have been arranged by Mr. Hawes, of His Majesty's Chapel Royal, and of St. Paul's Cathedral.

And now, in humble dependence upon God's blessing, we commit the work to our brethren and friends, the Clergy and laity of the Church of England. That it will fully satisfy every one, we dare not presume to hope; yet can we truly affirm, that no pains or expense have been spared to make it such as may approve itself to correct taste; to the conscience of every Christian; and to the principles of every Churchman. If it assist those who worship in our church, and perhaps some who now desert, and ignorantly revile her, to understand how pure, how holy, how scriptural she is, and how well her services are designed to lead to the knowledge and practice of Divine truth, the labour bestowed on it will not have been in vain.

LITERARY REPORT.

A Letter to the Right Honourable Lord Viscount Melbourne, on the Idolatry and Apostasy of the Church of Rome; in proof that the Doctrines of the Church of Rome are not fundamentally the same with those of the Church of England. By the BISHOP OF SALISBURY. Salisbury: Hearn. London: Rivington. 1835. 8vo. pp. 20.

WHETHER it be from any fondness for the Romish Church, or for any secret dislike to our Protestant faith and principles, that led my Lord Melbourne to make the extraordinary assertions which he did on his moving the second reading of the Irish Church Bill, we will not pretend to determine. They have, however, been most ably answered by Dr. Burgess, the present Bishop of Salisbury. It is an old device of Satan to make mankind believe that things are not what they really are. Hence it is that Papists and their advocates have ever aimed to persuade us that there is no difference between the doctrines of Popery and those of Protestantism. This delusion or artifice the present Letter is written to expose; and to our minds has, in an easy manner, accomplished. Lord Melbourne asserted that "the doctrines of the Romish Church were fundamentally the same with those of

the Church of England;" to which the Bishop of Salisbury replies:

The doctrines of the Roman Church are so far from being fundamentally the same with those of our Church, that they are fundamentally and essentially opposed to them, and subversive of them.

The Church of Rome has not left us at a loss to know, what are the fundamental articles of her Creed. Your Lordship will, I doubt not, readily admit, that all doctrines are to be so denominated in both Churches, which are held in each to be necessary to salvation. Such are the doctrines which are contained in the Creed, commonly called Pope Pius's Creed, which at once presents this broad difference between the Church of Rome and all other Churches,—that all who deny her doctrines are pronounced by her to be accursed. In that Creed are contained the following articles of her faith, without the belief of which she declares that no one can be saved:-The supremacy of the Pope and of his Church,-Transubstantiation, -the sacrifice of the Mass,-the worship of Saints, the veneration of Images and Relics,-Purgatory,-Penance for the Remission of Sins,-Seven Sacraments, &c.

These articles of Pope Pius's Creed are fundamental doctrines of the Church of Rome, and not of the Church of England, but were rejected by her three centuries ago, as idolatrous, impious, and heretical. And so utterly at variance are they with the doctrines of our

A SERMON.

THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND AN INDEPENDENT BRANCH OF THE HOLY

CATHOLIC CHURCH.

REV. III. S.

I know thy works: behold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it: for thou hast a little strength, and hast kept my word, and hast not denied my name.

In a former discourse* I endeavoured to give a brief sketch of the recognised Church of Christ throughout the world, by pointing out the essentials of that Church, and their agreement with the will of its Divine Founder, and the uniform conduct of his apostles. I would now confine our attention to that pure and reformed branch of it, which is happily established in these kingdoms, in order to prove its claim to be consi-, dered a true and apostolical Church.

The importance of an apostolical succession does not appear to be, in general, justly estimated by the members of our Church, although their attention has of late been frequently directed to it. Admitting that the validity of our orders will not be weakened by the absence of such a support, yet surely it must be allowed, that if an unbroken succession from the apostles, down to the present possessors of the episcopal office, can be proved, our claims will in consequence be strengthened, and the sacredness of our office will be far greater than theirs, who rush into the sanctuary uncalled and unwelcomed, merely urged by the goading influence of an ardent temperament and overheated imagination. To such a succession I before alluded, and would again and again press it on the attention of every member of the Church of England, because it is well calculated to give confidence in the expection of that glorious promise being realized in us in an especial manner,- -"Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." When Christ instituted a Church, and gave a commission to his apostles, promising that through his Spirit he would ever be present with them, he precluded the possibility of a suspension of the sacred office which he had established; for otherwise his promise would of necessity become of none effect. Such, too, would be the result with regard to the efficacy of the sacraments which he ordained. But the apostolical succession, from which, we maintain, our authority is derived, does not ask for proof upon any thing like presumptive reasoning; it is a matter of fact, a point of history, which we defy our opponents to disprove or gainsay. And not even the subtle artifices and false assertions of popish malevolence can establish the absurd tale which they have invented as a stumbling-block to our confidence in the apostolical authority of our own episcopacy.

The message which the beloved disciple of our Lord was commanded to deliver to the Church in Philadelphia, is language which, under similar circumstances, would probably be addressed to the Church of England at the present day. But before we consider the parallel, we must revert to our early history; from which it will appear, that, according

เส้

• See CHRISTIan RemembraNCER for October, 1835.

to the principles which we have laid down, we have a claim to be considered a true branch of the holy Catholic Church. It is only those who are under a strong delusion to believe a lie, that can gravely ask us where our Church was before the days of Luther? as though our title to antiquity were as slender as that of the numerous sects which sprung up soon after the Reformation was completed. We may reply to this question by proposing another. Suppose a beautiful antique pillar, of exquisite workmanship and proportions, to be, through lapse of time, and exposure to the weather, completely overgrown with moss and lichens; and suppose some careful hand removed those unseemly excrescences, cleaned the column, and again exhibited it in its original beauty; should we, knowing the process which had taken place, deny its antiquity, and call it a new work? To do so would indicate either ignorance or perverseness; and yet such conduct too often marks the overweening Romanist, and discovers to us the weakness of a cause which has recourse to such hollow sophistries for support. So far from the Church of England being a recent establishment, we can without difficulty trace it even to apostolical times; and there is every reason to believe that "the beautiful feet" which first brought the gospel of salvation to the shores of Britain, were those of St. Paul himself. Clement, his fellow-labourer, states, that St. Paul preached as far as the utmost bounds of the west; and these islands were anciently looked upon as so situated. It is, however, ascertained beyond a doubt that Christianity was very early proclaimed among the Britons; and that an episcopal Church was established here before the close of the second century. For this early evangelization we are not in any respect indebted to Rome: the Church was entirely and essentially British. But evil days fell upon it; the intestine commotions and warlike struggles, which are a principal feature in the history of the Saxon heptarchy, were unfriendly to the growth of religion; and paganism being openly professed by the Anglo-Saxons, it gained an ascendency over the Church, almost extinguished its light, and involved the land in the cold and cheerless shadow of death. And thus it remained, until an accident led Gregory the Great to form a plan, in the sixth century, for converting the pagan Saxons to Christianity. While he was only a private priest he was desirous of coming over himself as a missionary; but being persuaded to relinquish his design, he was soon after elevated to the papacy, and one of his first acts was to dispatch Augustin and about forty monks to execute the project which he had previously entertained. They arrived in Kent about the year 597. We must, however, bear in mind, that although corruptions had at this time crept into the Church of Rome, yet she was then free from many of those gross and dangerous errors for which she is now distinguished. These were not formally received by her until the Council of Trent declared them to be right and true doctrines.

With regard to purgatory and prayers for the dead, Gregory taught that in death either a good or evil spirit would seize the soul, and keep it for ever without any change; that in the day of death the just will go to joy, and the wicked will be reprobated with the apostate angels. But the Council of Trent declared that there is a purgatory after this life, out of which souls may be helped by the prayers of the faithful.