NOTES ON SOCIAL & RELIGIOUS

PROGRESS.

RITUALISM. The question of ritualism, which has of late excited so much attention, has been the subject of legal arguments which occupied the Court of Arches for the long space of sixteen days, and of an elaborate judgment, an abstract of which fills seven and a half closely printed pages of the "Guardian" newspaper. The proceedings were instituted by the "Church Association," and defended by the "English Church Union." The questions raised in this extraordinary trial are thus stated by the judge, Sir R. Phillimore, in his judgment:-" (1.) The elevation of the Blessed Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, accompanied in Mr. Mackonochie's case by kneeling, or 'excessive kneeling' at times not prescribed by the rubrics; (2.) The use of incense during the celebration of the Eucharist; (3.) The mixing of water with wine at the time of the administration of the Lord's Supper; (4.) The use of lighted candles upon the holy table." The judge thanks God that he is not called upon to pronounce, in the judgment he has to deliver, any decision upon any question of doctrine. The questions are determined, therefore, by ecclesiastical law and usage. And in relation to these the judge enters upon a statement over-burdened with legal and theological citations. The conclusion at which he arrives is to forbid the elevation of the consecrated elements, the mixing of water with the wine during the time of service, and the introduction of incense. He allows, however, the lighting of two candles on the holy table during the time of communion, for the signification that Christ is the light of the world. This judgment, therefore, determines three out of the four points against the ritualists; on the fourth point the decision is in their favour. This deci

sion was accepted by Mr. Mackonochie, and seemed at first likely to settle the question. It is now stated, however, that the decision respecting lights upon the altar will be appealed against, and that the defendants will, therefore, reopen the entire question.

The

It is humiliating to read these long and elaborate arguments, and to witness so laboured a judgment, on questions in themselves so trifling. Indeed, were it not that there is now seen connected with the question a something more important than the mere formalities which exercise so much attention, and lead to such bitter controversy, it is inconceivable that intelligent men should give way to such puerilities, or contend so zealously for matters of such trifling importance. question, however, is no longer, if indeed it has ever been, exclusively one of ritual. It involves a deeper question-the question of doctrine; and it is this feature which gives to it so much importance in the eyes of those who contend so earnestly for ritualistic practices. Religious zeal and earnestness is always commendable, and it is especially so at a time when indifferentism and inattention to the claims of religious truth and good are so extensively prevalent. But it is not the less painful to witness zeal on behalf of mistaken sentiments and injurious falses. The doctrine supposed to underlie this system of ritualism is the doctrine of a corporeal presence in the Sacrament.

It is thus stated by one of the ritualistic party:-" If He (Christ) called the elements His body and blood, it was no vain metaphor, but a name of truth and reality. His almighty power made them what He called them. He is the Real Consecrator still. The priest is His representative, and speaks not in His name only, but in His person, We are ambassadors for Christ.' The words

and the acts of consecration are His, though spoken and done by an earthly priest. What is done in the Eucharist is but an imitation and renewal of what He did. He still takes the bread and wine into His sacred and venerable hands, blesses and breaks, and says, This is my body.' These are words of power, and at their utterance the Holy Ghost, who consecrates all things in the church, makes Christ present, and in a supernatural and incomprehensible manner forms a conjunction between His sacred person and the elements of bread and wine, as at the Incarnation He formed in the Virgin's womb the Hypostatic union between the Eternal Word and man's nature."

What then is the value of this crusade against the mere formalities of ritualism while its essential principles are unassailed, and quietly work their way in the church? The assault on the mere outworks of the system, often assails what is not censurable in itself—as appropriate music and a more decorous performance of external worship. On this subject a writer in the "English Independent" shows the feeling of the more intelligent class of Dissenters. "Nothing," says this writer, "seems to be more difficult than to convince people in general that the more or less ornate character of religious ceremonial matters little, except as it is designed to give prominence to certain views of doctrine. Hence the most senseless and indiscriminate attacks are made upon practices perfectly lawful, and many of them extremely becoming in themselves, merely because they are among the accessories of ritualistic services. The most innocent and proper changes in the modes of worship, particular tunes, a special style of chants, are denounced because they are supposed to have the taint of this semi-popery on them; and the men who conduct this warfare are unable to see that they are only doing the work of their opponents, by depriving themselves of much that is perfectly unexceptionable, which would give increased interest and beauty to their worship, and by encouraging the notion, which many are ready enough to propagate, that the controversy is one of mere æstheticism." Meanwhile ritualism in certain modified forms steadily progresses. Its stronghold, perhaps, is the weakness of its opponents. The

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system of popular faith, so mistakenly designated Evangelical," commands little hearty or intelligent support. The spirit which sustained it is fast departing from Christian communities. Intelligent and thoughtful men can no longer persuade themselves, or suffer others to persuade them, that the whole history of salvation, and the only ground of its attainment, is a simple act of faith in a single objective fact in the media of our redemption. Men feel that such a dogma is utterly inadequate to the religious wants of the age. It is the doctrine not of a standing but a falling church, and the evidences of decline everywhere attend it. Evangelical teachers are impotent in their conflicts with their High Church brethren, and they lack unity among themselves. Their hopes from freedom are not unity but dispersion. "If in some moment of infatuation," says one of their advocates, (Rev. S. Garratt,) "the Evangelical body were deliberately to choose to become a Free Church, in the hope of improving their position, before a year had passed they would be split into twenty; for in that lower sphere in which visible Churches are formed, there is no cohesion among

COMMERCIAL MORALITY.-The unexpected failure some time ago of many of our public companies, and the consequent investigation into their affairs, led to the exposure of much secret fraud, and the manifestation of the want of commercial integrity on the part of large numbers of the trading community. The subject was felt to be one of national importance, and was very generally discussed by the public press. The question has not therefore been allowed to rest, but, since the immediate cause of excitement has somewhat subsided, has formed the subject of careful investigation and report by more than one of our Chambers of Commerce. The "Pall Mall Gazette," in remarking upon the report of the Liverpool Chamber, says :"We do not think that any one can doubt that, whilst there are a large number of merchants whose sense of honour and probity is as high and strict as any one could possibly desire it to be, a very loose way of feeling and a miserably low standard of honour prevails to a lamentable and increasing extent in a large section of the commercial world.

The scandals which have been brought to light so profusely in connection with all sorts of speculation supply proofs of this, of which it would be impossible to overrate the importance. It certainly is high time the commercial classes should take the matter into their most serious consideration, unless they wish to lose altogether and permanently that peculiar character for honesty which a fond, and perhaps to some extent a vain, tradition attaches to the idea of an English merchant, though the matter is now becoming day by day vaguer and more traditional. Happily the matter is to a great extent in their own power. If they are thoroughly determined that the thing shall be done, it is clearly in their power to do it, or at all events to make a very long step towards doing it. A tendency has long existed, and has been continually on the increase of late years, to underrate to an absurd degree the influence of law upon morals. The impossibility of making men moral by act of parliament has been insisted upon in all directions, till people have come to entertain a notion that law has hardly any moral weight at all, and that it is in reality little, if anything, more than a system of police regulations by which people are forcibly prevented from doing certain external acts. This we believe to be a great mistake, serving in many instances as an excuse for mere sluggishness and indifference, and useful only when it serves to parry attempts made by vigorous but narrow-minded men to impose their own narrow and petty standards of morality upon their neighbours by force. There is, however, no matter in relation to which the weak side of this maxim is so apparent as commercial morality. Without going so far as to say that they are creatures of law, it is obvious to all who consider the subject that commercial morals are in every respect, and throughout the whole of their structure, affected by law in the most intimate manner. The life of a merchant is passed almost entirely in making and acting upon contracts of various kinds, and perhaps the most important branch of the law is that which regulates contracts, deciding which shall bind and which shall be void, and defining the character, the extent, and the effects of fraud. All clear, stable, systematic notions on the subject of

commercial honesty and on the rights of property are and always must be legal; and if in an age of great temptation and extraordinary mercantile activity the law of the land gives an uncertain voice upon such matters as these, it is idle to doubt that the effect will be felt through every member of the commercial body. A high tone of mercantile honour will show itself in, and will in its turn be increased and supported by, a corresponding state of the law with unfailing certainty."

This whole subject is especially interesting to members of the New Church. It is a teaching of Swedenborg that "all religion has relation to life, and that the life of religion is to do good.” The channels through which this good is to flow are our several vocations in life. The religion of the judge and the lawyer is to be seen in the love and practice of justice, of the priest in zeal and love for the souls of men. The religion of the merchant and the manufacturer is to be shown in integrity and uprightness, of the artizan in industry and probity, and that of every class in the upright discharge of the duties of their calling, not merely as duties rendered to their fellow creatures, but to God. We thus serve the Lord in the service we render to His children. Regarded from this point of view, the engagements of the present life are seen to have a commanding and important relation to the hopes and prospects of the next. They form a school in which is to be developed and formed the love and habits of mutual usefulness; in which can be cherished and exercised the virtues of Christian charity and mutual benevolence. That this high character may be formed, it is important, however, that evils be steadily and constantly shunned. Every condition of life has its specific allurements,-the evils to which it is specially prone. The excessive worldliness of the present generation opens the mind to all the seductive hopes of speedily acquired riches, and too frequently deadens the conscience to the perception of the great laws of moral rectitude and commercial integrity and honour. We say deadens the conscience. But here an important question arises. Has the conscience, which is an acquired principle, in the majority of cases of commercial delinquency ever been formed? And this question again opens up the

subject of our upper and middle-class education, and of its influence in the formation of moral and religious character a subject at present undergoing a searching investigation, and occupying a large amount of public attention. The extract we have given above dwells on the subject of commercial honour, and the influence of public law in the formation of the code of honour. The law of honour is the law of the natural man, and is intended to aid in the formation of moral character before the attainment of the higher law of the spiritual man. It teaches to eschew all meanness, all secret fraud, all lying and deception, and it trains the life to those habits of rectitude, of justice, of honourableness, which are in harmony with the higher motives and the secret influences of heavenly wisdom and love. It thus prepares the way for the wise development of Christian faith and love, and for the most perfect formation of religious character, a character which is summed up in the phrase spiritual morality.

PALESTINE EXPLORATION FUND.-This fund was established in the early part of 1865, by the Archbishop of York, the Duke of Argyle, the Dean of Westminster, Sir Henry Rawlinson, Mr. Layard, and other gentlemen well acquainted with Biblical literature. "The object of the society is the accurate and systematic investigation of the archæology, topography, physical geography, natural history, manners, and customs of the Holy Land for Biblical illustration; and if this object can be earried out in the spirit in which the earlier operations of the society have been undertaken, it is hardly too much to say that little or nothing will remain for future investigation." The first expedition, sent out in 1855, consisted of Captain Wilson and Lieut. Anderson, accompanied by a corporal of Sappers, an expert photographer, and practical surveyor. They landed at Beyrout, in December, and occupied six months in passing slowly through the country from north to south, determining the exact positions of places, recording the features of the ground, taking heights, examining ruins, photographing, and generally investigating everything that came in their way. They fixed for the first time the the exact latitude and longitude of nearly fifty places between Damascus and Jerusalem,

and obtained accurate detailed maps of the whole centre line of the country, with several outlying districts. They also took 170 photographs, and made carefully-measured drawings of between thirty and forty structures-temples, synagogues, and churches-which had never before been taken. These in themselves formed a substantial addition to our topographical knowledge of the Holy Land. In 1867, in organising the second expedition, Jerusalem was made the head-quarters. For the topographical and excavation department, Lieut. Warren, an officer of much experience and great energy, was selected. He started early in January last, and is now in Jerusalem, with two Sappers, actively engaged in excavating and exploring. He has already been rewarded by a discovery in relation to the south wall of the sacred enclosure which, without going into details - which would be unintelligible without illustration-we imagine to be one of the most important yet made there. In addition to his labour in Jerusalem, Mr. Warren has carefully surveyed much of the Philistine Plain, a considerable portion of the highlands of Judea, and the Valley of the Jordan, for about sixteen miles north of the Dead Sea. These surveys, combined with those of Wilson and Anderson, give us for the first time the materials for a correct map of more than three-fourths of the Holy Land. Most valuable discoveries have been also made in geology, zoology, botany, and natural history generally, which to all students of the Bible cannot fail to be productive of attention and interest."

Jerusalem, which like Nineveh and other cities of the East has been for centuries buried, is being slowly disentombed. Modern times are permitted to examine the concealed evidences of its former greatness, and to learn the exact particulars of its ancient condition. The Jerusalem not of to-day, disfigured by modern bigotry and superstition and strife, but the Jerusalem of the past, of the Bible age, and as described in the letter of the Word, is being slowly disclosed to view. And in this all lovers of the Word have an interest. To those who regard only the literal sense it must be important to be able to read the letter intelligently and correctly. To the members of the New Church who know that the letter exists only for the sake of the spiritual