of his own; and we are purify himself" (1 John, iii. 3), though it still, and must continue to be, unprofitable is God who "cleanseth us from all unrightservants, having only done that which it was eousness" (1 John, i. 9). our duty to do. 66 The natural tendency of such reflections will be, to lead us to examine ourselves. How are we discharging those duties which devolve upon us in our respective stations? How are we improving the opportunities offered us? What use are we making of our authority? Are we employed in doing the work which our Master gave us to do? Are we watching closely the advances of our enemy? Are we aware of the disguises which he may assume in order to gain admittance to our hearts during the absence of our Lord? Are we living as faithful servants, looking forward with joy to the promised return of their master; and because we know not the day nor the hour in which he may arrive, are we living in constant preparation for his reception?-for let us remember that when he does arrive, we must each give account of our stewardship; and according as we have either made use of our Master's talents, or hid them in a napkin, so will be our sentence, either to "enter into the joy of our Lord," or to" depart" for ever from his presence "into outer darkness, where shall be weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth?" May these thoughts "sink deep into the hearts" of all who read them. May we feel more and more our responsibility, and live 66 I as those who must give account, that we may do it with joy, and not with grief." May we consider our utter inability to please God, and thus be led to feel the necessity of, and to seek the offices of, the Holy Spirit to assist our infirmities; and may we have a lively faith, and an increasing love and gratitude to that Saviour, who by his death has obtained for us the forgiveness of our sins, and that righteousness" without which no man can see the Lord!" THE SABBATH. S. S. Its Origin and Perpetuity vindicated, from the Old and BY THE REV. THOMAS PYNE, A.M. No. II. IN a former paper, some considerations connected with the day of sacred rest were presented to the readers of this Magazine. The Sabbath was traced through the Old Testament, from the command to sanctify the seventh day given in paradise, to the subsequent memorials of its observance during the patriarchal ages. The manner in which it became a part of the law enjoined to the Jews, at the establishment of their theocracy, was likewise observed. And the light in which it was viewed by the prophets; who, living later than Moses, set it forth rather in its primary spiritual, than in its subsequent ceremonial, character; and spoke of it, in their descriptions of the Gospel-dispensation, as an ordinance still to continue, and to be among the chief blessings, as it would be one of the most widely extended symbols, of the people of Christ. The pleasing task now remains of remind ing our readers of the obligations, privileges, and uses of the Sabbath or Lord's day from the time of the introduction of Christianity. In doing this, attention will be called to the New Testament portion of this subject. You will perceive that your day of holy rest— that period which every true Christian considers the choicest of his life, the happiest day of the seven, the most favourable of all opportunities for near converse with God, the antepast of heaven-is still a divine ordinance; that it was restored, indeed, by our blessed Lord, from the unrequired services which the Jews in his age had imposed upon it, but dignified by his habitual attention to it; that it was transferred, by this same Lord of the Sabbath and his early Church, to the triumphal day of his resurrection; that it received a new name, though not so as to render its ancient appellative wholly improper; and that, although thus accommodated to the new dispensation, it remained substantially the same, both in spirit, in time, and in obligation; and that it has, in this character, been transmitted to our times, by the universal and uninterrupted practice of the Church of Christ. The first portion of our proof, that the Sabbath in its moral character is still a divine ordinance, and therefore of constant obligation, will be drawn from the conduct of our Lord, who exonerated it indeed from the burden of ceremonies with which the Pharisees had loaded it, but constantly manifested his reverence for its sanctity. The law of the Lord was in itself " perfect," and suited to the circumstances of those to whom it was given. Had the Jews attended to it, they would have been in a spiritual, as well as a covenant, sense a "holy people." But this was the course which the fallen heart took-they lowered the moral enactments, and increased the ceremonial. In the degree in which they turned aside from heavenlyand add to its requirements. This was especially the mindedness, did they proclaim with rigour the ritual, case with the Pharisees in our Lord's time. Nothing could be more corrupt than their moral state; yet nothing more extreme than their self-enjoined austerities. The Sabbath shared in this oppression. As the law had commanded them not to work on that day, they conceived it to be sinful to do the slightest or most needful works; as, for example, to light a fire, to use oil medicinally, though they allowed it as a luxury, and to relieve the suffering. Hence our Lord spoke in such decisive terms of what was lawful to be done on the Sabbath; which very expression-the fact of some things being lawful-establishes the further truth that the Sabbath itself was not abrogated. But let us take the strongest instance to the contrary which occurs in the Gospel-history. "It came to pass that he went through the corn-fields on the Sabbath-day; and his disciples began, as they went, to pluck the ears of corn, being hungered. And the Pharisees said unto him, Behold, why do they on the Sabbath-day that which is not lawful ?" These ultraritualists construed a mere attention to the infirmities of nature into a reaping of the corn. But hear our Lord's reply," Have ye never read what David did, when he had need, and was an hungered, he and they that were with him? how he went into the house of God, in the days of Abiathar the high-priest, and did eat the shewbread, which it is not lawful to eat but for the priests, and gave also to them that were with him? Or have ye not read in the law, how that on the Sabbath-days the priests in the temple profane the Sabbath, and are blameless? But if ye had known what this meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless." Here was the Sabbath not abrogated, not removed from its original sanction. Christ was guiltless of all violation of its command; he did, indeed, but conform to its spirit. And then follows the striking declaration, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the |