Whether fuch circumfpection is at all times obferved, is highly queftionable. Certain however it is, that the charge itself has been of late, and is at prefent, perpetually advanced against a great majority of the minifters of the Church of England. Some of our own brethren in the miniftry, who are attached to certain peculiar tenets, and who in confe quence claim the appellation of Evangelical or Gospel preachers, thereby exclude, by implication at leaft, if not exprefsly, from a fhare in that appellation thofe of their fellow-labourers, whofe opinions and ftyle of preaching do not correfpond with their own. It is no lefs notorious, that a large body of men, who have risen to be, according to their own imaginations, minifters of the Gospel, (how legitimately it is not my prefent purpose to inquire;) and multitudes befides, who refort to them in fearch of that fpiritual improvement, which, as they allege, they defpair of procuring at the mouth of a regularly ordained priesthood; make no fcruple of pronounc ing, in the broadeft and most unequivocal language, that the Gofpel is not preached in our Church.

Upon this pretext Methodifm arose and hath been maintained. In avowed oppofition to the parochial Clergy, and the authorized rulers of the established Church, to "heathenish

"priefts and mitred infidels," (for in the language of cenfure the Methodists have not been diftinguished for their temperance,) the founders and abettors of the fchifm have gone forth, "to difpel the grofs darknefs of ignorance and "ungodliness; and to fpread the light of the "Gospel over a benighted land." The national Clergy, as a body, have been, and continue to be, ftigmatized, as "ignorant of evan

gelical truth;" as preachers of " Popish and "Socinian tenets;" as "fubftituting a hea"thenish morality for the doctrine of Scrip"ture;" and as "corrupting, fophifticating, "and mutilating the truth of God." In the vocabulary of these modern reformers, Methodism and the Gofpel are fynonymous terms. And fo exclufively do they affume the appellation of Preachers of the Gospel, and fo arrogantly do they withhold it from others, that no minifterial qualification will exempt a man from this awful charge, unless his views of Scripture should happen to coincide with their own. "I have seen it afferted in print," faith a learned prelate, " by one of these felf-fent apoftles, that the Gospel was first preached

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See the works of Wefley, Whitefield, and other Methodists, throughout. See alfo "Sermons and Extracts by "Edmund Outram, D.D. Public Orator of Cambridge," containing a useful collection of extracts from the works of Arminian and Calvinistic Methodists.

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པ

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on a certain day in a parish, where, to my own certain knowledge, every duty of a "minifter of the Gofpel has been regularly performed by a diligent confcientious cler"gymanh."

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By this fentence it is evident, that the matter of the difcourfes, delivered by the minifters of the Church of England in general, is the mark at which their accufers aim. And it is either intended to be alleged against them, that they renounce, and are apoftates, from the Gofpel, instead of which they fubftitute a style of preaching of a different character; a charge, which is pregnant with that "wo," denounced by the Apostle in my text; or it is intended to be alleged, that the Gospel is corrupted and perverted in their hands; an accufation, no lefs than the other, of a moft alarming and tremendous nature, if we call to mind the warning of the fame Apostle, that fuch perfons are to be held "accurfed."

We may however cherish the hope, that our preaching is not obnoxious to fo grievous a charge as that which is here levelled against us. And without calling in queftion the rity of our accusers' motives, and without putting upon their oppofition any harfher conftruction than charity muft allow, we may ad

Bishop Randolph's Charge at Bangor, 1808. p. 15.

pu

mit a belief, that their zeal, whencefoever it may originate, and to whatever end it may be directed, is at leaft "not according to know

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ledge." With this perfuafion, a love of truth and of juftice will fecond a becoming regard to our own characters and welfare, if we endeavour to maintain our ground against the affaults of our opponents; and fhould we, in repelling from ourselves the awful charge, that we preach not the Gospel, be driven to advance what may appear like recrimination, Chriftian charity, we truft, will authorize a measure, which is not prompted by a spirit of wanton hoftility; but is provoked by unmerited aggreffion, and rendered neceffary by felf-defence.

An inquiry into the juftice of the charge, that the great body of the national Clergy do not preach the Gofpel, is proposed for the fubject of thefe difcourfes. Consistent, as I truft it is, with the exprefs intention of the Founder of this lecture, and worthy of the ftricteft attention of thofe, for whofe benefit the lecture appears to have been more imme diately defigned, it is at the fame time unqueftionably a fubject of very great and general concern. May it please Almighty God for Christ's fake to give us the help of his Holy

1 Rom. x. 2.

Spirit, and profper the inquiry, if it be honestly directed to the promotion of the Gospel of

his Son !

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On all matters of religious controversy, and on this, in common with others of the fame nature, appeal must be made to the facred writings, as the only authentic records of the truth. These are the fource, from which our arguments must principally be derived; and these are the teft, to which all our reafonings muft ultimately be referred. Holy Scrip"ture," as our Church expreffes it," contain"eth all things neceffary to falvation; so that "whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be "proved thereby, is not to be required of any "man that it should be believed, as an article "of the faith, or be thought requifite or ne"ceffary to falvation."

But whilft we regard the Scriptures as the only infallible criterion of found doctrine, I would add a falutary and feafonable caution, as to the use and application of them. It is the duty of every Christian, and it is the privilege of every Proteftant, to "search the Scrip"tures;" for in them we read our title to eternal life, and they are they which testify of Chrift but it is not every man, who is duly qualified, at least on controverted points, to

k Art. vi.