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THE

PROTESTANT ANNUAL

1841.

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THE

PROTESTANT ANNUAL.

1841.

EDITED

BY CHARLOTTE ELIZABETH.

" Prove all things : hold fast that which is good."

] THESS. v. 21.

LONDON:

FRANCIS BAISLER,

124, OXFORD STREET.

/3
ji>

T.C. Savill, Printer, 107, St. Martin's Lane.

TO THE RIGHT REVEREND

THE BISHOPS

AND THE REVEREND

-THE CLERGY

OF THE UNITED CHURCH OF ENGLAND AND IRELAND,
AND OF THE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND,

BT LAW ESTABLISHED IX THESE REALMS,

FOR A WITNESS TO GOD'S ETERNAL TRUTH

IN THE GOSPEL OF HIS SON,

AND FOR THE MAINTENANCE OF PURE RELIGION, AS EMBODIED IN

THE PRINCIPLES OF

Cfje fcle00e& Reformation,

THIS VOLUME IS MOST RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED.

MAY THEY EVER BEAR IN MIND
ALIKE THE PRIVILEGES AND THE RESPONSIBILITIES

OF THEIR HIGH OFFICE,
AS OVERSEERS OF THE FLOCK PURCHASED WITH

THE PRECIOUS BLOOD OF CHRIST,
AND GUARDIANS OF THAT SACRED TRUST,

Rational 39roU£tanttem.

CONTENTS.

PAGE

INTRODUCTION ix

PREPARATION FOR SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. — By

the Rev. E. Bickersteth. . 1

JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL : a Tale of the Covenant-
By the Rev. John Cumming, M.A 35

PROTESTANT ENERGY AND PROTESTANT HOPES. — By

Miss M. A. Stodart 68

INDIFFERENCE. — By the Author of " Essays on the

Church." 70

ON THE DIFFERENCE, IN POINT OF SPIRIT AND CHA-
RACTER, BETWEEN THE LEGAL AND THE EvAN-
GELICAL OBEDIENCE. — By the Rev. Thomas Chalmers,
D.D. LL.D. 80

THE CROWN OF MARTYRDOM. — By Miss M. A. S. Barber, 93

IS THE LAST ENEMY OF THE CHURCH A PROFESSED IN-

FIDEL ? — By the Rev. Hussey Burgh Macartney * . 97

ELISHA IN DOTHAN 113

THE CONFESSIONAL : a Portuguese Recollection. — By an

Old Campaigner 120

* By a regretted oversight the Author's name is omitted in the heading

of this paper.

Vlll CONTENTS.

PAGE

" THOU SHALT NOT BOW DOWN TO THEM, NOR WORSHIP

THEM" 137

CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION. — By Macleod Wylie, Esq. . . 145

NEHEMIAH.— By L. H. J. T 164

THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT. — By the Rev.

Hugh M'Neile 180

THE COLUMN OF TRAJAN. — By the Rev. J. Hartley,M.A. 195

KATHARINE PARR. — By Charlotte Elizabeth 198

POPERY ANTI-TRINITARIAN. — By X. Q 208

"A JEALOUS GOD."— By the Rev. W. Muir, D.D. ... 214

THE ARMADA : a Fragment 230

THE MARTYR LAMBERT. — By George Finch, Esq., of

Burley-on-the-Hill, Rutlandshire 245

THE EARL OF WINCHILSEA AND NOTTINGHAM . . . 264

LUTHER : a Fragment. — By Robert Montgomery . . . 269

ILLUSTRATIONS.

FIRST INTRODUCTION OF THE BIBLE INTO ENGLAND FOR

PUBLIC READING, IN 1537 Vignette. x

DEATH OF JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL 60

MARTYRDOM OF IGNATIUS 94

ISAAC'S DISCLOSURE 126

REV. HUGH M'NEILE, M.A Frontispiece. 141

REBUILDING OF JERUSALEM BY NEHEMIAH 170

HENRY VIII. AND KATHARINE PARR 203

THE ESCAPE 235

EARL OF WINCHILSEA AND NOTTINGHAM 264

LUTHER AND MELANCTHON 301

INTRODUCTION.

TEN years ago the projectors of a work like the
present might have calculated on provoking deri-
sion by the undertaking, but would have enjoyed
a poor prospect of support. During these ten
years our national Protestantism has, alas ! retro-
graded fearfully ; yet do we confidently anticipate
for our miscellany an extensive and a cordial wel-
come from the hearts of a community where the
healthful pulse beats with renewed energy, alike
unshackled by, and independent of, all that the
great ones of the earth can do to repress it.

And whence is this? Our VIGNETTE supplies
the answer. Look at the central object there dis-
played to a rejoicing throng : " young men and
maidens, old men and children," press around,

X INTRODUCTION.

while the hand of one, who from the abject bond-
age of Romish delusion has become a preacher
of that liberty wherewith Christ makes his people
free, points to the blessed book, THE HOLY BIBLE,
then first by royal authority set up in Paul's
cathedral for the use of the laity. He tells them to
rest no longer their faith on the authority of man,
but to bring his teaching to that sure standard —
" To the law and to the testimony " — according to
which word if they speak not " there is no light
in them."

Yes, the Reformation gave to England an un-
fettered bible ; and because that bible has still free
course, and is glorified among us, therefore does
the strong pulse of Protestantism thus energeti-
cally beat throughout the mass of our population,
presenting a barrier against all menaced inroads,
whether of legislatorial innovation or of ecclesi-
astical corruption. God himself opened to our
fathers that bible ; man cannot prevail to shut it.
God re-kindled the torch of divine truth at that
blessed era ; man cannot succeed in extinguishing
it. Encouraged by this assurance, we send forth

INTRODUCTION. XI

a volume devoted to the cause of our most holy
faith, as contradistinguished from the heresy that
usurps its name, taking up with humble confidence
the words of him who rebuilt, in troublous times,
the walls of Jerusalem, " The God of heaven, He
will prosper us."

December, 1840.

THE

PROTESTANT ANNUAL.

PREPARATION FOR SUFFERING FOR
THE TRUTH.

BY THE REV. E. BICKERSTETH.

THE circumstances of the times are more arid
more bringing faithful Protestants again into full
conflict with all the adversaries of " the faith once
delivered to the saints." In this conflict we are
exhorted to " contend earnestly." We contend
indeed for the truth of God, " the common salva-
tion," the rich inheritance which God has freely
given to the sons of men, and, by the grace of
God, we know that we shall be " more than con-
querors through Him that loved us." Though the
war be sharp and prolonged, may we only the
more " wax valiant in the fight," till we turn " the
armies of the aliens to flight." The stirring events
of these days call upon Christians to take the
whole armour of God, and " his truth shall be our
shield and buckler in the evil day." (Psalm xci. 4.)
There is one part of the duty of the church

B

2 PREPARATION FOR

which has hitherto been little regarded. From
the extraordinary peace which God has given to
the world — a period of quiet clearly predicted be-
fore the last troubles, (1 Thess. v. 2, 3 ; Rev. vii. 1 ;
viii. 1) — Christians have not had their attention
directed, as the earlier church had, to the duty
and privilege of suffering for Christ.

But as the predicted trials are manifestly draw-
ing nearer, my object will be, in this paper, to
lead Christians to prepare and be ready for them,
that they may be enabled to withstand every
temptation, and become the largest blessings in
those trials to their country, their fellow Chris-
tians, and their fellow men.

That TRIALS ARE BEFORE us must be obvious to
every reflecting mind acquainted with the actual
state of the Christian world and with the word
of God.

What is the state of THE CHRISTIAN WORLD ?
It is probable that a number considerably exceed-
ing 200 millions are now living on the earth who
have been baptized into the name of the Father,
and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. What is
the spiritual condition of these millions ? Let us
classify them, and glance at their state : —

1. Eastern churches 6 millions.

2. The Greek church 42 millions.

3. The Romanists 100 millions.

4. The Protestants 60 millions.

There are, we may well hope, in the worst of
these classes, thousands who worship the Father

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 3

in spirit and in truth : the number is known only
to Him "who seeth in secret," and is probably
far larger than many a desponding heart would
imagine, and that even in those we are ready to
view as the darkest parts of the earth. But still
the actual state of the Christian icorld, as proved
by the facts that are open and evident, is manifest.
" By their fruits we know" the false teachers ; and
there are sins " open beforehand, going before to
judgment."

The EASTERN CHURCHES have longest had the
truth; and what is their spiritual condition? While
we have to thank God that, amidst enormous
oppressions and injuries from the Mahomedan
scourge, they have retained the name of Christ,
and the early creeds of the church, and have also
suffered contumely, of all kinds and degrees, for
that name which they bear ; yet, alas ! whether
we view Jacobites, Armenians, or Nestorians, they
have, as a body, sunk into outside worship — the
adoration of pictures, and confidence in saints;
and are, to a large extent, adhering to lying vani-
ties, trusting in the wooden cross, and the merest

o •*

shreds and forms of religion. They are also living
in the grossest ignorance of divine truth, and by
all kinds of wickedness are constantly dishonour-
ing the name of Christ. The Saracen woe chiefly
affected them, but " they repented not," and they
are now fearfully like that rejected " earth which
beareth thorns and briers, and is nigh unto curs-
ing, whose end is to be burned."

B 2

4 PREPARATION FOR

The GREEK CHURCH, including the established
church in the Russian empire, is a large propor-
tion of the Christian world. There is much of
God's truth in different branches of the Greek
church. They hold the Apostles', the Nicene,
and the Athanasian creeds, and they have sepa-
rated from the Man of Sin ; though they retain,
alas, many of the evils of that apostasy, using
paintings and varied superstitions in their wor-
ship, and having, as is too evident, to a prodigious
extent, the name only of Christians. Christianity
in the Greek church, which had before lost its
purity and power in those professing it, became,
from the time of the Turkish woe, as it were
slain, through the countries that formed the third
empire. (Rev. ix. 18.)

The ROMANISTS number the largest proportion
in any single class of Christians in connexion
with the profession of the Christian faith, and
there are many of the true people of God among
them. (Rev. xviii. 4.) The European kingdoms
still chiefly belong to them. In Austria, France,
Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Sardinia, Naples, Ba-
varia, Tuscany, and the Papal States, Popery is
the dominant religion, though more or less wasted
and crippled by the revolutions of the last fifty
years in every state. But have Romanists been
taught by the judgments on the eastern churches
to repent? No. " The rest of the men which
were not killed by these plagues yet repented not
of the work of their hands that they should not

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 5

worship * devils and idols of gold, and silver, and
brass, and stone, and of wood." There have now
descended upon them five of the vials of God's
wrath, but they have " blasphemed the God of
heaven, because of their pains and their sores, and
repented not of their deeds." (Rev. xvi. 11.)

PROTESTANTS have now in their churches the
chief vigour and purity of the Christian faith; and
in the British Isles and the United States, and in
Holland, Germany, and Switzerland, as well as in
other countries, great numbers of devoted servants
of Christ have not defiled their garments, and are
glorifying the name of Christ by their faith, hope,
and love. But the great mass of Protestants, even
in the most favoured countries, with an awful ac-
cumulation of guilt, sinning against the revived
light of divine truth which had visited them, and
all the solemn warnings of judgments on the
eastern churches by the Saracen woe, on the
Greek churches by the Turkish woe, on the Ro-
man churches by the five vials of wrath poured
on them, and on Mahomedan lands by the sixth
vial poured on the river Euphrates, seem to have
sinned before God with eminent and peculiar
guilt. Oh let us remember our real guilt is as
we stand in the sight of Him who judges men ac-
cording to the means which they have of knowing
and serving him. The unclean spirits that are now
abroad through all the kingdoms of the Roman
empire, with their unparalleled spread and activity
— Jesuits, Revolutionists, and Infidels — shew very

6 PREPARATION FOR

manifestly the corrupt state both of the Roman
and the Protestant churches. And indeed we may
expect the greatest and most daring wickedness
to be manifested where the fullest light and love
have been perseveringly rejected.

And what says the word of God to this? I
speak to those who admit the Protestant applica-
tion of the Revelation ; who do not, because of
difficulties in interpretation, in the spirit of the
English infidel Gibbon, and the French infidel

D *

Volney, reject prophetical truth as they rejected
Christian truth ; who believe, with their Protestant
forefathers, that Babylon and the Man of Sin,
and the mystery of iniquity, describe the Pope
and Popery.

To such it must be evident, events have already
largely fulfilled the book of Revelation, and that
all these corruptions of Christianity were foreseen.
To such it is generally evident that the sixth vial
is now pouring out on the Turkish empire, and
that the seventh vial brings that revolution which
is described as " a great earthquake, such as was
not since men were upon the earth, so mighty an
earthquake and so great." This harmonizes with
those oft-repeated testimonies of the prophets and
our Lord (Isa. xxvi. 20, 21; Jer. xxx. 7; Dan.
xii. 3; Joel, ii. 2; Mat. xxiv. 21; Luke, xxi. 25)
of " a time of trouble" before his return " such as
never was since there was a nation to that same
time, no, nor ever shall be."

And the righteousness as well as the necessity

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 7

of these judgments will be clear when we re-
member that peculiar light afforded (Mat. x. 15)
and previous warnings rejected very greatly in-
crease the guilt of men. The Israelites, neglecting
the warnings which the judgments on Egypt had
afforded them, were overthrown in the wilderness.
(Psalm cvi. 21 — 27.) When Judah continued in
idolatry, unwarned by the captivity of Israel, the
Lord accounted Judah more guilty than Israel.
(Jer. iii. 8 — 11.) For the same reason Belshazzar
was punished more severely than Nebuchadnezzar,
because he knew God's dealings with his father
and did not humble himself. (Dan. v. 22.) In the
same way as just noticed, the judgments on the
eastern churches by the Mahomedan woes were
a warning to us of the western, and the vials
poured out on Papal and Mahomedan empires to
us Protestants. All which warnings and the in-
struction thus given, slighted and disregarded, in-
crease the sin of our impenitence, unbelief, and
high-mindedness, (Rom. xi. 20, 21; Rev. xvi.
9 — 11,) accumulate the guilt of past ages on the
churches on which the judgment finally comes,
(Mat. xxiii. 35 ; Rev. xviii. 24,) and leave their
situation without remedy. (2 Chron. xxxvi. 16.)

We may take it, then, for an assured truth, that
trials of a specially severe character are before the
Christian world, continuing impenitent, and that
they are near to us. It is clear that there are
" a great multitude, which no man can number,
of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and

8 PREPARATION FOR

tongues, which stood before the throne and before
the Lamb," of whom it shall be said, " these are
they who came out of the great tribulation." (TTJS
0Ai\J/eo>£ rr/f /xsyaXw.) Our Lord does not return
till this tribulation has come. (Mat. xxiv. 29, 30;
Luke, xxi. 25.) If we look for reigning we must
also look for previous suffering. (Mat. xx. 20 — 23 ;
2 Tim. ii. 21.)

But do the scriptures give any particulars of
THE NATURE OF THESE TRIALS? This may be seen
in the various predictions of them.

GENERALLY, we may observe, in the words of
Dean Woodhouse, " Throughout the whole of the
prophetical scripture a time of retribution and
vengeance on God's enemies is announced. It is
called " the day of the Lord," " the day of wrath
and slaughter," " of the Lord's anger, visitation,
and judgment," " the great day," " the last day."
.... At the same time it is to be observed, that
this kind of description and the same expressions
which are used to represent this great day are
also employed by the prophets to describe the fall
and punishment of particular states and empires ;
of Babylon by Isaiah (ch. xiii.), of Egypt by Eze-
kiel (xxx. 2 — 4; xxxii. 7, 8), of Jerusalem by
Jeremiah and Joel, and by our Lord, (Mat. xxiv.)
In many of these prophecies the description of
the calamity which is to fall on a particular state
or nation is so blended and intermixed with that
general destruction which, in the final days of
vengeance, will invade all the inhabitants of the

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH.

earth, that the industry and skill of our ablest
interpreters have been scarcely equal to separate
and assort them. Hence it has been concluded
by judicious divines that these partial prophecies
and particular instances of the divine vengeance,
whose accomplishment we know to have taken
place, are presented to us as types, certain tokens
and forerunners of some greater events which are
also disclosed in them. To the dreadful time of
universal vengeance they all appear to look for-
ward, beyond their first and most immediate ob-
ject. Little indeed can we doubt that such is to
be considered the use and application of these
prophecies, since we see them thus applied by our
Lord and his apostles, (Mat. i. 22, 23 ; xxvii. 9 ;
John, xv. 25 ; xix. 36, 37 ; Acts, ii. 20—27 ; iii.
19, 22—24 ; Heb. iv. 7, 8 ; x. 27—37 ; Rom. ii. 5 ;
Gal. iv. 24; Ephes. v. 14; 2 Thess. ii. 3, &c. ;
2 Pet. iii. 2 — 14.) One of the most remarkable
of these prophecies is that splendid one of Isaiah,
xxxiv., the importance and universality of which
is to be collected from the manner in which it is

introduced It represents the day of the

Lord's vengeance and the year of the recompences
of Sion ; it descends on all nations and their ar-
mies .... The hosts of heaven are dissolved,
the heavens are rolled together as a scroll of
parchment, the stars fall like a leaf from a vine,
or a fig from its tree. And yet Idumea is men-
tioned by the prophet as the particular object of
vengeance. Such seems to be the typical com-

B 3

10 PREPARATION FOR

pletion and primary application of this prophecy ;
but it has evidently a more sublime and future
prospect, and in this sense the whole world is its
object ..... Such prophecies have evidently re-
ceived their partial accomplishment, yet as evi-
dently look forward to a more full and glorious
consummation. They are not become a dead
letter ; they unite in pointing to some grander
object which all such prophecies describe, even
the universal and final overthrow of the enemies
of Christ. And they encourage us to look with
certain assurance to the completion of the predic-
tions in their final sense, since we have already
seen them fulfilled typically.*

Some of the most STRIKING PARTICULARS con-
nected with the last trials seem to be these : —

THE RESTRAINTS NOW UPON THE WICKED WILL

BE REMOVED. Popery, that man of sin, could not
manifest itself, because, as the Thessalonians knew,
the Roman government hindered it ; " ye know
what withholdeth, that he might be revealed in his
time." In due time the Roman government was
removedj and the Man of Sin (whose type was
Judas, the son of Simon, the son of perdition)
opposed and exalted himself above all that is
called God. But there is a farther withholding of
evil ; ({ he who now letteth will let, until he be
out of the way," and then shall " that wicked," or
lawless one, the full-grown antichrist, like Judas

5

See Woodhonse's Apocalypse Translated, p. 172 — 174.

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 11

in his last stage, shew himself, and " be revealed"
before his destruction. By the overthrow of go-
vernments, as in the reign of terror in France, the
restraints on the wicked will be removed ; and if
other restraining influences be also withdrawn, we
may easily suppose the enormous evils on every
side that must then abound.

POPERY, AS, A SYSTEM OF RELIGION, WILL BE
STRIPPED BARE. " The ten horns which thou
sawest upon the beast, these shall hate the whore,
and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall
eat her flesh, and shall burn her with fire." (Rev.
xvii. 6.) Thus Popery, as a system of iniquity,
shall be manifested, and the powers of the earth
shall really hate her. Much of this has had its
beginning in the plundering of church property in
many papal countries.

There will be A VISIBLE, SUDDEN, AND ENTIRE

OVERTHROW OF THE SEAT OF THIS APOSTASY. Our

Lord's prediction in Revelation is very plain.
" Her plagues shall come in one day, death, and
mourning, and famine ; and she shall be burned
with fire : for strong is the Lord that judge th her —
in one hour is thy judgment come — with violence
shall that great city Babylon be thrown down,
and shall be found no more at all." (Rev. xviii.)
Infidelity may scoff at these statements. He who
believes God's words will stand in awe of them ;
and such passages clearly shew a violent and sud-
den visitation from Heaven on the head and seat
of the apostasy. And no wonder infidels scoff be-

12 PREPARATION FOR

forehand, when even these judgments will not bring
the kingdoms of this world to true repentance.
THE KINGDOMS OF THE WORLD SHALL, after this,

MAKE OPEN WAR AGAINST OUR LORD CHRIST. The

gatherings for this war seem already beginning to
take place. The kings are gathered together by
the " three unclean spirits which go forth unto the
kings of the earth, and of the whole world, to ga-
ther them to the battle of the great day of God
Almighty." (Rev. xvi. 14.) " These shall make
war with the Lamb." (Rev. xvii. 14.) The war
itself is described in the 19th chapter.

ALL THE ENEMIES OF CHRIST UNITE TOGETHER
AGAINST HIM IN THIS LAST WAR. One passage

may shew this. " I saw the beast, and the kings
of the earth and their armies gathered together to.
make war against him that sat on the horse, and
against his army, and the beast was taken, and

O t/ •*

with him the false prophet."

THE PEOPLE OF ISRAEL SHALL, IN THESE TROU-
BLES, BE RESTORED TO THEIR OWN LAND. On this

the prophet Daniel (xii. 1) is explicit. In the
midst of the trials, when the enemy is coming in
like a flood, " the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up
a standard against him." (Isa. lix. 19.) The Jews
shall be remarkably restored ; and this itself will
be as " an ensign lifted up on the mountains,"
and as the blowing of " a trumpet to all the in-
habitants of the world and dwellers upon the
earth." (Isaiah, xviii.) The Jews are to join in
the hallelujahs of the last triumph. (Rev. xix.)

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 13

Without entering into explanations of these pre-
dictions, the general aspect is sufficiently clear.
They all shew a violent conflict and struggle yet
to come, carried on by the enemies of our Lord
against him and his people. The general ten-
dency of all these predictions is clear, and their
near approach to our times must, to those who
hold the Protestant interpretation of the Revela-
tion, be manifest. The fearful issue of these con-
flicts is an unparalleled vintage, " the great wine-
press of the wrath of God," (Rev. xiv, 18,) and
an unparalleled supper, " the supper of the great
God," filling " all the fowls that flv in the midst

t/

of heaven" with the flesh of kings, captains, mighty
men, " and all men, both free and bond, both
small and great." (Rev. xix. 7, 8.)

Such are the plain predictions of the word of
God as to the day of tribulation yet to come, and
they are here stated that the reader may see the
special reason in these days for seeking to bring
men to a prepared state for trials ; and that Pro-
testants who hold the pure faith of Christ may be
ready for the peculiar difficulties of this time, and
be fully blessed in them. Let us, then, next con-
sider THE SITUATION OF GOD's CHILDREN IN THESE
LAST TRIALS.

There may probably be a sealed class (compare
Ezek. ix. and Rev. vii.) remarkably and altogether
preserved from them ; but it is clear that MANY

OF GOD'S SERVANTS WILL BE SHARERS IN THE

TRIALS. As Jeremiah and Ezekiel and Daniel

14 PREPARATION FOR

shared the trials of the first captivity ; as the first
Christians, though preserved from the horrors of
the siege of Jerusalem, had suffered much pre-
viously, 1 Thess. ii. 14 ; so we have reason to
think the church, represented by that of Phila-
delphia, while preserved, will yet pass through
" the hour of temptation which shall come upon
all the world, to try them that dwell upon the
earth." It will be seen by their burning lamps
and readiness to go out to meet him, who are
wise virgins and who are foolish. " Every man's
work shall be made manifest, for the day shall
declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire, and
the fire shall try every man's work of what sort

it is.'

But in these trials there will be SUCH A REFUGE

AS WILL COMPLETELY SHELTER THE PREPARED
SERVANTS OF CHRIST FROM EVIL. This IS often

brought before us. In the midst of the last
troubles the disciples of Christ are directed to
" lift up their heads, for their redemption draweth
nigh." They can say " God is our refuge and
strength, a very present help in time of trouble."
They are charged, " Come, my people, enter thou
into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee ;
hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until
the indignation be overpast." (Isaiah, xxvi. 20.)
They are assured, " Because thou hast kept the
word of my patience, I also will keep thee from
the hour of temptation." And again, " the Lord
knoweth how to deliver the godly out of tempta-

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 15

tion, and to reserve the unjust unto the day of
judgment to be punished."

But it is not merely a refuge and deliverance
that will be provided ; the tribulation itself will be

A TIME OF UNSPEAKABLE SPIRITUAL ADVANTAGE

TO THE3I. In this great tribulation they have
" washed their robes, and made them white in the
blood of the Lamb." They who now watch and
pray, will then " be accounted worthy to escape
all those things that shall come to pass, and to
stand before the Son of Man." We are solemnly
assured, not only that that day shall overtake
them as a thief, and that they are not appointed
to wrath ; but also that they are appointed " to
obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ." In
the darkest part of the tribulation, they are assured
thus : " Ye shall have a song as in the night, when
a holy solemnity is kept, and gladness of heart, as
when one goeth with a pipe to come unto the
mountain of the Lord." Such promises intimate,
not merely a preservation, but a season of peculiar
holiness and solemn joy to God's children at this
time — a season which rapidly ripens and prepares
the saints for their rapture to glory, without that
separation of the spirit from the body which has
hitherto taken place in the death of believers in
general.

The day of tribulation will be THE DAY OF
LARGE CONVERSION TO CHRIST. It will give strik-
ing advantages to the saints for manifesting the
blessedness of true religion. We have manv ex-

o ,/

16 PREPARATION FOR

plicit statements that the time of these judgments
will be the time of extended conversion of souls.
" The great multitude which no man can number
came out of it." (Rev. vii.) The last gatherings
to the great supper are, " that the house may be
filled." (Luke, xiv. 23.) We are assured, " when
thy judgments are in the earth the inhabitants of
the world shall learn righteousness." (Isa. xxvi. 9.)
The great harvest of the church, possibly in itself
a time of trial, precedes the full vintage of wrath.
(Rev. xiv.) Just after Daniel mentions this great
tribulation (Dan. xii.) and the resurrection fol-
lowing it, he gives the most glowing of all the
promises to those successful in labours for the
spiritual good of others : " they that be wise shall
shine as the brightness of the firmament; and
they that turn many to righteousness as the stars,
for ever." This accords with that which he further
predicts : " they that understand among the people
shall instruct many, yet they shall fall by the
sword, and by flame, by captivity, and by spoil,
many days." Thus, as in the beginning, the blood
of the martyrs is the seed of the church.

By the great difference of the effects of these
troubles THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN THE RIGHTEOUS

AND THE WICKED SHALL BE MANIFEST. Now it IS

often difficult to ascertain the real character of
men, and in distinguishing we often make mis-
takes ; then it will be manifest as the sun at noon
day. Now we " call the proud happy ;" then the
day comes " that shall burn as an oven, and all

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 17

the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be
as stubble." Now men say, " What profit is it if
we keep God's ordinances ?" then those who have
feared the Lord will be spared as his dear chil-
dren, and be as " his jewels," while the folly of
the wicked " shall be manifest unto all men."
And " men shall return and discern between the
righteous and the wicked, and him that serveth
God and him that serveth him not."

The CHARACTER AND SITUATION OF THE WICKED

UNDER THESE TRIALS is also brought before us.
There are those who will remain unconverted
under these unequalled exhibitions of grace on
the one hand and judgment on the other. Their
character will become more and more desperately
wicked (1 Tim. iii. 13), and this wickedness more
manifest to all. (Rev. xix. 19.) Even now, "after
their hardness and impenitent heart," they fi trea-
sure up to themselves wrath against the day of
wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of
God." It appears clear that the tribulation of the
seventh vial serves to separate men into their re-
spective classes, and not finally to destroy the
wicked. When the great hail out of heaven falls
upon the wicked, they do but "blaspheme God
because of the plague of the hail." (Rev. xvi. 21.)
Just thus Pharaoh, in Egypt, grew more hardened
with each successive judgment. They will go on
to make war with the Lamb and his followers,
and probably will reduce the people of Christ to
such extremities as to make their faith ready to

18 PREPARATION FOR

fail, and then hope to cease. Hence our Lord
says, " Shall not God avenge his own elect, which
cry day and night unto him ; though he bear long
with them ? I tell you that he will avenge them
speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of man
cometh, shall he find faith upon the earth?
(Luke, xviii.)

It is in this extremity of the church, I appre-
hend, that the saints, whether brought to Christ
from among Jews or Gentiles, the first fruits unto
God and the Lamb, the faithful remnant accord-
ing to the election of grace, are changed and
translated, and, with those raised from their graves,
ascend to the immediate presence of their Re-
deemer, and all are received to their heavenly
habitations. They are judged according to their
works, and have their lots assigned to them by
their righteous Judge in their blessed and hea-
venly kingdom. (Dan. xii. 13.)

The earth for a season seems left wholly to the
unconverted; the Jewish nation, not yet truly
converted, but self-righteous (Isa. Ixvi.), and the
nominal church in its Laodicean state of wretched
ignorance. After the first recovery of the wicked
from their surprise at the translation of the saints,
they, like the Egyptians, pursue their enmity,
and especially manifest it towards the Jewish na-
tion, in part restored to their own land. There
are many predictions of this, see especially the
last chapters of Isaiah and Zechariah, the 38th
and 39th of Ezekiel, and the 19th chapter of

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 19

Revelation. These attempts issue in the return
of our Lord with all his saints, (Zech. xiv. 5 ;
Jude, 14, 15; Rev. xix. 14;) the conversion of
the Jewish nation, and the awful and immediate
and everlasting punishment by fire of the living
obstinately wicked, and their being " cast alive
into a lake burning with fire and brimstone, to be
tormented day and night for ever and ever." The
conversion of the Jewish nation, and these direct
judgments from God our Saviour on the wicked,
end in that nation becoming a fuller blessing to
the rest of the world, even than they have yet
been ; while some of the Gentiles escaping,
through the forbearance of God, out of these last
judgments, are sent " to the nations afar off that
have not heard the fame of Jehovah, neither have
seen his glory." (Isaiah, Ixvi. 19.) Thus, "the
nations of them which are saved shall walk in the
light of the " heavenly Jerusalem, and " the kings
of the earth bring their honour and glory into it."
The glorified saints reign in the millennial king-
dom with Christ; the judgment of the dead, not
partakers of the first resurrection, takes place, and
then the glorified host " reign for ever and ever."
(Rev. xxii. 5.) In short, God's righteousness,
grace, and dealings with the sons of men, will be
made clear, so that he will be fully justified by all
creation.

Let us yet farther, for a moment, glance at THE

GLORY OF THE RISEN CHURCH OF CHRIST. Who

can describe this ? If " eye hath not seen, nor ear

20 PREPARATION FOR

heard, neither have entered into the heart of man,
the things which God hath prepared for them that
love him" (1 Cor. ii. 9), or them that "wait for
him" (Isaiah, Ixiv. 4), and they are only revealed
to us by his Spirit, what must be the blessedness
and glory of a resurrection body and a perfectly
purified soul? what the blessedness of asso-
ciating for ever only with those thus glorious, of
sharing all their joys, and with them living always
in that presence of our Lord, where is fulness of
joy ? Who can tell what royalties we partake of
in the heavenly kingdom, what priestly offices we
are there honoured with, what the beauteous
splendour of the heavenly Jerusalem is? what
the Lord God giving light to his servants there
shall be ? Who can reach the height, or fathom
the depth, or measure the length and breadth, of
the love of our Immanuel and the glories of the
mansions he is preparing for his faithful followers ?
See the promises made to the overcomers in the
seven churches, how they are added one to another,
till the overcomers are raised to the highest throne
of Immanuel's glory. " To him that overcometh
will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as
I also overcame, and am sit down with my Father
in his throne."

I do not wonder at the almost extravagant de-
sire of martyrdom in the early church, having full
faith in these promises. The sufferings before us
will restore this faith. To assist the reader's faith
let us consider SOME OF THE GREAT BENEFITS OF

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 21

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH'S SAKE. Had W6 in-
deed only those words, " Blessed are they which
are persecuted for righteousness' sake," we might
be sure that our Lord would not mislead us. But
he has strengthened our faith by more distinctly
and fully shewing how they are blessed.

The PURIFYING EFFECTS of tribulation are often
set before us. Thus the apostle Peter says, " If
need be. ye are in heaviness through manifold

«/ O

temptations ; that the trial of your faith, being
much more precious than of gold that perisheth,
though it be tried with fire, might be found unto
praise, and honour, and glory, at the appearing
of Jesus Christ." And the apostle Paul tells the
Hebrews, " No chastening for the present seemeth
to be joyous ; nevertheless, afterwards it yieldeth
the peaceable fruits of righteousness to them
which are exercised thereby." Similar statements
occur frequently in the holy scriptures. Thus
our Saviour was perfected, and we are to be per-
fected in a similar manner. (Luke, vi. 40.) The
fellowship of his sufferings is needful before we
can be fully like him. Intense hatred of sin, and
ardent love to God, and inward purity, are ad-
vanced most by sanctified afflictions. And how
clearly are these things predicted by Daniel in
the last days : " Many shall be purified, and made
\vhite, and tried; but the wdcked shall do wickedly:
and none of the wicked shall understand ; but the
wise shall understand." (Dan. xii. 10.)

The VAST USEFULNESS TO OTHERS of faithful

22 PREPARATION FOR

sufferings is evident in the past history of the
church. All its successes and triumphs have been
thus attained. Our Saviour's sufferings preceded
the numerous conversions to the early church;
the apostolic sufferings, and those of the first mar-
tyrs, preceded the establishment of religion in the
Roman empire ; the martyrdom of the witnesses
before the Reformation preceded their resurrec-
tion at the Reformation ; the sufferings of the
Reformers went before the establishment and en-
largement of the Protestant churches. Men are
generally blessed in the result as they have suf-
fered for the truth, and few have been largely
blessed without going through much suffering.
Doubtless, then, the exceeding grace given to
faithful Christians, keeping them from the hour
of temptation (Rev. iii. 10), and delivering them
out of it (2 Pet. ii. 9), will be a large blessing to
multitudes in that tribulation. (Rev. vii. 14.) And
as we have some intimations that there were those
who repented during the progress of the deluge
(1 Pet. iii. 19), so may a countless multitude yet
be brought to Christ through the fidelity given to
suffering Christians in the last days.

The NATIONAL BENEFITS connected with the
sufferings of Christians are very great. See what
a candle Latimer and his brother Ridley kindled
in Britain by their sufferings ! Which of the pro-
phets, apostles, and martyrs, have not, by their
sufferings, helped ultimately to preserve and spread
vital godliness among some at least in their own

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 23

country ? Jerusalem would have been preserved
from the Chaldean invasion if the Lord had found
" a man to stand in the gap before him." Ten
righteous men would have preserved Sodom. We
know not how far it may please God, BRITAIN
may yet be spared in the last judgments, or raised
out of them, greatly humbled and purified, through
the faithfulness of British Christians to the Lord
Jesus Christ: How glorious an object is it for a
Christian's aim, to be a national blessing in the
highest sense to our beloved land ! Oh may we
covet this happiness, and attain it by fidelity to
Christ !

The GLORIFYING OF GOD?S GREAT NAJME is a yet

higher aim, which is set before us as a duty in the
tribulation to come. This was the first and ardenT1
desire of the Redeemer in commencing his last
prayer with his disciples : " Father, the hour is
come, glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify
Thee." This desire consoled and strengthened
him in all that was before him : " Father, glorify
thy name." We also are taught that in the last
judgments, when the city of confusion is broken
up, there shall be a remnant of whom it is pre-
dicted, " they shall lift up their voice, they shall
sing for the majesty of the Lord, they shall cry
aloud from the sea. Wherefore glorify ye the
Lord in the fires, even the name of the God of
Israel in the isles of the sea." How greatly was
God glorified in Shadrach, Meshec, and Abed-
nego, and their unflinching boldness before Ne-

24 PREPARATION FOR

buchadnezzar, and then in their wonderful preser-
vation; in Daniel's faithfulness to his God, and
his deliverance in the lion's den ; in Peter's bold-
ness before the council and sufferings for the
truth, and God's protection and deliverance ; in
Luther's firmness at Worms, and in the martyr-
doms of the Reformation ! Let God's glory be
dearer to us than life itself. And in nothing is
God's glory more exhibited than in the faith, pa-
tience, peace, love, and holy triumph of his people
over the sharpest sufferings. It shews so the truth
of his gospel and the excellence of his grace in
supporting a feeble creature like man, as to compel
the attention of the world and win many a precious
soul to Christ. It is such an honouring of the
truth of his word against all the wiles or terrors of
the world, the flesh, and the devil ; such a seeing
of him that is invisible, as utterly confounds all the
devices of Satan and the short-sighted wisdom of
men of this world. The tide of triumphant wick-
edness is resisted and turned entirely back by the
stability of the faith of suffering Christians.

OUR FINAL BLESSEDNESS AND GLORY ARE AUG-
MENTED THROUGH SUFFERINGS FOR THE TRUTH.

What is the grand theme of the rapturous hal-
lelujahs above? — the sufferings of the Lamb:
" Worthy is the Lamb that was slain." What is
it that obtains the great reward in heaven ? — suf-
fering most for his sake below : " Blessed are ye
that weep now, for ye shall laugh. Blessed are
ye when men shall hate you, and when they shall

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 25

separate you from their company, and shall re-
proach you, and cast out your name as evil, for
the Son of man's sake ; rejoice ye in that day,
and leap for joy, for behold your reward is great
in heaven." What works out for us " the more
exceeding and eternal weight of glory?" is it not
" our light affliction, which is but for a moment ?"
The prosperity of the wicked over the righteous,
which now so pains us, is short, and only just
precedes their fall. The woman is last seen
" drunken with the blood of the saints," before
it is divinely determined <e how much she hath
glorified herself and lived deliciously, so much
torment and sorrow give her." The saints crying
under the altar are quieted by this remarkable
direction, " that they should rest yet for a little
season, until their fellow-servants also, and their
brethren that should be killed, as they were,
should be fulfilled;" and then are they glorified
together. (Heb. xi. 40.) " If we suffer we shall
also reign with him." Look at all the promises ;
they are made to the victors in the battle ; and
" they overcame the accuser of the brethren by
the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their
testimony, and they loved not their lives unto
death." See how all the worthies enumerated in
the llth of Hebrews attained their glory, and
then observe Jesus, the author and finisher of our
faith, crowning the whole, and enduring the cross
that he might enter his joy.

Thus the cross is the way to the crown ; afflic-

c

26 PREPARATION FOR

tion is the path to glory. This made Paul, looking
forward to his future rejoicing, triumphantly tes-
tify, " Yea, and if I be offered" (or poured out)
" upon the service and sacrifice of your faith, I
joy and rejoice with you all." Let me, then, stir
up my own heart and yours, Christian reader,
everywhere now to prepare for the cross, not as
something that we cannot escape, but as a gra-
cious appointment of privilege and eternal gain.
What shall we look back upon hereafter with most
joy? Upon this, that by the grace of God we
were enabled to make sacrifices of things seen for
the sake of things unseen ; that we walked not by
sight, but by faith : that we endured hardness and
sufferings for Christ, and so were made blessings
to our fellow men, brought many sons to glory,
and were fully ripened for that glory.

Such are the happy effects of suffering for the
truth. We will conclude with SOME PRACTICAL
LESSONS to be drawn from this subject.

ARM YOURSELVES WITH THE MIND OF CHRIST

about suffering. To be like him is the glory of a
Christian. He foresaw with perfect distinctness
and foreknowledge all the bitter cup which he
had to taste. He knew his sorrows beforehand
far more distinctly than we can possibly know any
sufferings through which we have to go, and yet
he withheld not himself from his overwhelming
baptism, and was only straitened till it was accom-
plished. Amidst all temptations, from friends and
from foes, from the world and the devil, and from

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 27

those infirmities of our nature, with the feeling-

' o

of which he was touched, look at the invincible
firmness, patience, meekness, gentleness, love, and
faithfulness, of our divine Lord. Truly we must
look much to Jesus if we would be armed with
his mind. He will give us his spirit; he will
strengthen us with his grace ; he will impart to
us his mind.

BE FURTHER STRENGTHENED BY THE PAST EX-
PERIENCE OF ALL GOD'S CHILDREN. Suffering for
the truth, from the time of righteous Abel, has
ever been the way by which God has led his
people to final triumph and to full blessedness.
Thus St. James (v. 1 — 11), speaking of the trials
of God's servants in the last days, says, " Take,
my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in
the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering
affliction, and of patience. Behold, we count
them happy which endure." Their faithfulness in
speaking in the name of the Lord brought on
them all their affliction ; but thence came all their
glory. (2 Cor. iv. 17.) It is the meek and holy
spirit of a believer, joined with his unflinching
confession of the truth, that disquiets the con-
science of sinners, and provokes their wrath ; for
it interferes with the easy enjoyment of all the
lusts of this world. Nor will the meekness of
Moses, the tenderness of Jeremiah, the wisdom
of Paul, and the combination of every grace and
perfection in our Lord Jesus, screen the faithful
servant of the Most High from this enmity. But

c 2

28 PREPARATION FOR

the more the world hates us for fidelity to God's
truth, the more the Lord himself loves us, and
will honour us, so that great shall be our reward
in heaven.

Now GATHER SCRIPTURAL TRUTH, that may be
as oil in our lamps, FOR THE DAY OF NECESSITYO
A man unacquainted with all that God has fore-
told in his word of events yet to come, and ex-
pecting things only to go on as they have done,
must be taken unawares by them (Luke, xxi. 34),
and so wholly unprepared ; while he who has
attended to God's warnings, and treasured up all
his gracious statements of what has to take place,
will not be taken by surprise, but will be found
ready and provided against the evil day. The
prepared Christian, who remembers what Christ
has beforehand told him, will be able, amidst all
the unusual shakings and convulsions of that day,
and the terrors of his fellow men, to lift up his
head. He knows the end of the Lord, he sees
his redemption and that of the whole earth ap-
proaching, and with this hope he can be full of
confidence, peace, and joy.

CHEERFULLY ENDURE PRESENT CROSSES TO BE
TAKEN UP FOR THE TRUTH. After St. Paul had
expressed, in the last epistle which he wrote, his
tender attachment to Timothy, he thus exhorts
him : " Be thou partaker of the afflictions of the
gospel, according to the power of God," shewing
him his privilege and his strength for it. There
is each day some sacrifice of ease and inclination

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 29

to be made ; some restraint to be put upon appe-
tite and the love of pleasure ; some mortification of
our high-mindedness, something disagreeable to
flesh and blood, to be endured; something labo-
rious and toilsome to be effected; by acting on
Christian principles. By faithfulness in these
things we shall become enured and habituated to
greater trials, a'nd so meet for a larger blessing.
" I die daily" was the experience of one of the
noblest sufferers in the school of Christ. That
this is our only safe course is clear from the plain
direction of our Lord : " If any man will come
after me, let him deny himself, and take up his
cross daily, and follow me." It is easy to think
that we may be firm and valiant for the truth in a
great trial and yet neglect present self-sacrifice ;
but the best means of being firm then, is by now
beginning a course of firmness and self-denial and
self-restraint. Observe how the self-denial of
Daniel and his companions in private preceded
their public boldness and firmness in standing for
the truth. Compare Daniel, chap. I. with chaps,
in. and v.

ASK FOR GRACE TO BE BOLD IN THE CONFESSION

OF TRUTH. Thus did the apostles, and they were
heard. (Acts, iv. 29.) True it is, this boldness will
expose us to ridicule and bitter hatred of evil
men ; true it is, even Christians may blame us,
and they of our own household think we carry
matters much too far; true it is, we may have
thereby to surfer and be shamefully entreated,

30 PREPARATION FOR

even though we had the wisdom, love, and hu-
mility, of Paul ; yet still let us be " bold in our
God, to speak the gospel of God with much con-
tention." Oh how great a grace is given to a
Christian when he is enabled to look off the praise
of man as a small thing, and one to be despised,
when put in competition with the praise of God ;
and with large love to all, with humility and pa-
tience and simplicity of mind, to seek only God's
approval. This will give us real boldness, as it
did to Peter and John before all the rulers of the
Jews (Acts, iv. 13 — 19), and so make us large
blessings to his church. The hope of the Re-
deemer's return is peculiarly calculated to em-
bolden and strengthen even the timid and weak
believer faithfully to confess present and needful
truth.

BE WATCHFUL. How often is this direction
given by our Lord in the gospels with reference
to these days ! and it is repeated from heaven
for this very period. (Rev. iii. 2 ; xvi. 15.) Let us
take care, then, that our garments are not defiled.
Errors and heresies abound on every side. The
three unclean spirits are all abroad, seeking to
gather men into the armies that war against the
Lamb : Jesuits, Revolutionists, and Infidels, shew
to enlightened Christians whose they are and to
whom they belong. Many have been defiled, and
when once the defilement is received, how diffi-
cult is the removal ? " Blessed is he that watcheth
and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked and

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 31

they see his shame." This is the special charge
and watchword of the Christian army for this
season. But not only have we to watch against
errors and temptations and sins, but to watch for
every opportunity of glorifying God and bene-
fiting men, seizing promptly each occasion of
doing good. And above all, we have to watch and
wait for the coming of the Redeemer : ee Watch,
therefore, for ye know not what hour your Lord
doth come." Happy those wise Christians to
whom this is a blessed hope for which they are
looking, to whom he comes as the expected Bride-
groom, and they enter with him to the marriage.

BE DILIGENT IN SEEKING TO SAVE SOULS. The

words of our Saviour should especially mark our pur-
pose and be our guide day by day. "I must work
the works of Him that sent me while it is day, the
night cometh when no man can work. As long
as I am in the world I am the light of the world."
Soon the present opportunities of spreading divine
truth ; soon freedom, liberty of action, and means
of reaching all quarters of the earth, as far as re-
gards the exertions of the children of God, may
be greatly impeded or wholly taken from us. Soon
we may be despoiled of the many advantages we
now have for doing good to the bodies and souls
of men ; but if we now scatter the seed it may
be harrowed in in days of trial, and ultimately
bring a glorious harvest, in which we shall for ever
rejoice. " He that winneth souls is wise." Let
this be the wisdom which we choose and prefer.

32 PREPARATION FOR

HOWEVER TRIED, IN THE ASSURED HOPE OF VIC-
TORY, BE FAITHFUL TO THE END. If, in the last

appearance of the harlot, she is " drunken with
the blood of the saints ; " if the great " war with
the Lamb " is yet to take place ; if the saints are
to be " made white, purified, and tried ; " if " the
elect" are to "cry day and night" before they are
avenged; we may justly anticipate great temp-
tations to unfaithfulness. Let us think of these
things beforehand, that when they really come,
being ready, we may stand, and, " having done
all, stand." Let the cheering promise, " Be thou
faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown
of life," animate us in the darkest hours. To have
nothing but love in our hearts and our lives to our
fellow men, even to those who hate us most, and
yet for this to endure unto a bloody death, striv-
ing against sin (Heb. xii.), here indeed we are
conformed to Christ ; and if it be the hardest, yet
it is the shortest path to highest blessedness and
glory, and that for ever.

And that you may choose and delight in this
way, we say, in the close of all, BE ANIMATED BY

THE BRIGHT HOPE OF A GLORIOUS AND EVERLAST-
ING REDEMPTION. This is what the whole crea-
tion is waiting for. All the exhibitions of evil in
our world will, through the wonder-working mercy
of our God, be overruled to this end. In what a
glowing strain, hoping for this, the apostle says,
" I reckon that the sufferings of this present time
are not worthy to be compared with the glory

SUFFERING FOR THE TRUTH. 33

which shall be revealed in us; for the earnest
expectation of the creature waiteth for the mani-
festation of the sons of God." The apostle pro-
ceeds to declare the groans and travail of all crea-
tion, and even of the sons of God, waiting for
their redemption. Well may it be so, for how
great are the glories of that redemption ! The
recovery of all creation from its ruin through sin ;
the earth and the creatures on it delivered from
the curse (Rom. viii. 19 — 22); the resurrection of
the body from the grave, and the deliverance of
the soul from all bondage and taint of sin, and its
perfected likeness to God ; the will of God done
on earth as it is in heaven ; his kingdom come,
his name everywhere hallowed, and his reigning
in his glory : these are some parts of this redemp-
tion. " There shall be no more curse, but the
throne of God and the Lamb shall be in it, and
his servants shall serve him, and they shall see his
face, and his name shall be in their foreheads;
and there shall be no night there, and they need
no candle, neither light of the sun, for the Lord
God giveth them light, and they shall reign for
ever and ever." O how well was it for Enoch,
that he walked with God, and for Noah, that he
was a preacher of righteousness ; for Abraham, that
he went into a strange land, and withheld not his
only son ; for David, that he was bold, trusting
onlv in the name of Jehovah to contend with

•/

Goliath, and became the man after God's own
heart ; for Daniel, that he was cast into the lion's

c 3

34 PREPARATION FOR SUFFERING, ETC.

den ; for Peter, that he followed the Lord in his
sufferings; for Paul, that he for the truth went
through unequalled afflictions ; and for John, that
he was the companion of the faithful in their tri-
bulation ! O happy confessors, martyrs, fathers,
reformers, and sufferers, in every age, who, en-
during all evils for Christ, through much tribula-
tion have entered the kingdom of Heaven ! How
much better all their momentary sufferings, issuing
in such an everlasting glory, than this world's
highest transitory gains and pleasures and ho-
nours, which do but end in shame and everlasting
contempt.

Christian reader, place these things before your
mind. Look not at the things seen, but at the
things unseen. Come to some fixed determina-
tion, in the strength of grace, to be the Lord's
only. Let us follow our Protestant fathers in the
part of the war now left to us, and, if need be
by suffering, let us achieve the victory for our
church, our country, and our world, the full bles-
sedness of which will be only known and enjoyed
in that " new heavens and new earth wherein
dwelleth righteousness."

35

JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL:

& Eale of tfje Covenant.

BY THE REV. JOHN GUMMING, M.A.

THE subject of the present sketch was one of the
most pious, though not of the most prominent, of
a remnant of the Scottish nation, whose obliquities
of judgment on some points are merged in a
universal admiration of their burning and enthu-
siastic devotion to the Kirk and the Covenant. He
was born in one of the humble shielins of the
most uncultivated districts of Ayrshire. He had
not only acquired a varied knowledge of sacred
writ from venerable and Christian parents, but by
associating with many of the persecuted and peeled
children of the covenant — ministers and laymen, he
had gathered the elements of an education far
superior to that of his peasant cotemporaries, and
had thoughts at one time of entering the sacred
order of the ministry, should God in his great
goodness grant the persecuted kirk a time of respite
and revival. The cottage of Priesthill, had few

36 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

modern comforts, and yet fewer modern elegances.
It was built of wood, and on the side of a rising
ground variegated with morass and corn, a few
large trees and stunted shrubs. A lark in a wil-
low cage and a veteran mastiff dog were its sole
guardians outside. Its windows were few and
small, and appeared to be of as great service in
giving exit to the smoke, as in affording ingress
to the light of day. The fire burned on the hearth-
stone in the "but" end, the "ben" end possessing
an approximation to a grate, and carefully re-
served for the exercise of the rites of hospitality
towards those who came weekly to worship, if not
in the parochial temple, as they preferred, in some
sequestered glen, where the songs of Zion might
rise and reach the ear of God, and escape the ken
of the hireling ruffians of Clavers. The " awmrie"
was a square hole with a lid, on one side of the
fire-place, in which were carefully deposited some
of the theological writings of the elder worthies
who lived before " the troubles." These works
and the " Big Ha" Bible were the exhaustless
storehouses of instruction and consolation and
hope to the venerable inmates, John Brown, and
Isabel Weir his wife. From these alone they
gathered a conviction of the divine origin of the
sacred volume, such as the able demonstrations of
Butler and Paley cannot impart ; and in their ex-
perience gave evidence of this great fact — that
where philosophy perplexes, prayer and piety make
plain; as well as of the sacred aphorism, "If any

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 37

man will do his will, he will know of the doctrine
whether it be of God." Our great and good domes-
tic poet has well said —

Yon cottager, who weaves at her own door,
Pillow and bobbins all her little store ;
Content though mean, and cheerful if not gay,
Shuffling her threads about the live-long day,
Just earns a scanty pittance, and at night
Lies down secure, her heart and pocket light ;
She, for her humble sphere by nature fit,
Has little understanding and no wit ;
Receives no praise ; but though her lot be such,
(Toilsome and indigent, she renders much;)
Just knows, and knows no more, her Bible true —
A truth the brilliant Frenchman never knew ;
And in that charter reads with sparkling eyes
Her title to a treasure in the skies.
Oh happy peasant ! Oh unhappy bard !
His the mere tinsel, hers the rich reward ;
He praised perhaps for ages yet to come,
She never heard of half a mile from home :
He lost in errors his vain heart prefers,
She safe in the simplicity of hers.

But however repulsive to more recent habits
was the cottage or " town" of Priesthill; however
destitute of the tastefulness of woodbine and roses
outside, or sentimental ornaments within, its in-
mates made it by their residence more than a con-
secrated fane, for they adorned it with costlier
materials than the temple of Jerusalem ever pre-
sented— even the beauties of quiet and domestic
holiness. Angels paused to admire, and felt that
Solomon in all his glory was not superior to John
Brown in the cottage of Priesthill.

On a Tuesday morning, in the autumn of one

38 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

of the sad years of the seventeenth century, tidings
came that at least three hundred of the faithful
and affectionate ministers of the kirk, ardent stick-
lers for the covenant, were to be removed from
their parishes and pulpits, and the minions of a
semi-papal king to be thrust into their places.
These tidings affected Brown of Priesthill with
unutterable sorrow. He felt, as he had often ex-
pected before, that awful days were about to visit
the land of his fathers, and in his evening wor-
ship he did not fail to give utterance, in the
words of adoring confession, to his too sure pre-
sentiments of lowering mischief. According to
his custom since the commencement of the days
of adversity, and from his being the most
gifted in the parish, he assembled the little band
of parishioners who usually took sweet counsel
together in the accustomed ewe-bucht; and after
praises and prayers offered up by turns, eloquent
of deep and scriptural feeling, he communicated
to them tidings of the sore dispensation. Their
own pastor, dear to them from kindness and cha-
racter and faithfulness and all the characteristics
of a true parish priest, was, it appeared, among
the exiled band of faithful witnesses. This pierced
every heart with sorrow. Brown called on the
assembled worshippers to pour out expressions of
gratitude to God that their minister had received
grace to be faithful, — that he was ready to sur-
render all the emoluments of earth rather than act
traitorously to the only Head of the church, — that

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 39

he counted kith and kin and kirk itself but loss
for Christ. He exhorted his co-parishioners to be
firm, — to fear not, — to cleave to their solemn vows,
— and to die rather than abjure the hallowed cove-
nant.

After several days spent in painful feeling — and
in which ardent prayers were poured out three
times a day from broken and contrite hearts, in
behalf of their minister and the Redeemer's cause
to which he was a martyr — the light of the Sabbath-
morn shone on moor and hill, peaceful and cloud-
less as if no sad hearts and no sorrowful homes were
in broad Scotland. After family worship, conducted
in every house by the peasant priest with more than
ordinary feeling and fervour, and pervaded by
wrestlings and outpoured cries for interposition
and deliverance, the chime of the church bell
was borne over glen and hill, telling the listen-
ing parishioners of that holy spot in the world's
wide waste on which " mercy and truth have
met together, and righteousness and peace have
kissed each other." Soon there were seen blue
bonnets and belted plaids winding along the
hill sides, and converging towards the house of
prayer. The furrowed countenances of the more
aged wore forebodings of the worst ; and even the
buoyant spirits of the young and the inexperi-
enced were in some measure repressed. A heavy
gloom hung upon the hearts of all. The church
was crowded in every part, and all eyes, flooded
with tears, were directed to the accustomed pulpit,

40 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

from which, by a cruel and unhallowed decree,
they were, for probably the last time, to hear the
last sermon of their revered and venerated minis-
ter. The holy man ascended the sacred desk,
hung up his hat, as usual, on the rail behind him,
and began the devotional services of the sanctuary
by reading, and the congregation by singing, im-
mediately afterwards, the eightieth psalm, accord-
ing to the simple but natural version of Rous, au-
thorized by the church.

O Lord of Hosts ! Almighty God !

How long shall kindled be
Thy wrath against the prayer made

By thine own folk to thee ?

Thou tears of sorrow giv'st to them,

Instead of bread to eat ;
Yea, tears instead of drink thou giv'st

To them, in measure great.

O God of Hosts, we thee beseech,

Return now unto thine ;
Look down from heaven in love behold,

And visit this thy vine ;

That vineyard which thine own right hand

Hath planted us among ;
And that same branch which for thyself

Thou hast made to be strong.

These, to an English ear and taste, antique and
ballad verses, faithful, nevertheless, to the original,
were sung by the whole congregation with a pathos,
and power such as all instruments of sweetest
tones never can surpass. There was no pealing
organ, there were no practised choristers, no exten-

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 41

sive and proportionately sustained harmony of bass,
tenor, treble, and soprano, and yet a burst of deep
and thrilling song poured forth, that awed all
hearts into sacredness, and rose to heaven, wel-
come there, no doubt, as the morning incense.
The tune to which the words were sung was Coles-
hill, a most plaintive minor, and in all respects
well adapted to the mournful words of the sweet
singer of Israel, and to the yet more melancholy feel-
ings and circumstances of a whole congregation, of
which they were made the apposite vehicle. At
the conclusion of the chief devotional exercises of
the service, the preacher made a most impressive and
affecting address to his assembled parishioners. He
gave them a full account of the course his con-
science had prescribed, and vindicated the conduct
of his fellow exiles.

" Who am I," said the weeping yet rejoicing
preacher, " that God should have called and con-
stituted me a minister of the gospel for years, and
now honoured me with exile, and it may be, mar-
tyrdom, for his holy name's sake ? I have fought
my fight, and I have run the race, and now from
henceforth is laid up for me a crown of righteous-
ness, which the Lord the righteous Judge will give
me at that day ; and not to me only, but to all that
love his appearing. I bear my witness, — and call
upon you to do so likewise — to the doctrine, wor-
ship, discipline, and government, of the church of
Scotland. I hold the sacred and apostolic succes-
sion of her simple priesthood, I believe her to be

42 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL;

the purest portion of the catholic church. Popery
and prelacy, and all the trumpery of service and
ceremonies, I do abhor. I do witness to the na-
tional covenant — the solemn league and covenant
betwixt the three kingdoms. God forgive the
poor intruder on my ministry and labours, who
will expose many to a famine of the bread of
life. God forgive the misleaders of that part of
the people who tempt them to turn away from
their own pastors. The discipline now forced
on our free church I hold to be a plant our hea-
venly Father has not planted. Have no fellowship
with it. e Be faithful unto death,' and Christ will
give you ea crown of life." He commended his
weeping flock to the grace and guardianship of God,
and the cause for which he and they suffered to
the presidency of those sure promises, in which
they saw, in brightening perspective, its triumphs
and its glories. In the severe, and according to
the judgment of many, bald ritual of the Scottish
church, there is often a power of impression few
unaccustomed to it suspect. The earnest and fer-
vid feeling with which the more gifted and holy
clergy of that church have made it instinct, has
often left impressions more durable than brass.
It was so on this occasion. The hearers' prayers
rose to Heaven, and returned in the shape of
broad and impenetrable shields around the vener-
able man. A thousand broadswords leapt in a
thousand scabbards, as if the electric eloquence of
the minister found in them conductors and depo-

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 43

sitaries. The audience felt sincerely, if not wholly
scripturally, that their stalwart arms and good fer-
raras must back their prayers, and present practical
comments on the sermon of the day. They were
driven to this. They must fight or they must
be slaughtered. The tidings came from nume-
rous quarters that Clavers and his desperadoes
were hovering in the horizon. This rendered
instantly necessary those measures of resistance
the propriety of which some of themselves had at
first questioned. Every one felt now that it be-
came his sacred duty to conquer or to die ; to per-
petuate freedom by their swords, or to be mown down
as grass, and leave slavery to their children. The
sun of the Sabbath set as if it were to rise to-mor-
row on an equally green and quiet earth. Many
and fervent were the humble but hallowed pray-
ers that the Angel of the covenant received in
his golden censer that night, from family altars.
The liturgy of the heart and of the spirit was in
each home ; and the plaintive melodies of the
olden day swelled from trembling and quiver-
ing lips by every ingle. In John Brown's house-
hold the seventy-ninth psalm was the evening
exercise.

Against us mind not former sins,

Thy tender mercies shew ;
Let them prevent us speedily,

For we're brought very low.

For thy name's glory, help us, Lord,

Who hast our Saviour been !
Deliver us for thy name's sake ;

O, purge away our sin !

44 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

Why say the heathen, Where's their God?

Let him to them be known
"When those who shed thy servants' blood

Are in our sight o'erthrown.

At twelve o'clock that night the muffled bells of
many and distant parishes were heard, like pre-
sentiments of coming sadness, or the first notes of
a premature requiem. The sound sunk like lead
into many a mother's heart. Muskets, pistols, and
broadswords, were buckled on, and before sunrise,
at two o'clock, many thousand Scottish peasants,
trained to arms, and full of a heroism the more
fearless and intrepid because sacred and allied with
God and their fatherland, were assembled on the
brown heath. Each regiment or division was well
officered, and a whole synod of clergy acted as
chaplains. On a hill side in the immediate vicinity
of Drumclog were seen more than two thousand —
mothers, wives, and children — from whom arose
fervid prayers, not so much for the safety of their
near and dear relatives as for the glory of the Lord
and the safety of the covenanted and consecrated
church. " Victory is sure," shouted a grey-haired
minister ; " the prayers of wives and mothers and
widows and orphans are lifted up to the God of
the widow and the orphan and the stranger, to
whom the shields of the earth do belong, and he
will hear them." The flash and roll of a cannon
discharged on a neighbouring eminence was the
signal that announced the approach of the perse-
cutor and his myrmidons. That moment, " To the

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 45

throne of grace !" was given as the word of com-
mand from every officer, and in two minutes each
minister knelt in the heart of each battalion, and
poured forth his feelings, faith, and prayer, in the
deep and melting eloquence of pure devotion. The
burden of the prayer of the aged Cameron was,
ee Lord, spare the green and take the ripe." It
was an impressive spectacle, but a spectacle misun-
derstood by Clavers and his rapidly -approaching
dragoons. " The covenanters are on their knees
imploring mercy," exclaimed one of Montrose's
officers. " Not of us," rejoined another, " but of
their God. They will repulse us, or die on that
field." " At them !" cried Claverhouse ; " spare
neither man nor child !" Before this fell onset was
made, Clavers sent a flag, not seriously to offer
terms of peace, but to deceive the unwary moun-
taineers. They, however, fully knew their man,

\j * «/

and sent him word " that they loved not the
bow, the shield, and the sword, and garments
rolled in blood ; thev were not the assailants, but

mf

the assailed ; they did not wish to capture him
or his men ; they had no prisons, no chains,
no desire to make prisoners ; and if he and his
men would retire, and allowr them to worship God
as their fathers of erst, they would not touch a hair
of a horseman's head." " No quarters !" shouted
Claverhouse. <( No quarters !" re-echoed his troops
as they rushed down the mountains of Drumclog.
" So be it, Amen," cried Burley, on the right
wing of the hosts of Zion. " God send me a

46 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

meeting with Clavers, that I may cast out his car-
cass to the ravens, and ease the camp of its
troubler." " Fire !" was the command that rushed
along: the lines of Clavers, stretching from one end

O O

of the morass to the other; but before the flash
gleamed in the sunshine, every covenanter was flat
upon his face, and " nobody" was the billet Pro-
vidence had fixed for each bullet of that volley.
" Rise ! fire !" passed along the line of the cove-
nant, and the full line fired a volley, and knelt
while the second fired next ; and every volley told
upon the ranks of Clavers with terrible destruction.
Ever and anon, as the mountain breeze swept away
the smoke, the stern, solemn, knit countenances of
the covenanters shewed theirs was not mere animal
excitement, but the sacred resolve of a deep prin-
ciple— the well-weighed purpose to exalt its su-
premacy, or themselves to seal it with their hearts'
blood. Claverhouse, stung to the heart at the
fearful havoc made in his ranks, ordered his ca-
valry to charge. On seeing this, Hall of Haughead
ordered the spearmen to form and kneel, and re-
ceive the cavalry on their spears ; and Hackston
shouted to his men to fire. " God, our church,
our country, and the covenant ! " gave more than
mortal energy to every soul, and more than human
precision to each bullet. By-and-by the conflict be-
came man to man ; but the fierce veterans of Cla-
vers could not stand the almost unearthly coolness,
and yet burning intrepidity, of the mountaineers
of the covenant. Burley — a man of prodigious

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 47

strength and self-command — was seen dashing into
the ranks of the enemy's cavalry like one of his
own mountain torrents, sweeping all resistance
before him. Down his horse rushed upon the
cavalry of Claverhouse, who, unable to bear the
shock, staggered and stuck fast, many of them, in
the morass. As each shot took effect the cavalier

0

was seen to leap from his saddle, spin round, and
roll down on the turf. A colonel of dragoons

o

rushed onward and encountered Burley. but the

*/ •*

covenanter's ferrara laid open the colonel's head at
one fell blow. Claverhouse was seen in the heart
of a hollow square, his eyes lighted up with fiendish
hate. He was the object chiefly aimed at ; every
effort was made by the officers of the covenant to
bring him down. Burley risked his life again and
again to measure swords with him, and on one occa-

O *

sion swept away a piece of his sword-hilt by a stroke
of his Andrea. " He is steel-proof and lead-proof,"
cried Hamilton ; (e try a silver bullet." " It is no
such unearthly defence," said Burley ; <f it is his
fine charger that saves him." Ere these words had
well escaped from his lips, Burley again spurred
his horse, and rushed at full speed, bringing down
horsemen right and left, and levelled at Clovers,
but struck his blow too soon. His ferrara felled
his antagonist's horse, and his rider rolled on the
morass. A hundred of his own dragoons covered
him with their bodies till he was again mounted.
Meanwhile, man fought man, each stepping where
his comrade stood the instant that he fell. In

48 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

the sanguinary melee it was difficult to distinguish
the victorious from the vanquished. The muscular
power and mental energy of the covenanters were
unparalleled ; they fought like men whose hearts
converged around a deep and sacred sentiment,
the tide of which rushed along every nerve and
sinew with a kind of resistless power, conquering
and to conquer. The soldiers of Clavers exhibited
the usual animal ferocity of well-fed and well-
disciplined men ; but perhaps the most formidable
section of his battalions were the Hielandmen of
the west, who were one degree remote from savages.
Both sides claimed the victory ; only victory, on the
side of the covenanters, was scarcely more eligible
than defeat. It was amid their shattered dwellings,
their green fields; that the blue and scarlet colours,
inscribed with CHRIST'S CROWN AND COVENANT,
were dyed again and again in the blood of its de-
fenders ; and cairns and hillocks, the only shrouds
of departed saints and warriors, covered those vales,
where of old the only objects beside the tenantry
were the smoke of the moorland cottage, that curled
upward to the skies, and the pees-weep, the merle,
and the mavis, that relieved the otherwise solitary
glen. Such of the covenanters as had been captured
by the troops of Claverhouse were carried away
prisoners, to endure the torture of the thumb-screws,
the boot, and the miseries of Haddo's Hole. The
savage troopers pillaged and murdered wherever
they appeared, visiting their dreadful brutalities on
helpless virgins and weeping mothers, snatching

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 49

the bread from orphans' hands, and the last sheep
from the widows' fold. Is it to be wondered that
some of the descendants of such sufferers entertain
a horror of prelacy,, when we bear in mind that all
this was done under its assumed sanction, and, in
their judgment, in order to uproot the vine their
forefathers planted, and to introduce, not an Eng-
lish, but a Romish prelacy ; and to cause to spring
up an exotic on their native soil which neither
they nor their progenitors approved. Many brave
hearts were cold in that field ; their souls, neverthe-
less, rejoiced in glory. The celebrated Cameron
was left on Drumclog a mangled corpse ; and to
their deep disgrace, the troops of Claverhouse cut
off his hands and head, and carried them to his
aged father, who was in prison in Edinburgh for the
testimony of Jesus. The savages of Clavers, dead
to the instincts of humanity, shewed the head and
hands to the grey-haired man, while they exult-
ingly asked him if he recognised them. He took
up his son's head and hands amid tears and
smiles, and said, " I know, I kno\v them ; they are
my son's, my own dear son's ; it is the Lord, good
is the will of the Lord, who cannot wrong me or
mine, but has made goodness and mercy to followr
us all our days. Father of heaven, I thank thee
that these hands fought and prayed so faithfully in
thy service, and that these pale lips expended all
their eloquence, and these eyes their tears, for thy
covenanted cause." The body of Richard Came-
ron was buried in Airdmoss; and often on that spot

50 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

sainted martyrs have sat and refreshed their souls.
The grateful remembrance, not the worship, of
saints is ingrained alike in nature and in grace.
The pious Peden frequently visited the martyr's
grave, and as frequently exclaimed, " O to be wi'
Ritchie Cameron !"

Among those who escaped from the sanguinary
raid we have very briefly sketched was John Brown
of Priesthill, the more immediate subject of this
narrative. We have already alluded to the traits of
piety and Christian heroism by which he was emi-
nently distinguished. His blood had dyed Drum-
clog, though his life was mercifully preserved. We
have also mentioned the name of his wife, whose
sympathies and unsubdued affections ever were as
ministering angels to her suffering husband. Their
marriage, some years before this, was almost pro-
phetic of their separation: its brief story is so
striking that it should be told. He had become
acquainted with Isabel Weir at the house of her
father, to which his business frequently led him.
After some months of growing and affectionate
intimacy, they fixed on the day of marriage. The
desolations of their father's house prevented all
prospect of its solemnization in the parish church ;
but providentially Peden was that day baptizing in
a neighbouring glen; and by a rock, covered with
green moss, the sacred rite of marriage between
John Brown and Isabel Weir was celebrated.
There have been more gorgeous altars, more
splendid retinue, a more richly-decorated priest,

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 51

and strains of deeper music ; but never did there
rise to Heaven more fervid prayer, or grace the
earth a more holy and affectionate couple. The
God whose temple is the universe was there ; the
holy dove nestled on their heads. At the close of
the simple but sublime ceremonial, Peden took the
bride aside, and said, " You have got a good hus-
band, value him highly; but keep linen for a wind-
ing-sheet beside you., for in a day when you least
expect it he will be taken from you, In him the
image of our Lord and Saviour is too visible to
pass unnoticed by those who drive the chariot-
wheels of persecution through the breadth and
length of bleeding Scotland ; but fear not ; thou
shalt be comforted." " God will suit the wind to
the shorn lamb," replied the weeping bride.

Many days after this, and after the fell slaughter
at Drumclog, the whole female household of Priest-
hill was seated round the ingle carding and spin-
ning wool. The turf fire burnt clearly, and shed
around the interior a cheerful light, that well con-
trasted with the murkiness and storm without ; the
affectionate shepherd-dog slept before the fire, a
very picture of domestic peace ; and the whistling
wind and pelting rain affected the minds only of
the inmates of the cottage, for, though warm and
dry themselves, they thought of the father and the
husband returning from a distance, amidst the
storm and across a dreary morass. About eight
o'clock in the evening a knock was heard at the
door, and, on two or three rushing to open it, in

D 2

52 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

the expectation of seeing their near and dear rela-
tive, a stranger, to their disappointment, presented
himself, drenched in rain, attired in the olden cle-
rical dress — the hodden gray — with a plaid around
his shoulders. In these days hospitality was un-
feigned ; and though the stranger was no substitute
for a father, he was not less kindly received. The
visitor was welcomed " ben," and placed in the
warmest corner by the ingle, where he squeezed
the rain from his plaid, and enjoyed the blazing
fire. " May the blessing," he said, " of him that
is ready to perish rest on you, my bonnie bairns,"
addressing himself to Brown's little children that
prattled beside him. Scarcely had he uttered these
words when another and a well-known voice was
heard, and John Brown himself entered, and im-
mediately recognised in the stranger the pious and
faithful Renwick, who had fled to Holland in the
more troublous times. " I fear, my dear brother in
the bonds of truth and of persecution," exclaimed
Brown, as he grasped his hand, ee they have not
sufficiently attended to your wants." "Abundantly,
the Lord be blessed and praised." -Excessive
preaching, wandering, often barefoot, amid rocks
and dales, famine one day and coarse food the next,
had reduced the holy man to the shadow of what
he was. " But," said he, " let none fear suffering
for sweet Christ. Our enemies," said the weary
man, " think they sufficiently harass the puir chil-
dren of the covenant when they hunt us like
partridges on the mountain, and drive us from the

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 53

manses of our fathers and our fathers' fathers to
the morasses and the wilds of earth ; but they are
bitterly mistaken. For even amid the storms of
these last two nights I cannot express what sweet
times I have had, when I had no covering but the
dark curtains of night; yea, in the silent watch
my mind was led out to admire the deep and in-
expressible ocean of joy wherein the whole family
of heaven swim. Each star led me to wonder
what he must be who is the Star of Jacob, of whom
all stars borrow their shining. Indeed, if I may
term it, I am much obliged to enemies ; they have
covered me many a table in the wilderness, and
made me friends where I never expected them."

The two venerable men — in whose hearts, with
all their failings, and making every allowance for
the excesses of a sacred enthusiasm, which, even
in its wildest moods, is infinitely preferable to cold
and calculating selfishness, there glowed a flame lit
from no earthly altar, and along whose veins were
felt the beatings of a freedom which the despot's
chains cannot bind, and which the passions of the
fierce democracy cannot corrupt or dissolve ; spent
many hours, and exhausted many sacred topics, in
sweet and sanctified communion. They wept to-
gether when they remembered Zion, its reft harps,
its bleeding children, its broken folds ; but even in
their weeping there was hope. Their very tears
threw out rainbow tints ; their very groans were of
the covenant ordered in all things and sure ; the
Spirit of God withdrew in those days from courts

54 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

and palaces, and dwelt in cottages, in glens, and
ewe-buchts. Outside the covenanters, all was want
and weariness and woe ; but within their hearts, as
in a congenial home, the spirit of peace tabernacled.
The bulls of Bashan and the dogs of the uncircum-
cised tracked their footsteps, and shed their blood ;
but the undefiled, the holy dove, had made his nest
in the inmost recesses of their hearts, and in the
agonies of martyrdom poured forth songs significant
of unutterable glory. The soldiers of the dominant
party received orders to shoot not only the con-
victed, but the suspected, of real and vital godli-
ness ; and these orders they mercilessly executed.
The virgin snow as it lighted on the earth was in-
stantly stained with a yet holier and purer thing-
the blood of martyrs ; and its flakes became the
sacred shroud, and its hillocks the consecrated
graves, of righteous men.

It was not many days after Renwick had left
Priesthill that the approach of the cruel and mer-
cenary murderers of Clavers were seen from a
neighbouring height. This was the signal for
speedy separation. Accordingly, John Brown re-
treated to a distant ravine, where rocks and brush-
wood and heather constituted a hiding-place so
complete, that it seemed as if the bounteous God
of creation and providence had prepared it for the
suffering and the persecuted for Christ's sake in
the times of their troubles. In this sheltered ra-
vine he felt he was not alone ; prayer and praise
were therefore the spontaneous outpourings of his

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 55

soul ; and the Lord, whose temple is the universe,
heard him. Before he had added the fervent
amen to the litany that breathed forth as the even-
ing incense from his rapt spirit, he heard sounds of
psalmody from some worshipper in another chamber
of the same temple, and on listening more atten-
tively, he recognised the plaintive tones of mar-
tyrdom wafting heavenward these words of the
psalmist —

Oh, let the prisoner's sighs ascend

Before thy throne on high ;
Preserve those in thy mighty power

That are ordained to die.

Brown felt the music, and the truths it softened
and subdued to very heaven unspeakably precious;
and, before the sweet singers, near, but unseen,
could begin another verse, he raised, in the same
key and to the same tune, in unison with their
voices also, the next line —

Though ye have lain among the pots,

Like doves ye shall appear,
Whose wings with silver, and with gold

Whose feathers covered are.

The response of Brown surprised the other wor-
shippers ; it was not the echo of their own they
felt sure, and yet they knew of no other of the
persecuted for Christ who could be in the moss-
hag near them. At length John Brown presented
himself, to the high joy of the little band who were
his brethren in tribulation, and many minutes did
not elapse before they all knelt, and found an

56 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

organ of true prayer, of glowing and filial devotion,
in John Brown. Never were petitions more ear-
nest, never more replete with real devotion. The
angel of the covenant presented them in the golden
censer with the prayers of all saints. While in many
a great cathedral, and on embroidered altars, and
beneath fretted roofs, and amid anthem peals, and
with clouds of incense, accents of idolatry re-
sounded hateful to high heaven, from that wild
glen a pure and spiritual worship, naked of all cir-
cumstance and ceremony, ascended to their God
and Christ's God, to their Father and Christ's
Father, sweeter than incense. How true is it that
too frequently the weight of ceremonial is in the in-
verse ratio of the spirituality and purity of the
worship, as if the adoration of our Father threw
off the incrustations of time the nearer it ap-
proaches the confines of eternity, and the mind of
the worshipper dropped the material and the sen-
sual, the more deeply it drinks of the unseen and
spiritual, — the earthen vessels that are needful in
this earthen tabernacle dissolving and disappearing
as the margin of the great ocean of living waters
becomes more apparent. After many sweet hours of
communion — presage to many of them of the un-
dying communion of the blessed --John Brown
proposed to a venerable minister, one of the per-
secuted, that he should baptize his youngest bairn
next morning at sunrise, as the hour most likely to
escape the cognizance of the bloodhounds. The
child was upwards of a year old, no convenient

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 57

opportunity having occurred of administering the
solemn sacrament of baptism to the little boy.
This was arranged, and Brown retired to Priest-
hill. Next morning, at sunrise, Brown, his wife,
and other two children, were seen wending their
way toward the moss-hag, to dedicate their little
one to the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of
Jacob, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. The
ceremonial was simple, severe, but scriptural. The
pious parents, according to the rubric of the
Scottish church, were the two sponsors. The vene-
rable clergyman, while he made them confess their
faith, and take on them the most solemn vows, freely
told them of all that was lowering on the future of
this world, and ready to burst in destruction upon
them. He told them at the same time of the
coming glory, the unfading crown, the better land,
" the city of the living God, the heavenly Jeru-
salem ; the general assembly of the church of the
first-born, whose names are in the Lamb's book of
life, an innumerable company of angels ; God the
judge of all, and Jesus the Mediator of the new
covenant." Brown, as desired, presented his infant
boy on his two arms ; the minister then took a little
water in his hand from a hollow in the rock, and
sprinkled it in the infant's face, saying, " John, I
baptize thee in the name of the Father, and of the
Son, and of the Holy Ghost." Prayers and praises
followed this, and next day the sacrament of the
eucharist was celebrated on the same spot. The
communion-table was the rock, a ledge in its jagged

•* O v OO

D 3

58 JOHN BROWN OF P1UESTHILL ;

side the pulpit, and around it some sat and others
knelt, the concentration of their hearts in the hal-
lowed exercise rendering them alike careless and
forgetful of the mere forms of kneeling or of sitting.
In fact, this will be found to be generally the case.
Men become contentious about forms when they
grow indifferent to realities. The little flock then
sung together a portion of another psalm-
According as the days have been

Wherein we grief have had,
And years wherein we ill have seen,
So do thou make us glad ;

And let the beauty of the Lord

Our God be us upon ;
Establish thou our handiworks,

Establish them each one.

Many months passed away with no other interest
than that of occasionally narrow escapes from the
fangs of the ministers of unrighteous vengeance.
The wonder is that Brown, who was a marked
man, escaped so often ; but his hour at length drew
near. One summer morning he had read and
prayed with his family ; the lesson read was the
sixteenth chapter of St. John's gospel, more ap-
propriate to his circumstances than he at the time
imagined. His prayers were characterized by more
than usual earnestness and unction. After the
family exercise was over, he went forth to his
daily toils. He had not, however, entered on
his farm-work many minutes, before two or three
troops of dragoons surrounded him, and made

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 59

him prisoner. The eldest child saw this sad occur-
rence from one of the windows, and ran and told
her mother. The tidings only made the weeping
wife concentrate her utmost energies for the trying
occasion. She therefore hastily snatched up her
youngest child in her bosorn, wrapt him in his
father's plaid, and cried, as she ran to see her hus-
band, " The thing that I feared is come upon me !
Oh, my God, give me grace and strength for this
hour!" Clavers heaped all kinds of insults and
reproaches on the holy man, and told him to go to
his prayers, for that his days were now done. This
he instantly did; and on one side stood the sol-
diers and their savage leader, and hard by, Mrs.
Brown, big with child, with one in her arms, and
two at her side, " patient in suffering." " Isabel !"
said Brown to his wife, " you see me summoned
this day to witness for Christ ; are you willing I
should part from you ?" " Heartily willing," said
she, amid tears that told the agony of her heart,
but with a firmness of tone that evinced how truly
her will was melted into God's. te This is all I
waited for," exclaimed the martyr, in triumph.
" O death, where is thy sting ! O grave, where is
thy victory !" He clasped his wife in his arms,
and kissed her, and after her each of his weeping
children, saying to them, " My bonnie bairns, fear
and love God your Saviour ; obey and comfort
your mother, and the Spirit of all grace keep you
to his kingdom in glory." He then knelt down,
and prayed that every covenanted blessing might

60 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

be poured on his wife and children, born and un-
born ; that the Spirit might descend on the perse-
cuted kirk as rain on mown grass ; and that his
murderers and persecutors might be brought to re-
pentance,, and forgiven. Before he had closed his
prayers, Claverhouse ordered six dragoons to fire
on him ; but even these men of blood, inured to
vengeance, reckless of life and crime, were so over-
powered by the moving prayers and unearthly
resignation of the holy man, that they refused, ut-
terly unnerved and apparently afraid to touch one
so unlike themselves. The monster Clavers him-
self therefore approached the saint, and shot him
through the head. To complete the picture of
evil, this demon in the shape of man, standing
back from his victim, and with the horse-pistol
in his hand, insultingly asked the weeping wife,
as she held her martyred husband's head, while
around both clung the sobbing children, " What
thinkest thou of thy husband now, woman ?" " I
ever thought muckle good of him," answered the
widow, " and now more than ever." Cut to the
heart at her holy heroism, Clavers said, " It were
but justice to lay you beside him." " If ye were
permitted," she replied, " I doubt not that your
cruelty is capable of it ; but how will ye be an-
swerable to God for this morning's work ?" " To
men," he replied, " I can be answerable ; and as
for God, I will take him in my own hands." With
these words he mounted, put spurs to his horse,
and disappeared. She tied up the shattered head

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 61

in a handkerchief covered the body with his plaid,
and sat down and prayed and wept beside the
corpse. It was a sad, yet sublime spectacle.
Those who prayed and praised with him in the
ravine dug his grave, and deposited his remains,
with no feigned hope of his resurrection to eternal
life. There was no funeral service over the dead ;
no prayers were said or chanted ; but the moment
the coffin was lowered into the grave, each mourner
took off his blue bonnet, and lifted his eyes in
silent, but solemn prayer, that he also might die
the death of the righteous.

In solitudes like these
Thy persecuted children, Scotia, foiled
A tyrant and a bigot's bloody laws.
There, leaning on his spear,
The Ivart vet'ran heard the word of God

•/

By Cameron thundered, or by Renwick poured
In gentle stream ; there rose the song, the loud
Acclaim of praise. The wheeling plover ceased
Her plaint ; the solitary place was glad ;
And on the distant cairns the watchman's ear
Caught doubtfully, at times, the breeze- borne note.
But years more gloomy followed ; and no more
The assembled people dared, in face of day,
To worship God, or even at the dead
Of night, save when the wintry storms raged fierce,
And thunder-peals compelled the men of blood
To couch within their dens ; then dauntlessly
The scattered few would meet in some deep dell,
By rocks o'er-canopied, to hear the voice —
Their faithful pastor's voice. He, by the gleam
Of sheeted lightning, opened the sacred book,
And words of comfort spoke. Over their souls
His accents soothing came, as to her young
The heath-fowl's plumes, when, at the close of eve,

62 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

She gathers in mournful her brood, dispersed
By murderous sport, and o'er the remnant spreads
Fondly her wings ; close nestling 'neath her breast,
They cherished cower amidst the purple blooms.

The mourners accompanied the widow of Priest-
hill to her now desolate tabernacle. The priest,
the father, and the husband, had just been re-
moved ; the chasm had been filled with despair
if Christianity had not been there to people it with
the lights of living hope, and to proclaim, in tones
from afar, " thy Maker is thy husband, a husband
to the widow and a father to the orphan." Under
circumstances of such bereavement, even the sym-
pathies of the saints of God fail to comfort. It is
often better to allow the overcharged heart of grief
to expend itself in tears, than to try to dilute its
bitter water with our consolations. Without, there-
fore, any observations of a consolatory cast, in every
variety commonplace from the frequency of the
occasions that receive them, David Steel opened
the psalm-book, and led the praises of the day by
singing the simple, but beautiful stanzas —

For he, in his pavilion, shall

Me hide in evil days ;
In secret of his tent me hide,

And on a rock me raise.

And now, even at this present time,

Mine head shall lifted be
Above all those that are my foes,

And round encompass me.

Therefore unto his tabernacle

I'll sacrifices bring
Of joy fulness; I'll sing, yea, I

To God will praises sing.

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 63

The contrast between the widow of Priesthill
and Claverhouse was in every respect complete.
He scoured the country in strength, in prosperity,
in power; she sojourned in Priesthill a lonely
weeper — poor and unprotected. The world, ever
judging according to the outward man, no doubt
pronounced the wicked alone happy, and the good
forsaken. But it was not so. That widow enjoyed
the sunshine of her Saviour's countenance, and
felt shed abroad in her heart a peace which the
world could neither give nor take away. Claver-
house was scourged by his own conscience, and
felt more dread at its rebukes than from the bullets
and broadswords of his foes. It is a fact that not
many months after the murder he perpetrated at
Priesthill, he acknowledged that " the prayer of
Brown made so deep an impression on his mind,
that he could not get rid of it when he took time
to think."

I have thus closed a tale of the covenant. It
is but a sample of scenes in which the conduct
of the sufferers was so magnanimous, that it
ought to be perpetuated in the memories, and en-
shrined in the hearts, of all generations ; in which,
also, the deeds of the dominant party were so
atrocious, that for the sake of loyalty, religion, and
mankind, they should be forgotten. The cove-
nanters have been grievously misrepresented in
history, in novels, in tradition. Radical subverters
of church and state have claimed them as prece-
dents for a course of conduct from which " the

64 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

dignified Henderson, the renowned Gillespie, the
learned Binning, the laborious Durham, the hea-
venly-minded Rutherford, the religious Wellwood,
the zealous Cameron, and the prayerful Peden,"
would have revolted in horror. The Scotch epis-
copal dissenters, so inferior in moderation to Eng-
lish churchmen, have traduced the covenanters in
a tone of bitterness unhappily too characteristic of
that sect from the hour of its deposition from the
supremacy it once usurped over the church of
Scotland. The fact is, that notwithstanding many
who enrolled themselves among them were factious,
fanatical, and superstitious, and the means of pre-
venting a peaceful adjustment of grievances, yet
those who took the lead and were the responsible
among them, were men of unquestioned piety,
profound learning, and enduring loyalty. Monu-
ments of their learning and piety survive. The
writings and commentaries of Hutchinson, Fergu-
son, Dickson, Binning, and Rutherford, are now
valued and appreciated throughout the church,
while the crabbed stuff of their bitter opponents is
buried and forgotten. Their loyalty to Charles
was too intense to be blasted by the change of his
fortunes. They refused to submit to Cromwell
while Charles lived. Loyalty with too many of
this age means the service of the king in the meri-
dian, and the abandonment of him in his decline.
It is like much in the manners and morals of a
money-worshipping generation — an article of profit
and loss. It rises and falls with the stocks. In

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 65

the hearts of the covenanters it was a sacred affec-
tion, fixed and imperishable as their sense of right
and wrong;. Even the excesses of these men are

o

not to be judged of as isolated events torn from the
turmoil of cotemporaneous things. The treatment
that stimulated these must be taken into our esti-
mate. To preach or worship apart from the church
out of which they were driven to make room for
unprincipled hirelings, subjected them to fines,
imprisonment, and torture. Sir George Maxwell,
baronet, of Nether Pollock, was fined £8000 in
the course of three years, for persisting in attend-
ing the presbyterian worship. The Highland host

— an armv of half-naked savages from Lochaber, In-
i/

verness, and Argyleshire — were sent down like a
mountain torrent upon the covenanters, to extir-
pate them. Dr. M'Crie, in his effective review
and exposure of the blasphemous libels cast upon
the men of the covenant in the " Tales of My
Landlord," by a pen that ought to have rather de-
fended them, writes thus : —

" We cannot give an account of the sufferings
which the presbyterians endured by the execution
of these barbarous measures ; they suffered extre-
mities that tongue cannot describe, and which
heart can hardly conceive of, from the dismal cir-
cumstances of hunger, nakedness, and the severity
of the climate, lying in damp caves, and in hollow
clefts of the naked rocks, without shelter, covering,
fire, or food ; none dare harbour, entertain, relieve,
or speak to them on pain of death. Many for

66 JOHN BROWN OF PRIESTHILL ;

venturing to receive them were forced to fly to
Holland, and several put to death for no other
offence. Fathers were persecuted for supplying
their children, and children for nourishing their
parents ; husbands for harbouring their wives, and
wives for cherishing their husbands. The ties and
obligations of nature were no defence. It was
made death to perform natural duties, and many
suffered death for acts of piety and charity, in cases
where human nature could not bear the thoughts
of suffering it. Nor can we give an account of the
murders perpetrated under the cloak of justice, the
inhuman tortures to which the accused were sub-
jected, to constrain them to bear witness against
themselves, their relatives, and their brethren, and
the barbarity of sounding drums on the scaffold to
drown their words ; and apprehending and punish-
ing those who expressed sympathy for them, or
who uttered the prayer — God comfort you. The
number of prisoners was often so great, that the
government could not bring them to trial. Such
of them as escaped execution were transported, or
rather sold as slaves to barbarous colonies."

We thank God that such scenes are passed.
We trust, notwithstanding many painful excep-
tions, that between the two co-ordinate Establish-
ments there exists a better and a holier feeling;
that the hot jealousies, the persecuting spirit, which
both brought with them out of popery, and for
which popery alone is responsible, has been exor-
cised alike from St. Paul's and St. Giles's — from

A TALE OF THE COVENANT. 67

Lambeth and from Edinburgh ; and that now their
points of difference are being lost in the growing
feeling of a cordial brotherhood. In the whole
past there is but one thing at which we can bear to
look backward — the cross of Christ. It rises an
illuminated spot amid surrounding gloom. On
each side of it is a thief, and before and behind it
a corrupted church and a faithless priesthood. To
that saving and glorious object we must ever look.
Let the church cease to look behind her, lest, like
Lot's wife, she become a fixture. Let her look
upward to her Lord ; inward, to the Holy Spirit,
whose temple she is ; and onward, to that unfading
glory which shall flood the universe when the Bride
shall meet the Bridegroom ; and from regenerated
races there shall rise to reconciled heaven the
anthem peal of ten thousand times ten thousand
thousand voices.

68

PROTESTANT ENERGY AND PROTESTANT HOPES.

BY MISS M. A. STODART.

I.

THEY say that clouds of papal Rome are rolling o'er

our land ;
But this we know, our hearts are fixed, and firm shall

be our stand :
We look above the earth-born clouds to light of other

days,
And martyrs' fires shine o'er our path, with calm and

steady blaze.

ii.

From north to south, from east to west, the gospel-
trumpets sound,

And thousand thousand gallant hearts in highest hopes
rebound :

The light of heav'n is on our eye, its summons in
our ear ;

Our God himself is near to aid, and wherefore should
we fear?

PROTESTANT ENERGY AND PROTESTANT HOPES. 69

III.

We know that error creepeth forth, the reptile of the

night;
But we see her turn and shrink appalled, amid the

blaze of light.
We mark the flood of evil rush — all fearless is our

eye,

For the standard 'of the Lord of Hosts is lifted up
on high.

IV.

We see the adverse legions stand — we mark their

gathering powers ;
The battle may be fierce and long, the victory must

be ours.
'Tis not by might nor power, but by the Spirit of the

Lord,
That we press so boldly to the field — God's truth our

battle- word.

v.
With serried ranks, united hearts, we stand on hostile

ground ;
Within our lines no dastard heart, no laggard, shall

be found.
Ay ! even now the cry resounds ! ev'n now we close

in fight,
And firm our prayer ascends to heav'n — « May God

defend the right!"

70

INDIFFERENCE.

BY THE AUTHOR OF " ESSAYS OX THE CHURCH."

" MARRIED, on the — of July, at St. George's,
Hanover Square, and afterwards at the - - Am-
bassador's Chapel, the Earl of , eldest son of

the Marquis of , to Lady , widow of the

late Sir - , of Shropshire. The bride is

a Neapolitan lady, of great beauty and accomplish-
ments."

It is sufficiently evident that alliances of this
description are greatly on the increase among us,
nor is it difficult to trace the cause, in the increas-
ing " liberality of thought," especially as indicated
in the literature of our times.

About twenty years since, the greatest novelist
of that or any other period succeeded in portray-
ing a female character of more than usual brilliancy
and interest. He winds up the story by marrying
her to a London merchant, a professed Protestant,
she herself being a bigoted Papist; and the reader
is told of her excellences and virtues, but not one
word as to any change in her faith, nor of any

INDIFFERENCE. 71

desire or effort on the part of her husband for
such a change.

The whole British community, excepting only
those who were too ignorant to read anything, and
those who had received higher tastes and found
better employments, — the whole British commu-
nity read, again and again, this novel. Of course,
too, a herd of imitators followed, all harping on
the same string, (-f that it was intolerable to allow
religious prejudices to interfere with the outgoing
of the heart's best affections;" and so on, in every
possible variation of phrase and of deprecation.

Unhappily, however, this tone of thought is not
confined to the lighter branches of literature.
Grave and serious books are written, in which the
doctrine is unhesitatingly inculcated, that Pro-
testants and Papists should now forget their dif-
ferences ; should cease to vex or disturb each
other; should rest content with their respective
acquisitions, and think no more of hostility or
encroachment.

Such was the theory espoused by M. Guizot,
the leading secular person among the Protestants
of France, in an essay published by him about two
years since. And within these few months we
have been treated with a similar declaration from
a German professor of the highest rank in the Pro-
testant university of Berlin.

Professor Ranke's " History of the Popes of
the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries," is a
work which has been received by the literati of

72 INDIFFERENCE.

England with the greatest warmth and unanimity.
The Quarterly Revieiv is loud in its praise ; and
the Times readily echoes the laudation. Scarcely
a breath has been heard of dissent from the general
burst of delight and approbation.

Yet what is the spirit and tenour of this pro-
fessedly Protestant wrork? It may be accurately
surmised from the fact, that the Jesuits of Paris,
making a few slight alterations here and there,
have translated Professor Ranke's history, for the
use of their pupils in France and Belgium !

This sufficiently characterizes the work. But
let us look a little into this ambiguous, or rather
amphibious, production, and we may probably dis-
cover why it is that a work written by a nominally
Protestant historian, should be adopted by the
most crafty and perspicacious of all the bands of
Rome.

The tone of Professor Ranke's history may be
gathered from the following extracts: —

" An Italian, a catholic, would set about the
task in a totally different spirit from that in which
the present work is written. By the expression of
personal veneration, or it may be, (in the present
state of opinion,) of personal hatred, he would im-
part to his work a characteristic, and, I doubt not,
a more vivid and brilliant colouring ; and, in many
passages, he would be more circumstantial, more
ecclesiastical, or more local. In these respects a
Protestant and a North German cannot hope to
vie with him. The position and the feelings of

INDIFFERENCE. 73

such a writer, with respect to the papacy, are less
exposed to the influences which excite the passions,
and therefore while he is enabled to maintain the
indifferency so essential to an historian, he must,
from the very outset of his work, renounce that
warmth of expression which springs from partiality
or antipathy, and which might perhaps produce a
considerable effect on Europe. We are necessarily
deficient in true sympathy with purely ecclesiastical
or canonical details. On the other hand, our cir-
cumstances enable us to occupy another point of
view, which, if I mistake not, is more favourable to
historical truth and impartiality. For what is there
that can now make the history of the papal power
interesting or important to us ? Not its peculiar
relation to us, which can no longer affect us in any
material point ; nor the anxiety or dread which it
can inspire. The times in which we had anything
to fear are over; we are conscious of our perfect
security. The papacy can inspire us with no other
interest than what arises from its historical deve-
lopment and its former influence."

" Christianity appears under various forms ; but
however great be the discrepancies between them,
no party can deny to another the possession of the
fundamentals of faith."

" Never more can the thought of exalting the
one or the other confession to universal supremacy
find place among men. The only consideration
now is, how each state, each people, can best pro-
ceed from the basis of its own politico-religious

E

74 INDIFFERENCE.

principles to the development of its intellectual
and moral powers."

Now, as we are not about to write a review of
Professor Ranke's work, we shall merely remark,
— having given these passages, — that we have here
the same principle, the same sort of feeling, which
encourages a young Englishman, if inclination
prompts him, to take as his partner in life, without
repugnance and without fear, one who is, and who
intends to continue, a devoted disciple of the
Romish church. The sentiment avow?ed in each
case is the same, — namely, that it is irrational, at
this time of day, to look upon Popery with the
dread and aversion entertained by our forefathers ;
and that common sense rather teaches us to con-
sider it " neither with partiality nor antipathy," but
merely as one of " the two great confessions" into
which Europe is mainly divided, and which must
and will continue to share its population between
them.

This sentiment we perceive, by the allowance
of such marriages, and the adoption of such works,
to be regarded with approbation by the Jesuits.
Not that they would for an instant avow or espouse
it for their own, but that they evidently consider
it to be a desirable opinion to be propagated among
the Protestants.

If we reflect seriously upon the matter, we shall
have no difficulty in discovering why it is so re-
garded. Throughout the word of God we find
instances almost without number, of an exactly

INDIFFERENCE. 75

similar spirit and sentiment, entertained by all
shades and descriptions of idolaters, towards the
worshippers of the true God. And the real ground
of this feeling is plainly stated by Hamor the
father of Shechem, in his address to the people of
his city, to shew to them the advantage which
must accrue to them by acting on the most " liberal"

*/ O

plan with refere-nce to the family of Israel, the
visible ruler of the worshippers of God on earth at
that time. " Let us take their daughters to us for
wives, and let us give them our daughters ; shall
not their cattle and their substance and every beast of
theirs be ours ?" Thus it is throughout all history.
The mingling of the " sons of God" with " the
daughters of men" does not raise the latter, it only
debases the former.

But in the case of the church of Rome, the folly
of such concession is more than ordinarily evident.
There is in it the strange delusion of a compact or
truce, purporting to end hostilities and inroads on
either side ; while, in spite of such a compact, the
war is as vigorously carried on as ever on the Papal
behalf; and the unharnessing, and opening of
gates, and throwing down of ramparts, is strangely
confined to the Protestant party.

When the Romish priest encourages the Pro-
testant to indulge in " liberal" sentiments, to see
no harm in now and then attending " the Catholic
worship," and in subscribing to raise Popish chapels
and schools, will he ever be found preaching to, or
even tolerating, in his own pupil, any such latitu-

E 2

76 INDIFFERENCE.

dinarianism ? Will he tell the young Papist that
there is no harm in her sometimes hearing a Pro-
testant sermon., or reading a Protestant book ? Or
rather, will he not guard in the most sedulous
manner against the least contact with the dreaded
heresy, and visit with his direst indignation any
tendency towards even the very least of these con-
cessions ?

So, likewise, he will probably give his consent
to an union with a Protestant husband ; but most
careful will he be to stipulate for the education of
the children in " the true faith," and for the entire
restriction of the wife to her own worship and her
own creed.

And in all this he acts craftily, and (after the
wisdom of this world) wisely. He takes care to
make the perversion of his pupil to Protestantism
almost impossible, while on the other hand he
obtains an excellent opening for the perversion of
his pupil's husband to Popery.

The secret of this real inequality, amidst apparent
and professing equality, is just this, — that Popery
and Protestantism are not (i two confessions," or
two different shades of Christianity ; they are not
sister creeds, which may and ought to exist side
by side, in unity and harmony of soul. All this
is a fiction and a falsehood, and none knows this
better than the priests of Rome themselves. They
may encourage Protestants to think so, but never
wih1 they teach such a doctrine to their own dis-
ciples. On the contrary, they know and teach

INDIFFERENCE. 77

that the two are diametrically opposed, and can
never be at peace or concord. Their declared
object, whenever they find it convenient to avow
it, is to overcome and eradicate Protestantism, and
to bring; all Protestants over to their own church.

o

Thus, then, in all these discussions of friendship,
amity, and alliance, whether of nation with nation,
or individual with individual, the fact is, that the
two parties do not mean the same thing. A dis-
arming is talked of; but it takes place only on
one side. The Protestant lays down his shield —
his protest, — and consents to abandon all opposi-
tion to Popery. But, on the other side, though
something of the kind may be professed, nothing
like it in reality takes place. The Protestant acts
for himself and by himself; but the Papist is
guided and directed by another. The wife or
husband who has wedded a Protestant is not left
in his or her own weakness, to fall into the same
neutrality which prevails on the other side. The
conscience is carefully watched and guarded by
the priest; frequent and full confession is main-
tained; and thus the irreconcileable foe of Pro-
testantism is covertly at work, even amidst the
appearance of the profoundest peace.

It is true that the sincere Christian will not
often be brought into a situation of this kind. The
scripture rule — " only in the Lord" — will gene-
rally preserve him from even contemplating an
alliance with a Papist. But the spirit of Ranke's
work is greatly on the increase among us. Almost

78 INDIFFERENCE.

all the literature of Germany, which is now greatly
studied in England, is tainted with this kind of
liberalism. At home, the new theory which has
recently been taught at Oxford tends the same
way. Rome is there constantly spoken of as " a
branch of the Catholic church;" and we have
heard of Oxford students, even this very year,
seriously proposing their college vacation to be
spent in France, to attend the daily service of that
idolatrous church !

Now all this is lamentable, and tends to utter
ruin, because it is a deliberate confounding of
truth and falsehood. The whole tenor of scrip-
ture warns us against such confusion. " Woe unto
them that call evil good, and good evil ; that put
bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter." " If the
Lord be God, then follow Him ; but if Baal, then
follow him." " If any man preach unto you any
other gospel than I have preached unto you, let
him be accursed."

Is Popery idolatry or not ? Is it, or is it not,
an affront and an insult to the Lord Jesus to ad-
dress, for one prayer to Him, ten to the woman
who bare him ? Is it, or is it not, a bold defiance
to the Majesty of heaven to confer the incom-
municable attributes of Deity, — omniscience, om-
nipresence, the hearing and answering of prayer, —
upon a crowd of poor weak men and women, who
died some centuries since ? Are these matters on
which " men's opinions may differ?"

If they are, then there is no such thing as truth

INDIFFERENCE. 79

or certainty in the world. If we do not know so
much as this, that God, and God alone, is " the
rewarder of those who diligently seek Him," then
we know nothing whatever. If we do not know
that he, and he only, is to be addressed as the one
" that heareth prayer," then the very initial step in
our religious knowledge is yet to be taken. But
if we do know this, — if we have drawn our views
of the Divine character from the only sure and
safe source, the Bible, — then we shall feel and know
that those who fall down before the Lawrences and
Gregories and Januariuses of the Romish church
are indeed in fearful case.

ie Horror hath taken hold upon me," saith the
psalmist, " because of the wicked who have for-
saken thy law." The spirit of Paul, at Athens,
" was stirred in him, when he saw the city
wholly given to idolatry." And so will it be with
all who follow the psalmist and the apostle, " as
they followed Christ." Alliance, amity, toleration
of spirit for idolatry, there can be none. The
Christian's whole life, in this world, is a warfare ;
and in a warfare neutrality is treason, and indif-
ference disloyalty to the sovereign whom we
serve ; and who has repeatedly and earnestly
warned us, " Take heed to yourselves, — lest ye
make you a graven image, or the likeness of any-
thing ; — the similitude of any figure, the likeness of
male or female. For the Lord thy God is a con-
suming fire, even a jealous God"

80

ON THE DIFFERENCE, IN POINT OF SPIRIT AND
CHARACTER, BETWEEN THE LEGAL AND THE
EVANGELICAL OBEDIENCE.

BY THE REV. THOMAS CHALMERS, D.D. LL.D.

THERE are many who think the}7 do homage to
virtue when they impugn the doctrine of justifica-
tion by faith ; and that it has a higher place and
consequence in their religious system, which re-
presents a blissful eternity as the result of their
doing, instead of being the result of their believ-
ing. In their imagination, virtue is the work by
which Heaven is earned, in the shape of wages;
and I think it may with all safety be affirmed,
that, along with this, there is a very general ima-
gination of the wages being a something distinct
from the work. In the earthly relationship be-
tween a master and a servant, the service is one
thing, but the reward is another ; and, in general,
a wholly dissimilar thing — insomuch that it would
be held a very strange remuneration, if, in return
for the first piece of service, it were proposed just
to impose another and more laborious piece of

LEGAL AND EVANGELICAL OBEDIENCE. 81

sendee ; or that because he had done one thing
so well, he must just get additional and more
things to do. No doubt the customary effect,
when one is expert and faithful in the employ-
ment which has been allotted to him, is that more
of that employment is required from his hands ;
and he is pleased that it should be so. Still it is
not the employment which yields him so much
satisfaction, but a something given in return for it,
and distinct from the employment. He is pleased
that more work should be put into his hands ; not
however for the pleasure which he has in the per-
formance of the work, but for the pleasure he has
in the payment that is made for it. If punctual
and honest and able in the execution of his task,
he may look for other and similar tasks being re-
quired of him ; but this is not what he ultimately
looks to. It is not the pleasure which he has in
the exercise that prompts his assiduity, but a
distinct pleasure which he has in the equivalent
which is bestowed upon him ; and which equiva-
lent is a something addressed to the pure selfish-
ness of his nature — the food that subsists him, or
the lodging and raiment that shelter him, or the
luxuries that regale him, or the money that pur-
chase th all things. This is the moving force that
sets our servants, and tradesmen, and functionaries
of all sorts in civil society, on the discharge of
their respective obligations. And this, with all
the inveteracy of a settled habit, is the main and
moving principle of obedience under the legal

E 3

82 ON TIIE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN

economy of " do this and live." When a man
works for heaven as for wages, he conceives of
heaven as distinct from the work — not as a place
whose happiness consists in the joys of obedience,
but as a place whose happiness consists in the
compensations which there await him for the toils
of obedience. In the estimation of every earthly
servant, the wages are better than the work, that
which is earned better than that which earned it.
And so under the legal economy, heaven stands
forth to the eye of the imagination, not as virtue,
but as something better than virtue. In other
words, principle, under this system, degenerates
into prudence ; and the service of God becomes a
thing of concentrated and absorbing selfishness.

If virtue be the price, and heaven be a remune-
ration distinct from the price, then the end that
we propose to ourselves in the work of obedience
is not heaven because of its moral, but heaven
because of its intellectual, or heaven because of
its physical enjoyments. We believe that in the
popular imagination of heaven, the physical will
be found greatly to predominate ; and there is no
saying how much the prospects, even of those
professing Christianity, are tinged with the idea
of a sensual paradise. Into our vague and inde-
finite conception of its happiness there by no
means generally enters the happiness of virtuous
affections, or the delight which is necessarily and
immediately felt in the service of God. We figure
to ourselves a heaven of splendour, and of spa-

LEGAL AND EVANGELICAL OBEDIENCE. 83

ciousness, and of melody — all fitted to regale, not
the spiritual, but the sentient nature of man ; and
what gives a still more decidedly physical cha-
racter to our notions of the upper sanctuary is,
that we are sure to associate with our admittance
there a secure and everlasting exemption from

the agonies of hell. Now if to us the main charm

o

of heaven be, not its psalmody or its sacredness
or its charities or its seraphic adorations, but its
freedom from the sore inflictions of the place of
condemnation, — then it matters not whether the
moving force of our obedience be to obtain deli-
verance from physical suffering, or to obtain the
enjoyment of physical gratifications. Either way,
in working for such a heaven, we are working not
for the moral, but the physical ; and the wages we
look to are just as distinct from the labour that we
are rendering, as in any mercenary contract of an
earthly trade or an earthly service. Now this in-
serts a vitiating flaw into the whole character of
our obedience. It so taints and transforms as to
annihilate its virtuousness. The moral is de-
graded thereby into the sentient and the physical ;
and instead of a native principle sustained by its
own energies, or the outgoings of a high disin-
terested affection for God and for goodness, we
behold, in every aspirant for heaven, a system of
action whereof self is perpetually the centre, and
the sordid interests of self are mainly the objects
which the heart longs after, and the desires of the
whole man are intently set upon.

84 ON THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN

To ascertain what virtue should be in man, we
have only to consider what virtue is in the God-
head. It is not with Him the price given for
happiness ; for what being is there in the universe
to confer the remuneration? Virtue is the very
essence of His happiness. It is that which consti-
tutes the eternal and infinite beatitude of His
nature. Neither is it extorted from Him at the
bidding of authority ; for in what quarter, ex-
ternal to the Godhead, can any such authority be
lodged ? He is virtuous, not because responsible
at the bar of any jurisprudence ; but He is vir-
tuous because prompted thereto by the spon-
taneous wakings of a love for righteousness, of a
hatred for iniquity. It is with Him not the pro-
duct of a dictate from without, but the product,
the native product and emanation of a desire
from within. You will at once perceive the in-
finitely higher character of that morality which is
loved and cultivated for itself, over that morality
which is rendered at the bidding of another, and
for the sake of a something distinct from itself. By
this change in its object, it, in fact, ceases to be
morality, and assumes one or other of the forms
of selfishness. At all events, it ceases to be God-
like ; and restoration to the very character of the
Godhead is the great design of that economy
under which we sit. This is another way in which
we may be made to perceive the transcendent su-
periority of the evangelical over the legal virtue.
The one is but the term of a mercenary bargain,

»/ o -*

LEGAL AXD EVAXGELICAL OBEDIENCE. 85

which any man with but the spirit and the selfish-
ness of a hireling may execute. The other needs
the spirit of the divinity to awaken it. It is the
spontaneous homage of the inner man to the
worth and excellence of virtue in itself, and apart
from its consequences. It is virtue unmixed and
unpolluted — the elements of selfishness and cal-
culation and interest being wholly detached from
it. Virtue would be heaven enough to a being so
framed and so actuated. His is a pure moral ex-
istence, and a moral atmosphere is the only one
suited to him. Such a heaven is the generous,
the lofty ambition of every true Christian. It is
there where all his fondest hopes, and all his most
exalted conceptions of happiness lie. With him sin
is wretchedness, and risvhteousness is the element

J O

in which he desires to live and luxuriate through
eternity. He would be happy enough were he but
holy enough. With him these two things are not

t/

only conjoined but identical. With him the educa-
tion of virtue is the ascending ladder to heaven, and

O 7

heaven itself is but the perfection of virtue. This
is the mark for the prize of his high calling — the
perpetual aim of his existence — the high and holy
aspiration of his now regenerated nature.

Now it never can come to this with any aspi-
rant after immortality, till the legal economy be
set aside, and all its mercantile fears and mercan-
tile jealousies are disposed of. So long as the
object is to establish a right to heaven bv our

•J C) «y

righteousness, the constant set of the spirit is

86 ON THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN

towards a something ulterior to the righteousness
and distinct from it. Righteousness is but the
work, and a something different from righteous-
ness is the wages; the one being the path of
transition along which the spirit toils, the other
the ultimatum on which the spirit rests. The bliss
and beauty of the landing place, are conceived to
be a recompence for the weariness or discom-
forts of the journey — in other words, virtue is the
hard and revolting labour that must be submitted
to, in return for an equivalent distinct from the
virtue which earns it. This conception is greatly
fostered, by those elements of a right and a claim
and a legal challenge to reward, which are all
bound up in the dispensation of " do this and
live." Inseparable from these then is the idea of
an exchange, which presupposes two sides or two
terms — whereof the one is virtue, and the other is
its mercenary hire. This marketing for heaven
belongs to the essence of legality; and it is im-
possible to compute how much morality is vul-
garised by it. It is on the great scale making a
gain of godliness; and those feelings of self, and
sordidness, and ignoble affection, which are impli-
cated with the pursuit of gain, gather around the
work of preparation for eternity, and spoil the
virtue by which we hope to win our way to it of
its celestial character altogether.

o

And the effect is greatly enhanced by that con-
sciousness of insufficiency, which haunts and dis-
spirits this whole enterprise. If there be aught like

LEGAL AND EVANGELICAL OBEDIENCE. 87

a sufficient estimate of the law,, there must, along
with it, be a perpetual sense of distance and defi-
ciency therefrom ; so that he who seeks to esta-
blish a righteousness of his own, is ever and anon
pursued by the apprehension, that he has not made
good his term of the bargain. The jealousies of
a contract enter into this converse between God
and man ; and selfishness takes its most concen-
trated, and at the same time, its most degrading
form — the form of fear. At this rate religious
obedience is no other principle than that which
actuates the eifort of a creature to struggle and
keep back from the precipice — down which its
persecutors are endeavouring to cast it. In so far
as it is the terror of hell which forms the principle
of our religious services, it is not a moral but an
animal salvation after which we are aspiring. To
have the desire of such a salvation, no higher en-
dowment is requisite than the capacity of pain.
It were enough that we had a sentient nature,

c

with an extinct moral or an extinct spiritual na-
ture. The desire to escape from physical pain is
certainly not a higher principle, than the desire
to obtain physical gratifications ; and so, whether
the moving force be to work out our exemption
from the agonies of hell, or to work out a right in
law to the joys of heaven — still there may be but
the grossness of sense, and nought of high or hea-
ven-born principle, in our religious observances.

Now it is only under the evangelical system,
that we stand disencumbered of all these adverse

88 ON THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN

influences ; and that the whole of that legality
which is so fitted to repress the willingness, and
so to degrade the character of our religious ser-
vices, is fully cleared away. Heaven, instead of
being exposed to us for purchase, is held forth as
a present to us — while the fruit of the purchase of
another. Its gate is thrown open for our entrance
if we will; and a proclaimed welcome has been
sent to our world for one and all of the human
family. Eternal life is the gift of God through
Jesus Christ our Lord ; and you cannot overstate
the perfect freeness, wherewith even the chief of
sinners are invited to lay hold of it. It is of capital
importance, in the work of Christianization, that
this freeness of the gospel should be fully and
distinctly understood. What causes many thou-
sands to hang back from it, is either the imagina-
tion of an impassable barrier, in the guilt which
they have already contracted, or the imagination
of an impracticable task, in the establishing of a
right through their own obedience to the rewards
of eternity. It is like the removal of a wall of
separation between them and heaven, when both
these obstacles are cleared away ; and many, who,
before they perceived so patent a way to the hap-
piness of eternity] were chilled into inaction by
the heartlessness and the apathy of despair, are
made to bestir themselves when heaven is set be-
fore them as an object so hopeful and so acces-
sible. There is no danger of antinomianism from
this representation, if, along with their welcome,

LEGAL AXD EVANGELICAL OBEDIENCE. 89

their unbounded and unconditional welcome to
heaven, you further tell them what heaven is — a
land of uprightness, where love and purity and
religion form the eternal recreation of beatific
spirits — an essentially moral paradise, where moral
affections and moral services constitute at once
the felicity and employment of all the inmates — a
society of immortals, in the full enjoyment of most
exquisite and exalted happiness ; but that a hap-
piness which none beside the virtuous can taste,
and none beside the lovers of God and virtue can
at all understand or sympathize with. You must
at once perceive, that to hold out the overture of
such a heaven to the worldly and the vicious, is
to bid them renounce their vice and forsake their
worldliiiess. If they will not make this renuncia-

\J

tion, that is the obstacle, the only obstacle in fact,
for, by the constitution of the gospel, all others
have been moved away. The vicarious sufferings
of Christ have cleared away the else impassable
obstacle of their guilt. The vicarious services of
Christ have superseded the impracticable task of
establishing a right to heaven by their own obe-
dience. The Spirit given by the Saviour to them
who will, is in readiness to help them onward
through the toils and the difficulties of a progres-
sive sanctification. Heaven, in fact, is theirs if
they wrill ; and the only remaining obstacle is if
they will not — if they turn in distaste from such a
heaven, because of their greater love for earth or
for earthliness — -if they choose to grovel in the

90 ON THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN

pleasures of sin which are but for a season, and
put away from them the offered boon of a hea-
venly nature on this side of death and a heavenly
state on the other side of it — if they refuse the
happiness which lies in the service of God, be-
cause the happiness of present and sensible things
has a greater charm for them — in a word, if they
love the darkness rather than the light and that
because their deeds are evil.

You will now understand the respective places
which virtue holds in the legal and the evangelical
dispensations. In the legal, virtue is the price of
heaven ; in the evangelical, virtue is heaven itself.
In the one, virtue is the purchase-money where-
with we buy heaven ; in the other, virtue is heaven
already in possession, and there is nothing of
equal worth in the whole compass of the universe
that could be given or that would be taken in ex-
change for it. The wages given for earthly work
are meat and drink. Under the legal economy,
virtue is conceived to be the work ; and the wages
are a meat and a drink, not perhaps suited to
our present animal constitution, but a meat and a
drink suited to the more exalted physical or the
more exalted intellectual nature wherewith hu-
manity shall then be invested. But under the
evangelical economy, the kingdom of heaven is
not meat or drink of any sort — it is righteousness
and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost, even in
Him whose fruit is represented to be in all
righteousness and goodness and truth. These

LEGAL AND EVANGELICAL OBEDIENCE. 91

moral treasures form the main beatitude of heaven.
They themselves are the meat and the drink of
all who are admitted to heaven's glorious and im-
mortal festival — their only meat and their only
drink, like their Saviour's before them., being to
do the will of God. Their will is at one with that
of God's, and therefore it is that their happiness
is at one with that of God's. They need not
first to acquire virtue, and therewith to purchase
heaven. In the very act of acquiring virtue, they
lay an immediate hold on heaven. Let them but
have virtue, and they hold within their grasp the
very essence of heaven's blessedness.

The advocates of the legal system arrogate this
glory to themselves — that it is by them only, and
not by their opponents, that morality is exalted
to the place and the precedency which rightfully
belong to her. But we leave it to yourselves to
judge, by which of the two systems it is that the
highest honours are awarded to her — whether by

o •>

that system which represents virtue as standing

on one side of an exchange, and heaven on the
other; or by that system by which virtue and
heaven are identified — whether by those who em-
ploy virtue as the stepping-stone to eternal hap-
piness ; or by those who, in taking hold of virtue,
rejoice as in their immediate possession of that
wherein mainly the happiness of their eternity
lies — whether by those who regard virtue but as
the ascending ladder to the summum bonum ; or
by those in whose estimation virtue is itself the

92 LEGAL AND EVANGELICAL OBEDIENCE.

summum bonum, the ultimate and the highest good
of existence — whether by the men who, in labour-
ing at the work of virtue, are only truckling for
heaven by their services ; or by the men who, on
entering the career of virtue, feel that their heaven
is already begun, and know that it is just by their
virtue being complete that their heaven is per-
fected— whether by those with whom virtue is the
beggarly element of a sordid negotiation ; or by
those with whom virtue is that element which
they would not barter for all the glories and feli-
cities of creation besides, the element in which
they desire to breathe and to be regaled by its
own native beatitude for ever — whether, in one
word, by those with whom virtue is a thing of
ignoble selfishness and speculation ; or by those
whose virtue, apart from all its connections and its
consequences, is like that of the primary fountain-
head whence it springs, innate and generous and
godlike.

93

THE CROWN OF MARTYRDOM.

BY MISS M. A. S. BARBER.

" The noble army of martyrs : praise Thee."

AMIDST that vast expanse of shining seas,

Where tropic thunders linger on the breeze,

Behold one little boat which strives to keep

A steadfast passage o'er the roaring deep !

No gallant vessel she, in proud array,

Who through the billows walks her stately way,

Well skilled o'er bounding waves her course to urge,

And from her prow to shake the foaming surge ;

A poor small boat ! whose slight and fragile form

Drives, like a leaf, before th' impending storm ;

Loud rising tempests rend the puny sail,

And the tossed shallop shudders in the gale.

Frail tenement for human life ! yet still

She moves obedient to her master's will ;

No friendly shore, no ship, no harbour near, —

On, on, with dauntless hearts, their way they steer,

94 THE CROWN OF MARTYRDOM.

With eyes turned towards the faithful stars, which

guide

Their dangerous track along the chartless tide.
No vain laments, no sighs are uttered there,
No fretful words, no wailings of despair,
Though there gaunt hunger dwells in ghastly woe,
With every want which shipwrecked sailors know,
And fevered thirst, with slowly torturing pains,
Breeds all but madness in their burning veins.
Patient, in calm discourse they wear away
The fearful moments of the lengthening day ;
Oh ! what the theme of times, of deeds of old,
So mutely heeded and so fondly told ;
In such an hour! a seaman's tale of those
Who shared like perils and had felt like woes
As now they felt ; and more, who yet had passed
Bravely through all, and safely home at last,
Found a glad welcome on old England's shore,
Where seas and tempests broke their rest no more.

Thus, brethren, thus, while storms and perils nigh
O'ershade the church, and warn each watchful eye, —
Thus let us listen to each glorious page
Which speaks the triumphs of an earlier age ;
The records of that band, nor faint nor few,
Who, true in suffering and in death still true,
Bore witness of their Lord ; and if not now,
Called in such scenes our faith, our love, t' avow ;
Still, still like them with patience let us wait,
Through every sorrow of this mortal state,

•*

O

THE CROWN OF MARTYRDOM. 95

Till we shall taste, with them, eternal peace,

Where death is not — where pain, where sin shall cease !

'Tis night in London ! night of olden time,

Unscared by lamplight. Hark ! the ancient chime,

Which tells the hours, from old St. Botolph's church,

Verges towards morn ; yet, in St. Botolph's porch?

Wife, mother, child, their tearful eyes still strain

To catch the martyr's* last, last look in vain !

Yet he draws nigh ; — did ever woman's ear

The step of her beloved fail to hear ?

Near and more near the tramp of that dread band

Strikes to their hearts ; — they stretch the eager hand ;

A moment's pause, — and the stern yeomen there

Allow one w'ord, one blessing, and one prayer !

Or see where, lingering at the prison-gate,

Daily denied, the household faces wait ;

See where, obedient to the last behest,

The gentle wifef fulfils the dread request,

And. armed with faith no earthly love can shake,

y v s

Brings the sad garment fitted for the stake !

o o

Behold, where mingling with the awe-struck crowd,
No parting speech, no parting word allowed,
The watchful brethren seek their brethren's eye,
In voiceless prayer, and to the stake draw nigh ;
Receive the last mute sign of conquering faith,
Which speaks the soul triumphant over death,

* Dr. Rowland Taylor. f The wife of Laurence Saunders.

96 THE CROWN OF MARTYRDOM.

Rejoicing thus in life's last act to seal
That love for Christ which faithful Christians feel,
As shoots aloft the flame they well might deem,
Should shine o'er England's church with deathless

gleam.

Though weak by nature, yet in faith still strong,
Vainly those fires their torturing power prolong, —
No word, no look, whate'er the pang may be,
Says to beholders aught, save, « Follow me !"

Heed, Christian, heed ! the call is still the same,

Not to the stake, the prison, or the flame,

But in the daily walks of life to prove

The gracious lesson of submissive love ;

Thine be the heart no cross can e'er offend,

Patient in suffering all the Lord may send ;

The eye, whose light affliction cannot dim,

While turns its daily, hourly look to Him ;

And, bright reflection of eternal joy,

The smile whose sweetness pain can ne'er destroy ;

The deep humility, whose lowly ways

Lie far from human scorn and human praise,

Which seeks no further than for daily food,

And calls each sorrow of His sending good ;

Oh ! bear thou thus, amidst life's troubled ways,

A faithful witness to thy Saviour's praise,

Nor grieve, that with those saints of old renown,

'Twas not thy lot to wear the martyr's crown !

97

IS THE LAST ENEMY OF THE CHURCH
A PROFESSED INFIDEL?

THE church is now admitted to be entering on, or
to have entered, the last days. Many and various
as are the opinions advanced among God's pro-
fessing people as to the nature of the conflict, the
character of the enemy, the mode in which the
ultimate result is to be obtained, and even the
nature of that resulting reign of righteousness,
there is but one voice as to the acknowledgment
that the final struggle between light and darkness
is approaching, if not actually begun. Surely,
then, the question is not one of theory, nor one
of presumptuous curiosity — who is this enemy so
frequently foretold in scripture ? for thus only can
we know what is his character, what his charac-
teristics, whither we are to look for his approach,
how guard against him. It may be objected in
limine, that the question, who is this enemy, in-
volves a petitio principii^ since prophecy can only
be fully interpreted by its fulfilment, and, till the

98 IS THE LAST ENEMY OF THE

enemy appears, we cannot say who he may be.
This is true. To point out the enemy involves
many considerations, including matters of history
and inquiries relating to the tenets of particular
churches ; but without stirring one step from
scripture ground, we may ascertain, and if we
may, are bound to ascertain, what are his leading
characteristics, so as to be prepared to recognise
him, when he does appear, by those marks which
scripture has for this very purpose laid down to
warn us. Even this inquiry, important as it is,
and limited to scripture ground, is wider than I
shall at present attempt to enter on ; convinced
that by confirming our examination to one single
step, we shall be able to obtain a certainty which
we might fail to reach were I to enter on a wider
field, embracing more doubtful matters.

Respecting the minor points connected with this
disturber of the church there may be obscurity,
but if his character be given at all, we must surely
expect that we shall be able to ascertain whether
he is to be a professed infidel, or one who works
out his iniquitous purposes under the garb of a
follower of Him whom he comes to oppose.
Passing by the Old-Testament prophecies as less
clearly worded and of more doubtful interpreta-
tion, I shall bring forward a few of such New-
Testament prophecies as may direct us in this
inquiry.

We are forewarned (2 Thess. ii. 3), that the day
of Christ " shall not come, except there come a

CHURCH A PROFESSED INFIDEL? 99

falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed,
the son of perdition." The name given to this
person is the name applied, not to an infidel, but
to an apostle (John, xvii. 12), to an apostle who,
so far from being an infidel or atheist, when he
saw that the Master he had betrayed was indeed
given over to be crucified, cried, " I have sinned
in that I have betrayed the innocent blood," and
whose last act, except that which terminated his
career, was one of restitution. The terms of the
first clause of ver. 4, " Who opposeth and exalteth *
himself above all that is called God, or that is
worshipped," manifest that the opposer is not an
atheist, for he who exalts himself above another
cannot deny the existence of that other ; he must,
by the very terms of the proposition, be one who
confesses a God ; nay, he must countenance the
worship of God, otherwise " the temple of God "
would be no seat of honour for him to claim.
Again, what is meant by " exalteth himself above
all that is called God, or is worshipped"? Does
it mean that he climbs up to heaven, and there
exercises the power and exhibits the attributes of
God? — certainly not; or does it mean that he who
confesses a God claims yet to be greater than that
Being whose omnipotence he recognises? — cer-
tainly not. This exaltation above God, explain it
as we may, must be virtual, not actual. There
must be (unless we would maintain one or other
of the absurd assertions mentioned above), first,
the exhibition of some sensible representation of

F 2

100 IS THE LAST ENEMY OF THE

God, something that can be looked on, handled,
honoured or dishonoured, as being God ; he must,
either personally or through others, establish the
belief that this thing is God, and to mark his own
sense that it is God, worship it ; and, secondly, he
must then place himself in a situation, relatively,
above that which a little before he and his fol-
lowers worshipped as God, in order to exalt him-
self above it ; for, first, he must acknowledge the
existence of that which he sets himself above ; —
secondly, to set himself above God, he must ac-
knowledge that thing to be God, i. e. the object of
universal homage ; but if of universal homage — of
his homage, therefore — he must be a worshipper,
and his exaltation must be virtual, not actual. In
truth, it needs but to state the terms to prove the
fact. Will any one maintain that the exaltation
of the man of sin over God is or shall be real ?
but if not real, it must be virtual and in preten-
sion : not over Him who dwelleth " in the light
which no man can approach unto," but over some-
thing to which, for his own purposes, he chooses
to give the name and honour of God, " all that is
called God or is worshipped," a God of his own
creation, — a God whom he shall delight to honour,
and to lead millions to bow before, that his own
exaltation over it may be great in proportion to
the glory of this manifested God. The man of
sin, then, must be a theist, and a worshipper of
some visible God ; that is, an idolator. Now we
are told still further, that he " sitteth in the temple

CHURCH A PROFESSED INFIDEL? 101

of God ;" but God has at present no literal temple,
and if, as some suppose, from Ezek. xl. to xlviii.,
the temple at Jerusalem is to be rebuilt, it will not
be for the occupation of the man of sin, but for
the occupation of Jehovah. (See Ezek. xxxix. 28,
29 ; xliv. 1 — 3 ; and xlviii. 35.) In fact, were the
temple of Jerusalem rebuilt by the unbelieving
Jews, it would' no more be the temple of God
than is the mosque of Omar, erected in honour of
the one God by unbelieving hands, on the site
where Solomon was commanded to build. Scrip-
ture, therefore, being express that the temple in
which he sits cannot be the literal temple, it
must be a figurative or mystical temple. Now
we are not left in doubt as to what is the figura-
tive temple of God: " Ye are," saith the Holy
Ghost, — addressing " the church of God which
is at Corinth," by the mouth of the apostle whose
words we are now considering, — " Ye are the
temple of the living God." (2 Cor. vi. 16.) The
temple of God is the church of God; therefore,
this opposer is to be found within the church ; a
baptized person, and one who has not, by an open
denial of the Trinity or the incarnation, or by any
other overt act, ceased to be a member of the
visible church. " Shewing himself that he is
God ;" exercising some of those acts which, with-
out contradiction, are said to belong to " Gcd
alone ;" opening so that no man can shut, and
shutting so that no man can open. Ver. 5 : " Re-
member ye not, that, while I was yet with you, I

102 IS THE LAST ENEMY OF THE

told you these things ?" The heathenish idolatry
of the multitude, the deism and atheism of the
philosophers, and the apostasy of professing Chris-
tians, who renounced their faith for any of these
forms of error, were familiar to the Thessalonian
Christians; but this, of which the apostle had to
tell them, and to remind them that he had told
them, was a distinct form of error; not heathen-
ism, not deism, not atheism, but something differ-
ent from all, which should in time appear. Ver. 6
and 7 : It was as yet restrained from shewing it-
self; nevertheless, it was already working. What
was that spirit which began so early to work in the
church, that we can scarcely trace its beginning,
or lay our finger on one venerable name, since the
apostles' days, not tainted by it ? Certainly not
atheism ; certainly not infidelity ; certainly not the
spirit of believing too little. Whatever might have
been found in the schools of the philosophers, within
the primitive church the workings of infidelity,
except so far as all ungodliness may imply in-
fidelity, were unknown. That heathenism and its
philosophy were not intended is manifest, for this
was, when the apostle wrote, in its timid infancy,
while they were in their full maturity. This is,
too, " the mystery of iniquity." How man can
bring his mind to deny the being of a God, or
close his eyes to the light of revelation, — the process
by which the mind of an infidel becomes blinded, —
may be a mystery ; but infidelity itself is no mys-
tery, it is the denial of all mysteries. We may be

CHURCH A PROFESSED INFIDEL? 103

assisted in approximating towards the idea of the
mystery of iniquity, by considering what is the
mystery of godliness, to which it is opposed. Now,
the mystery of godliness is (1 Tim. iii. 16) that
" God was manifest in the flesh." The mystery
of iniquity, therefore, must be something which
opposeth this truth, not merely by a simple denial,
but by the substitution of some other mystery for
that awful reality. Ver. 8 : " That wicked," whose
spirit was secretly working in St. Paul's days, is
to continue unchanged and unchangeable, except
as being more fully " revealed," until the day of
the brightness, or epiphany, of the Lord's coming
in glory, when, and not till then, he shall be de-
stroyed. Has any form of atheism or infidelity so
continued ? Ver. 9 : " Power, signs, and lying
wonders," are the characteristics of theism and su-
perstition, not of infidelity. Ver. 10 : " Deceivable-
ness." Does not this expression forcibly send us
back to such warnings as these : " Beware of false
prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but
inwardly they are ravening wolves." (Math. vii.
15.) " Also of your oivn selves shall men arise
speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples
after them." (Acts, xx. 30.) Ver. 11: And be-
cause they did not receive the love of the truth,
" God shall send them strong delusion, that they

•/

should" — doubt all things ? deny all things ? No ;
but believe — what? — a lie. The characteristics,
then, of the man of sin are these — that he op-
poseth Christ, and exalteth himself; that he raiseth

104 IS THE LAST ENEMY OF THE

himself above something which he himself calls
God, and worships; that he, idolater and blas-
phemer as he is, still remains in the church, there
exercising the attributes of God ; that he was un-
known to the primitive Christians, while his spirit
was yet growing up amongst them ; that he should
continue from the apostles' days, when his spirit
began to work, to the appearing of Christ; that
he should come with power, signs, and lying won-
ders, and all deceivableness. The characteristics
of his followers should be, that they were to be
found among those who had somewhat of the truth,
but not the love of it; and that they should re-
ceive strong delusion, that they might believe a lie.
1 Tim. iv. 1 : The Spirit warns us of a departure
from the faith which characterizes the latter times.
In the former account, the deceiver was chiefly
contemplated ; in this, the deceived ; and here we
as vainly look for the characteristics of atheism or
infidelity. On the contrary, attention to seducing
spirits and doctrines of demons, intermediate
beings, demigods, who mediate between God and
men, forms their first characteristic. How could a
person who believed that there was no God believe
in intermediate existences? or those who denied
all revelation receive error as revealed ? Ver. 2 :
The name hypocrisy is sufficient: where there is
no profession there can be no hypocrisy. Ver. 3 :
" Forbidding to marry" must not be confounded
with throwing contempt on marriage. Infidels
have been found to pour on marriage the foul tor-

CHURCH A PROFESSED INFIDEL ? 105

rent of their censure, contempt, and scorn, and to
use every endeavour to loosen its bonds, and to
dissuade men from it altogether; and when the
legislature shall have loosened the bond of law,
and unbelief the bond of conscience, infidelity shall
have accomplished her work. But forbidding to
marry is not to condemn or loosen the bond ; it is
to prohibit the act, as being either altogether or
under certain circumstances unlawful, which sup-
poses a law, a standard, a religion. With respect
to the next point, the commanding to abstain from
certain kinds of food, we are not left to draw our
own conclusion, for the apostle enters on an argu-
ment to prove the lawfulness of the use of meats,
utterly unsuitable for any one who did not recog-
nise, and to a certain extent acknowledge, the
authority of revelation. Are the words, " It is
sanctified by the word of God and prayer," in-
tended to warn atheists, or to strengthen weak
disciples against the scoffs of infidelity? Surely
not. The words are an announcement calculated
to warn and to support against the pretences of
fictitious holiness. The departure from the faith,
then, is a departure consistent with an outward
continuance within the church, and with high pro-
fessions of scrupulosity, and not consistent with the
reverse.

1 John, iv. 1 — 3 : The Holy Spirit had, by
the mouth of Paul, warned the church against a
certain form of evil which must rise up within her
own bosom ; first viewing it in its singleness as a

F3

106 IS THE LAST ENEMY OF THE

system whereby our individual opposer obtains
supremacy over a deluded multitude, and, again,
as the apostasy of the multitude. Years had
passed away, and the beloved apostle was now
giving in a series, not only his own last message to
the church, but the last communication that should
be made till the appearing in glory of that Master
whom he had followed to the cross. In the mean-
time Jerusalem had been destroyed, and the false
Christs, announced (Matt. xxiv. 15 — 24) as to ap-
pear after that event, had begun to shew themselves;
while the leaven which in the days of St. Paul was
beginning to work had been more fully manifested,
so that it was said, (1 John, ii. 18), "even now
are there many Antichrists ;" but the apostle leaves
the solemn warning that these should yet appear
in one form, to which distinctively he gives the
name of "Antichrist." Now the disciples had
been already warned concerning this Antichrist,
" whereof ye have heard that it should come ;" but
we find no warning of any opposing power but
that noticed in 2 Thess. ii. 1 — 12. Therefore the
" man of sin" " that oppose th" of St. Paul, is clearly
identical with the Antichrist of St. John. The
name Antichrist signifies the opposer of Christ, or
rather the opposing Christ or counter-anointed
one ; as we say pope and antipope, not meaning
thereby indiscriminately any enemy of the pope,
but that one enemy who claimed to be pope him-
self. The Antichrist then is not merely an enemy
of Christ, but that enemy who claims to be him-

CHURCH A PROFESSED INFIDEL? 107

self the Lord's anointed, — who sitteth in the temple
of God, shewing himself that he is God. If mere
opposition to Christ constituted Antichrist, it is
impossible that any opposition should be more
violent, or for the time more successful, than that
of Herod, and Pontius Pilate, and the chief
priests ; or if his distinguishing characteristic were
that he should rise out of the church itself, Judas
Iscariot the traitor had the best claim to that
name ; but undeniably that name does not belong
to any of them, and we must therefore seek in him
for some characteristics which did not belong to
them. Now his character having been already
drawn at length by St. Paul, to whose ac-
count, as known, St. John refers, the latter apostle
merely points out one distinctive mark. He had
already said, (Col. ii. 22,) " He is Antichrist that
denieth the Father and the Son," and explained
v. 23, the denial of the Father to be virtually in-
volved in the denial of the Son, and he now shews
what is the denial of the Son which constitutes
Antichrist, " Every spirit that confesseth not that
Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is not of God, and
this is that spirit of Antichrist." (See 2 John, vii.)
The denial of the Father is involved in the denial
of the Son, and the denial of the Son consists in
the not confessing that he is come in the flesh.
Antichrist, then, is no atheist or infidel, but a
subtle theologian — one who is more likely to entice
by his wiles, than to astound by his blasphemies, —
one whose divinely announced error presupposes

108 IS THE LAST ENEMY OF THE

the general correctness of his creed, and who does
not put forward even that error with startling dis-
tinctness,— who does not, like Mahomet, reduce
Christ to the rank of an inferior prophet, — or, like
Socinus, deny His godhead, — or even, in so many
words, deny His manhood ; but who, orthodox in
all besides, " confesseth not that Jesus Christ is
come in the flesh." Antichrist is therefore a
Christian divine, who, without formally denying
the manhood of Christ, still sets forth doctrines
which either break off his relationship with Adam
and his posterity by the mode of his generation,
or asserts things concerning His flesh which could
not be asserted respecting any other human body.
Should any teacher, therefore, by the deification
of the Virgin Mother, cut off this only link by
which the Son of God is united to the human
family, and represent her as, at birth or by the
mysterious overshadowing of the Holy Ghost,
raised to a semideific state ; or should he affirm
that of the flesh of Christ which may be myste-
riously true of His godhead, but could not be true
of mere flesh and blood, that teacher has with-
drawn his confession that Jesus has come in the
flesh, — has thus marked himself as Antichrist who
denies the Son, and denying the Son, denies the
Father also. This is not the work of an infidel or
an atheist; it must be the work of a professing
Christian, — a work that begins within the church,
and among those well-skilled in controversies of
faith. An open denial would unchurch him at

CHURCH A PROFESSED INFIDEL? 109

once, and an open denial would mark him not
the Antichrist ; for we can no more add to, than
take from, the words of inspiration, and open
denial is not the thing we are warned against in
the words "confesseth not."

Rev. xvii. 4 — 6. As St. Paul prophesied
twice in distinct writings, one of the man of sin,
one of his follo'wers ; so St. John has given us a
similar double meaning. A woman is the type of
the church, (see Cant, passim; Ps. xlv. 9 — 14;
Is. liv. 1 — 6; Rev. xxi. 9 — 10,) with many others;
an adulterous woman of a corrupt and idolatrous
church, Ezek. 16th and 18th chapters, with many
others. Women are sometimes spoken of as re-
presenting empires, (Is. xlvii. 1;) but this woman,
sitting on a beast, the representative of an empire,
(see Dan. viii. 20, 21,) cannot represent the same
thing as what she sits on, and must therefore
signify the only other thing of which she is ever
emblematic, a church. Purple and scarlet were
used for the hangings of the tabernacle and the
high-priest's garments, and therefore represent not
carnal magnificence, but spiritual honours; the
high-priest being an acknowledged type of Christ,
this woman, arrayed in robes similar in nature to
his, must represent a church claiming, and ap-
pearing to possess, the attributes of Christ himself.
Gold, precious stones, and pearls, are uniformly
taken to represent the good things of God's king-
dom. (See Ex. xxviii. 6 — 30; Ezek. xvi. 11, 12 ;
Is. Ixi. 10; Matt. iii. 17; Matt. xiii. 45, 46;

110 IS THE LAST ENEMY OF THE

1 Cor. iii. 12 ; Rev. xxi. 19 — 21.) A cup is a
vessel by means of which we drink ourselves, and
give drink to others ; a golden cup is a drinking
vessel highly honourable and beautiful. The
church drinks herself, and gives others to drink, if
she be faithful, the water of life, but if unfaithful,
her substitutes for that water, and the medium
through which she gives it is the ministry which
is externally the more honourable, the more re-
gularly ordained and constituted. This woman,
thus drunken with the blood of saints, and who
makes all nations drink of the wine of the wrath
of her fornications, is an honoured church, with a
regularly ordained ministry, and no infidel or
atheist power ; she is the church of the " some"
who have departed from the faith, " giving heed
to seducing spirits."

If in the foregoing examination I have wrested
scripture, on my own head be the sin and shame ;
but if, as I believe, I have expressed its true and
simple meaning, and drawn out only necessary
consequences, the enemy of the latter days, great
as his power may be, great as his malice, great his
blasphemy, is to be dreaded far more on account
of his subtlety than for any of these. He is to be
found in the church of Christ, zealous for certain
truths, decked in prescriptive rights and honours,
and saying to those who proclaim God's truth, " I
am a prophet as thou art," promising to lead in-
quirers to Zion, and putting forward his most
awful blasphemies in the form of acknowledged

CHURCH A PROFESSED INFIDEL? Ill

truths ; now as the Lamb on Mount Zion, preach-
ing something like the gospel ; now as the lion of
the tribe of Judah, treading down those whom he
calls the enemies of God ; high in pretensions, and
many of those pretensions firmly founded, (the
gold and jewels on the harlot were not tinsel;) so
holy in profession that marriage is too secularizing,
ordinary food too defiling for his use ; presenting
mysteries similar to the great mystery of godliness,
some manifestation of God with us, other than that
which he made when he did not abhor the virgin's
womb ; orthodox in his announced creed, yet vir-
tually denying that incarnation, and thereby the
Trinity, which he professed to maintain; filled
with powers of deceit, " with all deceivableness,"
fresh taught from the father of lies, most fearful
when least dreaded, most deceitful when least sus-
pected— thus the great deceiver comes. Who are
his pioneers ? who are breaking down the barriers
which oppose his progress ? Had the serpent, when
he came to deceive Eve by his subtlety, needed
agents, — had her suspicions been aroused so that
he required to lull them before he made his grand
attempt, what aid might he have desired? Would
he not have taught his servants to whisper in her
ear that Satan's form was hideous as his power was
terrific ; that he came in the whirlwind, and black-
ness, and terror ; that the thunder-storm preceded
his course, and desolation followed ; and then she
would have been prepared, however afraid of some
unseen power, to look with unsuspecting pleasure

112 IS THE LAST ENEMY, ETC.

on the crested neck and graceful folds of the ser-
pent as he glided among flowers, scarcely disturbed
by his gentle movements, and to listen to the
soothing tones of his dulcet voice ; so now, when
we preach an atheist Antichrist, a mighty con-
queror, an overturner of society, a breaker up of
dynasties, an enemy of all religion, or Satan him-
self decked in superhuman power and glory, are
we not leading the church to look without appre-
hension on what is familiar, and can smooth its
coils and hide its sting; teaching her to regard
with friendship or pity her real foe, aiding the
mighty power of his deceivableness, and preparing
a beguiled people to receive his strong delusion, to
believe his lie ?

113

ELISHA IN DOTHAN.

Then the king of Syria warred against Israel. . . . And the
man of God sent unto the king of Israel, saying, Beware — pass
not such a place. . . . And the king of Israel saved himself
there, not once, nor twice. . . . And the king of Syria was sore
troubled. . . . And one of his servants said unto him, Elisha
the prophet telleth unto the king of Israel the words that thou
speakest in thy bedchamber. . . . And it was said to the king,
Behold, he is in Dothan. Therefore sent he thither horses, and
chariots, and a great host. . . . And Elisha prayed. . . . And
behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire. . . .
And Elisha prayed unto the Lord, Smite the Syrian with
blindness. And HE smote them with blindness, according to the
prayer of Elisha. . . . But Elisha led them to Samaria, . . . and
they saw. . . . And the king of Israel said unto Elisha, My
father, shall I smite them ? And he answered, Thou shalt not
smite them : set bread and water before them, that they may
eat and drink . . . And the king prepared great provision for
them, and when they had eaten and drunk, he sent them away
to their master. . . . So, the bands of Syria came no more into
the land of Israel. — 2 KINGS, vi.

'Tis eve ; and the tempest
Is rushing through heaven ;

The oaks on the hills

By the lightnings are riven ;

114 ELISHA IN DOTHAN.

The rain in the valleys

Falls heavy and chill,
And the cataract bursts

In the bed of the rill.
Wild hour for the Syrian

On Hermon's white brow ;
While the gust bears along
The scoff and the song
From Israel's proud tents

In the forest below.

'Tis midnight, deep midnight !

Now vengeance is near !
Hark ! the tramp of the warrior,

The clash of the spear ;
For the Syrian is marching

Through whirlwind and snow,
On the revel of Judah

To strike the death blow.
His march is but lit

By the tempest's red glare :
No ear hears his tramp
In the Israelite camp :
The hunters have driven

The prey to its lair.

" Now, now, for the slaughter !"
The trumpet is blown;

Now woe to the temple,
And woe to the throne.

ELISHA IN DOTHAX. 115

But no trumpet has answer'd,

No arrow has sprung,
No torch has been lighted,

No lance has been flung.
They pour o'er the ramparts,

The tents stand alone ;
Through the gust and the haze
The watch-fires still blaze;
But the warriors of Israel

Like shadows are gone !

Then spake the king's sorcerer :

" King, wouldest thou hear,
How those Israelite wolves

Have escaped from thy spear ;
Know, their prophet Elijah

Has spells to unbind
The words on thy lip, —

Nay, the thoughts in thy mind. -
Though thy secret were deep

As the grave, 'twould be known ;
The serpent has stings
And the vulture has wings ;
But he's serpent and vulture

To thee and thy throne."

" Sound the trumpet ! " They rush

Over mountain and plain.
'Tis noon, but no chieftain

Has slacken'd the rein.

116 ELISHA IN DOT1IAN.

'Tis eve; and the valleys

Are dropping with wine ;
But no chieftain has tasted

The fruit of the vine.
To Dothan the horseman

And mail'd charioteer
Are speeding like fire :
Their banquet is ire,
For the scorner of Syria,

Elisha, is there.

On the ramparts of Dothan,

At morning, was woe ;
There fell the fierce hail

Of the lance and the bow.
And men rent their garments,

And women their hair.
But Elisha came forth

From his chamber of prayer ;
Like thunder his voice

O'er the multitude roll'd : —
" Jehovah, arise ;
Pour thy light on our eyes ;
Shew this people the shepherds

Who watch o'er thy fold."

The mountain horizon
Was burning with light ;

On its brow stood the Syrian
In glory and might.

ELISHA IN DOTHAN. 117

Proud toss'd to the sunbeam

The banner's rich fold,
Proud blazed the genini'd turbans

And corslets of gold.
And loud rose the taunt

Of the infidel's tongue : —
" Ho ! Israelite slaves !

0

This night sees your graves ;
And first from your walls
Shall Elisha be flung."

At the word rush'd a cloud

From the crown of the sky ;
In its splendours the sun

Seem'd to sicken and die.
From its depths pour'd a host

Upon mountain and plain.
There was seen the starr'd helm,

And the sky-tinctured vane ;
And the armour of fire,

And the seraph's broad wing ;

But no eyeball dared gaze
On the pomp of the blaze,
As their banner unfolded
The name of their KING !

But where are the foe?

Like a forest o'erblown,
In their ranks, as they stood,

Their thousands are strown.

118 ELISHA IN DOTHAN.

No banner is lifted,

No chariot is wheel'd ;
To earth falls the lance,

To earth falls the shield.
There is terror before them,

And terror behind.
Now, proud homicide,
Thou art smote in thy pride !
The Syrian is captive ;

His host are struck blind !

There were writhings of agony,

Yells of despair,
And eyeballs turn'd up,

As if seeking the glare.
And sorcerers shouting

To Baal, in pain —
The madness of tongue,

And the madness of brain.
And groups of pale chieftains

Awaiting in gloom,

Till the Israelite sword
In their bosoms was gored.
But they knew not Elisha,

They knew not their doom.

Those, those were the triumphs

Of Israel of old !
And those were the shepherds

Who guarded the fold.

ELISHA IN DOTHAN. 119

But the Leopard was loosed

From his thicket again,
And the flock of the chosen

Was scatter'd and slain.
But visions are rising

Mysterious and grand;
The trumpet shall sound,
And thy dead be unbound.
For the night is far spent,

And the day is at hand !

120

THE CONFESSIONAL.

A PORTUGUESE RECOLLECTION".
BY AN OLD CAMPAIGNER.

You ask what I thought of Popery in the Pen-
insula thirty years ago. I thought nothing about
it, till the following incident startled me out of my
liberalism.

We were quartered, that is to say, the Portu-
guese regiment where I, a British lieutenant, held
the rank of captain, was quartered in a small
town, waiting for supplies to proceed on our
march in the rear of the enemy. A parcel of fel-
lows, contractors, who lived by putting a finishing
hand to the ruin of their poor country people, al-
ways hovered on our path with bags of ready
money, easily prevailing on the wretched peasan-
try to part with their remaining corn and cattle
for half the value in hard specie, rather than take
our paper securities for double the sum. Of course
they resold them to us at an enormous profit,
robbing both parties ; of whom it was hard to say
which was the poorest, soldiers or farmers.

THE CONFESSION AL. 121

A couple of these worthies waited on us in the

little market-place of V , and driving up a few

miserable beasts, made their own terms ; the Portu-
guese officers submitted with a shrug, as they saw
the cent, per cent, pocketed by the rogues ; but I
could not restrain a few expressions of indignation
at their hearties^ cruelty to the poor breeders of
those cattle, who, first ravaged by the enemy, and
now plundered by their friends, stood by with
melancholy visages, spectators of the sale. For the
benefit of the public I uttered my soliloquy in
Portuguese, and in a tone sufficiently audible ;
and, in glancing round, encountered the keen
gaze of a pair of eyes, black, but of a blackness
surpassing that of the Portuguese generally, as
polished jet outvies the smoke of a smithy. The
man turned away as I looked ; his figure was ab-
ject, his dress mean, and I thought no more about
it.

That evening a peasant entered the little square
occupied by us, bringing a couple of milch goats ;
but as the soldiers gathered round him, one of the
contractors seized the poor fellow by the arm, and
whispered the usual expostulation on the worth-
lessness of our notes, which the knaves were glad
enough to consign to their own pockets. Roused
by this mixture of fraud and insult, I appealed
openly to my comrades, for the grief and poverty-
stricken aspect of their countrymen told a tale of
suffering not to be mistaken. But I appealed in
vain ; something was lacking that should have

G

122 THE CONFESSIONAL.

responded to my words ; whether it was naturally
nonexistent in their bosoms, or whether the sear-
ing-iron of Popery had scorched it into nothing-
ness, I know not. The only result of my remarks
was to draw several stragglers about us, and seeing
that they were taking more effect on a party of the
plundered villagers than, for their own sakes, I
wished to produce, I desisted ; giving vent to one
short burst of muttered indignation in my native
tongue, as I walked away from the spot

" Noble, generous Englishman !" responded a
voice, low, but distinct, and fervent.

I looked round: one person alone was near me,
and those jet-black eyes again flashed from beneath
the greasy cap of the mechanic, for such he ap-
peared to be. In another moment he had eluded
my sight.

I was on duty that night, visiting the little
pickets that were always posted round in a strange
place. A spot, half-way between two of these
stations, attracted me ; it was a natural alley,
formed of lime and orange trees, of which the fra-
grance and beauty were irresistible. I took two
or three turns under its green fretwork, inlaid with
silver blossoms and golden fruit, and began to
dream of home as a young soldier dreams, when,
in the midst of many softening recollections, I be-
came aware of a stealthy approach. I was, of
course, prepared ; but scarcely had the first
words of inquiry passed my lips, when " Hush,
hush, Captain, I want to speak to you alone, and

THE CONFESSIONAL. 123

unobserved," arrested them, and the black-eyed
stranger stood beside me.

(i Who are you, friend ? What is your business
with me ?"

" You are an Englishman, Sir."

" I am ; but you are not, though you speak the
language fluently. You are a foreigner."

(i Yet I was born in London."

" That may be : but why this mystery ? Why not
claim me as your countryman in the face of day ?"

" Sir, my circumstances forbid it ; they are des-
perate, and I come to throw myself on your gene-
rosity— the generosity of an Englishman !"

" Why, to say truth, I am not rich ; but still —
the poor fellow caught my hand as I made a move-
ment towards my purse. " Money ! oh no, no,
not money, I need not that ; but oh, Sir, I need a
friend ; I want counsel from one who will not be-
tray the trust that places two lives at his disposal.
Can I find such in this country ? Despair had
seized me till I heard the well-known accent
from your lip this morning, rendered doubly sure
by the sentiments it uttered, and this evening the
language itself. Will you befriend me ? Will
you rescue me and my poor wife, a native also of
brave, honest England !"

" My services you may command as far as they
are useful ; but no time to lose, for wre may march
to-morrow for aught I know/'

" No ; I have ascertained that you are likely to
remain here for some days."

G 2

124 THE CONFESSIONAL.

" Who told you ?"

" The contractors. I have dealings with them,
and with others equally worthy." He spoke this
with great scorn.

Youth is naturally unsuspicious, and my nature
formed no exception ; the adventure was romantic
so far, and I felt no reluctance to be the hero of its
succeeding chapters.

We arranged to meet the following night, in a
place my new acquaintance described, and parted,
for my time was up.

Next morning the remainder of our battalion
joined, and with them the only Portuguese for

whom I felt a cordial regard. Luis da M was

a young man of family, education, and talent, with
a measure of high honourable feeling which I, at
that period, regarded as the most important feature
in a man's character. Indeed, my comrade's mind
was singularly noble, and his sentiments lofty.
When I recounted the transaction of the preceding
day, he burst into indignant denunciations alike
of the villanous contractors and the cold-hearted
lookers-on. I longed to acquaint him with the
sequel, but my lips w7ere sealed.

Evening arrived ; I was punctual ; and my new
acquaintance led me through a circuitous road to
one of the lonely dwellings we commonly meet
with in Portugal. Here wTe found his wife, a wo-
man about thirty-five or forty, with a prepossess-
ing countenance, a clear, dark complexion, and,
under the disguise of very humble garments, a

O c/ O

THE CONFESSIONAL. 125

manner that at once bespoke acquaintance with the
better ranks of society. Seated at a little table,

«s

the lamp shedding its clear light on each, I con-
templated this mysterious pair, whose counte-
nances were so interesting, their language so
purely English, their looks so decidedly foreign,
their manner so expressive of mingled joy, doubt,
and apprehensio'n.

The matter was soon cleared up ; they wrere
children of Abraham, their families long located in
Poland, but subsequently settling in London be-
fore the present generation were bora. All the
tale I cannot relate — it was strange, but evidently
true. Isaac, as his wife called him, had made a
considerable property in gold and jewellery, with
which, in an evil hour, they ventured into the
Peninsula. Here Isaac became the object of sus-
picion, real or pretended, to some party, who, of
course, only looked to the seizure of his valuables ;
and one of these being in the priesthood, saw it
incumbent on him to transfer, if he could, the
spoils of an unbelieving Jew to the coffers of the
church.

The plot thickened around poor Isaac ; he had
been lured to the interior of the country, and
most rigidly watched ; but, after many vain at-
tempts to gain Lisbon, or Oporto, he had at length
eluded his enemies, and by changing his name,
assuming the garb and manners of the lower orders,
and making himself useful to the government offi-
cers, as a sort of inferior agent among the people,

126 THE CONFESSIONAL.

he had, by a mixture of seeming publicity with
real concealment, remained so far unknown.

" But think," he continued, " how great is my
peril : a thousand chances may discover me, and
once discovered, I am lost. I possess evidence to
satisfy you of the truth of all my statements. I
hold in my hand the inventory of my effects, and
the letters of honourable mercantile men, known,
at least by name, to yon. Sir, as such ; but to
communicate with them has been impossible. I
dare not pen a letter that might furnish the clue
to my retreat. Beset on all sides, hemmed in by
invisible snares, condemned to sorrow of heart,
and failing of eyes, and continual terror, all the
threatenings pronounced against my sinful nation
are upon me, and I have fallen into the hands of
the Christians."

Poor Isaac ! Neither he nor his hearer knew
rightly what Christianity was ; we both conceded
the title to those whose spot was anything but the
spot of God's children. I was thoroughly inte-
rested in the matter, and presently devised a
scheme for Isaac's escape, which we all agreed
was feasible enough. After a little hesitation,
he rose, and removing some heavy articles, disco-
vered to me a large trunk ; within a concealed
recess of which, he told me, were jewels and
gold to the value of many thousands of pounds,
besides securities for as many more. The chest
was filled up with articles of wearing apparel and
such like things, to mislead any who might dis-

-

-

-

THE CONFESSIONAL. 127

cover it. What a prey for the needy government
and rapacious priesthood !

I could readily believe what Isaac told me, that
some of the highest in the land were his merce-
nary assailants.

Having made our arrangements, I expressed
some doubt of being able to effect the business by
ourselves ; and named a friend and brother officer,
for whose integrity I could pledge my own, as
likely to aid us.

" Is he an Englishman ?"

" No, a Portuguese ; but a truly honourable

man.'

A deadly paleness overspread the countenance
of his wife, while Isaac's forehead flushed to
crimson. " Not for a thousand worlds would I
trust a Portuguese !" exclaimed the latter.

" Nonsense ; there are rogues to be found in
England, and honest men in every nation ; my
friend is an exception to the general rule of his
country : he would never betray you."

" He must betray me," replied Isaac.

" Must ? why must he more than I ?"

A sudden trembling came over the woman : she
looked at me as with a desperate resolve to know
the worst; then, shrinking as she put the ques-
tion, said, " Are you ? Do you go to — - to

confession ?"

" Oh no ! I'm a Protestant." And the fervency
with which she clasped her hands, with eyes up-
turned to heaven, I shall never forget; while

128 THE CONFESSIONAL.

Isaac's face brightened into a smile of stern de-
light, as he said, " Did I not tell you so, Rachel ?"

" But why this sweeping condemnation?" asked
I, who in my heart attributed it all to Jewish pre-
judices, and felt piqued for the credit of a religion
that, like a fool, I regarded as part and parcel of
my own. " Does it follow that, because my friend
is not a Protestant, he must be a traitor and a
scoundrel ?"

The only reply to this was an earnest appeal :
" Sir, we have confided to you our lives, and all
that we have ; we are satisfied while you confine it
to your own bosom ; but rather than divulge it to
any human being holding the religion of this
country, bury it for ever — forget us — leave us to
the God of Israel alone. Anything — anything but
what you now propose to do !"

" Well, well," I rejoined, " if you are so averse
we will say no more about it."

And here I bitterly condemn myself. Glorying
in a character of unimpeachable honour, I yet held
that vile and essentially Popish doctrine of mental
reservation, which left me at liberty to act as cir-
cumstances might dictate, providing I broke no
express promise, and that I honestly sought the
advantage of my proteges. I had no further in-
tention of telling Luis da M ; but I avoided

giving such pledge as would bind me to silence,
and the poor Hebrews, conceiving I had done so,
were satisfied.

Before my plans were half matured, my com-

THE CONFESSIONAL. 129

pany was ordered to a quarter some miles distant,
whence we might have to advance without ever
seeing; V again. I told Isaac the unwelcome

o o

news, who received it with smothered anguish,
and replied calmly, " It cannot be helped, Sir;
the good deed you purposed doing will be remem-
bered by the God of Abraham. Possibly we may
yet, by acting on the hints you have given us,
carry out the plan. At the worst, you have been
to us as the wells and the palm trees in a thirsty
desert, refreshing our drooping hearts with your
generous sympathy. I am content; you bury
the secret in your own bosom, and I am sa-
tisfied."

So was not I ; it seemed monstrous to sacrifice
two lives to an idle prejudice against Christianity,
and I felt it a duty to rescue them, even without
their consent. I sought out Luis, and after drawing
from him some of the chivalrous sentiments that
belonged to his nature, and exacting the most
distinct, unequivocal, and reiterated promises of
never divulging to any mortal ear what I should
communicate, I told him the circumstances, only
withholding what bore hard on the character of
his church, and omitting the mention of a priest
among Isaac's pursuers. He entered warmly into
the recital, glowed with indignation, melted with
compassion, and from the bottom of his soul, as I
fully believe, devoted himself to their rescue. I
gave him directions as to the preparations to be
made, unknown to Isaac, during my absence ; and

130 THE CONFESSIONAL.

he promised that whenever I could snatch a few

hours to revisit V , I should find all ready for

a coup de main. We had just parted, when I be-
thought myself, and returning, said, " Remember,
Da M , you are pledged not to name this sub-
ject to any human being, and of course, not at the
confessional."

What a change came over him ! His brow clouded
directly, as if a thousand dark recollections had
been unexpectedly called up. I knew he was a
devotee to his religion ; but that, though I pitied
it as a weakness, seemed an additional guarantee
of his fidelity and conscientious discharge of an
engagement. Strange, therefore, it was to read in
the glance that met mine an expression far from
friendly ; and I believe my gaze grew stern, for
the colour mounted to his cheek, which had at
the first turned pale. He was a young man of
high courage ; and my blood was English, with a
dash of Irish to inflame it. The image of my
Hebrew friends in their lonely hut rose, however,
to my mind's eye, and helped to allay the impru-
dent heat of what, after all, was only a surmise. I
forced myself, therefore, to speak mildly, " Luis,
you are not, surely, capable of betraying a trust
confided to your honour?"

" No, R , my honour is, and ever shall be,

that of a soldier."

" Then you renew the pledge, without any ex-
ception or reservation whatever ?"

" You have embarrassed a plain matter, R ,

THE CONFESSIONAL. 131

by forcing into a question of personal honour that
which belongs to religion alone."

" And how can you separate the two ?"

" We cannot discuss this point ; you are not a
Catholic, and your friend Isaac is not a Ca-
tholic either," he continued, checking the word
Jew, which was evidently on his scornful lip.

' ' Be satisfied, R , that I shall act in every way

as becomes a man of strict honour and a good
Christian."

His kind look returned, and as he held out his
hand I felt that perhaps I had judged him wrong-
fully, under the influence of Rachel's injurious
prejudices. Yet my mind was considerably unset-
tled, and I wished that I had weighed the matter
more maturely before divulging it.

Some days passed ; the regiment was still at

V ; I got a few hours' leave, and galloped

over; there was a stir in the place that excited
my attention, and I asked a sentry whether any
thing had occurred. " A grand mass, Senhor, has
been celebrated by two clergymen of rank, who
came here on some government business; and
there has been a procession of the host," taking
off his cap as he named it.

An uncomfortable feeling, in spite of me, bore
testimony to the lurking suspicion within. I rode
on, and found Luis arm-in-arm with another
officer. He greeted we with accustomed cordiality,
and I tried to persuade myself that his colour did
not change, and that there was no anxiety on his

132 THE CONFESSIONAL.

part to avoid being alone with me. I gave him
sundry hints, and even put, in a covert wray, a
question or two ; but he appeared to forget there
was anything unusual on the tapis. At last I fairly
told him I wanted a few minutes' private conver-
sation, as I must proceed to the colonel's quarters,
and then return to my post. His companion, on
this, took leave, and we slowly walked on together.

" I want your aid immediately, Da M , to

carry into effect a project wliich will at once end
this business."

" What business ?"

" Why, have you forgotten ?" I asked, almost
hoping he might have done so.

" I have not forgotten the subject we spoke on
at parting."

" And what have you done ?"

" Nothing; there was no opening as yet."

" Well, I have now every hope of succeeding,
if " he interrupted me.

" R , this is not a safe place for private con-
versations."

I began again in French, but he made some
other objection, and evidently wished to prevent
my saying a word about it. His manner evinced
abstraction and despondency ; to me, more than
usually cordial and kind, but full of frivolous pre-
texts for not listening to my plan. Suddenly, to
his great relief, the colonel appeared at a short dis-
tance, and he announced the fact to me so loudly
as to draw that officer's attention. Of course all

THE CONFESSIONAL. 133

private conference was at an end ; and before I left
the colonel, Luis had somehow slipped away.

I had not a moment's time to seek out Isaac.
I returned to my detachment vexed and gloomy,
resolving, if no other means appeared, to take ad-
vantage of the night, and steal a march ; for there
was a report that we were to move on very soon.
•In fact, the order was hourly expected. The very
next night, after having carefully arranged my
plans, I slipped on a disguise — and secretly arming
myself with two brace of pistols, I mounted, and
by a circuitous road, neither pleasant nor safe to
traverse, I contrived to reach Isaac's hut soon after
midnight. All was silent; I listened long, and
gave cautiously the signal agreed upon ; but no re-
sponse came, and it was so dark I could scarcely
discern the door. After repeating again and again,
even loudly, the sounds that I was sure would be
recognised, I tried the latch — it yielded, and I
passed the threshold; but though nothing might
be discerned in the thick gloom, I felt that desola-
tion reigned within. The state of my feelings
soon set caution at defiance. I drew forth the ap-
paratus for instantaneous light, which I always car-
ried about me, and in a moment the glare of an
ignited paper was thrown round the apartment.
I had only time to discover, during its short dazzling
blaze, where Isaac's lamp stood, or rather lay, for
it was overturned ; and having groped my way to
it, and replaced the wick in the small quantity of
oil left, I succeeded at last in lighting it.

134 THE CONFESSIONAL.

All was gone : the poor children of Abraham,
the little box that had been artfully deposited under
the leaf of the small table, and the larger coffer —
evidently rent, with great force, from its recess,
the boarding of which was broken in pieces. I
strove to hope that an escape had been effected ;
but marks of a struggle were visible on every side.
I found some object at my feet; it was Isaac's cap.
I lifted it to the light ; and when I let it fall, the
stain of blood remained on my hand. I sickened
almost to fainting ; and before I could resume the
search, the few drops of oil had wasted ; I was
again in darkness. To wait for the dawn was im-
possible ; and with a heart lacerated with the
bitterest agony of self reproach, I mounted to re-
trace my path.

Here ends the tale of mystery and of treachery.
On the following morning, an order from the regi-
mental commandant — singularly opportune, per-
haps you will think — moved my little detachment
a couple of leagues further from the scene ; at the
same time imposing on me a vigilance so strict as
would have rendered impossible such discoveries
as I had already made by my midnight excursion.

I burned for a meeting with Luis, and meet we
shortly did ; but it was on the battle-field, where
first my company rejoined the main body. Again
we met in the evening of the same day, in the
surgeon's tent, where we both lay wounded, I
painfully — he mortally. I first recognised him ;
and on hearing me pronounce his name, he started,

THE CONFESSIONAL. 135

threw a hasty glance towards me, and then, groan-
ing, averted his head.

" Da M ," said I, in an under tone, " where

are they ?" A stare of agony, whether bodily
alone, or mental too, was all the reply. I raised
myself on my elbow, and, looking earnestly at him,
whispered, " Luis, did you — surely you did not
betray them ! Say that you have not been false to
jour plighted word." The sternness of death — a
soldier's death — was on his features; he raised,
with a last effort, the little crucifix that he grasped,
and slowly, distinctly exclaiming, " I have been
true to my most holy faith !" again turned from
me, and expired.

The lesson sunk deep into my heart ; and I date
my first inquiry into scripture truth from this most
painful display of antiscriptural falsehood. All the
investigation I could make in the regiment, when
convalescent, only satisfied me that Luis had been

*/

much and repeatedly closeted with one of the ec-
clesiastics who visited V in my absence ; that

he had appeared at first restless and uneasy, but
after a while, settled into even more devotional
habits than had before distinguished him. Whe-
ther a clue had already been obtained, which these
priests were following up, or whether the line of
ghostly inquiry at the confessional had led Luis to
a contrite acknowledgment of such dealings with
a heretic in favour of a Jew, and so afforded the
trace, can only be conjectured. That he was cog-
nizant of the affair I would not venture to doubt ;

136 THE CONFESSIONAL.

and a bitter pang it then was, perhaps even more
bitter now, to reflect, that to the injured Israelites
I must have appeared the traitor ; that the treachery
was charged upon our pure faith which belonged
exclusively to the demon of Popery.

Often has that climax of Isaac's lamentation
sounded in my ears — " I have fallen into the
hands of the CHRISTIANS !" Often do I recal the
wild terror of poor Rachel's countenance as she
gasped out the question, " Do you — do you go to
confession ?" One or both of them most probably
fell a sacrifice in the struggle to which their hut
bore evidence, and Rome shall answer for the
crime, if, like millions in either hemisphere, they
died denouncing for her sake the pure, holy, and
peaceful religion of the Saviour she dishonours
and blasphemes !

137

THOU SHALT. NOT BOW DOWN TO THE3I,
NOR WORSHIP THEM."

BY the mouth of the LORD these words were
spoken, when, making the clouds his chariot, and
walking upon the wings of the wind, he vouch-
safed, from the midst of the thick darkness, with
thunderings and lightnings, and flames of fire, to
declare unto Jacob his statutes, and his ordinances
unto Israel. By the finger of the LORD these
words were engraven on tablets of stone, for a per-
petual memorial of that awful scene, and in testi-
mony that, howsoever transitory the typical law of
ceremonies might be, — destined to endure no longer
than till the Great Antitype should come, — the
moral law of the ten commandments should con-
tinue of perpetual obligation, binding as a perfect
rule of life wheresoever the knowledge is conferred
of Him who spake them. " To the law, and to
the testimony," we bring all things to prove them,
that we may hold fast that which is good. The
apostle James distinctly and emphatically points
this out, when applying to the touchstone of truth

138 THOU SHALT NOT BOW DOWN TO THEM,

certain errors, against which he warned the be-

' O

loved brethren. He expressly cites two of these
ten commandments : — " He that said, Do not com-
mit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now, if thou
commit no adultery, yet, if thou kill, thou art be-
come a transgressor of the law."

The application of this is obvious. He that said,
" Thou shalt not kill," said also, at the same time,
yea, giving a precedence to the solemn prohibition,
" Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven image
— thou shalt not bow down to them, nor worship
them." Yea, and to impress on us more strongly the
exceeding heinousness of the offence, he further
declared that the sin, when committed, should be
visited not only on the actual transgressors, but on
their children to succeeding generations.

Israel, to whom these words were primarily ad-
dressed, instigated thereto by the evil heart of un-
belief, fell into the transgression repeatedly, until
their provocations drew down a terrible judgment
upon the whole people. The ten tribes were first
carried away captive ; and to this day, with very
few exceptions, they remain hidden among the
nations, only to be revealed by a special mani-
festation of God's wondrous power when he shall
set himself to recover and to bring them back.
Judah, surviving for a time, but ceasing not to sin
idolatrously, was next smitten ; and learned, during
a sore captivity of seventy years, that the LORD
was not always to be mocked. Among other irre-
parable losses was the ark of the covenant, con-

NOR WORSHIP THEM. 139

taining these tables of stone ; and it is remarkable
that, from the period of their partial restoration, to
the final blow which their fearful crime in crucify-
ing the Lord of Glory drew down on their de-
voted heads, the Jews never relapsed into idolatry.
They had lost the written commandment so long
before their eyes ; but the scourge of the captor
had so cut it into, their memories, that they dared
no further to provoke the vengeance of their jealous
God by that particular transgression.

In like manner, the Gentile churches being
grafted by faith into the original holy stock of
God's choice olive-tree, received this law of com-
mandments, and while they kept the precept, it
was well with them ; but the great enemy of God
and man too well knows the terrible consequences
that shall inevitably follow the commission of that
sin to cease from his malignant enticements. The
Holy Ghost has declared that what is sacrificed to
idols is sacrificed to devils : and sweet must it be
to the old serpent, who beguiled Eve by his subtilly,
to violate the divine command ; very sweet must it
be to him, in this day of enlightened knowledge, to
receive from a huge portion of the professing church
of Christ the homage due to God alone, rendered
through the medium, the very medium most dis-
tinctly prohibited — graven images, purporting to be
the likeness of things that are in heaven above.

Many accusations are brought and fully sus-
tained against those who have followed in the track
of her utter apostasy, the once faithful church at

140 THOU SHALT NOT BOW DOWN TO THEM,

Rome — no longer a church of Christ, but a temple
of idols, a synagogue of Satan, a wild branch early
grafted into the true olive, then severed, withered,
and still rotting on the ground in the sight of all
men, until the day when God sees fit to cast it
into the fire. Like other putrid bodies, this cor-
rupt mass has the property of communicating the
principle of decay to all within breathing space of
its locality, and wide indeed is the spread of its
baneful influence !

The British church was originally ingrafted

«/ o

through the ministry of an apostle, or of his im-
mediate successor, and stood by faith long after
that of Rome had provoked the severing knife of
the husbandman. In an evil hour the pestilential
influence seized our branch, and the incrustations
of advancing ruin covered it. Oh for a song of
praise to Him who doeth wondrously, and who
from his lofty habitation beheld and rescued it !
Purged by fire, pruned to the very stem, but not
excised, our branch cast off her rottenness, and
again shot forth in the vigour of health, and in the
brightness of beauty, and became an admiration
among men, as the richness of her produce spread
abroad throughout the world to the glory of her
great Redeemer.

Henceforth the church of England assumed, as
a frontlet between her eyes, the words that the
Lord God had spoken ; and from sabbath to sab-
bath the ministers of her sanctuary are commis-
sioned to proclaim the divine denunciation against

NOR WORSHIP THEM. 141

that sin whereby the Roman branch fell, and under
the effects of which she lies before our sight an
accursed thing.

The frontispiece to this volume must not be re-
garded as the mere portrait of an individual, how-
ever highly and justly esteemed in the church for
his works' sake ; it speaks the history of the past,
the security of the present, the peril of the future.
The artist himself, deeply imbued with the spirit
of pure Protestantism, caught the expression of the
pastor's countenance at the moment when those
solemn words breathed the divine will to a listen-
ing congregation — " Thou shalt not bow down to
them, nor worship them !" and verily from the
depths of the heart did they come.

Beside him, on the table of the Lord, no longer
paganized with the name of altar, stands the pre-
cious pledge of our renewed membership in the
body of Christ, the cup whereof he commanded
his disciples, " Drink ye all of this ;" and which,
as though the marks of her apostasy were not al-
ready sufficiently numerous, the dead branch of
Rome casts away, in token of her utter separation
from that body. What God had joined she dared
to put asunder, and in the impious attempt she
fell. Our fathers were too long consenting unto
the deed; they partook in her sins, and received
of her plagues ; but, like Israel of old, they stum-
bled not to a final fall. The Lord put a wise heart
into their children, raised up to them a young
Josiah, and, in replacing in their hands the cup of

142 THOU SHALT NOT BOW DOWN TO THEM,

blessing, renewed his early covenant, and em-
braced with arms of everlasting mercy the return-
ing prodigal. Wherefore does the minister's hand
so earnestly press upon the page of that book ?
Whence the frown upon his brow, the concen-
trated energy of every feature, the anxious expres-
sion of that eloquent countenance, so full of love,
so full of zeal, so fraught with the watchman's
spirit? He knows that grievous wolves once en-
tered in and scattered the Lord's flock ; he knows
that little foxes are even now spoiling the tender
grapes, while they pioneer the way for the in-
bursting of the wild boar that longs to root up the
vine ; he trembles for the Lord's table, lest again
it become the heathen altar of some massing priest ;
he trembles for the cup of blessing, lest the wrath
of Jehovah leave his deluded people again to put
it from them ; and,, knowing whence the danger
arises, he warns them as one who watches for their
souls in the certainty of having to give account to
God ; and longing to do so with joy and not with
grief, he warns them of the coming woe ; he
remembers that pictures, and crucifixes, and all
the lumber of idolatrous services are stealing
back into the churches of the land; he remembers
that the very bread which stands beside the cup
upon his table may again be made the engine of
a horrible profanation ; and he shews them the
written page, stamped with the sanction of divine
revelation, and, in reference to the dreaded snare
of visible things, he says, yet not he, but the Lord —

NOR WORSHIP THEM. 143

" THOU SHALT NOT BOW DOWN TO THEM, NOR

WORSHIP THEM.'

To exalt the creature is at no time good, even
though that creature were a Paul or an Apollos ;
still less is it seemly when the subject before us is
one where the LORD OF HOSTS stands forth in the
awful majesty of lawgiver. But we are commanded
to render unto ail men their dues, " honour to
whom honour ;" and while devoutly ascribing to
God the glory of gifts that are the fruits of his
sovereign grace, we may be permitted to render
the tribute of due honour, of unfeigned love, of
deep thankfulness, to the Rev. Hugh M'Neile.

It is not for us to enumerate the works that shall
follow him to the presence of the Lord, if by
mercy he is kept faithful unto death, as to this
period of his valuable life he has been kept faithful.
He is universally known throughout this empire
as one of the most powerful instruments ever raised
up to arm the church in troublous days. The tes-
timonv of his brethren in the faith is valuable ;

•/

that of his adversaries, the enemies of the faith,
yet more so. No man living has been so grossly,
so impudently, calumniated in the face of all evi-
dence ; no man is so notoriously dreaded by the
workers of seditious evil in church and state ; and
perhaps no man on earth is so ardently, so exten-
sively loved by all classes of right-minded people.
Neither his fascinating eloquence, nor any of the
shining gifts conferred on him, would, or could, in-
vest him with such amazing power over the spirits

144 THOU SHALT NOT BOW DOWN TO THEM, ETC.

of his fellow men ; it is that God gives him favour
in their eyes for special purposes of his own. Pur-
poses, we humbly trust, connected with the removal
of that frightful blot from our national legislation,
which no minister, no man in the kingdom more
fervently strove to avert. True it is, that if he
were taken to his rest to-morrow, becoming one of
the great cloud of witnesses to that race wherein
he is now a leader, the work would proceed.
God's counsel would stand, and he would do all
his pleasure, with equal certainty; and equally
true it is that, if our England were to-morrow
blotted out of the world's map, no blank would be
felt as regards the determined operations of him
to whom every knee shall shortly bow at his com-
ing ; but let us hope that a gracious dispensation
will yet preserve the land of our birth, to be a means
of working out the Lord's promises towards Israel,
and of glorifying him among the nations ; and
let us pray that alike to the green isle of his birth,
who out of her deep poverty has inundated her
more wealthy sister with many a treasure of gospel
ministty, and to the land of his adoption, which
has learned to appreciate his worth, the beloved
servant of our God may long be spared, a golden
vessel, consecrated to the Master's use, and faith-
fully dispensing among men the riches of the
grace for that purpose given unto him.

145

CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION.

0

BY MACLEOD WYLIE, ESQ.

" For them that honour me I will honour."

1 SAMUEL, ii. 30.

MANY of the practical results and all the wayward
theories of the modern system of liberalism, are
strange outrages on the feelings of sincere Chris-
tians, and wide derelictions from the principles
and intentions of the greatest English states-
men. To men truly enlightened, the hallowed
truth that " righteousness exalteth a nation," and
the revealed warning that " sin is a reproach to
any people," recommend themselves as considera-
tions of the highest importance. To the ancient
statesmen of England especially — who lived nearer
than we do to the blessed Reformation, who had
caught something of its spirit, and who from prac-
tical experience knew far more than our present le-
gislators can know of Popery — these scriptural ex-
pressions were deeply interesting. They had not
learned that, if belief be sincere, its object is a
matter of indifference ; they had not discovered
that a state oppresses conscience when it provides

H

146 CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION.

for the religions instruction of the people ; the?/
were not insensible to the guilt of national sins,
but,

" Soul inflamed,
And strong in hatred of idolatry,"

they endeavoured manfully, wherever their power
extended, to crush triumphant error, and to che-
rish afflicted truth. Thus the early Reformers,
who were Edward the Sixth's advisers, Cranmer
and Ridley, Latimer and Bradford; thus afterwards,
Burleigh and Walsingham, Bacon and Salisbury ;
thus Falkland and Clarendon, on the one side,
and Hampden and Eliot on the other ; and thus
Tillotson and Somers, felt and acted. To them,
Popery's abominations and tyranny, and the social
danger of Infidelity, were not matters of theory
but of fact.

But now, times have altered, and we have
changed with them ; that which was undisputed
by these men must be proved : that which they
held without reproach, nay, rather as the common
opinion of all good people, is now scorned as an
obsolete fallacy — an exploded principle of dying
bigotry. For suddenly it has been found out and
declared, that in the eye of the state ah1 religions
should be alike ; that statesmen, as statesmen,
have nothing to do with the eternal interests of
the people they govern ; and that it is despotism to
support out of the public funds, directly or in-
directly, any particular system for promoting

CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION. 147

Christian knowledge. And into this error nearly
all the public men of the present age have fallen.
Some, indeed, profess to hold a different opinion ;
and, perchance, they argue warmly against any
spoliation or withdrawal of the endowments en-
joyed by the church, or any other body recog-
nised by the state. But usually even these men
shrink from meeting the main point at issue — whe-
ther Christian governments are not bound to rule
according to God's word, in His fear, and with a
sense of responsibility to Him to whom all power
belongs, and by whom alone "king's reign, and
princes decree justice." That is the point now to
be debated in this age of speculators and sophists-
that is, in fact, the chief political difference be-
tween the godly and the ungodly in parliament
and in the country.

But surely if God's word in this controversy be
taken as infallible authority; if historical expe-
rience be allowed to operate as an argument, all
dispute on the subject must be acknowledged to be
frivolous and idle. We read in the Bible that the
"powers that be are ordained of God;" we know
that even heathen rulers who have oppressed His
people have been punished, while those who have
protected them, and worked righteousness, have
been prospered ; and doubtless all who, knowing
the Lord, have, like Jeroboam, caused others to sin,
or have themselves deserted or denied Him, have
found that " it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands
of the living God." The reigns of David and

H 2

148 CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION.

Solomon, of Hezckiah and Josiah, were times
when God baffled every invader, and gave peace,
plenteousness, and glory, to Judali. The reigns
of Manasseh and of Ahab were seasons of humilia-
tion, commotion, and defeat. And these things
were written for our example. " Holy men of
God spake as they were moved by the Holy
Ghost ;" " all scripture is given by inspiration of
God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof,
for correction, for instruction in righteousness."
These things therefore should be our beacons or
our encouragements ; they should warn us against
national and public offences, or strengthen us
with one heart to serve the Lord.

And this lesson is confirmed by historical expe-
rience. The lands where Popery and the Inquisi-
tion flourished — Italy and Spain, though blessed
with rare fertility, with mineral wealth, with un-
clouded skies, are now, of all the lands where the
name of Christ has been mentioned so long, the
most degraded and the most wretched. The
countries where Popery has not been quite strong
enough to establish or to maintain the Inquisition,
but in which, nevertheless, she has substituted
cunningly-devised fables and the commandments
of men, for pure and imdefiled religion, are coun-
tries sunk beneath a load of despotism, and de-
based even in this, the boasted nineteenth century
to a degree of ignorance and servility happily un-
known, for many generations, to British freemen.
And in those darker lands where Mahommedanism

CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION. 149

has deluded the population — in Turkey and Persia
particularly — freedom is unknown, the people
perish through lack of knowledge, and God's an-
cient people are barbarously oppressed ; while in
China and all Pagan nations, in the wilds of Africa,
among the savage tribes of America, the hordes
of Tartary, and ths heathens of the distant isles,
the weak are unprotected from the strong, lust
and rapine reign supreme, the land is uncultured,
and generation follows generation to the grave,
each sinking lower than its predecessor in misery,
barbarism, and sin.

Nor let it be said that other peculiarities affect-
ing these nations account for their disasters, other-
wise than by the simple fact of the withdrawal of
God's favour. The test has been applied to diffe-
rent parts of the same countries, and everywhere
the same tale is told. The north and south of
Ireland are the seats respectively of Protestantism
and Popery — in the former, the arts of industry
and peace continually flourish ; the latter are the
favourite abodes of superstition and penury, of
disaffection and crime. The Popish and Protes-
tant cantons of Switzerland are similarly con-
trasted— so also are the Popish and Protestant
parts of Prussia ; and France, besides presenting
the same distinction between several of her southern
departments, can tell the tale that, with the faith-
ful band of Protestants whom she exiled by the
perfidious revocation of the Edict of Nantes, fled
the glory and the happiness of the nation. So

150 CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION.

likewise Upper and Lower Canada, and Holland
and Belgium respectively, prove that there is in
national fidelity, in the acknowledgment of the
one true God, who has promised "them that
honour me I will honour," a salient spring of
strength and prosperity ; and that there is in national
apostasy, and particularly in the Popish form of it,
the certain source of domestic distraction and in-
cessant depression. The events that mark the
history of these countries cannot otherwise be ex-
plained. If they can — if, indeed, peculiar advan-
tages of climate, position, or soil, are to be deemed
the causes of prosperity — or if human skill and
policy be considered its efficient promoters, how
shall the difficulty be solved when the same cli-
mate, soil, and position, and the same form of go-
vernment, have been enjoyed by the countries or
parts of countries in which different fruits have
been gathered ? And above all, how shall the
very different influence of countries in colonization
be explained, save by reference to the operation
of the Christian or worldly principles that distin-
guish their governments — the civilization and
wisdom of the rulers being in ail cases much the
same ? England, for instance, has carried, and is
carrying even now, to many a colony, her sceptre
of mercy and justice. In none of them is there
now a slave. In all, the Bible and indefatigable
preachers of the pure Word of God are scattered
among an intelligent and improving population.
But the blood-hound tracked the way of the

CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION. 151

Popish Spaniard across the southern continent of
America; at Goa the mandate of Portuguese in-
quisitors summoned trembling heathens to bow to
idols scarcely less debasing than their own ; and
France has carried to Lower Canada, and, in latter
times, to Algiers and the Pacific, a tyranny as
merciless as that which, in her now liberated
colony of St. Domingo, roused thousands of ener-
vated but maddened bondmen to seize and
trample on their intolerable oppressors.

These things happened not by chance — not
coincidence but causation must account for them.
If not, passing strange indeed is the accident that
permanent prosperity and success have attended
those countries only, which have acknowledged a
power either unable or unwilling, according to the
new theory, to assist them ; and that disaster and
ruin have been the fate of those nations and go-
vernments and men only, whose proud preemi-
nence and wisdom it was, to be less dependent on
imaginary aid ! This is the accident that has
happened according to the hypothesis of men who,
nevertheless, while they give utterance to the
monstrous absurdity, stultify themselves by ac-
knowledging, and pretending to reverence, a Great
and Omniscient Being before wrhom they allow,
in one great appointed day, all flesh must appear
for judgment. By whose authority, we may \vell
inquire, is this startling theory recommended to
the world ? Truly it needs some stamp ere it can
pass current. There have been giants on the

152 CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION.

earth — men whose intellectual power marked their
age, who lived in times of stirring action, and laid
in their deeds the solid foundations of glory for
their names, and of greatness for their nations.
Have these men announced their belief in the wild
fancy of the nineteenth century? Far from it.
The memories of the noblest heirs of Fame des-
cend the stream of Time burdened \vith no such
dishonour. Everywhere their witness has been
the same. In England, Bacon and Newton were
politicians; in France, De Thou; in Spain, Ximenes;
in Sweden, Gustavus ; in Germany, Maurice the
Silent ; in Holland, De Witt ; and these men have
all repudiated the hope, and scorned the opinion,
that national security is compatible with national
apostasy, or public infidelity. With these men, we
may well resolve to be counted as bigots, and ridi-
culed as fools. With the unhappy worshippers of
reason, children of the bloody revolution that de-
voured her own offspring, the philosophical liberals
of the present day may, on the other hand, if they
please, court shame with an effrontery mistaken
for the confidence of martyrs, and with an excited
devotion confounded with the zeal of apostles.
The day has been before when it was fashionable
to deride what afterwards was admitted to be
truth ; nay, more ; the predicted time did come
when those who slaughtered the disciples of the
Lord, thought that they were doing God service.
But that is now altered, and so hopes may be en-
tertained of a further change. The persecutors

CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION. 153

now build up the sepulchres of the prophets, and,
in the present fancy of most enlightened men,
Galileo is no longer heretical, and Kepler no
longer mad. How long this opinion and this
tolerance may continue, we know not. The fashion
of this world passe th away. It is well, therefore,
on the important point of Christian legislation,
that there should be some endeavour made to settle
the opinions of all who are willing to bow to supe-
rior authority, or to examine facts.

Let us turn, then, from these considerations to
an observation of events passing before us ; by
them we shall find the lesson already taught us,
powerfully confirmed. On the wide and wild sea
of expediency this nation has floated off from her
moorings, without a definite plan, without com-
pass or pole-star. Religion and the stale preju-
dices of our forefathers concerning national re-
sponsibilities are unheeded ; like Gallic, our rulers
care for none of these things. The vile are
exalted, and the wicked walk on every side.
Directly a man becomes a ruler he ceases to think
himself a Christian, — at least, in that character of
ruler it has come to be understood that he shall
act on principles which in private he would be
ashamed to avow ; or if he desire to gain popularity
by his zeal, it must be a zeal for infidelity under
the mask of knowledge, and for anarchy under the
name of freedom. The tone of public feeling, con-
sequently, is considerably altered ; the sovereignty
of God gives way to the majesty of the people ; and

H 3

154 CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION.

years after, the country congratulates itself on hav-
ing just managed to escape some wild democratical
outbreak, only, however, to give time to the coming
flood to gather force in its resistless impetuous pro-
gress. And where is our hope ? Why, in a little
more practice of the very system that has led to
our present danger — concessions to each new
claimant; conciliation of each new conspiracy; tam-
perings with each new invader ; a servile imitation
of the policy of enervated Rome, by which bar-
barians were tempted, with bribes paid for their re-
treat, to prepare for fresh and more successful onsets.
All this, too, is done with the least possible dis-
tinctness of purpose ; all, whether it be right or
wrong, is settled or permitted without reference to
any sort of principle. The queen and her minis-
ters are sworn to uphold Protestantism, as pro-
fessed by the established churches ; and this is to be
done by the aid of a parliament, in which the scale
of parties is confessedly turned by Papists and So-
cinians, leagued together to destroy those insti-
tutions. And while Protestantism is thus pro-
fessedly upheld, but in fact betrayed, at home, a
revenue is drawn from the encouragement of ido-

o

latry in India. Protestant troops in one of our
Popish colonies are compelled to venerate the Host ;
in Ireland the system of public education is en-
trusted to an anti-christian and disaffected priest-
hood, themselves educated by the state ; and in
Lower Canada the governor, as representative of a
Protestant queen, is bound, by the solemn obli-

CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION. 155

gation of an oath, to maintain Popery as the esta-
blished religion ! So that practically Pilate's question,
" What is truth?" is asked by the British government,
with an emphasis which must at least produce doubt
in the mind of the people. And while this is the
conduct of the government, the country is rent with
intestine discord; party spirit, socialism, and various
kinds of infidelity, Popish combinations, and chartist
agitators, continually threaten a dismemberment of
the empire or a civil war ; and the helm of execu-
tive power is held with a nerveless grasp, by men
whose energy is paralyzed by the consciousness
that sedition must not be repressed, because it
gained them authority, and may be again required
for that purpose. And this being our condition,
we are told not to trust in God, but to put our
confidence in man. The Whig tells us that, bar-
ring all accidents, he can so contrive things, that
the tide of democracy shall come in quite gently
and imperceptibly, exactly in measure enough to
keep him and his, floating on its waters ; and if
permission to manage things thus, be denied him,
he himself prepares to swell its volume and to
heighten its fury. The Radical is for letting it
all in boldly at once, because he morbidly broods
over former fancied oppressions, and prepares com-
placently to contemplate the ruin he joyfully an-
ticipates ; while the Conservative,

Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike,

to be sure, is very sorry for the national peril, par-

156 CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION.

ticularly as he has something to lose ; and therefore
he has quite resolved to take office when he can
get it, and keeps things, bad as they are, in their
present condition. He assures the Liberals that
he has no evil intentions ; he did indeed oppose
everything, or nearly everything, that has led to
our present distresses ; but then he is now content
with his lot, for he calculates that, if let into office
now, he is exactly in time to prevent further mis-
chief. Alas ! that these should be our counsellors
in the hour of peril. Our chiefest misery and
curse now are, that the faithful are " vanished out
of the land," — our legitimate leaders are gone, — the
bramble is king of the forest, nobler trees are dead,
or shun the shame of such a sovereignty.

Truly, then, in England we have no reason to
rejoice in the success of our experiment of govern-
ing without God. And this is not our lesson alone.
To what advantage, tranquillity, or social harmony
have Prussia's mixed schemes of education led ?
how much peace has her conciliation of Popery
produced ? What was Holland's reward when she
sacrificed her ancient policy to gain the honour of
governing the Belgians in conjunction with her
own people, on a system in which violence was ne-
cessarily offered to the prejudices of both, without
the hope of satisfaction to either ? And boasted
America, whose federal government has set up no
altar in the land, but rather has left all men to do
as may seem good in their eyes, how great is not
the value of her contribution to the mass of evidence

CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION. 157

on this subject, when considered with her slaves
and her slave trade, her persecution of the Indians,
her lax principles of trade, her rifeness of Soci-
nianism, her degraded literature, and the admitted
probability of her spiritually destitute population,
as well in her towns as in the wilderness, becoming
the prey of the r'estless propaganda ?

We appeal, then, to the world around us for
present illustrations of the truth which revelation
and experience have already been appealed to, to
establish. That any man can deny a principle so
sound is in itself a lamentable proof of mental hal-
lucination ; that all the rulers of a great country
should combine to deny it, and to act on some
other fancy of their own, is an evidence that God's
judgments are upon that country, and that He hath
sent on those rulers " a strong delusion that they
should believe a lie." We do, indeed, marvel how
a fallacy so absurd and so presumptuous ever came
to be openly published without shame and con-
fusion. Surely to every reasonable mind its ab-
surdity must be apparent. If there be no national
responsibilities, why should the Bible speak of
them, and threaten nations, as such, with disasters ;
and announce the execution of wrath on nations
many generations after the deeds that provoked
the Almighty ? And if there be national respon-
sibilities, while it is untrue that nations as such
are now subject to heavy judgments of a temporal
kind, how can they be punished at all ? A nation
as a nation cannot be punished hereafter. In the

158 CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION.

last day every nation will be divided into her indi-
vidual members, each of whom will then be judged,
and can then be punished. So from man, as an
individual, it is consistent with God's justice to
withhold temporal punishment, seeing that retri-
bution must finally surely come. But with nations
it is not so. If national guilt and apostasy be not
temporally punished, they never can be ; and so
to the eyes of the world may be presented the
spectacle of a just and omnipotent God, offended
with impunity.

We dismiss this awful supposition, and with it
all further pleading for the general proposition we
have endeavoured to establish, and we turn to the
minor point so often raised, " What is this Christian
legislation you so often advocate ?" We reply,
that we deem it to be such legislation as betokens
a sense on the part of the rulers, that they are re-
sponsible to God for the due use of their power,
and a conviction that their duty will not be fulfilled,
unless that power is used solely to promote His
glory. We might illustrate what we mean by a
reference to the conduct of Alfred the Great or
the Elector Frederic, but, to come nearer to our
own times, let us glance at the statute-book and
history of King Edward the Sixth. In that reign,
an age of peculiar intolerance, a time when all the
worst passions of the breast had been most power-
fully excited, persecution ceased. The Papists,
who, in the subsequent reign, so fearfully laboured
to cement their authority with the blood of their

CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION. 159

opponents, were unmolested, — not one perished for
his religion. The most splendid institutions were
established for charitable purposes and for general
education, and schemes the most magnificent were
formed for increasing and spreading them through-
out the kingdom — schemes which nothing but the
untimely death of the saintly royal youth nipped in
the bud. The laws enacted were not like those in
the statute-book of Mary, the succeeding Popish
queen, for making more offences treasonable, for
limiting the right to the writ of habeas corpus, for in-
stituting arbitrary courts, and establishing first the
authority of a Popish bishop, and then of a foreign
prince, (the most sanguinary tyrant of modern times ;)
nor against " seditious words and rumours," and the
punishment of heretics and gipsies ; but rather for
the relief of the poor and impotent, against blas-
pheming the sacraments, for the prevention of the
abatement of suits by the death of the king ; for re-
pealing certain statutes concerning treasons, felonies,
&c. ; for abolishing images, and enabling priests to
marry ; for a general pardon ; for an uniformity of
worship ; for providing the means of endowing col-
leges, hospitals, &c. ; against ale-houses and against
fighting in churches ; for the encouragement of the
woollen trade ; for keeping holy days, &c. In all
that reign there was perfect peace ; there was no
war or rumour of war, no serious civil dissension,
but justice was tempered with mercy ; the word of
God was printed and published for the people in
the vernacular tongue, and was read and taught to

160 CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION.

them ; some of the most able and pious ministers
that ever ruled a state or adorned a church, were
entrusted with civil and ecclesiastical power ; and
in every public deed and document, the most so-
lemn reverential acknowledgment was made of the
one true God and of Jesus Christ, whom he hath
sent as the Redeemer of the world. Popery was
then treated as the great apostasy, and as such no
compromise whatever with it was dreamt of or
desired ; infidelity was deemed an offence against
the state as well as against God, and, justly so,
on the sound scriptural rule, " Smite a scorner,
and the simple will beware."

Happy would it be for this land if the boasted
intelligence of the nineteenth century suggested
such a system of government, and realized such
results as were suggested and achieved by the
simple Christian wisdom of Edward the Sixth's
counsellors. Then indeed there would be, as of
yore, something remarkable in Great Britain, the
glorious distinction of being the most faithful, and
therefore the most favoured, country under heaven.
But, alas ! situated as we are, crooked as our policy
has been, wre can look for nothing but judgments
and wrath from the Almighty, if we repent not,
and do our first works — strengthening, too, " the
things which remain that are ready to die." Whe-
ther, if our sins and impenitence continue, these
penalties will be inflicted upon the most guilty
generations, or will be delayed ; whether our ruin
will come from foreign invasion, or " our casting

CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION. 161

down will be in the midst of us," cannot be deter-
mined or reasonably conjectured. But that they
will certainly come, in some form or another, and
with a force sufficient to denote at once God's
wrath and His power, cannot be questioned by any
one who has looked to revelation, experience, or
the current events of the present age ; and who,
considering the evidence afforded by these wit-
nesses, thinks also of the guilt of the nation and
the greatness of the Being offended — He who
" takes up the isles as a very little thing." There
is great reason to believe that, in the case of Great
Britain, the seeds of disaster and ruin are already
sown and growing ; emigration ; the destitution of
religious knowledge ; the measures (perhaps well
intended) that have tended to regulate, if not to
limit, the charities and sympathies of life; the extent
to which the population has become inured to suc-
cessful or unrestrained sedition, and to sudden and
violent shocks and changes in the constitution; the
looseness of public morals that has of late been
produced by the singular disregard of principle and
consistency manifested by the executive govern-
ment; and, above all, the infectious and "perilous
stuff" that, by means of a degraded press, has been
circulated among the people — these things give
rise to apprehensions that very little dependence
can be placed on the people in any national ex-
tremity, and that indeed much dread may be en-
tertained of further degeneracy. To speculate,
however, on the effect of these several causes is

162 CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION.

needless ; but it is necessary to know, and knowing
to remember, that " the wicked shall be turned
into hell, and all the nations that forget God ;"
and that if due reverence be done to "His glorious
and fearful name," those wrho rule will be just,
ruling in his fear. It is necessary to know also,
that while this is the duty of the governors, the
people must beware lest they be partakers of other
men's sins when those governors neglect that duty,
and they themselves have the right to make their
feelings known. It therefore behoves all who in these
critical and trying times have any part in the ad-
ministration of public affairs, and the people of this
country who are constitutionally entitled to an in-
direct influence in her legislative functions, care-
fully and scrupulously to consider what are the
exact proportions of their respective responsibili-
ties. By their efforts and by their prayers the
Lord's judgments may be averted, and blessings
instead of judgments called down on the nation.
There are, we trust and believe, even now, seven
thousand who have not bowed the knee to Baal,
and on them, who sigh and cry for the abomina-
tions that are done in the land, lies now the solemn
duty of warning others, clearing their own con-
sciences, and pouring out constant supplications
for mercy to their native land. It may be that
they will be branded as hypocrites or fanatics, de-
spised as bigots, held in contempt and " every-
where spoken against ;" but these things must not
move them ; their path is plain. To God they

CHRISTIAN LEGISLATION, 163

have to commit themselves in patient well-doing ;
and He who of old has done such marvellous things
may yet again reveal His arm and bring forth sal-
vation, restoring to this country the spirit of holi-
ness, and bestowing its government on those who
will hold their authority as subject to the King of
kings, and govern the people committed to their
charge as beings with immortal spirits, destined to
happiness or misery for ever.

164

NEHEMIAH.

BY L. H. J. T.

WHAT amazing condescension has the Almighty
displayed in the method and system by which in
all his dispensations, he has been pleased to com-
municate to us his will and pleasure, his laws and
his injunctions, his threats and his promises. The
Bible is not a series of abstract maxims. His
word ever comes to us by the lips of man, in which
we may almost see a shadowy type of the crowning
dispensation, when the Word, which from the be-
ginning was with God and was God, in the fulness
of time was made flesh and dwelt among us ; when
a man spake on earth, and prefaced not his teach-
ing, as did the holy prophets, with the solemn
" Thus saith the Lord," for he who spake was
himself that Lord.

It is in the Old Testament especially that we
are taught by the actions, the sayings, and the
characters of men, of like passions with ourselves.
When indeed they affix to their words the broad
seal of heaven, when they commence with the

NEHEMIAH. 165

preamble " Thus saith the Lord," all individuality
is lost, and we feel that as ambassadors they are
reading to us a proclamation from the King of
kings, but though their every word be equally and
at all times dictated by the same spirit of God, we
are often allowed to distinguish and to discern the
characters, the dispositions, and the feelings of the
fellow-worms who are thus moved by the Holy
Spirit to act and to speak for our edification and
instruction. We are thus, as it were, allowed to
know the men themselves after the flesh ; we feel
that they are men; and like as we find in our
daily intercourse with our Christian brethren, while
we love them all as fellow members incorporate
in the Lord's mystical body, yet to some more
than to others our hearts are drawn out and our
affections engaged by an irresistible sympathy,
according to the peculiarities of the disposition
which it has pleased God to endow us with. So
with the penmen of holy writ, and the individuals
whose actions they are inspired to record; we can-
not avoid, from our mysterious and complex nature,
feeling an especial and an individualizing affection
for some more than for others, As the soul of
David was knit to that of the loving Jonathan, as
Ruth clave to the patient Naomi, as the Lord
himself emphatically loved John, so are our hearts
won and our human affections engaged, where we

find in the sacred narratives that congeniality of

\j

nature which irresistibly begets that which no me-
taphysician can define — affection.

166 NEHEMIAH.

NEHEMIAII stands forth conspicuously as one
whom we needs must love and admire. His fer-
vent piety, his disinterested zeal, his glowing pa-
triotism, his prudence, his wisdom, his conscious
dignity, his graceful humility, all combine to form
a truly noble man.

Of his birth and lineage scripture is silent; some
have supposed that he was of the seed of Aaron,
others that he was a prince of the house of David.
The latter supposition seems the most probable,
as he always appears to us as the civil ruler, the
tirshatha,* or governor, while Ezra, a kindred noble
spirit, a descendant in the sixteenth generation
from Aaron,| devoted himself more exclusively to
the affairs of the priesthood, and although previous
to the arrival of Nehemiah from Shushan, he per-
formed the duties of governor, and was empowered
by Artaxerxes to set magistrates and judges, yet
is he nowhere styled tirshatha, or governor, but
simply the priest or scribe. Ezra's commission
relates to the temple, Nehemiah's to the walls of
Jerusalem.

Nehemiah held the honourable and responsible
office of cupbearer to King Artaxerxes,:): but, like

* The word xnunn, tirshatha, is supposed to be Persian ;
and if, as Castel supposes, it signifies austerity, or that fear which
is impressed by the authority of a governor, it may be derived
from tznn, tars, " fear," or unn, tarsh, " acid, austere." — Bag-
ster's Comprehensive Bible. Note on Ezra, ii. 63.

f Ezra, viii. 1 — 5.

+ Surnamed Mafcpo%ap, or Longimanus, the third son of
Xerxes. B. C. 446.

NEHEMIAH. 167

Moses, he chose rather to suffer affliction with the
people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin
for a season.

The gorgeous pomp, the silken luxury of the
Persian court had no attractions for this heavenly-
minded patriot. Certain of his brethren came to
the palace at Shush an, and his first inquiry is con-
cerning the Jews, and concerning Jerusalem. The

O J O

answer cuts him to the heart. " The remnant
that are left of the captivity there in the province
are in great affliction and reproach ; the wall also
of Jerusalem is broken down, and the gates thereof
burned with fire." Oh see the princely courtier !
— his robe of state is laid aside, and wreeping, and
mourning, and fasting for many days, he prays be-
fore the God of heaven. Who can read his prayer,
and not weep with him ? Prostrate in the dust, he
invokes the Lord the God of heaven, the great and
terrible God. He confesses the sins of his nation ;
he confesses his own and the sins of his father's
house; he owns that justly are they punished, for
they have dealt very corruptly, but he does not
lose sight of God's faithfulness. He knows that
man's sins cannot make void God's promises. He
searches for a promise suited to their present con-
dition; he finds it, and he pleads it: — " These,"
he adds, " these," whose sins he had but then
confessed and bewailed, " Now these are thy ser-
vants and thy people, whom thou hast redeemed
by thy great power, and by thy strong hand."f
* Neh. i. 3. f Ib. i. 11.

168 NEHEMIAH.

At once he sees God's purpose in raising him to
rank and station in the household of the Persian
king. At once he resolves to use that influence in
behalf of Israel, and he prays for " mercy in the
sight of this man."

Again he resumes his princely attire, he takes
the wine and gives it to the king, but grief and
sadness are stamped upon his brow. He dares to
look sad, an act of some boldness in the presence
of an eastern despot, accustomed to

mouth-honour, breath,

Which the poor heart would fain deny, but dare not.

His prayers, however, had not been cast away ; he
found " mercy in the sight of this man." It was
evidently an occasion of state and ceremony, for
the queen, most probably Esther, was sitting be-
side him. The feelings of the man overcame the

<_?

pomp of the monarch, and in words of sympathy
and kindness he asked Nehemiah of his griefs —
" This is nothing but sorrow of heart." But Ne-
hemiah knew how cheating are a despot's smiles,
and putting no trust in princes, he owns that his
heart was " very sore afraid ;" so he prayed to the
God of heaven, and then he spoke unto the king.
" Let the king live for ever ; why should not my
countenance be sad, when the city, the place of
my father's sepulchres, lieth waste, and the gates
thereof are devoured with fire ?" Boldly he asks
the king to send him, that he may rebuild the
city ; and though the king shewed some regret at

NEHEMIAH. 169

parting with his faithful servant, he accedes. All
that he asked the king granted him, according to
the good hand of his God upon him ; captains of
the army and horsemen are sent with him, and he
arrives at Jerusalem. And Sanballat the Horonite,
and Tobiah the Ammonite, heard of it, and " it
grieved them exceedingly that there was come a
man to seek the welfare of the children of Israel."
For three days Nehemiah remains unknown in
Jerusalem ; he visits the broken wall, and, like a
skilful statesman, he satisfies himself by personal
inspection of the actual condition of the city. At
length he assembles the priests, the nobles, and the
rulers, and tells them of the Lord's goodness, and
how he had found favour in the sight of the kino;.

O t3

There is no hesitation, no murmur amongst them,
but with one voice they exclaim, " Let us rise up
and build," and their hands are strengthened for
this good work. This, too, comes to the ears of
Sanballat the Horonite, and Tobiah the Ammonite,
and Geshem the Arabian, and they laughed them
to scorn, and despised them, and said " What is
this thing that ye do ? Will ye rebel against the
king?" Calm and dignified, Nehemiah replies,
" The God of heaven he will prosper us ; there-
fore we his servants will arise and build : but ye
have no portion, nor right, nor memorial, in Jeru-
salem."

With consummate wisdom the whole circuit of
the city is divided amongst the people. High and

low, priest and noble, artificer and merchant, " for

i

170 NEHEMIAII.

the people had a mind to work." The head of
each family takes a portion of the wall as his task,
and by this division of labour, the wall rises simul-
taneously on all sides, at which the wrath of San-
ballat is excited. " What do these feeble Jews ?
Will they fortify themselves ? Will they sacrifice ?
Will they make an end in a day ? Will they re-
vive the stones out of the heaps of the rubbish
which are burned ?"

In spite of his wrath, in spite of his scorn, the
wall rises to the half of its destined height. Things
now become serious — mockery will not deter these
" feeble Jews."

And now Sanballat, and Tobiah, and the
Arabians, the Ammonites, and the Ashdodites,
find that they must fight against Jerusalem, if
they would keep her still low in the dust. They
hover round on all sides, and the Jews are harassed,
not knowing whence to expect an attack. Nehe-
miah's energies rise with the difficulties. " Be not
ve afraid of them," he cries to the nobles and the

«/

people ; se remember the LORD, which is great and
terrible, and fight for your brethren, your sons
and your daughters, your wives and your houses."
Right noble sight ! The Jews are divided into
two bands; one-half in their habergeons, with
shields, with spears, and with bows, read}T to as-
semble on what side the trumpet sounds ; the other
half labouring at the wall, and even they with
swords girded at their loins. Aloft, on some emi-
nence, stands Nehemiah, the trumpeter by his

-

-

-

NEHEMIAH. 171

side. " In what place ye hear the sound of the
trumpet, resort ye thither unto us : our God shall
fight for us."

But where are Sanballat, Tobiah, and Geshem ?
Scoffs and threats had failed ; they must now re-
sort to artifice. " Come," say they ; " come, let
us meet together ,in some one of the villages in the
plain of Ono." Four times they send this message,
but the only answer they receive is, " I am doing
a great work, so that I cannot come down ; why
should the work cease, whilst I leave it, and come
down to you ?"

Oh, let us lay this lesson to heart ; most Chris-
tians have their Sanballat, their Tobiah, and their
Geshem, to hinder them in the great work of build-
ing up the ramparts of their faith. At first they
scoff when they see a man shaking himself from
the dust, and often their scoffs are succeeded by
threats ; but when these fail, they, too, resort to
artifice. " Come among us," says the worldling ;
"let us meet together." But, Christian, beware;
give them Nehemiah's answer — " I am doing a
great work ; why should the work cease, while I
leave it, and come down to you ?"

A deeper plot is now laid for Nehemiah ; they
suborn Shemaiah ; and in the tone of a prophet,
he entreats the noble man to shut himself close in
the temple of God, or his enemies will come in the
nio-ht to slay him. But all is in vain ; he discerns
their treachery, and replies, " Should such a man
as I flee ? I will not go in !" Steadfast and un-

i 2

172 NEHEMIAH.

daunted, he pursues his work ; and in fifty and two
days from the commencement of the building, the
wall is finished. No breach is left ; and the doors
are set up in the gates. " And it came to pass,
that when all our enemies heard thereof, and all
the heathen that were about us saw these things,
they were much cast down in their oivn eyes ; for they
perceived that this work was wrought of our God."
Neh. vi. 16.

And thus were the walls of Zion rebuilt after
they had mouldered in the dust one hundred and
twenty-three years.

The walls of Zion were rebuilt ; the Jews were
again a nation ; but not as in days of yore, for the
glory had departed from them. They who once
sent forth armies and conquered mighty nations
\vere now a tributary nation, existing in sufferance.
A glimpse of their former days was seen when the
Maccabees nobly struggled for independence ; but
the Asmonean princes were but faint shadows of
David, of Hezekiah, of Jehoshaphat, and venal
corruption soon extinguished their line.

A temple, indeed, was rebuilt ; but the ancient
men wept when they saw it. The topstone was
laid ; but instead of shouting " Grace — grace unto
it," — " the people could not discern the noise of the
shout of joy from the noise of the weeping of the
people."

A high priest, indeed, they had, who, clad in
his uncleft mitre and linen robes, went year by
year into the holiest of holies. But no divine

NEIIEMIAH. 173

effulgence met his eye. The breastplate he may
have worn, and on it may have sparkled the gems
engraven with the names of the twelve tribes, but
the Urim and the Thummim were not there — Icha-
bod, Ichabod ! The Israelites might have taken up
the words of the man of Uz — " Oh that we were as
in months past, as in the days when God preserved
us; when his candle shined upon our head, and
when by his light we walked through darkness ; as
we were in the days when the secret of God was
upon our tabernacle, when the Almighty was yet
with us !"*

Was this, then, the fulfilment of the promise,
that He who scattered Israel would gather him ?
Who shall so dishonour God's faithfulness as to
say so ?

Ezekiel wrote during the Babylonish captivity ;
and thus the Lord spoke by his mouth : — " Be-
hold, I will take the children of Israel from among
the heathen, whither they be gone, and will gather
them on every side, and bring them into their own
land: and I will make them one nation in the
land upon the mountains of Israel : and one king
shall be king to them all, (viz., to Judah, and to
Ephraim, or the ten tribes :) and they shall be no
more two nations, neither shall they be divided
into two kingdoms any more at all : I will save
them out of all their dwelling places, wherein they
have sinned, and will cleanse them : so shall they be
my people, and I will be their God. And David,

* Job, xxix. 2 — 5.

174 NEHEMIAH.

my servant (or my beloved servant), shall be king
over them ; and they all shall have one shepherd ;
they shall also walk in my judgments, and observe
my statutes, and do them. And they shall dwell
in the land that I have given unto Jacob my ser-
vant, wherein your fathers have dwelt ; and they
shall dwell therein, even they, and their children,
and their children's children, for ever ; and my ser-
vant David shall be their prince for ever. More-
over, I will make a covenant of peace with them :
it shall be an everlasting covenant with them ; and
I will place them, and will set my sanctuary in the
midst of them for evermore. My tabernacle also
shall be with them : yea I will be their God, and
they shall be my people. And the heathen shall
know that I, the Lord, do sanctify Israel, when
my sanctuary shall be in the midst of them for
evermore." (Ezekiel, xxxvii. 21 — 28.)

Yes, Christian Gentiles, believers in the Lord,
these are God's promises to his people. This hath
the Lord spoken, and this will the Lord perform.
He brought up his people from Egypt ; he brought
forth some from Babylon; and this he did as an
ensample of what he will yet do when it shall no
more be said the Lord liveth that brought them up
out of the land of Egypt, but " the Lord liveth
who brought up the children of Israel out of the
Land of the North, and from all the lands whither
he had driven them ; and I will bring them again
into their land that I gave unto their fathers."

But, oh ! Gentiles, cut out of the olive tree wild

NEHEMIAH. 175

by nature, dare not to boast yourselves against the
natural branches. Look on the daughter of Zion,
she is now weeping and mourning; her lovely
limbs are clad in sackcloth, ashes are upon her
head, but in the bridegroom's treasury are crowns
and jewels for her beautiful garments, which are
all her own ; dare not to claim them for your-
selves. A time shall indeed come, when there
shall be no difference between Jew and Greek ;
but remember, that is a time when there shall be
no difference between male and female. But Zioii
has her own special promises ; let us not envy
them, for Gentiles also will rejoice when she re-
joices.

Jerusalem shall yet be the joy of the whole
earth.

And now look to the river Euphrates — are not
its tides at their last ebb ? Is not the way for the
kings of the east preparing ? Are not the unclean
spirits abroad in the \vorld ? Is not the fig-tree
putting forth its buds ?

The dead bones, though very many and very
dry, are more than shaking ; already are they
coming together bone to his bone, the sinews and
the flesh are coming upon them, although as yet
there is no breath in them. The Jews are read-
ing and searching the scriptures ; they are begin-
ning to understand their political position, but as
yet the veil is on their eyes, and they have not yet
mourned over Him whom their fathers pierced : as
yet there is no breath in them. Pray earnestly

176 NEIIEMIAH.

that it may speedily come, from the four winds of
heaven. Then shall these dead ones stand upon
their feet, an exceeding great army.

Their land is preparing for them ; on it are the
eyes of the world now fixed ; for it are the Gentiles
stirring. The upstart Pharaoh who now rules
Egypt would claim it ; the Sultan, who rules in the
literal Babylon, asserts a prior claim. To support
one or the other, the horns of the seven-headed
beast are divided ; Gog and Magog from the north
parts, and we, the isles of the sea — all are preparing
armaments, all are contending for the land of the
Jews. And will they remain mute and silent?
It seems improbable ; and were they at this mo-
ment to stand forth, they have only to ask, and
their land would be theirs.

Oh ! that the captive daughter of Zion would
shake herself from the dust, and cry to the Lord in
the prayer indited for her — " Awake, awake, put
on strength, O arm of the Lord ; awake, as in
the ancient days, in the generations of old. Art
thou not it that hath cut Rahab, and wounded the
dragon ? Art thou not it which hath dried the sea,
the waters of the great deep ; that hath made the
depths of the sea a way for the ransomed to pass
over ?" Oh ! would Israel but take up this prayer,
the answer to it is also indited. Yes, when the
" captive exile hasteneth that he may be loosed,"
the Lord will answer, " / am the Lord thy God,
that divided the sea, whose waves roared. And /

* Isa. li. 9, 10,

XEHE31IAH. 177

•

have put my words in thy mouth, and / have
covered thee in the shadow of mine hand. Thou
art my people." And then, in a most beautiful
antistrophe to the prayer that the Lord would
awake, he answers and says to Jerusalem — "Awake,
awake, stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk
at the hand of the Lord the cup of his fury ; thou
hast drunken the dregs of the cup of trembling,
and wrung them out. Therefore hear now this,
thou afflicted, and drunken, but not with wine :
Thus saith thy Lord the Lord, and thy God that
pleadeth the cause of his people, Behold, I have
taken out of thine hand the cup of trembling,
even the dregs of the cup of my fury ; thou shalt
no more drink it again : but I will put it into the
hand of them that afflict thee.f Awake, awake;
put on thy strength, O Zion ; put on thy beautiful
garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city. Shake
thyself from the dust ; arise, and sit down, O Jeru-
salem : loose thyself from the bands of thy neck,
O captive daughter of Zion."

O daughter of Zion, since thou knowest how
the Lord will answer thee, why art thou yet silent ?
Lift up thy voice and cry, for his ear is not heavy
that it cannot hear.

The virgin of Israel sitteth in the dust ; in her
hand is a cup of trembling. The great whore sit-
teth upon many waters ; in her hand a cup of
abominations and nlthiness.

The virgin of Zion is drunk, but not with wine ;

* Isa. li. 15, 16. f Ver. 17—23.

I 3

178 NEHEMIAH.

the whore of the seven hills is drunk, drunk with
the blood of the saints.

Rend thou thy scarlet robes, mother of harlots,
when Zion puts on her beautiful garments ! When
the mountain of the Lord's house is established,
call thou on thy seven hills to hide thee, for thine
hour is come. In one day shall her plagues come
upon her — death, and mourning, and famine ; the
millstone trembles in the angel's hand. " Thus
with violence shall that great city Babylon be
thrown down, and shall be found no more at
all."*

But, to return to the partial restoration in the
days of Ezra and Nehemiah, how was it brought
about ? By prayer. First, Daniel " understood
by books the number of the years" foretold by
Jeremiah the prophet, and he set his face unto the
Lord God, to seek by prayer and supplications,
with fasting, and sackcloth, and ashes, f He ac-
knowledged his sins, and pleaded God's promises —
" For thine own sake, O my God, for thy city and
thy people are called by thy name." The result
of this prayer was the edict of Cyrus by which the
temple was rebuilt. Nehemiah prayed, as we have
seen above, and in answer to his prayer the Lord
stirred up Artaxerxes ; he gave the command, and
the walls were rebuilt. Oh, that the mantle of
these holy men would fall on some son of Abraham
in our own days ; some of them are high in rank
and influence, but the Lord will point out his in-
* Rev. xviii. 21. f Dan. ix. 2.

NEHEMIAH. 179

struments when the set time is come. Zerub-
babels and Jeshuas, Ezras and Nehemiahs, will be
found ; the hearts of monarchs will be inclined to
favour the dust of Zion. Would that this honour
might be conferred on our gracious sovereign !
Oh, that her young hands would pen the edict,
saying to the Hebrew dwellers in her land, " Who
is there among you of the Lord's people ? His
God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem,
which is in Judah." Sanballats, and Tobiahs, and
Geshems, would arise ; they would be grieved to
see any seeking the welfare of the children of
Israel. They would mock the " feeble Jews," but
they would mock in vain ; and the " feeble Jews"
would answer, " The God of heaven, he will
prosper us ; therefore we, his servants, will arise
and build."

Oh glorious, glorious sight ! Oh that our be-
loved queen, who alone of Europe's monarchs
wears upon her crown the crest of Judah, the lion
standing in his strength ! — oh that she may be stirred
up by the Lord to seek the welfare of Zion, and
thus bring down showers of blessings upon herself
and her people ! Oh that we may find ourselves
not mistaken in applying to Britain the words of
Isaiah : —

" Surely the isles shall wait for me, and the ships
of Tarshish first, to bring thy sons from far, their
silver and their gold with them, unto the name of
the Lord thy God, and to the Holy One of Israel."

180

THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT.

BY THE REV. HUGH M'NEILE.

" AMIDST those deep and retired thoughts — which
with every man Christianly instructed ought to
be most frequent — of God, and of his miraculous
ways and works amongst men, and of our religion,
and works to be performed to him ; after the story
of our Saviour Christ suffering to the lowest bent
of weakness in the flesh, and presently triumphing
to the highest pitch of glory in the spirit, which
drew up his body also — till we in both be united to
him in the revelation of his kingdom ; I do not
know of anything more worthy to take up the
whole passion of pity on the one side, and joy
on the other, than to consider, first, the foul and
sudden corruption, and then, after many a tedious
age, the long deferred but much more wonderful
and happy reformation of the church in these latter
days. Sad is it to think how that doctrine of the
gospel, planted by teachers divinely inspired, and
by them winnowed and sifted from the chaff of over-
dated ceremonies, and refined to such a spiritual

THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT. 181

height and temper of purity, and knowledge of the
Creator, that the body, with all the circumstances
of time and place, were purified by the affections
of the regenerate soul, and nothing left impure but
sin ; faith needing not the weak and fallible office
of the senses to be either the ushers or interpreters
of heavenly mysteries, save where our Lord him-
self, in his sacraments, ordained, — that such a doc-
trine should, through the grossness and blindness
of her professors, and the fraud of deceivable tra-
ditions, drag so downwards, as to backslide one
way into Jewish beggary of old cast rudiments,
and stumble forward another way into the new-
vomited paganism of sensual idolatry, attributing
purity or impurity to things indifferent, that they
might bring the inward acts of the spirit to the
outward and customary eye-service of the body, as
if they could make God earthly and fleshly, be-
cause they could not make themselves heavenly
and spiritual. They began to draw down all the
divine intercourse betwixt God and the soul; yea,
the very shape of God himself into an exterior and
bodily form, urgently pretending a necessity and
obligement of joining the body in a formal rever-
ence, and worship circumscribed ; they hallowed
it, they fumed it, they sprinkled it, they bedecked
it, not in robes of pure innocency, but of pure
linen, with other deformed and fantastic dresses,
in palls, and mitres, gold and gewgaws fetched
from Aaron's old wardrobe, or the Flamin's vestry.

182 THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT.

Then was the priest set to con his motions and his
postures, his liturgies and his lurries, till the soul,
by this means of overbodying herself, given up
justly to fleshly delights, bated her wing apace
downward ; and finding the ease she had from her
visible and sensuous colleague, the body, in perfor-
mance of religious duties, her pinions now broken
and flagging, shifted off from herself the labour
of high soaring any more, forgot her heavenly
flight, and left the dull and droiling carcass to plod
on in the old road, and drudging trade of outward
conformity. And here, out of question, from her
perverse conceiting of God and holy things she
had fallen to believe no God at all, had not custom
and the worm of conscience nipped her incredu-
lity. Hence, to all the duties of evangelical grace,
instead of the adoptive and cheerful boldness which
our new alliance with God requires, came servile
and thrall-like fear; for in very deed the super-
stitious man, by his good will, is an atheist ; but
being scared from thence by the pangs and gripes
of a boiling conscience, all in a pudder, shuffles up
to himself such a God and such a worship as is
most agreeable to remedy his fear ; which fear of
his, as is also his hope, fixed only upon the flesh,
renders likewise the whole faculty of his appre-
hension carnal; and all the inward acts of wor-
ship, issuing from the native strength of the soul,
run out lavishly to the upper skin, and there
harden into a crust of formality. Hence men came

THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT. 183

to scan the scriptures by the letter, and in the
covenant of our redemption magnified the external
signs more than the quickening power of the Spirit;
and yet, looking on them through their own guilti-
ness with a servile fear, and finding as little com-
fort, or rather terror, from them again, they knew
not how to hide their slavish approach to God's
behests, by them not understood nor worthily re-
ceived, but by cloaking their servile crouching to all
religious presentiments, sometimes lawful, some-
times idolatrous, under the name of humility, and
terming the piebald frippery and ostentation of

ceremonies decency But, to dwell no longer

in characterising the depravities of the church, and
how they sprung, and how they took increase ;
when I recall to my mind, at last, after so many
dark ages, wherein the huge overshadowing train
of error had almost swept all the stars out of the
firmament of the church, how the bright and bliss-
ful Reformation (by divine power) struck through
the black and settled night of ignorance and anti-
Christian tyranny, methinks a sovereign and re-
viving joy must needs rush into the bosom of him
that reads or hears, and the sweet odour of the re-
turning gospel imbathe his soul with the fragrancy
of heaven. Then was the sacred Bible sought out
of the dusty corners, where profane falsehood and
neglect had thrown it ; the schools opened ; divine
and human learning raked out of the embers of
forgotten tongues ; the princes and cities trooping
apace to the new erected banner of salvation ; the

184 THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT.

martyrs, with the irresistible might of weakness,
shaking the powers of darkness, and scorning the
fiery rage of the old red dragon."

So spake, not Mr. Fronde, neither any of his
publishers or admirers, but a man whose estimate
of the necessity and nature of the Reformation,
and of the character of the reformers, may well
console us under the heavy tidings that any of the
students of Oxford have become less and less the
children of the Reformation ; thus spake JOHN
MILTON,* distinguishing truly between formalism
and spirituality, and having no fear of the charge
of ultra-protestantism before his eyes.

The truth is necessarily protestant. Since the
fall of man, and the successful usurpations of Satan,
which have entitled him to the name of " the God
of this world," it has been so. And until the se-
cond coming of the Son of Man, who will effec-
tually bruise Satan under his and his church's
feet, it must be so.

Jesus Christ is the truth ; and concerning him
at his first coming it is written, that the light
shone in darkness, and the darkness comprehended
it not. He was in the world, and the world was
made by him, and the world knew him not. The
treatment which he received affords a most striking;

o

proof of the fallen condition of the world, fallen
from all conformity to, or congeniality with God.

* On Reformation in England, pp. 1 — 4. In thus quoting
Milton's general estimate of the Reformation, I feel in no way
pledged to the adoption of the detail of his views.

THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT. 185

He was of God — the image of the invisible God —
God manifest in the flesh. He came among men ;
and instead of being received as a benefactor,
with gratitude, and love, and joy, he Avas des-
pised and rejected ; his life was a life of hard-
ship ; he had not where to lay his head ; his
ministry was a ministry of controversy, perpetually
in collision with, and protesting against, Pharisee,
or Sadducee, or Herodian ; his death was a death
of violence, nailed to the accursed tree. All this
is placed in a still stronger light by considering to
whom among men he came. Not to some savage
tribe, whose untamed ferocity might account for
their peculiar hostility to such a character ; not to
the polished idolators of Greece or Rome, whose
prejudices in favour of a gorgeous and long-che-
rished polytheism might be pleaded in extenuation
of their resistance against an intruding reformer.
No ; the circumstances of the case will not supply
any such evasive excuses for human nature. He
came to the only people upon earth who were in
possession of the blessings of revealed religion, the
consecrated nation, " the witness and keeper of
holy writ ;" he came to his own, and his own re-
ceived him not.

This general statement is not intended to ex-
clude exceptions. There were a few who received
him ; and to his confiding friends — such friends as
Martha, and Marv, and Lazarus — he was a kind

*/ ^

instructor and sympathizing comforter. But he
did not confine himself to such friendly intercourse.

186 THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT.

He was not only a teacher of truth, but also a pro-
tester against error. He came not only to mani-
fest and commend the works of God, but also " to
destroy the works of the devil." He loved the
world, and sought the salvation of men at the ex-
pense of incurring their present resentment. His
faithfulness in word and deed forced unwilling
conviction on their minds, and roused the unwel-
come reproaches of their consciences. They would
gladly have excused the probing process; they
were anxious to hide from themselves, if possible,
the extent to which the ministry of Jesus wras
laying naked their corrupt hearts. Hence their
endeavours to entangle him in his talk, to wrest
his words, to misrepresent him, in the hope that
by fastening some accusation upon him, they might
justify, or seem to justify, their opposition against
him.

Well has Milton characterised the great apostasy
of the human heart — " Attributing purity or im-
purity to things indifferent ; striving to bring the
inward acts of the spirit to the outward and cus-
tomary eye-service of the body ; as if they could
make God earthly and fleshly, because they could
not make themselves heavenly and spiritual."
Against this our Lord Jesus Christ was a perpetual
protestant. One main object which he kept con-
stantly and prominently in view was, to impress
the great truth, that " God is a Spirit, and that
they who worship him must worship in spirit and
in truth."

THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT. 187

For this purpose he appears to have made oppor-
tunities for withdrawing the minds of his disciples
from many outward and visible practices, and fixing
their attention upon the inward, invisible purity of
the heart. One of the practices in question was
the scrupulous washing of hands before meat.
This, however agreeable, and even useful it may
be, as a matter of cleanliness and comfort, has
nothing religious in it ; neither is it irreligious in
any man to omit it. The Pharisees, however, and
after them the Jewish nation generally, following
certain human traditions, represented practical reli-
gion as in a great measure consisting of such obser-
vances. When they saw Jesus and his disciples
violating this tradition, and disregarding this prac-
tice, they found fault, and opened a controversy.
" For the Pharisees and all the Jews, except they
wash their hands oft, eat not, holding the tradition
of the elders. And when they come from the
market, except they wash, they eat not. And
many other things there be, which they have re-
ceived to hold, as the washing of cups and pots,
brazen vessels, and tables, or beds." (St. Mark,
vii. 3, 4.)

It is most valuable to us, who are to profit by
the example of Jesus, to find him brought into
controversy with the votaries of such superstitions ;
and we do indeed derive most important and prac-
tical information from the manner in which he
conducted those controversies. To one point es-
pecially our attention is called ; I mean his con-

188 THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT.

stant appeal to the written word of God. He was
come from the fountain-head of truth, and spake
with the same infallible authority which had dic-
tated the Old Testament Scriptures. Moreover,
all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, both in
the natural world and in the human heart, were
open to him. Yet he appeals to the Holy Scrip-
tures. We do indeed find him occasionally, as
God manifest in the flesh, appealing to his own
well attested authority, and manifesting his un-
erring knowledge ; but most frequently we find
him, as a member of the church among men, shew-
ing us an example that we should follow his steps,
and honouring his Father's word — the written,
fixed, unerring word of God.

He pays no attention to the objection which
might have been urged then, as it is now, that
such an appeal to scripture was a mere matter of
unauthorized private judgment ; that every heretic
so appealed ; that the Sadducees, who denied both
angels and spirits, appealed to the scriptures ; and
the Pharisees, who confessed both, appealed to the
scriptures ; and that as it thus became evident
that the scriptures could never decide the contro-
versy, it became necessary, for the sake of unity,
to have recourse to the practice of the church — the
generally received catholic practice — as supplying
the only satisfactory interpretation of Holy Scrip-
ture. No ; our Lord knew that to unwilling minds
and unsanctified hearts nothing could decide the
controversy; and that to persons of a different

TUE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT. 189

tone of character, whom the Lord had in mercy
converted to the love of the truth, nothing could be
decisive but God's own word.

As to visible unity among fallen men, nothing
short of a constantly and miraculously interposing
theocracy could maintain it. Even under such a
theocracy in the camp of Moses, it was difficult,
and required not only the infallible tribunal of
reference for instruction, but also the yawning pit,
which, at the bidding of God's servant, swallowed
up and hid for ever the contentious heretics.

"Why," said the Scribes and Pharisees to Jesus —
f( why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of
the elders ? for they wash not their hands when
they eat bread."

Our Lord must not merely have sanctioned such
conduct in his disciples, he must have actually
inculcated it; for otherwise his disciples, being
Jews, would naturally have continued to conform
to the usual habits of their nation.

The practice in question was catholic. St. Mark
ascribes it to the Pharisees and all the Jews. It
was ancient — derived not indeed from the inspired
writers, but from the elders of the church and
nation. It was as truly conformed as any practice
could be to the celebrated canon of Vincentius
Lerinensis, quod semper, quod ubique, quod ab omni-
bus. All this, however, did not screen it from the
reprobation of the Lord Jesus. In itself it was
scarcely worth notice, pro or con ; but Christ
seeing the superstition attached to it, became him-

190 THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT.

self a practical protester against it, and encouraged
his disciples to follow his Protestant practice.

This was a crime in the eyes of the Pharisees.
Had the disciples neglected only the weightier mat-
ters of the law of God, — judgment, and justice, and
truth, — they might have been friends with the
Pharisees. This is proved by the instance of Judas,
who was hailed by them as a coadjutor, and taken
into friendly co-operation, while he was in the
active exercise of ingratitude, treachery, and base
covetousness. This was merely breaking the com-
mandments of God ; but to disregard the traditions
of the elders, to rebel against the will-worship, the
superstitious observances, and mock humility of
the priests, and to appeal to the written word as
the umpire in the controversy, this was not to be
endured. What ! reject a practice commended by
antiquity, by Catholicism, and by what is even
more endearing to " the natural man" — namely,
that it invested with an odour of sanctity an out-
ward observance, within his power to perform and
reiterate ! The Pharisees assailed our Saviour as
an ultra Protestant. " But Jesus answered and
said unto them, Why do ye also transgress the
commandment of God by your tradition ? . . . . Ye
hypocrites ! well did Esaias prophesy of you, say-
ing, This people draweth nigh unto me with their
mouth, and honoureth me with their lips, but their
heart is far from me. But in vain do they worship
me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of
men" (St. Matt. xv. 1—20.)

THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT. 191

For doctrines ! This leads to an important dis-
tinction. The commandments of men may be
taught for local and orderly arrangements; and
" every particular or national church hath autho-
rity to ordain, change, and abolish, ceremonies or
rites of the church ordained only by man's autho-
rity, so that all things be done to edifying." (Art.
xxxiv.) And when such things are ordained in
any particular or national church, no member of
that church can without grave offence deviate from
the order so prescribed. But if such things be
elevated into the place of doctrines to be identified
with Christianity and enforced as necessary to
salvation then, the word of God which proclaims
salvation without such accompaniments is frus-
trated by the commandments of men. For " Holy
Scripture containeth all things necessary to salva-
tion : 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 requisite or necessary
to salvation." (Art. vi.)

Say we not well, that the truth is essentially
Protestant? that revelation has from the beginning
been not only direct in the announcement of truth,
but also indirect in the exposure of falsehood.
Abraham was not only a witness for the true and
living God, but also a witness against idolatry.
Moses was not only the inspired advocate of the
deliverance of the children of Israel out of bondage,
but also the inspired denouncer of the tyranny and

192 THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT.

oppression of Pharaoh, King of Egypt. The Jewish
prophets were not only ministers of righteousness,
and equity, and truth, and judgment, but also
sharp rebukers of the temporising policy of un-
faithful rulers, and the plausible, daubing flatteries
of those who counselled peace, peace, when there
w^as no peace. John Baptist was not only a mes-
senger, crying, Behold the Lamb of God; but also
so pungent and personal a protester against sin,
even in the case of the king, that he lost his head
for his service of his God.

We have seen the position occupied by the
WORD made flesh, the wisdom of God, the measure
and manifestation of divine love to a fallen world.
He was not only a faithful teacher, but also and
consequently (inevitably so) a Protestant contro-
versialist. The apostles, in like manner, were not
only preachers of the gospel, directly proclaiming
the revealed mind of God, but also indefatigable
controversialists, against the Jew who required a
sign, and the Greek who sought after man's wis-
dom. They were not only shepherds standing to
feed the flock of God with bread from heaven, but
also watchmen warning the church, and crying,
" Beware, lest any man spoil you through philo-
sophy and vain deceit, after the traditions of men
—after the rudiments of the world, and not after
Christ." These things are written for our learn-
ing ; and since these things, since the apostles
have fallen asleep, the great principles involved
remain the same. Every true evangelist becomes

THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT. 193

inevitably a controversialist also. Why is this the
case? or, in other words, what are the principles
involved? The answer is — true religion is not
natural to fallen man; but falsehood, in some
one or more of its deceitful aspects, is natural to
man. True religion meets with not only an indis-
posed, but a pre-occupied soil : and he who would
cultivate it has not only to plant what is right, but
to root out and pluck up what is wrong. The
forms of falsehood by which the minds of men are
now pre-occupied are many and various, and con-
sequently many and various are the controversies
in which the bold, and faithful, and determined, and
persevering advocates of true religion must be in-
volved. There is no new thing under the sun. We
have around us at this day counterparts of the an-
cient Sadducees, who, not knowing the Scriptures,
neither the power of God, dare to deny the first
principles of revelation ; we have counterparts of
the Herodians, who, by raising the cry of political
parsons, endeavour to neutralize our advocacy be-
cause they cannot answer our arguments ; and we
have counterparts of the Scribes and Pharisees,
who being destitute of spirituality, and yet desirous
of credit for religion, endeavour to uphold outward
formality by human authority, teach for doctrines
the traditions of men, and so make void the glorious
gospel of the blessed God. So situated, what
shall we do ? Shall we withhold our testimony for
our Lord Jesus Christ altogether, and thereby
avoid all contention ? Shall we modify, and soften,

K

194 THE TRUTH NECESSARILY PROTESTANT.

and adulterate our testimony with the lax prin-
ciples of its enemies, and dignify our temporizing
trimming with the name of judicious prudence ?
Shall we become useless, in order to continue
peaceable ? Shall we walk in cowardice, or supine-
ness, or paralyzing worldliness, and deceive our-
selves and others by calling this Christian meek-
ness ? Shall we be really traitors to God, in order
to seem to be charitable among men? Or, repu-
diating all this as utterly unworthy of us, shall we
stand forth and speak out, in the strength of the
Lord Jesus ; in imitation also of his high example,
in true meekness — not whining, mawkish senti-
mentality ; but the genuine gentleness of calm, de-
termined, dignified self-possession ? Shall we thus
stand against the sneers of the scoffer, while we
expose the hollowness of his objections; against the
craftiness of the wily politician, while we refuse to
confine ourselves to the saying, " Render unto
God the things that are God's," seeing that our
glorious Lord said also, " Render unto Caesar the
things that are Caesar's ;" and against the formality
and hypocrisy of apostate Scribes, who make clean
the outside of the cup and platter, while within
they are full of rottenness and corruption? Our
course is plain. We are put in trust with the
gospel, for the preaching of it, and the propagation
of it, and the defence of it ; and as ministers of
the church we have no choice.

195

THE COLUMN OF TRAJAN.

»

BY THE REV. J. HARTLEY, M.A.
I.

THE midnights of a thousand years,
A thousand summers' smiles and tears,
Have glided through the Roman sky ;
But vainly has the tempest broke,
In vain to thee the thunder spoke, —
Grey column, silent in thy upper air,
Thou only still art there !

ii.

The Vandal with his ocean tide,
Alaric with his battle pride,
Have swept the Roman might away ;
But round thy aged stony frame
The Gothic swords in weakness came,—
To harm thee who could ever dare ?
Thou, column, still art there !

K 2

196 THE COLUMN OF TRAJAN.

III.

The arrowy javelin storni'd thy height,
The blazing ball threw iron light,
All ages wasting Roman dust ;
But what was chivalry's loud power,
The fiery cannon's thunder shower?
All were alike beneath thy care,
Stern pillar ! thou art there !

IV.

In fury Tiber's billows flow'd,

And oft with watery ruin strow'd

Rome and her Romans through the plain ;

But never inundation's power

Could shake thee, calm and steadfast tower;

Thee only could the billows spare, —

Thou, ever thou art there !

v.

Rising above old ruin's rage,

High temples soar'd from age to age,

And Peter's majesty in glory shone ;

But long ere cupolas on high

Bore the bright cross to meet the sky,

When storms did older turrets tear,

Thou, column, thou wast there !

THE COLUMN OF TRAJAN. 197

VI.

But heaven darts volley'd fire on Rome, —
She sinks beneath her burning tomb.
'Tis done*! the prophet clarion sounds.
Oh ! when the last dread ruin's blow

0

Shall strike the Papal Babel low, —
When Home's no longer, — then beware !
No more wilt thou be there !

198

KATHARINE PARR.

BY CHARLOTTE ELIZABETH.

IN tracing the progress of the glorious and ever-
blessed Reformation, we find all things perceptibly
working together for good, for its ultimate esta-
blishment, with a harmony of arrangement most
beautifully consonant to those laws which it has
pleased the Most High to promulgate for the go-
vernment of our world. Each instrument was duly
prepared in its natural station, and wielded accord-
ing to its originally appointed use, without any
violent displacement or startling deviation from the
wonted order of things. God is not the God of
confusion ; he does not call upon his creatures to
quit the path that his own infallible wisdom first
marked out for them, but employs alike the king's
authority and the subject's loyalty, the pastor's
teaching and the statesman's finesse, the warrior's
weapon and the civilian's gold, to carry forward
his great, his perfect designs. In like manner,
having placed woman in the modest shade of life,
bidding her not to usurp authority over the man,

KATHARINE PARR. 199

but to learn in silence, with all subjection, — to be
discreet, chaste, and a keeper at home, the Lord is
often pleased to make her inobtrusive services,
when rendered strictly within these prescribed
bounds, more available for the benefit of his church
and her country than the combined efforts of many
classes among men.

Thus it was, pre-eminently and with most happy
effects, in the case of Queen Katharine Parr. The
worldly historian scarcely finds more to record

»/ t/

concerning her than that she was the sixth to
whom the fickle, tyrannical Henry plighted his ill-
omened marriage vow, and that it was her lot to
survive him ; the Christian annalist dwells on her
name with grateful affection, contemplating in that
mild, patient queen a dear nursing-mother of the
church, which in her day awoke from the long
deep lethargy of deadly disease into a state re-
quiring the tenderest nurture, the most unwearied
diligence of judicious care. Some, indeed, call it
the infancy of the church, but surely they err.
The church of the Reformation existed in Christ
Jesus before the foundation of the world ; it was
made known to Adam ere yet he left his earthly
Eden, and had its witness in the blood of Abel,
the proto-martyr for that great Reformation doc-
trine, justification by faith.

To this long slumbering but now awakened
church, Queen Katharine proved a loving fosterer.
She pressed not forward into the ranks of polemical

200 KATHARINE PARR.

disputants, she interfered not with the political
movements of the day, nor claimed even a nominal
participation in the public acts of her husband ;
but learning in silence, with all subjection, she
diligently studied the scriptures, retaining in her
household several learned and godly divines, who
daily instructed her and her ladies in the gospel of
Christ. Her royal apartments were the scene of
many a pious conference, her private closet of de-
vout meditation and unceasing prayer. Thus fitted
by the Lord's grace, she fulfilled her part with ad-
mirable judgment and propriety. The king, always
unamiable, had become, as John Foxe says, " very
stern and opinionate, so that of few he could be
content to be taught, but worst of all to be con-
tended withal by argument." A painful disease in
his leg, added to the stings of a conscience that,
however seared, must have often writhed in secret
torture, heightened the savageness of his temper,
now aggravated by the querulousness of age. He
was, moreover, continually watched and powerfully
influenced by that monster of iniquity, Stephen
Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, and, ex officio,
keeper of the royal conscience. A fox in cunning,
this infamous priest basely entrapped his prey ; a
tiger in ferocity, he sprang on the helpless victim
to revel in its blood. He was, in truth, an incar-
nation of the spirit of Popery raised on high for
judgment in a guilty land, wielding the power of
the kingdom by means of subtle flatteries and un-

KATHARINE PARR. 201

principled concessions to the wretched prince,
whom he governed by seeming to servilely obey.

But government belongs to God, and no man
can exercise authority beyond the bounds pre-
scribed by him. Gardiner had swept away, with
a bloody besom, many an opponent, and none re-
mained whom he would so gladly have dismissed
to a like sanguinary end as Queen Katharine ; but
the Lord's blessing rested on that gentle lady ; he
reserved her for further and important work in the
cause of the gospel, therefore could no man set
upon her to hurt her. Frequently was Gardiner
compelled to hear her discourses with the king,
whom it was her custom to visit in his sick
chamber ; and there, with the meekness of wisdom,
to render, when called upon, a reason of the faith
that was in her. Henry had done much towards
reforming ecclesiastical abuses. God made use of
his perverseness, his tyranny and cupidity, to carry
on the good work ; and Katharine pleaded its past
successful progress as a stimulus to continued and
increased exertion. Against this no occasion could
be found, and her influence threatened to counter-
act that of the chancellor, who watched, with fever-
ish anxiety, for some pretext to loosen her hold on
the king's esteem.

This was at length found : the peevish monarch,
having evinced some momentary impatience during
one of these interviews, the enemy seized on it the
moment after her departure, and eagerly sought to

K 3

202 KATHARINE PARR.

arouse against her the evil passions that had sent
her unhappy predecessors to the scaffold. But
who has power to curse where God has pronounced
a blessing ? The king listened to his evil coun-
sellor, his heart being in the hand of the Lord,
and every word spoken against the queen took
effect in a way the reverse of what her foe in-
tended. Henry however dissembled, appearing to
acquiesce in Gardiner's views ; and carried on the
deception to a length that left him at liberty, as he
supposed, to embrue his hands in the blood of this
innocent.

Meanwhile, through the casual dropping of a
paper, Katharine was made acquainted with her
peril. No doubt it drew her nearer to Him who
is a very present help in trouble, and worked for
good to the little flock of her faithful ladies and
godly chaplains, by teaching them a new lesson of
trust in the Rock of their salvation. Foxe gives an
interesting account of the whole business ; until,
encouraging himself in his wickedness, Stephen
Gardiner conceived that he had the king's autho-
rity for conveying Katharine to the Tower, yet
reeking with the blood of Henry's former wives.
The time chosen for this atrocious act proves how
confidently Gardiner reckoned on his master's
countenance in it. The king, somewhat recovered
from his illness, repaired to his garden for an hour's
refreshment, and summoned the queen to enjoy it
with him. She came, attended by her three most

I

±
H

KATHARINE PARR. 203

attached companions, the Lady Herbert, her ma-
jesty's sister, the Lady Fane, her cousin, and the
Lady Tyrwhit. Henry received her with great
affection, and there, under the refreshing shade of
the royal garden at Whitehall, they continued in
animated converse, the king being remarkably
pleasant and merry. Foxe proceeds — fe Suddenly,
in the midst of their mirth, the hour determined
being come, in cometh the lord chancellor into
the garden, with forty of the king's guard at his
heels, with purpose indeed to have taken the queen
together with the three ladies aforesaid, whom they
had before proposed to apprehend alone, even then
unto the Tower. Whom the king sternly behold-
ing, breaking off his mirth with the queen, step-
ping a little aside, called the chancellor unto him,
who upon his knees spake certain words unto the
king, but what they were (for that they were softly
spoken, and the king a pretty good distance from
the queen) it is not well known ; but it is most
certain that the king's replying unto him was,
' Knave !' for his answer ; yea, ( Arrant knave,
beast, and fool !' And with that the king com-
manded him presently to avaunt out of his pre-
sence. These words, although they were uttered
somewhat low, yet were they so vehemently whis-
pered out by the king, that the queen did easily
with her ladies aforesaid, overhear them ; which
had been not a little to her comfort, if she had
known at that time the whole cause of his coming.

204 KATHARINE PARR.

as perfectly as after she knew it. Thus departed
the lord chancellor out of the king's presence, as
he came, with all his train ; the whole mould of
all his device being utterly broken."

How beautifully does this exemplify the Psalmist's
assurance, " The wicked watcheth the righteous,
and seeketh to slay him; the Lord will not leave
him in his hand." Many of God's people were
indeed slain, glorifying him in the burning fire ;
but some were preserved to help forward by their
open efforts the glorious work which as yet they
could only aid in secret prayer and domestic ad-
monition. I have before me a venerable looking
volume which bears on its pages a high testimony
to the zealous co-operation of Queen Katharine in
the Protestant labours of the youthful Edward. It
contains the historical books of the New Testa-
ment, with the paraphrase of Erasmus, translated
into English under the superintendence of that
royal lady, and printed during her lifetime. The
animated tribute therein rendered to the queen by
its editor stamps with peculiar emphasis the im-
portance of this remarkable interposition of divine
power, in turning the heart of her husband to her
at such a season, and breaking the snare of him
who seldom set a snare in vain. It shews, too,
how much of zeal and resolute action in the cause
of truth may consist with the perfection of femi-
nine modesty and submission. It demands for
Katharine Parr a monument in the grateful re-

KATHARINE PARR. 205

membrance of every Protestant, while speaking to
the Christian females of the land which called her
queen an injunction to go and do likewise.

But the old book in question also contains an
awful warning to such as rest their confidence
on the enjoyment of present privileges arid an ac-
quaintance with the letter of God's word. The
fact is not generally known, that in apportioning to
various persons, the task of thus clothing in our
language a foreign work of truly scriptural charac-
ter, the individual chosen to translate the gospel
of St. John was no other than the wretched Prin-
cess Mary, who shortly afterwards darkened the
skies of England with the smoke, and drenched its
soil with the blood of the martyrdoms of her sub-
jects, for daring to read, or even to possess a copy
of what she had herself prepared for their perusal.
Yes, Mary, the pitiless persecutor, spent many a
toilsome hour, even to the injury of her bodily
health, over that most precious portion of the Holy
Scriptures where the love of Jesus is so richly
set forth by the disciple whom Jesus loved. It is
melancholy to peruse the language conscientiously
applied by a godly man to this miserable castaway,
grounded evidently on a conviction that such line
of study must needs influence her future course.
" O how greatly may we all glory in such a peer-
less flower of virginity as her grace is," writes the
editor, " wrho in the midst of courtly delights, and
in the midst of worldly vanities, hath by her own

206 KATHARINE PARR.

choice and election so virtuously and so fruitfully
passed her tender youth, that to the public comfort
and gladful rejoicing which at her birth she brought
to all England, she doth now also confer unto the
same the inestimable benefit of furthering both us
and our posterity in the knowledge of God's word,
and to the more clear understanding of Christ's
gospel."

Alas for man when he dares to glory, save in the
Lord alone ! There breathes not one among; us,

o "

howsoever gifted with natural talents, howsoever
distinguished by a consistent dedication of those
gifts to the service of God, who can stand one mo-
ment longer than while the everlasting arms sus-
tain his helplessness. Often have we, in our day,
to take up the lament concerning some who have
seemed to be pillars. " How are the mighty
fallen, and the weapons of war perished !" and the
frequency of these falls will be just in proportion
to the cherishing of a haughty spirit concerning
ourselves or others. The Lord our God is a jea-
lous God, who looketh on the proud that he may
abase him. Arrogant assumption, whether in in-
dividuals or in churches, is the sure token of a
coming fall ; and though the work itself be un-
questionably good, as was the Princess Mary's
translation, yet if it be not wrought in the Lord,
and to the Lord, its root shall be as rottenness, and
its blossom shall go up as dust.

Such was not the case with Katharine Parr;

KATHARINE PARR, 207

she held the beginning of her confidence firm unto
the end. That which was sown in faith, nourished
by prayer, and evermore humbly committed to the
Lord's keeping, prospered to the last. Shaded
from the sun of prosperity, shielded from the storm
of adversity, she ran not as uncertainly, and having
richly served her own and succeeding generations,
she entered into the joy of her Lord.

208

POPERY ANTI-TRINITARIAN.

BY X. Q.

" They profess that they know God ; but in works they
deny Him."— TITUS, i. 1C.

IT is probable that few who may glance at these
pages have been in the habit of considering this
striking description as a portrait of the church of
Rome. It is usually applied to professors of reli-
gion, who, with a great shew of theological know-
ledge and experience, combine a laxity of moral
practice ; to such it is undoubtedly applicable, but
they are not the only class whom it describes.
My present object will be to prove it an accu-
rate sketch of Popery, by shewing that, while the
church of Rome professes a belief in God, as a
trinity in unity, and also in the separate office and
character of each of these heavenly three, she prac-
tically denies every one of them.

Let us first hear her authenticated creed, that of
Pope Pius IV.—

" I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker
of heaven and earth, and of all things, visible and

POPERY ANTI-TRINITARIAN. 209

invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only
begotten Son of God . . . who for us men and

o

our salvation came down from heaven, and was in-
carnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary,
and was made man, and was crucified also for us
under Pontius Pilate . . . And I believe in the
Holy Ghost, the. Lord and Giver of life, who pro-
ceedeth from the Father and the Son, who with
the Father and the Son together is worshipped
and glorified, who spake by the prophets."

Thus does Rome "profess" that she knows God;
and that not only in the mere existence and om-
nipotence of His nature, but as revealed to us in
the Scriptures as a trinity in unity, as essentially
one, yet in character and manifestation three.
She "professes" to know Him as the creative
Father, the Almighty, — as the incarnate and re-
deeming Word, the Son of God, — as the life-
giving Spirit of holiness. All is good in creed ;
the theory is good, but what is the practice ?

She falls down and worships before carved and
painted images, giving them the homage due only
to the Creator. By the second Council of Nice,
A.D. 787, she decreed " that the images of the glo-
rious saints and angels are to be adored" Nor
are images of living beings alone to receive this
" latria" or highest degree of worship — the cross
itself shares it with them. On the 14th of Sep-
tember every year, the following prayers are ad-
dressed to it: — "O cross, more splendid than the
stars, illustrious to the world, much beloved by

210 POPERY ANTI-TRINITARIAN.

men, more holy than all things, — sweet wood,
sweet nails, — SAVE this present multitude assem-
bled this day in thy praise ! O cross, only hope,
hail ! In this glory of thy triumph give an in-
crease of grace to the pious, and BLOT OUT the
crimes of the guilty." " Who can forgive sins but
God only ?" and yet Rome begs a certain piece of
wood to " BLOT OUT" her crimes ! Is not this to
deny the omnipotence of the Deity, thus to rob
Him of His highest and dearest prerogative, that
of forgiveness ?

But the Virgin Mary also has a full share of
Godhead, or at least of the powers of Godhead,
ascribed to her. "We fly to thy patronage, oh
holy Mother of God ! despise not our prayers in
our necessities, but DELIVER us from all dangers."
(Litany of B. V.) In "Our Lady's Psalter," the
whole book of Psalms is addressed to her, by alter-
ing the eternal and incommunicable name of
JEHOVAH into " Lady" If this be not to undeify
God, I know not what can be.

But the church of Rome not onlv thus denies

«/

the Deity of the Father, she also sets aside the propi-
tiation and intercession of the Son. All the saints
and angels, as well as the Virgin, share this work
of Deity with Jesus, or rather rob Him of it
altogether. Witness the following prayers from
her books of devotion: — "O God, who by innu-
merable miracles hast honoured blessed Nicholas
the bishop, grant, we beseech thee, that by HIS
.MERITS and intercession, we may escape eternal

POPERY ANTI-TRINITARIAN. 211

flames." " O God, who wast pleased to let the
soul of thy blessed virgin, St. Scholastica, ascend
to heaven in the shape of a dove, grant that by her
prayers and MERITS, we may lead innocent lives
here, and ascend to eternal joys hereafter."

" Saint Michel, archange de paix,
Nous n'aurons QUE vous au moment
Que viendra le Juge severe,
Pour tenir son grand jugement,
Qui puisse adoucir sa colere :
Nous avons tous recours a vous,
Saint Archange, secourez-nous."

"O God, who hast translated the Bishop St.
Dunstan, thy HIGH PRIEST, to thy heavenly king-
dom, grant that we, by HIS glorious MERITS, may
pass from hence to never-ending joys." I could
quote hundreds more, but let these suffice.

The creed of Pope Pius IV. (Art. 20), declares
that " the saints reigning together with Christ, are
to be worshipped and prayed to, and that they do
offer prayers unto God for us." And she follows
up this declaration, by praying to all the saints
in her long calendar to give her the benefit of their
merits, and to intercede for her with God. But
further: in her catechism of Christian doctrine,
she teaches that the atonement for sin may be
made by oneself or other men.

Q. " What do you mean by a good action being
satisfactory ?"

A. " I mean that it is capable of atoning for the
punishment due to sin"

212 POPERY ANTI-TRINITARIAN.

Q. " Can a good action be of any service to any
other besides the doer?"

A. " Yes ; in consequence of the communion
of saints."

Q. "How so?"

A. " By a good action one may impetrate and
satisfy for others as well as himself"

Let us not forget her indulgences, by which the
Pope's Bull takes the place of Christ, and expiates
all the sins of those who pay the proper price for
the sheet of sealed paper. "The ministers of

Jesus Christ, invested with His authority, ani-

«/ •'

mated with His spirit, expect you with a holy im-
patience, ready to ease you of that burden of sin
under which you have so long laboured. Were
your sins as red as scarlet, by the grace of the ab-
solution, and application of this plenary indulgence,
your souls shall become white as snow." So says
one Dr. Moylan, in his pastoral letter of 181 3, con~
taining Pope Pius VI. 's Bull of Indulgence to all
who shall confess and pray in the new cathedral of
Cork. Thus does Rome virtually set aside that
propitiation of Christ which, in the beginning of
her creed, she " professes " to believe.

But even this is not all, for she likewise robs the
Holy Spirit of His divine offices. He is, in her
creed, " the Lord and giver of life ;" that is, of
natural life first, and more peculiarly still of
spiritual life, and that grace which alone can sup-
port it. But she prays to the Virgin and saints
for this grace, and thus practically denies His

POPERY ANTI-TRINITARIAN. 213

power to bestow it. Even the cross, as we have
seen, is besought to " give an increase of grace to
the pious." Moreover, Pope Pius' creed (Art. 15)
declares that the seven so-called sacraments " do
confer grace" thereby giving to the means that
power which belongs only to the Holy Spirit
himself.

t

Thus does the church of Rome set aside every
one of those scriptural and catholic doctrines con-
cerning the ever-blessed Trinity, which, in her
creed, she "professes" to believe. She speaks of
one Almighty God, but she " adores" and prays to
others than him. She speaks of a propitiating
Saviour, but she begs to be saved by the merits of
St. Dunstan and St. Scholastica. She speaks of a
life-giving Spirit, but she looks for grace to the
Virgin, the saints, and the "seven sacraments."

o y

Such is the profession, such the practical denial.

Is this church, then, the church of Christ, or the
"catholic church?" or is she, in any sense, a
scriptural church? Surely not — until such ap-
pellations can be justly given to a system which
" professes that it knows God, but in works denies
Him."

For many of the above quotations, see Rev. D. Bagot's
" Protestant Catechism."

* *
*

214

" A JEALOUS GOD.1'

BY THE REV. W. MUIR, D. D.

JEALOUSY, when ascribed to human character, be-
longs to him who is suspicious of injury, who is
inquisitive on the subject of an offence either done
or threatened, who cherishes anxious care in
guarding his rights and honour from being invaded
or slandered, who is ready to meet and to repel
every appearance of insult, and who, strong in his
indignation against enemies, whether to his pro-
perty or good name, will not rest satisfied till he
has executed vengeance for the deed under which
he may have suffered.

But jealousy, when ascribed to the Divine cha-
racter, is modified on the principle of an obvious
accommodation to the new direction in which the
term is applied. It is then meant to convey, only
with greater force, this thought— that whatever
concerns the perfections of God and His service is
sacredly regarded, maintained, and fenced by him-
self. It is therefore to remind us impressively

"A JEALOUS GOD." 215

that he looks on his intelligent offspring, — that
especially on his church, named in the Bible his
spouse, he looks with minute and holy scrutinis-
ing, as well as with affectionate interest, to remind
us that he puts no trust in our most impassioned
avowals of religious devotedness, — that he is ever
watchful over us, .discerning whether the heart cor-
respond with the profession of homage. And
hence, in reminding us of these solemn considera-
tions, it is to arouse our fears of ourselves, lest we
prove unfaithful to the covenant into which, as the
worshippers of Jehovah, we have entered; and lest
wre displease him by giving to any other the service
and affection which we owe exclusively to Him.

The Scripture, as it represents the Divine mind
under an emotion of jealousy, connects the repre-
sentation in a great number of passages with the
sin of worshipping idols. This appears first and
most prominently in the commandment which is
set directly against the making and the reverencing
of images. The second law of the decalogue en-
forces its prohibition by reasons of which the one
that is uttered with peculiar emphasis comes out
through these wrords, " a jealous God." An agree-
ment, a holy contract, w^as formed between Jehovah
and his people, had been proposed on his part in
an act of sovereign and rich mercy, — ratified on
their part by sacrifices and public vows, — and was
itself the constituted medium of precious benefits.
The breach of such a covenant, by the people who
had voluntarily entered into its engagements, and

216 "A JEALOUS GOD.

whom with such solemnity it had sanctified for the
love and service of God, could not fail to lay open
the way to them for the visitations of his righteous
anger. To set before them, therefore, what miser-

O 73

able consequences were to fall down on them as
by a necessary entail of divine wrath, this terrific
sanction is given, " For I the Lord thy God am a
jealous God."

Proceeding on that very sanction, the warning,
expressed in the following words, was sounded in
the ear of the children of Israel : — " Take heed
unto yourselves, lest ye forget the covenant of the
Lord your God, which he made with you, and
make you a graven image in the likeness of any-
thing which the Lord thy God hath forbidden
thee. For the Lord thy God is a consuming fire,
even a jealous God."

When, again, the pernicious influence of idola-
trous example as what would contaminate the
minds of the chosen people, is the subject of re-
monstrance, the point of the address is edged by
the same thought. " Ye shall not go after other
gods, of the gods of the people which are round
about you. For the Lord thy God is a jealous
God among you."

In describing, further, the thanklessness and
rebellion of the highly favoured tribes who had
requited Jehovah for his mercies by lightly esteem-
ing him, and by departing from his service, the
aggravation of the charge is summed up in the
words, " they provoked him to jealousy."

" A JEALOUS GOD." 217

When, moreover, the Divine procedure towards
the enemies of the Divine cause is announced, the
extreme of righteous indignation is threatened, by
declaring that " the Lord shall stir up jealousy," —
a threatening found in the very portion of Scrip-
ture in which this solemn statement is made : — " I
am the Lord, that is my name, and my glory will I
not give to another, neither my praise to graven

images."

Ezekiel, when he unfolds what had been wit-
nessed by him of Judah's " abominations," gives
an appalling view of the idolatries with which the
holy of holies was denied ; and, for characterising
the pollutions which he bewailed, he names them
"an image of jealousy that provoketh to jealousy."

Zephaniah, speaking of the judgments on Judah,
denounces over the whole land " a devouring, by
the fire of the Lord's jealousy," because " Baal was
worshipped," and the service offered to Jehovah
was presumptuously joined with the service offered
to an idol. The very same connexion of thought
is suggested when the Apostle Paul, remonstrating
with the Corinthians for their sinful inconsistency
in partaking both " of the Lord's table and the
table of devils," or attempting to unite the homage
due to Christ with the practices of heathen super-
stition, urges the awakening question, " do we
provoke the Lord to jealousy ?"

The sin, then, of worshipping and serving an-
other than the true God, or of worshipping and
serving him in any way not appointed by him, is

L

218 "A JEALOUS GOD."

what the scripture connects peculiarly with the
view of jealousy in the divine mind. The holy
indignation, which is represented as flaming out
against the sin, is vehement. It is a consuming
fire. It burns up the false adorers as they are
standing with their unhallowed censers and strange

o &

incense. And, extending its destructive power
beyond the more immediate occasion of its exer-
cise, it reaches through a succession of ages, and
deepens to " the third and fourth generation " the
brand of the curse — an indelible token of righteous
displeasure.

At an early period of the Bible-history, for ex-
ample, it is recorded that " the Lord said unto
Moses, write for a memorial in a book — I will ut-
terly put out the remembrance of Amalek from
under heaven." The destruction of this idolatrous
power, which had defied the worshippers of the true
God, is again announced by the prophet Balaam,
" who took up his parable and said, Amalek was the
first of nations, but his latter end shall be that
he perish for ever." Whatever were their emi-
nence, or the greatness of their resources, the
curse was registered against them. The " memo-
rial" for their destruction was gradually verified.
When three hundred and sixty years had elapsed
from the son of Beor's prophecy, the sentence
that hung over that devoted people was partly
executed by Saul. A larger measure of it was
next accomplished through the agency of David.
And when three hundred years more had flowed

" A JEALOUS GOD." 219

on, the words of the threatening were finished.

" The sons of Simeon, in the days of Hezekiah,

i/

smote the rest of the Amalekites that were es-
caped." And where is now to be found, on any
spot of the territories which they possessed, the
slightest traditionary notice of them ? How fully
realised the declaration " written in the book " —
that, " their remembrance should be blotted out
for ever."

From nations turn to individuals. Ahab, king
of Israel, " did evil in the sight of the Lord." He
allied himself to idolaters. He worshipped Baal.
He reared altars to many false gods. He sup
ported by luxurious provision the priests that
served these altars. And he followed them de-
votedly in all their abominations. And, as it is
recorded, " he did more to provoke the Lord God
of Israel to anger than all the kings of Israel that
went before him." And what was the sequel ?
His sins hurried him to destruction. In imitating
his example, his children drew down on them-
selves punishment similar to his. Ahaziah, " in
serving idols, and doing according to all his father
had done, provoked the Lord to anger." And the
daughter of Ahab, married to the king of Judah,
conveyed to the land which adopted her the sin
and misery by which her native land had been
troubled. A message from heaven accordingly
came to Jehu, couched in these words of exter-
mination, ie And thou shalt smite the house of
Ahab, that I may avenge the blood of my servants

L 2

220 " A JEALOUS GOD."

the prophets, and the blood of all the servants of
the Lord. For the whole house of Ahab shall
perish." And how short the time that elapsed after
this sentence had gone forth when the fact of its
accomplishment was engrossed in the history of
Israel — " and none of Ahab was left remaining."

Manasseh, king of Judah, was Ahab's equal in
idolatry and wickedness. Judgments, therefore,
were pronounced over him, " such as that whoso-
ever heareth of them both his ears should tingle."
His son " walked in all the way that his father had
walked in, and forsook the Lord God ;" and though
his grandson Josiah, the good Josiah, " whose heart
was tender and who humbled himself before the
Lord," testifying against the idolatries and sins of
his progenitors, and " doing right before the Lord,"
obtained immediate blessings for himself and his
people, yet a burden of woe was still reserved —
the very burden which the iniquities of a former
age had in weight so overwhelmingly prepared.
Manasseh died ; his son died also ; and the grave
had held them during many years. And still this
record is found in the history — " Notwithstanding
the Lord turned not from the fierceness of his great
wrath wherewith his anger was kindled against
Judah, because of all the provocations that Ma-
nasseh had provoked him withal. And the Lord
said, I \vill remove Judah also out of my sight as I
have removed Israel." And finally, when, about
twenty years after that sentence was uttered, Ne-
buchadnezzar, king of Babylon, carried away all

" A JEALOUS GOD." 221

Jerusalem, it is expressly declared — " Surely at
the commandment of the Lord came this upon
Judah, to remove them out of his sight for the
sins of Manasseh, according to all that he did."
Is there, indeed, a fact more common in the history
of the world than the fact of one generation, or one
family of men, suffering the consequences of the
impieties and sins of those who lived and trans-
gressed ages before they had a being? Do not
the disgrace and punishment which the irreligious
and criminal habits of an individual bring down
on himself often spread a blighting and withering
shade on his children, and more especially by the
perpetuated infection of bad example send onwards
a moral taint even to remote points in the line of
succession from him ? Among nations, too, are
not the crimes and miseries of one race protracted
in the vices and wretchedness of generations that
even after long intervals may follow ? Where is a
kingdom that throws off its allegiance to Jehovah,
that severs the cause of religion from its govern-
ment, gives a portion of its legislature and power
into the hand of antichrist, and tampers through
the principles of false liberalism with the schemes
of infidel policy ? That kingdom is, in what it
does, sowing the seed, the fruit of which gene-
rations far beyond the third and the fourth are to
reap in harvests of licentiousness, and woe, and
utter confusion. History is imprinted in charac-
ters broad and deep with proofs of the divine
jealousy. Human experience attests the procedure

222 " A JEALOUS GOD."

threatened and exemplified in the scripture on the
sin of forsaking Jehovah's worship and service ;
and thus to become rational and consistent sceptics
on the Bible declarations and narratives we will
have to dispute universal fact and to resist the very
evidence of the senses. Ah ! the Bible history
may well be read by us with an interest and trem-
bling anxiety peculiar to ourselves. There is a
parallelism between Jerusalem and Britain fitted
to strike and arouse us. The Lord God, in his
sovereign pleasure, chose Jerusalem; the people
were his own above all others on the face of the
earth by his election of them, and his great pity
for them, and his exercise of unspeakable goodness
towards them. They were in circumstances of des-
titution, and sin, and misery, and he raised them
up to receive the blessings of his family ; there
was no eye to compassionate them, and he had
compassion on them ; there was no hand to help
them, and he interposed for their aid ; he entered
into covenant with them, and they became his.
" He washed them with water, anointed them with
oil, clothed them with broidered work, decked them
with ornaments, and made their beauty perfect
through his comeliness which he put on them."
And say, then, how strong the obligations to the
love and service of Jehovah ought such privileges
as these to have impressed and wrought deep into
their hearts ? Yet, alas ! the very richness and
magnitude of the divine benefits seemed to form
the measure by which their ingratitude and rebel-

" A JEALOUS GOD." 223

lion were regulated. They dealt treacherously
with the covenant of the Lord ; they forsook his
alliance, and scorned it ; they corrupted his ordi-
nance of worship ; they tolerated other gods ; nay
more, they upheld with their substance the fabric
of false religion ; they took the very inheritance
that had been appropriated to the sanctuary, and
turned it basely to the maintenance of idols and
idolators ; they gave up their children to be pol-
luted by the foul ritual of heathenism, and even
sacrificed of their offspring in the fires of Moloch ;
they proceeded even so far in their evil course as
to outrun the steps of their neighbours in sin.
" Thine elder sister is Samaria, she and her
daughter that dwell at thy left hand. And thy
younger sister that dwelleth at thy right hand is
Sodom and her daughter. Yet thou hast not
walked after their ways, nor done after their abo-
minations. But as if that were a very little thing,
thou wert corrupted more than they in all thy
ways. Thou hast taken thy sons and thy daughters,
and these thou hast sacrificed unto the false gods
to be devoured. My meat also which I gave thee,
fine flour, and oil, and honey, wherewith I fed
thee, thou hast even set it before them for a sweet
savour. For thus saith the Lord God, I will even
deal with thee as thou hast done who hast despised
the oath in breaking the covenant." How dark
the catalogue of crimes ! how loud-toned the
charge of ingratitude ! how heavy the sentence is
with judgments !

224 " A JEALOUS GOD."

Is there not yet a people of whom it may well
be said that Jehovah chose them ; that he has made
them doubly his own by his extraordinary inter-
positions of care and bounty; that he has entered
into covenant with them, and that he has caused
" their renown," equally for religious privileges and
secular advantages, " to go forth among the hea-
then through his own comeliness which he has put
upon them ?" And if there be a parallel in the
divine dispensations towards Britain which holds
it out as a second Israel, is there no parallel in the
returns offered by those who have thus been so
munificently dealt with ? Alas ! a nation chosen
of God to receive his law and promises of mercy ;
a nation fed as with manna dropping down from
the sweet heavens ; a nation distinguished by the
glorious tokens of Jehovah's presence in the estab-
lishment of the true faith, and by its own high
oath, sworn in the Protestant deed and settlement,
and vowing to be the Lord's for ever ; a nation
that passed through dangers and was safe, and was
beset with enemies, and protected ; that has had
poured out upon it the richest prosperities, and
even whose sorest troubles have been rendered the
prolific occasions of blessing ; a nation thus pre-
served, nourished, and honoured by Jehovah — such
a nation rebels against him, impairs and vitiates
the great deed of alliance with him, by public acts
receives his enemies into favour, gives of its sub-
stance and strength to prop up the tottering fabric
of superstition, connives at and tolerates the very

" A JEALOUS GOD. 225

madness of infidelity and atheism,, and stands forth
an example to " Samaria and Sodom" of how far a
nation professedly Jehovah's can exceed in its in-
gratitude and disobedience and rebellion the other
kingdoms of the world. How humbling ! and also
how fearful ! And ever as the mind reverts to the
procedure of God towards our land — a procedure so
gracious and bountiful, and to the whole course
which has been run in the requiting of his good-
ness and mercy — ever as the mind reverts to the
public transaction of eighteen hundred and twenty-
nine, conveying to Antichrist a portion of Britain's
power, thenceforth to be wielded for discouraging
and undermining the cause of Protestantism — ever
as the mind reverts to the annual legislative grants
for the endowing of the seminaries and endowing
of the priesthood, the design of which is the spread
and magnifying of the Romish abomination, ah,
what is left but fear, and the prayer for mercy, and
the penitent sighing and crying lest the " jealousy"
that is provoked by such heinous treachery may
flame out for the wasting down of our privileges,
and the consuming of all who have slighted and
despised them ?

Surely, then, the motive is irresistible that ap-
plies to our selfishness, though nothing besides
were thought of, for guarding and upholding, with
all devotion, the knowledge and worship and ser-
vice of God. Doubtless the civil institutions of
our land are justly to be prized at a high estimate
by us. But it is in the very measure in which we

L 3

226 " A JEALOUS GOD."

value them that we ought to desire and labour to
bring and keep them unalienably connected with
the divine cause and glory ; for this alone can
render them fully beneficial, and by this alone can
they be prolonged and perpetuated. Doubtless
our literary establishments are deservedly to be
cherished; our schools and colleges, sources of
light and improvement, wells of water refreshing
and fertilizing the heritage. But how shall the
knowledge which they spread, the intellectual
energies which they foster — how shall these influ-
ences, capable of ill not less than of good — how
shall they be turned to the furthering of the nation's
prosperity, if the wisdom of revealed truth, the
only wisdom that " maketh wise unto salvation,"
be not diffused through the system of secular in-
struction— be not set up as the grand object, as the
ultimate scope and aim, of all the lessons in human
philosophy and science ? Doubtless our families
and households claim, demand our watchful super-
intendence, and exercise of zealous and affectionate
concern. But what shall these choice corners of
the vineyard, given us to cultivate, become, except
so many barren spots, when the blessing of God is
withheld, and the peace and hope and joy of his
children do not hallow and gladden the domestic
comforts and privileges ? It may be that the na-
tion is seemingly flourishing in all those luxuri-
ances of which the sensual heart is so proud and
boastful. It may be that our families and ourselves
may prosper in health, and in the courses of tern-

" A JEALOUS GOD." 227

poral abundance and distinction. But should the
eyes of the Holy God, fixed intensely as they
always are, on the secret springs, as well as on
the outward frame of our condition, mark the se-
paration of all that we have and are from our
choice of his favour, and our maintenance of his
cause, what is worth, what desirable in anything
we possess ? There is, then, a deep and incurable
canker working in the very core, and down to
the root of all our state and worldly happiness.

But let us consider well that whatever we at-
tempt to do for promoting Jehovah's honour and
service, whether in our private circle or in our
public relationships, is the directest aim and effort
for arresting the moral evil, for removing the disease
and curse which threaten the ruin of all that is
dearest to us. It is in the degree of our remissness,
however, and our want of zeal, and our luke-warm-
ness in promoting the cause of the Lord, whether
on the lower scale of personal and domestic, or on
the higher scale of public interests, that we expose
ourselves to the rebuke and the punishment of his
jealousy. Such is an awakening consideration on
our own account ; and it is equally so on account
of others. We are entrusted with the souls of
others — with the welfare of multitudes — even with
the salvation and eternity of those that are to come
after us in life.

We may excite and strengthen, or we may

«/ ~ c/

wreaken and destroy, the principles of sound faith
in the minds of our fellow-men. We may encou-

228 "A JEALOUS GOD."

rage them in the service of God, or wholly
estrange them from it — may have occasion at last
to rejoice that we have forwarded among them the
grand interests of their being, or have occasion at
last to lament that our indifference, if not hosti-
lity, to saving truth had hastened on their ruin.
We fulfil the trust conveyed down to us by our
Protestant Fathers in doing our utmost effort to
retrieve the gross and lamentable wrong which the
false charity of modern opinion and legislation has
wrought on our best institutions by lifting up our
voice on the side of scripture truth, by spreading
the knowledge of sound doctrine, and seeking in
all things to advance the pure worship, and to re-
store the honoured service of the Bible faith, — and
thus " deliver our own souls" while we attempt to
stop the wild progress of popery and infidelity.
Or, on the contrary, we may sanction, by fellow-
ship with the avowed enemies of the Protestant
cause, by ceasing to declare ourselves firmly on the
Lord's side, by our want of piety, by our un-
decidedness in the profession and practice of evan-
gelical religion ; by these and other things of similar
character we may sanction the very system of
Antichrist on which the curse of Revelation is
pronounced ; and by rousing into solemn and awful
exercise the divine jealousy, hasten forward the
consummation of those plagues in which ourselves
and our country, and all who " have the mark of
the beast," must be involved. Ah ! is it possible,
at last, that of us the sad complaint and accusation

"A JEALOUS GOD. 229

may have to be uttered, that but for us there are
souls who might have stood at the right hand of
the throne in the glories and joys of the Lord —
that we had our share in the work of obstructing
the real prosperity of our nation — the only sub-
stantial good of our families — the salvation of our
own and others' souls ? Ought not this to strike
deeply into us the feeling of serious responsibility ?
And since God has declared his jealousy over his
name, his gospel, his worship, and service, in order
that men may be brought to reverence and de-
votedly obey him, and all for securing their own
present and eternal benefit, shall we not cherish
and exert the utmost zeal for objects so pure and
ennobling, that the divine honour may be pro-
moted, human welfare be advanced, and ourselves,
and every one whom we can influence, may rejoice
together in the reception of "the favour which
is better than Life ?"

230

THE ARMADA.

^fragment.

" Hark ! Isabel, didst thou hear that distant peal,
mingling its echo with the surges' roar, and dying
away over the eastern hills? Methinks it was a
farewell note, and the storm hath spent itself."

" A dreary morning will rise upon the coast,
Joseph; and yon tumbling waves, that seem to
rock our hut as they spend their fury on the
shore, will perchance cast up some mangled corse
to glitter horribly in the sunbeam that flashes on
its sightless eyeballs. I shudder to walk abroad."

" Nay, Isabel, thou hast looked on death in
ghastlier form and quailed not."

" True, dear heart ; but the death of the righ-
teous, when he taketh the cup of suffering for his
Master's sake, even as the Master drank a sorer
cup for him, is a lightsome and a glorious spec-
tacle. Thirty-two years have rolled by since these
hands wrought my mother's white garment, end
these eyes beheld it kindle in the flame that con-

THE ARMADA. 231

sumed her fair body : thirty-one years and six
months, Joseph, since I saw my father's scourged
and famished carcass hanging dead from the
wooden stocks that fettered his heels high above
the ground. Thou sayest true, I quailed not then,
nor made faint answer when the fierce tormentors

0

shouted in mine ear, e Wilt thou now to the mass
with us, girl, or to hell with yonder heretic?' But
fearful it is to look upon the drowned corpse of
him whom the sea hath swallowed up, perchance
in the midst of his unrepented iniquities ! "

A gust of wind shook the cottage, causing the

O o ' o

lamp to flicker : it presently expired. " I will open
yon shutter, Isabel," said her husband, rising,
"and look forth upon the sky. The grey tint is
spreading, but a sore tempest hath indeed passed
over the land. Blessed be God, it was not a storm
of his wrathful displeasure, causing us to fall into
the hands of man : the sword hath had no com-
mission to pass through: the ungodly make us
not afraid. He hath scattered the people that
delight in war. Come, Isabel, let us worship and
fall down before Him who hath not given us over
as a prey unto their teeth."

Not alone from the solitary cottage of Joseph
Fanshawe, but from many a lordly roof, and from
many a stately tower, ascended the voice of praise.
On the nineteenth day of July had the terrible
Armada first been descried from England's shore ;
and thence to the last day of August a succession
of menacing approaches, engagements, and re-

232 THE ARMADA.

treats, kept up the excitement of England at a
feverish height. Vanquished in fight, storm-tossed,
scattered, and evidently pursued by vengeance
from on high, the bigoted invaders were fre-
quently driven, in shattered barks, upon the rude
northern coasts of Britain, the rocky intricacies of
the Scottish shore, and the stern barriers of Ire-
land. The sea was wont to cast up their miserable
remains, with occasional chests of treasure, casks
of provision, and not unfrequently instruments
which the survivors of the Marian persecution but
too readily recognised as framed for torturing
heretics. By such means was their past danger
long kept in vivid remembrance by our rescued
forefathers ; while those who loved to plunder, ra-
ther than to labour with their hands, fixed their
temporary dwellings on the lines of coast more
prolific in wrecks, and snatched from the deep the
spoil of those baffled spoilers.

Not of these, however, was Fanshawe ; by birth
a gentleman, liberally educated, and early taught
in the faith of that gospel which, during his early
days, had free course and was glorified under the
rule of the pious Edward, he had travelled abroad
for improvement, just as the bloody character of
Mary began to develope itself, and thus escaped
the horrors to which his kindred were exposed.
Several of them had obtained the crown of mar-
tyrdom ; but young Fanshawe remained in the
Low Countries until, Elizabeth having ascended
the throne, he essayed to return home, where

THE ARMADA. 233

Isabel, his early betrothed, had, alone of all her
family, survived the sanguinary persecution. Pass-
ing, however, first to Spain, on some private
business, he was informed against, arrested, im-
prisoned, and held in cruel captivity for ten years.
Delivered at last, he found his patrimony a wreck,
and nothing remaining of all that he could call
his own, save that which above all he prized — his
true-hearted Isabel, With her he retired to a se-
cluded spot on the north-western coast, having
that godliness which, with contentment, is great
gain; and living to the glory of Him who had
given both of them grace freely to hazard their
lives for a testimony to his truth.

The year was waning, and when Fanshawe,
after a devout thanksgiving, left his hut to explore
the neighbouring rocks, the sun had not looked
forth. All was comfortless, chill, dreary. The
ocean spray, borne on the gusty blast, spread a
blinding mist around him ; and the breakers with
hollow roar seemed to exult in mysterious lan-
guage over victims ingulfed beneath their surge.
" Wind and storm fulfilling His word," thought
Fanshawe, as he shrank from the imaged power
of the element, and referred all things to Him
who sitteth a king over the water-floods. ' Some
may have found a tomb in yon mighty deep ; but
not a hair of man's head can perish, save as HE
giveth commandment/

Thus pondering, he gained an eminence where
the summit of one perpendicular rock formed the

234 THE ARMADA.

base of another — a rude, wild crag, the chosen
haunt of the heron and sea-mew, while on its lofty
crown, inaccessible to man, the eagle formed her
eyry, and looked forth, perched like a warder on
the topmost turret of her fortress. From this point
Fanshawe surveyed an awful spectacle — the broken
wreck of what had been a majestic ship, her bow
buried deep behind a detached rock on which she
had struck, her towering stern and broken masts
alone remaining visible, soon to be ingulfed be-
neath the billows that had evidently swept away
whatever might have tenanted that floating castle ;
for ever and anon they dashed, not only over, but
even through the shattered fragment. Far off, in
the dim horizon, he might descry the outline of
other struggling barks ; but while straining his
sight to catch, if it might be, a token that some
poor mariner had escaped the raging waves, a
broken boat was tossed for a moment on their
crests, again to be borne downwards by the riotous
surges. This object was sufficiently near the main
land to afford a hope that its occupiers had made
good a footing on the rocks which ran out, in
straggling ridges, to a considerable distance, and
in tranquil weather shone high above the level
tide, yielding a rich supply of shell fish alike to
the inmates of the lonely cottage and to the fea-
thered tenants of the scene.

His heart throbbing with benevolent hope, Fan-
shawe rapidly descended, proposing to skirt, as
far as he safely might, the base of the cliff, whence

THE ARMADA.

'Vould spe, retire. T

)f the waters was subsiding
boat now lay stationary on son

though still washed over by the bii
jbre ! !ie pa

.

piv but screened from siglr

T of r. -k.

Th -;ures met his view; two clad in drenci
and dripping garments bore between them a third,
evident!
.

.

irn: L the

rei
" La.

with little to
this, with

1 an iu4

THE ARMADA. 235

he knew the tide would speedily retire. The
stormy swell, too, of the waters was subsiding fast,
and the boat now lay stationary on some support-
ing ledge, though still washed over by the billows.
Before Fanshawe could emerge from the pass by
which he hastily approached the only possible
point of landing, ' he was startled by the sound of
voices so near that prudence dictated a pause ere
he should throw himself among a party perchance
of hostile strangers. Intimately acquainted with
those rugged paths, he presently gained a spot
immediately overlooking that whence the voices
proceeded, but screened from sight by a rough
barrier of natural breastwork.

Three figures met his view; two clad in drenched
and dripping garments bore between them a third,
evidently disabled, whose frequent exclamations
of pain rose above the subsiding murmur of the
now half-slumbering ocean. His companions had
laid him on a projecting ledge of rock, over which
the waves still occasionally ran ; and now with a
renewed effort, they moved him further on, as the
retreating breakers revealed a more commodious
spot. Their garb confirmed what the fashion of
the ship had already proclaimed ; and as Fanshawe
cautiously stole nearer, he caught the accents of a
tongue with which his long captivity in Spain had
rendered him perfectly familiar.

" Landed at last," said one ; " but by St. Jago,
with little to boast of! What an infernal coast is
this, with its ready-made fortifications and ever-

236 THE ARMADA.

lasting outworks, contrived to break up every keel
but those of its heretic inhabitants."

" Well worth the conquest, if we had it," re-
sponded another. " I tell thee, Cervalhos, no
country on earth hath goodlier ports, or richer
land, or better store of all gallant spoil than
this, which hath presented to us a front breathing
defiance and working destruction."

" I would we had our brave galley, manned as
yester-eve she was," resumed the first, " and bear-
ing for the strand which in evil hour we left upon
this bootless emprise. Hath not disaster pursued
us, even from the outset until, the very elements
conspiring to our ruin, the storm has ingulfed
what remained after our desperate encounter with
yon restless crew, who have been chasing us over
the waves from day to day, until we trusted to the
gloom of night and the fair aspect of what has proved
a network of rocks, whence no escape lay open."

" Ay ; when the brig shortened sail, and stood
off, we might have guessed she had hunted us to
the trap's mouth, and trusted for the rest to the
undiscovered snare. A plague pursue her ! The
curse is over this land and all pertaining to it."

Fanshawe deeply felt that over his native land
was the blessing of Him who had suffered no hos-
tile power to harm her. Again the wounded man
groaned. " How now, Diego, is life within thee
still ? " asked one of his comrades.

" Would it were extinct ! " replied the sufferer.

" Patience, man ; thou didst vow to our Lady

THE ARMADA. 237

l

costly gifts, if she brought thee but to plant thy
foot on this English soil ; and truly thou must ren-
der due offe rings, for thy prayer is granted."

" Mock me not, Alphonso ; I am cast here to
perish, and so are ye."

" Perhaps not ; I am here no stranger, thanks to
good king Philip. My tongue can full well play
the Englishman — ay, and the stanch protestant
to boot."

" That were a damnable sin !" exclaimed the
third Spaniard.

" Thou art a shallow theologian, Cervalhos ;
nothing is sinful that promotes the interests of our
most holy faith. If the infernal cannonading of
those heretics had not riddled our good ships, and
their stout allies, the blustering winds dismantled,
dispersed, and sunk them, we should have played
an open game to the praise of St. Jago, with lead
and steel, where I, as a blithe boy, have often
danced round the roasting rebels. But fate denied ;
and now, Diego, having 'scaped the waves by our
help, who had sore work to bear thee hither, thou
mayest rejoice in having one to guide you who can
tell a credible tale in the language of the country,
and await a prosperous hour for more congenial
work."

" Little avails your boasting," remarked Cerval-
hos, " while the desolateness of the spot holds out
no better prospect to us than a miserable death."

This was true. Fanshawe's hut lay far remote
from any other dwelling ; and the nature of the

238 THE ARMADA.

country was such as to exhaust the strength of the
unprovided, unguided traveller, ere he could hope
to reach a place of refreshment. The Englishman
well understood the character of those before him ;
he knew that, once admitted to his hearth, and ac-
quainted with its isolated situation, they might
overpower by force, or by treachery destroy its two
inhabitants. An entrance they could not gain
unpermitted ; he was fully competent to defend it,
while Isabel, mounted on her pillion, would speedily
traverse the familiar passes, and bring back those
who would dispose of them. These thoughts were
rapidly passing through his mind, when another
heavy groan from Diego interrupted them.

" Is there no water near ?"

" Water enough," replied Alphonso, in the same
tone of levity, " but too salt to suit your palate."

" I care not ; let me die ! But, oh, the oath
weighs down my soul, and I depart unblest. Holy
Mother of God ! regard my intention, and reckon
it to me for the act I would but cannot perform."

" What means he ?" asked Cervalhos.

" He made a vow that, if permitted to land, he
would steep his garments in heretic blood, and
hang them up in our Lady's church at Seville.
Take courage, Diego, with the help of my devices
it may yet be performed."

Fanshawe shuddered ; he well knew that such
vows were common among the soldiers of the papal
army when proceeding on an enterprise conse-
crated, as this had been, by the pope. The bull

THE ARMADA. 239

of excommunication fulminated against Elizabeth
had been followed up by the announcement of
plenary indulgences to all who should take part in
the expedition against England ; thus dispersing
spiritual gifts from the church's treasury of super-
abundant merits for the benefit of the pious ; while
he encouraged the worldly-minded by an equally
liberal donation from her well-filled coffers — a
million of gold, in solid ducats, being secured to
the crusaders, the one-half in hand, the other pay-
able on landing. This was, indeed, a tempting ser-
vice : pillaging for the love of God, murdering for
the honour of Christianity, earning alike the bless-
ing and the blood-money by obeying the worst
dictates of man's vilest propensities ; these were the
meritorious exploits to which the bishop of Rome
instigated his faithful sons, and readily they betook
themselves to work out his congenial behests ; and
well could the southern continent of America testify
to the forwardness of Spain in exceeding, if that
were possible, the broad commission of the Vatican.
The Englishman stood irresolute as to the course
he should pursue ; deeper groans issuing from the
bosom of the wrounded man moved him to pity;
the others also declared their inability to make any
efforts for him or themselves : they had, they said,
exhausted their strength, first in labouring at the
oar through that tremendous sea, and when the
boat capsized in struggling to rescue their com-
rade from among the drowning crew. Fanshawe
gathered from their discourse that Diego had pre-

240 THE ARMADA.

viously been wounded in some encounter with an
English vessel, and now the half-healed limb was
again sorely hurt in the conflict with a mightier

O */ O

foe. Succour they would find none on that unfre-
quented spot, unless some band of strolling wreckers
were haply induced to explore the line of coast in
search of what the waves might cast up ; and at
their hands no mercy could be hoped. Should he
retire to his little fortress and wait the event ?
Had they, the invading enemies of his country,
the persecutors unto death of his faith, overtaken
by divine judgment in the act of wanton aggression,
and bewailing their inability to shed innocent blood,
or plotting still to accomplish, by stratagem, the
work of murder, — had they any claim on his hospi-
tality ? Should he revive, in the warmth of his
poor but pleasant dwelling, the adder that would
assuredly seek to transfix his bosom with a sting ?
He lifted up his heart in secret prayer, and the
voice prevailed which said, "If thine enemy hunger,
feed him ; if he thirst, give him drink." The Chris-
tian hesitated no longer, but at once presented
himself before the startled group.

Alphonso sprang forward, and in good English
besought his friendly aid on behalf of three ship-
wrecked strangers, who had, as he said, taken their
passage in a goodly galleon, laden with merchan-
dise from the west; but which, encountering a
succession of adverse winds, had been driven into
those seas, dismasted, and an easy prey to the
storm of yester-eve. They alone had escaped,

THE ARMADA. 241

one of them being severely injured by the falling
of their mast ; and now they craved protection not
only from impending famine, but from such as
might erroneously confound them with enemies
who, it was reported, had been hovering on the
English coast; but who they were, or what was
their enterprise, these honest merchants knew not.
His companions, he said, were foreigners, but him-
self an Englishman, whose long sojourn in other
lands had well-nigh untuned his tongue for its
native accents.

Fanshawe replied not ; though a rebuke swelled
to his lip, as the ready lie roused the spirit of truth
within him. Prudence dictated the necessity of

•/

concealing his acquaintance with their language ;
nor could they surmise that beneath his simple as-
pect and rustic attire lurked aught but what an
untutored peasant might know. Yet they shrank
beneath his steady eye, and Alphonso again im-
patiently demanded the help, without which they
must perish ; adding promise of a large reward so
soon as he should apprize his wealthy connexions
in London of their mishap.

" Follow me !" said Fanshawe.

" To a place of safety ?"

" To the shelter of a Christian's roof, where
no harm can overtake the confiding stranger."

Assisted by him, they gained the cottage, which
a projecting mass of rock had alone concealed from
them ; and, in a few moments, Isabel was moisten-
ing the parched lips of Diego with new milk ;

M

242 THE ARMADA.

while the contents of their little larder were spread
before his comrades.

" Ask him if they dwell alone," said Cervalhos ;
the query was put in English, and answered affir-
matively.

"It is a desert spot," observed Alphonso; "have
ye no fears ?"

" We dwell under the shadow of the Most High.
He is our strength, and whom should we fear ?"

He rose to replenish the cup, and Alphonso re-
peated these answers, adding, " Depend on it they
are heretics. We may here find means of pro-
ceeding to a sea-port, whence escape will be easy
enough. What says Diego now ?" A glance accom-
panied the words that spoke a dreadful meaning.

" Safety," replied Diego, " is nought to me ; I
feel my hours are numbered, and let me but per-
form my vow, I am content. A soldier of the
church from boyhood, I have hunted her enemies
in every clime, and revelled in their slaughter.
To die as I have lived is all my desire ; the sword
I may wield no more, but to aim a knife at the
heart of a heretic, expending my last energies on
the blow ; this, this, holy Mother of God, I will
do in thy cause, and thou wilt smile upon thy ser-
vant while opening to him that paradise whereof
thou art the gate !"

A deep flush was kindled on his brow, the stern-
ness of which contrasted with the pathos of his
tones. Isabel gazed on him with compassionate
interest, and remarked, "Methinks, Joseph, the

THE ARMADA. 243

last enemy is at hand ; and he seemeth to pray.
Oh that the only Saviour of sinners may be the
refuge sought unto by this departing one !"

No longer able to endure the awful contrast,
Fanshawe approached the couch, and exclaimed
in Spanish, " Forbear to put thy trust in these
lying vanities, and flee to Jesus ; in him only is
salvation for thy lost and guilty soul !"

The dying man darted forward with a desperate
effort to grasp his arm, while the others looked 011
in momentary stupefaction. Isabel quickly opened
an inner door, and at her call a powerful blood-
hound sprang into the apartment, and stood with
panting eagerness awaiting his master's will. Fan-
shawe had, unperceived, withdrawn the knives
from their table ; and now, stepping back, while
Isabel clung to his arm, and the dog with menac-
ing eye glared on the shrinking traitors, he thus
pursued the subject: —

" O, woeful spectacle of ruined man, that Satan
should prevail over him to turn the truth into a
lie, — the pure worship of the invisible God into a
senseless adoration of idols, — and the gospel of
peace, proclaimed by a loving Saviour, into a reli-
gion of blood and cruel murderous rage ! See the
contrariety of that wherein ye trust to that ap-
pointed of the Lord. He linketh 'honour the
king,' with f fear God,' and denounceth as worthy
of judgment the sin of rebellion. Your false god,
the Bishop of Rome, proclaimeth a reward in
heaven to such among her subjects as shall use re-

244 THE AR31ADA.

bellious weapon to depose and slay our lawful sove-
reign. God telleth you that the wisdom which is
of Him is pure, peaceable, placable ; but the wis-
dom of your church sendeth you forth to massacre,
with pitiless hand, a people that do ye no wrong.
The Holy Ghost commands, f Lie not one to an-
other ;' but ye have come with lying lips to deceive
and betray, not content to avail yourselves of a
poor man's succour, unless ye stain his hearthstone
with his blood, as a passport into the paradise of
God. Brother sinner," he added, with increased
fervour, addressing Diego, " she whom ye call the
gate of Heaven had never herself found entrance
thereto, but for the atoning sacrifice of Him who
vouchsafed to take flesh of her substance, that he
might give a ransom for her soul and thine. Hear
this, — turn not from me, — let thy dying ear drink in
the blessed sound that yet there is pardon for
thee, poor guilty victim of a false delusion ! Look
to Jesus, He is able to save ; call on Jesus, He
will not reject thy cry. Oh, now, now, while life
lingers, cast thy soul down before Him, for Jesus
is pitiful, very pitiful," he repeated, his voice fal-
tering with emotion, as, once more drawing nigh,
he laid his hand on Diego's shoulder. The un-
happy man turned towards him the ghastly face
that he had averted ; a wild look, an expression not
ferocious as before, but full of strange meaning,
met the Christian's gaze; and with a low, smo-
thered groan, he expired.

245

THE 'MARTYR LAMBERT.

•

BY GEORGE FINCH, ESQ., OF BURLEY-ON-THE-HILL,
RUTLANDSHIRE.

IN the Jewish dispensation a most sublime reve-
lation was made of the ineffable holiness of God,
and of his awful judgments against sinners ; and
the thunderings and lightnings on Mount Sinai
figuratively represented the terror of his justice,
and the tremendous penalties which menaced the
transgressors of his perfect law. Salvation by
faith in the Lamb of God, who was to take away
the sins of the wrorld, was typically represented
in the sacrifices instituted by Moses, so as to
be intelligible to all spiritual believers; but the
grand characteristics of the Jewish economy were
the law and its denunciations, and these operated
as a schoolmaster to conduct true believers to
Christ. Hence the apostle Paul did not hesitate
to style the Mosaic system " the ministry of con-
demnation ;" and, in perfect unison with its spirit
and design, the Jews were employed by God as
the instruments of his vengeance upon idolatrous
nations, whilst the severest penalties were enacted

N

246 THE MARTYR LAMBERT.

in their own laws against those Jews who were
guilty of sacrilege or idolatry.

The main object of the Christian dispensation
was the revelation of the unutterable grace of God
to perishing sinners ; the manifestation of his in-
finite pity and goodness. By Christ, and in Christ,
God is made known to man as the God of Love ;
and the apostle John designates him a£ being
" love" itself. In complete harmony with this
design is the whole of the Christian economy.
Jesus was meek and lowly ; he came to bless, to
suffer, to redeem, and not to punish. He pub-
lished the grace of God ; through the gospel was
preached forgiveness of sins to the most guilty ;
God was exhibited as reconciled to all who should
repent and believe in his dear Son ; the apostles
were sent forth to entreat sinners to be reconciled
to God ; their ministry was termed the ministry of
reconciliation ; as a pledge that God was pacified,
the gift of the Holy Spirit was imparted ; in con-
trast to the ministry of condemnation, the Christian
system was termed the ministration of the Spirit ;
and although there was a time predicted in wrhich
God's vengeance was to be poured forth upon
guilty nations, that day was not to arrive till the
days of grace were fulfilled. Well would it have
been for the character of the primitive church in
the fourth and fifth centuries — for the reputation
of reformed catholic statesmen, parliaments, and
churchmen of various sects in the sixteenth, seven-
teenth, and eighteenth centuries — and, most of all,

THE MARTYR LAMBERT. 247

for that murderess of the saints, the church of
Rome, if the sweet and merciful and lovely spirit
of Christianity had been more clearly perceived
and practised.

The first persecutions were perpetrated by the
heathen governments against the church of Christ ;
the next persecutions were those so fiercely pur-
sued by the Arians against orthodox believers.
These were followed, in due course of time, by the
penal code of Theodosius, which was enacted in
accordance with the views and interests of the
Nicene church. The example of the primitive
church was not lost upon the church of Rome. In
the middle ages, borrowing authority from Augus-
tine and Jerome, and the fathers of Chalcedon,
she unsheathed the sword of vengeance, and the
slaughter of her unhappy victims inundated, with
its crimson tide, the south of France, and exhibited
the Romish apostasy as literally drunken with the
blood of the saints, It is consolatory to enlightened
members of the reformed catholic church to find
that no principles of persecution are discoverable
in their creeds ; that private judgment is proclaimed
by the reformed religion to be at once a common
privilege, a duty, and a birthright ; and that those
Protestants who have persecuted are convicted of
having acted in direct violation of the spirit and
essence of the reformed faith. It must, on the
other hand, be the source of deep regret and ol
heartfelt misgiving to enlightened Roman catho-
lics to find that the punishment of heretics is so

N 2

248 THE MARTYR LAMBERT.

bound up with the infallibility of the church of
Rome that no true friend of religious liberty and
of freedom of conscience can consistently remain a
member of the Roman-catholic communion.

Aware how pre-eminently calculated the know-
ledge of the persecuting doctrines of the Romish
church was to prejudice the political claims of
British and Irish Roman catholics, and to prevent
the reception of Romish principles by British Pro-
testants, the Romish prelates who were examined
by the parliamentary committee in 1825, and
the Irish prelates who published authoritative ex-
positions of Romish principles, left no means un-
tried of misstating the Roman-catholic doctrine
upon this head. Unwilling to believe that men
occupying such responsible offices in the church of
Rome, and assuming for themselves the episcopal
dignity, could, in the face of earth and heaven, be
guilty of such heinous falsehood, the honest, honour-
able, and ignorant simplicity of British statesmen,
and legislators, and of a large portion of the popu-
lation of Great Britain, was utterly deceived. The
exterminating principles of the fourth council of
Lateran were supposed to be unauthentic, by reason
of the solemn disavowal of them by Romish church-
men. It was urged, that in the Mazarine manu-
script, which was incomplete, only the beginning
and conclusion of the canon were in esse. The coun-
cil of Constance had indeed pronounced sentence
against Huss and Jerome as incorrigible heretics,
and delivered them over to the secular arm ; but

THE MARTYR LAMBERT. 249

their deaths were solely attributable, it was con-
tended, to the sanguinary edicts of the imperial
law. Miserable sophistry ! only sufficient, one
should have thought, to have blinded those pre-
determined to be convinced, if experience had not
instructed us that sound sense and senatorial elo-
quence are not \mfrequently as widely distant as
the poles. To prove the persecuting spirit of the
church of Rome, we are not necessitated to run
over the whole of her history ; her motto is " sem-
per eadem." If we can shew that any tenet has
once been received by her, her infallibility eter-
nally forbids its renunciation. Her assumed infal-
libility is, in point of fact, the power which binds
together her unsightly system; and if this were
abandoned by her, the whole of that system would
fly to pieces. It will suffice, therefore, to establish
the fact, that she cherished the doctrine of per-
secution in the thirteenth century, in order to
convict her of being a persecuting church for ever.
In the year 1215, the fourth Lateran council
was held, in which Pope Innocent III. proposed
certain articles, which, although some of them
appeared repulsive to certain members, received
the tacit assent of the council and of the universal
church. These, therefore, are as true and holy as
Romish infallibility can make them, and as such,
are binding upon the consciences of all Roman
catholics. Among these articles is the well-known
canon which sanctions the extirpation of heretics.
Of this fact, called in question as it has been by

250 THE MARTYR LAMBERT.

interested parties, there can be no reasonable
doubt. About twenty years after the holding of
the abovementioned council, Pope Gregory IX.*
in his decretals inserted the canon at full length,
and referred to Pope Innocent III. in a general
council, which could only be the fourth council of
Lateran, for its authority. A better attested fact
can scarcely be discovered in history. In the year
1220,f Pope Honorius III., in a public bull, con-
firmed the laws of Frederic II. of Germany, and
inserted them verbatim in his bull ; these laws en-
joined the extermination of heretics. In about the
year 1235, Pope Gregory IX., as we have already
seen, introduced the exterminating decree of the
fourth council of Lateran into his decretals, which
are part of the common law of the church of Rome.
In the year 1243, Pope Innocent IV., in a public
bull, confirmed the abovementioned laws of Fre-
deric II., and thus enforced the extermination of
heretics ; and by one of the enactments of these
laws, as they are set forth at large in Pope Inno-
cent IV. 's bull, it was decreed that heretics should
be publicly burnt alive : " ut vivi in conspectu
hominum comburantur, nammarum commissi ju-
dicio." In the year 1258, Pope Alexander IV.
confirmed the same laws. In the year 1262, Pope
Urban IV., in a public bull, directed the inqui-
sitors to exterminate the heretics, (vulpeculis ex-
terminatis.) In the prefatory remarks to the

* Decretalium Gregorii, lib. v., de heretico, tit. vii.
f Bullarium Magnum, Hon. III.

THE MARTYR LAMBERT. 251

insertion of the bull of Pope Innocent IV., the
" Bullarium Magnum" informs us, that Pope Cle-
ment IV., on the 22nd day of October, 1265, con-
firmed the same exterminating laws of Frederick II.
In the year 1280, Pope Nicolas III. issued a bull
of excommunication against heretics, which de-
creed that those who were condemned by the church
should be left to the secular judgment to be duly
punished, and that even those who were willing to
perform condign repentance should be perpetually
imprisoned. In the prefatory remarks to the in-
troduction of the bull of Pope Honorius III., to
which we have already referred, we are told that
Pope Boniface VIIL, who occupied the papal chair
in the year 1295, confirmed the same laws of Fre-
deric II. ; and lastly, if it were possible that any
doubt could remain in the mind of any sane man
respecting the fact that not only the persecution,
but the extermination, of heretics was approved of
and enforced by the church of Rome in the thir-
teenth century, that doubt would be utterly can-
celled by the declaration of the learned Thomas
Aquinas, who wrote in the latter half of the thir-
teenth century, and who declared that the church
consigned relapsed heretics to the secular judg-
ment, to be exterminated by death from the world.
(Sec. sec. part. sum. theol. S. Thorn. Aquin.
Quaes. xi. art. 3. " Et ulterius relinquit cum ju-
dicio seculari a rnundo exterminandum per mor-
tem.") To deny, therefore, that the extermination
of heretics has had the sanction and been enforced

252 THE MARTYR LAMBERT.

by the infallible authority of the church of Rome,
would be as rash as it would be to deny the exist-
ence of the sun, moon, and stars, or of the church
of Rome herself.

Of this persecuting system many of the holiest
saints of God have been the victims ; and of all
of that murdered band, who obtained the victory
by their faith, no one perhaps is better entitled to
the sympathy and affection of reformed catholics,
or has more glorified the grace of God, than Lam-
bert, a schoolmaster in London. The bare men-
tion of his name revives the reminiscence of the
era of the Reformation, and the heart of every
true believer overflows with gratitude to his God
when he calls to mind the deliverance of his church
and country from papal bondage and corruption.
By the most merciless cruelties, the bishops of Rome
had attained for a time the triumph over all op-
position. The Waldenses had been scattered, and
constrained to conceal themselves in Languedoc,
the north of Italy, Hungary, and Switzerland.
The great western schism, however, introduced
such intolerable evils, and such irremediable confu-
sion and indiscipline, at the close of the fourteenth
century, that the papal power received a shock
from which it never recovered. The court of
Rome and the Romish prelates and clergy lost all
hold on the respect of the people at large, and the
demand for a moral reformation of the church in
her head and members became almost universal.
St. Bridget, in her revelations, which were recog-

THE MARTYR LAMBERT. 253

nised by the councils of Constance and Basil, and
by Popes Urban VI., Martin V., and Paul V. (edit.
Coloniae, 1629, book i. c. 41), described the pope
as being worse than Lucifer, more unjust than
Pilate, more merciless than Judas, and more abo-
minable than the Jews. She gave also a most
appalling picture of priestly and monkish profli-
gacy ;* and portrayed the prelates of the church
as being filled with pride and covetousness and the
putridity of corporeal enjoyments. By their secret
intrigues and overt opposition the popes baffled
the desire for reformation, but Europe was more
and more scandalized by their worldlymindedness
and vices. Pope Sixtus IV. was accused, upon the
strongest grounds, of being involved in the conspi-
racy of the Pazzi at Florence, and stained with the
blood of the assassinated Julian de Medici. At the
siege of Mirandola, Julius II. , impatient of delay,
was seen by his wondering troops to mount the
breach in person, clad in armour. Alexander VI.
was graphically described by Guicciardini as a ser-
pent, who, by his pestiferous wickedness, had poi-
soned the whole world. If the head was thus defiled
and deformed, the body of the church was in a state
of almost equal demoralization. In the council of
Pisa, anno 1409, Gerson, the chancellor of Paris,
delivered a sermon before Pope Alexander, in which
he gave a most lamentable account of the wide-
spread corruption, and intimated that all the evils
had sprung from the foul pollutions of the clergy?

* Lib.vii.
N 3

254 THE MARTYR LAMBERT.

(ex foedis inquinamentis clcricorum.) In the fifth
council of Lateran, Anthony Pucci, clerk of the
apostolic chamber, described the church as being
in a deserted and filthy state, and the shepherds
of the flock as slaying rather than saving. At the
council of Trent, Paganus, a minorite, in a sermon
which he delivered to the council, went so far as
to state that " every Christian was without reli-
gion !" The revival of literature had already set
men's minds in motion ; the invention of printing
facilitated the diffusion of knowledge ; and a sense
of the need of a moral reformation in the church
of Rome pervaded all classes of men. At this
time, under the direction of divine Providence,
the desire for a moral reformation was superseded
by the still more irrepressible longing for a doc-
trinal reformation. Many had been the frauds of
monks and priests which had provoked disgust,
but no abuse equalled that which prevailed in the
distribution of indulgences. By an indulgence is
meant, in the language of Rome, the remission,
either in whole or in part, of the temporal punish-
ment which is reserved by God in this world, or in
purgatory, for those sins of which the eternal punish-
ment has been remitted. The distribution of indul-
gences had long been most profane and irrational.
In one of the most authoritative books of Roman
devotion in use in the fifteenth and sixteenth cen-
turies, in England, we find that the recital of a
few prayers, or the performance of a few devo-
tional services, was rewarded by the popes by indul-

THE MARTYR LAMBERT. 255

gences for eleven thousand, and even sixty thousand
years.* Under the pontificate of Leo X., the pro-
fligate sale of indulgences awakened the zeal of
Luther ; and as the divine truth gradually revealed
itself to his soul, he subsequently denounced, in
succession, the main doctrinal corruptions of the
Romish church. , The blessed principles of ever-
lasting truth, which had long been cherished by
the followers of Wickliffe, now obtained entrance
into many English hearts ; and vainly did the tyrant
Henry VIII. endeavour to extinguish the sacred
fire. The schoolmaster Lambert was a man of
ardent temperament, and was animated by an
evangelical detestation of error. He was, in fine,
so " illiberal'* as to detest soul-destroying doc-
trines; and so " fanaticaV as to desire to purify
the poisoned fountains of truth. He loved his
God ; he cherished God's blessed promises ; he con-
tended earnestly for the faith once delivered to the
saints ; and he opposed those deadly errors which
degraded and ruined his fellow men. The uncom-
promising publication of his sentiments led to his
imprisonment by Archbishop Watham, at whose
death he was released. Subsequently hearing
Dr. Taylor, afterwards bishop of Lincoln, preach
in favour of transubstantiation, he declared to him
his dissent from that doctrine. For this offence
he was summoned before certain of the bishops,
who vainly endeavoured to persuade him to re-

* Horse beatissimce Virginis Marise ad legitimum Sarisburien-
sis Ecclesise ritum, &c. 1533.

256 THE MARTYR LAMBERT.

tract. He appealed to the king himself; the ap-
peal was accepted by his sovereign, who was proud
of his learning, and insolent in his pomp and
power, and a disputation occurred which termi-
nated in the bodily destruction of the champion
of truth. To some the weakness of Lambert's
understanding may appear to be evidenced by his
zealous hostility to a doctrine represented by many
as only mysterious and speculative. But the martyr
had truer views of the dignity of truth, and of the
melancholy results of doctrinal error. He doubt-
less perceived that from the doctrine of transub-
stantiation resulted priestly pride, the degradation
of the laity, insult to the Saviour, gross idolatry, and
that false propitiatory sacrifice which is termed the
mass. The priests were described as miraculously
converting, whenever they intended to do so, the
wafer — which they pronounced to be the body of
Christ — into his body, blood, soul, and divinity —
and thus working a greater miracle than any which
were wrought by Moses or Joshua. The conse-
crated wafer was worshipped by the priests and
people as very Christ, with the adoration of latria,
which, according to the Romish church, is due to
Jehovah only; and the offering of this sacrifice
was declared to be propitiatory for the sins of the
quick and the dead. Such fearful errors naturally
filled the minds of pious Christians with awe and
detestation ; and those whose eyes had been opened
to a perception of delusion were most anxious to
rescue from it their fellow-citizens, who were the

THE MARTYR LAMBERT. 257

abject slaves of a pretended infallibility. In pro-
portion as the doctrine tended to elevate the priestly
office was the eagerness of the Romish clergy to up-
hold it ; and in proportion as it was unscriptural and
irrational, Romish policy prescribed the employ-
ment of the greatest severities in its defence. How-
ever much we may be disgusted with Henry VIII. 's
pedantic pride ; however justly, on other occasions,
we may abhor his regal tyranny ; in the cruelties
with wThich he visited Lambert's opposition to tran-
substantiation, he only proved himself to be a faith-
ful disciple of Thomas Aquinas, and an obedient
member of the Roman-catholic church. Lambert,
as we have already stated, appealed to the king.
But why did he select for his antagonist the wearer
of the British crowrn ? His true motive for so doing
is known with certainty to Him only to whom the
secrets of all hearts are open. We can only pre-
sume what the springs of his conduct were ; and
such presumptions must not war against charity.
Our knowledge of the infirmities of human nature,
nevertheless, and of the defects which accompany
the conduct of the best of men, cannot but lead us
to presume that some feeling of vanity may have
been mixed up with purer motives, when he singled
out the king of England as the person to whose
judgment he appealed, and in wrhose presence he
would contend against the ablest defenders of
the Romish doctrine. If any sentiment of self-
sufficiency instigated him, they were completely
humbled. We are informed that towards the close

258 THE MARTYR LAMBERT.

of the discussion he was wearied, browbeaten, and
abashed. His constancy, however, did not utterly
forsake him. He refused to recant, but cast him-
self upon the king's clemency. The king declared
that he would be no protector of heretics, and that
Lambert must expect to be committed to the
flames. Lambert was condemned to prison, and
left to meditate upon his awful fate. On that
morning he had been the gazing-stock of thousands;
he had had a king for his antagonist, and had dis-
puted with the highest dignitaries of the church ;
at night he was a solitary and condemned criminal,
menaced by the terrors of a death of torture. But,
doubtless, the same gracious Saviour who bid Paul
be of good cheer, deserted not his servant in his
hour of need. Fervent indeed, we may be sure,
were the martyr's prayers, rich the spiritual con-
solations which were vouchsafed to him, and bright
and glorious the hope which irradiated his soul.

The morning of Lambert's execution dawned,
and the most excruciating sufferings awaited him.
But the martyr's spirit was undaunted ; his heart
was firm as adamant, and his aspect bespoke the
confidence of victory. He knew in whom he had
believed, and he was confident that the God who
had enabled Jerome of Prague to walk to his
funeral pile with greater cheerfulness (to use the
words of Pope Pius II.) than most men journeyed
to a banquet, would not desert him. He doubt-
less remembered the cheering declaration of the
apostle Paul, " Who shall separate us from the

THE MARTYR LAMBERT. 259

love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or
persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or
sword ? As it is written, for thy sake we are killed
all the day long ; we are accounted as sheep for
the slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are
more than conquerors through him that loved us.
For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life,
nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor
things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor
depth, nor any other creature, shah! be able to sepa-
rate us from the love of God, which is in Christ
Jesus our Lord." His barbarous executioners de-
termined to prolong his agonies to the utmost, and
constructed his fagots of green wood. His tor-
tures were prolonged to such a degree, that some
of his guards lifted him on their halberds, and
threw him into the flames, where he was consumed.
Whilst they were thus engaged, he cried aloud
several times, " None but Christ, none but Christ ;"
and these words were in his mouth when he ex-
pired. His last baptism was the baptism of suffer-
ing. He was privileged to drink of his Lord's
cup. His support was the love of Christ. Sus-
tained by the Holy Spirit, he triumphed over the
malice of Satanic cruelty, and died with the Sa-
viour's name upon his lips, and with his love en-
shrined within his heart. How impotent, after all,
is human vengeance, and how short is the triumph
of the enemies of God ! When the flames had ex-
hausted their destructive powers upon the martyr's
bodily frame, all that remained in the possession

260 THE MARTYR LAMBERT.

of his persecutors was a heap of dust ; his emanci-
pated spirit had already joined that bright band
" which came out of great tribulation, and washed
their robes, and made them white in the blood of
the Lamb."

In Lambert we behold one of the most glorious
martyrs of the church of Christ. This honour be-
longs to him, not because he laid down his life in
defence of his opinions, but because he suffered
for the truth; not because he triumphed over
bodily torture, but because he triumphed through
the love of Christ. Hindoo fanatics have courted
martyrdom, and been unconquered by the flames ;
Mahommedan fanatics have rushed upon certain
death ; vainglory and Satan have had thousands
and tens of thousands of martyrs. But Lambert
died for the love of Him who was despised and re-
jected of men, and in whom there is no beauty to
the natural man that he should desire him. He
was a champion of that gospel which to the Greeks
was foolishness and to the Jews a stumbling-
block, but unto them which are called, both Jews
and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the
wisdom of God." By the divine power imparted
to him, he died as a witness of that truth which
in his unconverted state he would have eagerly
sought to destroy. In his death, therefore, he
glorified the grace of God.

It is needful at the present day to call these
things to mind. It is requisite, first, that the
fountains of religious doctrine be pure, and, se-

THE MARTYR LAMBERT. 261

condly, that the martyr spirit revive. In the apos-
tolic church of Ephesus, the fountains of truth
were pure, but the first love had already departed.
In the present century there has been a great revival
and extension of evangelical truth ; but whilst
there is a widely diffused light, there is, compara-
tively speaking, but little heat. The wisdom that
is from above, it is true, is " first pure, then gentle,"
and few, alas ! at the present day, breathe the gen-
tleness and meekness which are divine. But albeit
the wisdom that is from above is not only pure, but
gentle and love-breathing ; it is faithful and uncom-
promising in its protest against error. Paul spared
not the superstition of the polished Athenians;
Peter hesitated not to declare to the Jews that by
wicked hands they had crucified the Prince of Life ;
the language of the protomartyr Stephen was even
of a stronger character, and yet his last prayer was
for the pardon of his murderers. To denounce
the soul-destroying errors of the Romish system,
and to counterwork the efforts of the emissaries of
Rome, is as solemn a duty as it is to mourn over
the declension, and to pray for the conversion, of
Roman catholics. What is wanting at the present
day is the revival of the martyr spirit in the church
of Christ, and the determination, through that
love-breathing but dauntless spirit, to destroy Ro-
manism in the United Kingdom of Great Britain
and Ireland, by that gospel which is the power of
God unto salvation. Policy, humanity, faith, the
love of souls, and the love of Christ, dictate, in Ian-

262 THE MARTYR LAMBERT.

guage which cannot be misunderstood, persever-
ing, strenuous, almost superhuman, efforts for the
conversion of our Roman-catholic fellow-country-
men. Great, every one must admit, are the diffi-
culties which impede their reception of the true
gospel. Political and religious bigotry, ignorance
of the truth, attachment to error, hereditary predi-
lection, the fear of scorn in England, and the well-
grounded apprehension of demoniac persecution
in Ireland, are powerful barriers against the pro-
gress of their evangelization. But the power of
God is resistless ; the prayer of faith and the labour
of love must as certainly prevail at last over priest-
craft and superstition, as it is certain that God is
true, and that his Spirit is invincible. There is
nothing in the intellect or affections of modern
Romanists which renders them invulnerable by
the sword of truth. In Ireland, numerous converts
have been made, and among these are to be found
some of the finest specimens of apostolic Chris-
tianity. What is wanting on the part of reformed
catholics is, a stronger faith, a more ardent zeal, a
more apostolic love ; yes, the martyr-love of a
Stephen, a Paul, a Peter, a Lambert, a Ridley,
and a Latimer. That British Protestants, possess-
ing the knowledge which they do of the supersti-
tions, idolatry, priestcraft, false gospel, and deadly
errors of Romanism, should almost sleep, whilst
seven millions at least of British and Irish Roman
catholics are the vassals of the Romish church, and
the victims of her lethiferous system, is neither

THE MARTYR LAMBERT. 263

more nor less than a standing miracle, which must
be the subject of boundless amazement to the an-
gels of light and to the spirits of darkness. May
the recollection of the glories of heaven and the
agonies of hell, of the sweetness of God's pity and
of the terrors of his wrath ; may the love of Christ
constrain all who- believe the truth as it is in Jesus
to assume the missionary office, and as far as their
pecuniary means, their personal exertions, their
voices, their pens, their literary talents, their
prayers, and their examples, can avail, to embark
in the noble enterprise of seeking and saving their
Roman-catholic fellow-countrymen, and conjuring
them to cast their idols to the bats and the moles ;
to place no confidence in their good works and
penances for the atonement of their sins ; to re-
nounce the hyperdulian. veneration of the Virgin
Mary, and in life and in death to exclaim, f( None
but Christ, none but Christ."

264

THE EARL OF WINCHILSEA AND NOTTINGHAM.

IT is not in a miscellaneous production like ours
that the record will be sought of the noble protester
whose portrait adorns its pages. It has been Lord
Winchilsea's privilege — and a precious privilege
he esteems it — to occupy a conspicuous station in
the van of that unflinching host who never quailed
before the bugbear of rebellion, nor gave ear to
the dishonest whispers of truckling expediency,
when the tide set in with full purpose to sweep
away the sacred bulwarks of our national pro-
testantism. Alas ! God permitted the foe to pre-
vail against us, as of old he once and again " sold
Israel into the hands of their enemies." That
wherein our fathers trusted was taken away ; not
because their children too much trusted in it as a
mere means, but because they undervalued it as a
means weak in itself, overlooking the invincible
strength wherewith it was endowed as a means ap-
pointed of God, and by Him blessed. Those who

THE EARL OF WLNCHILSEA. 265

committed the deed sinned ; some with a high
hand, scorning to acknowledge the supreme autho-
rity of revealed truth in matters of legislation ;
others under a deluding persuasion that religion
was too holy a thing to be intermingled with
worldly politics, or the more wretchedly puerile
conceit that Popery in the nineteenth century was
a corrected and improved edition of Popery in
the sixteenth century. Worldly men ratted (as it
was familiarly termed) — that is to say, they cal-
culated on the increased probabilities of the utter
prostration of a fabric wrhich their own inconsisten-
cies had greatly aided to endanger ; and they fol-
lowed the example of that sagacious long-tailed
fraternity, who forsake a falling house when their
previous sojourn has prevailed to undermine its
foundations. Others apostatized, if not from the
faith of the gospel, yet assuredly from that which
their wiser and more devout ancestors held dearer
to them than their lives; while another section
wavered, and without actually lending a hand in
the work of demolition, weakened by their con-
cessions the minds of some who looked to them for
guidance, and caused many to halt, who but for
their Laodicean influence would have kept the
straight path.

It was a time of severe sifting, when the cry
" Who is on the Lord's side, who ?" while scouted
at by some, was responded to by a phalanx of rnen
shewing themselves in the breach, and prepared to

266 THE EARL OF

defend, at all hazards, what their ancestors at all
hazards, and at all sacrifices too, had planted.
Among these — in the house to which the country
looked with natural confidence at such a juncture,
as including the prelacy of the church, together
with the hereditary nobility, whose minds were
not likely to be so soon carried away with the
liberalizing and levelling spirit that had con-
taminated the democracy of England — among
these stood the Earl of Winchilsea, making good
to the last moment his noble pledge to the yeo-
manry of Kent, who, on Pennenden Heath, had
rallied by tens of thousands round the standard of
our Protestant faith. Lord Winchilsea's solemn
protest, uttered without reserve while yet the
matter was under debate, and delivered in as a
lasting document after the perpetration of the
deed, would not be forgotten either by friend or
foe, even had it ended here ; but subsequent occa-
sions have exhibited the enduring, the persevering,
character of his attachment to the cause. During
a short visit to Ireland, where his endeared friend
and stanch brother, the truly noble Earl of Roden,
\vas busied in consolidating the mass of long-tried
and recently persecuted Protestantism, Lord Win-
chilsea cheered the spirits, while he won the warm
hearts, of those hereditary " no surrender" men in
an extraordinary measure ; and at home we find
him ever at his post — manning with dauntless re-
solution even the crumbled ruins of the walls whose

WINCHILSEA AND NOTTINGHAM. 267

breach he formerly mounted, and lifting the warn-
in^ voice that will be remembered when, alas ! its
o

awful predictions are irretrievably verified ; drag-
ging out into broad day the abuses that shelter
themselves 011 our now unguarded ground; and
pointing out to unwilling eyes the rapid approaches
of a desolation that will not tarry. We cannot
forget who it was that stood forth and made the

o

empire resound with his indignant call when Eng-
land's ancient pride — her bold yeomanry, were
doomed to extinction as a collective force, by men
whose object was, it appears, to disarm her of every
available weapon ; nor are we insensible to the
encouragement afforded by Lord Winchilsea's
animated championship as president of the Protes-
tant Association, when he addresses the assembled
thousands of its friends and supporters — with an
admixture, no doubt, of enemies and spies — on
anniversary occasions, and when he never fails to
strengthen the hands and brighten the hopes of
his brethren.

Lord Winchilsea is a rich specimen of the true
old English baronial character, now in danger of
being numbered among the things that were. Un-
contaminated by foreign influence, undiluted by
modern liberalism, undaunted by increasing op-
position, and wrholly unmindful of the insolence
that points a scornful finger where it dare not
raise a menacing hand, Lord Winchilsea holds
on his even course in the path of old-fashioned
patriotism. Those who know him in the pri-

268 THE EARL OF WINCHILSEA.

vate intercourse of life bear testimony to the
mingled strength and sweetness of his character.
But our province it is to regard him in his public
capacity — to recognise his invaluable services
in the cause of our jeoparded rights; and with
affectionate gratitude to hail him as a noble,
an unflinching, and a right honest PROTESTER !

269

LUTHER:

»

& ^Fragment.

BY ROBERT MONTGOMERY,

AUTHOR OF
"THE OMNIPRESENCE OF THE DEITY," "THE SIESSIAH," ETC. ETC.

INTRODUCTION.

THY heart, ALMIGHTY ! in the church is seen,
Where the rich glory of redeeming love
Unveils its vast expression. In the face
Of HIM, — the arch ELECT, before all worlds
In secrecy of love divine embraced, —
In Christ, the counterpart of Godhead, — shines
That moral radiance which Thyself repeats
By humaniz'd reflection : — there alone
The fallen spirit, with an eye unfilm'd
By grace, from sin and sensual darkness freed,
The will and purpose, pardon, love and peace
From God to man, adoringly may find.
All other media, which inventive pride
Presumes to fashion, — are but barren dreams : —

o

270 LUTHER.

Man's Deity is only dust refined,

Himself re-cast in some ethereal mould,

A finite into infinite enlarged,

And this dilation for a God mistook ! —

But Thou ! IMMANUEL ! art the way we come,

The truth we know, the endless life secur'd,

The all in all of God to us re veal' d,

And us to Him restor'd ! — Creation's book

Lies blotted o'er with sin's perplexing stain,

And no erasure can Thy name detect,

In full divinity of sound and sense

Conspicuous and complete. And what can law,

That dreadful paraphrase of justice! — speak

To lawless guilt, but condemnation dire ?

And how can Reason in her light resolve

That problem, deep as God, and dark as guilt, —

How sin is punish'd and the sinner spar'd,

When falls the sabre of celestial wrath

And in one flash both Heaven and Hell illumes ?-

Or, say, can conscience, whose rebuking voice

A jealous echo of the jealous God

For aye reverberates the soul within, —

Can this alarmist, to the shrinking gaze

Of guilt, the trembler ! — mercy's plan unfold ?

Ah ! no ; in CHRIST alone we Godhead find,

In CHRIST alone His character evolves ;

On Calv'ry's hill, God's attributes were throned,

Jehovah there in coronation shin'd !

LUTHER. 271

II.

THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH'S EXPERIENCE.

But, oh ! what myst'ry doth the church infold
Of blended weal and woe ! — through sin and shame,
Through suff'ring dire, and persecution dread,
Through blood and havoc, through disastrous wrongs
And burning martyrdom, — her ways have been,
From the last breath that play'd on Stephen's lip
Adown the rolling ages — e'en till now !
And while in silence, — oft religion's soul,
Before this truth august our faith would bow, —
That God in time eternity reflects,
And on the mirror of the church's life
Doth glass the features of eternal WILL, —
How tempted Reason, when her musing eye
Roves o'er the moral waste the church hath been
Trembles and starts ! — Behold ! the unexplain'd, —
The warring mass of good and evil mixed,
Where saint and sinner, grace and nature blend,
Where dust and deity in clash appear,
Angels and fiends for blood-earn'd souls combine,
All passions, principles and powers remote, —
From the high daring of celestial hearts
To the low horrors of consummate guilt, —
All strive with each, and each with all conflicts ! —
Lo ! the deep myst'ry of the church's doom.
We see in part ; but when perfection dawns,
Both part and whole shall then Thy name uplift,

o 2

272 LUTHER.

Almighty ! — then the choir of chanting worlds
Around salvation one stupendous tide
Of deep'ning rapture shall for ever roll,
And God his own great vindication be.

Meanwhile to us, eternal SPIRIT ! grant
The wisdom meek, that lives on truth divine
However veil'd ; a waiting mind impart,
And in our weakness shew our strength to dwell;
Like, as of old, the pensive Mary sat
Low at his feet, and listened to her LORD,
Absorb'd and self-renouncing, — be our soul
Before the cross in docile rev'rence bent.
For Thou, oh, Christ ! amid the fires hast been ;
And o'er the flames that on Thy church advanc'd,
The promise — I am with you, till the end of time, —
Breath'd, like the spell of some almighty breeze,
And cool'cl them into impotence, or calm. —
No ! never hath the murd'rous hoof of hell
Trampled the heart from out the church of heaven ;
Within her, life, when all seem'd lifeless, glow'd,
Within her, grace, when all seem'd graceless, dwelt,
Within her, truth, when all seem'd truthless, reign'd;
While ever and anon, amid that gloom
The priest, the tyrant and the devil made,
Star after star in radiant grandeur rose
To shame the midnight of the soul away ! —
But, chief o'er all the galaxy of lights
That stud the firmament of Christian fame,
Shin'd LUTHER forth, — that miracle of men !

LUTHER. 273

The gospel hero, who with faith sublime
Fulmin'd the lightnings of God's flaming word
Full on the towers of superstition's home,
Till, lo ! they crumbled ! — and his with'ring flash
Yet sears the ruin with victorious play.

m.

THE MAJESTY OF LUTHER'S WORK.

But, where the tongue so eloquently fir'd,
Or, where the harp, seraphically ton'd
And sweet enough, o'er Luther's work sublime
The high, the holy, and the lauding chant
To lift ? — to laurel his intrepid brow,
Who faced alone, (by all save Heaven unarm'd,)
That priestly giantess of pamper'd sin
Whose throne was blasphemy by pride upheld, —
That brazen arbitress, whose sceptre robb'd
The King Almighty of the soul's domain, —
E'en papal ROME? — who still her wine-cup drugs
With damning charms, and deadly spells, and dares
Within the heart's pantheon yet to shrine
Dark falsehoods which redeeming truth bemock,
Profane the soul, and parody our God !

Eternal hallelujahs rise ! and ring
That grace around, which call'd the champion forth,
And with Heaven's panoply his spirit clad
For combat. — With the energies of hell

274 LUTHER.

To grapple, — with incarnate fiends to fight,

Behold him summon'd ! — on that brow

Heroic calm indomitably smiles,

And in that lion heart each pulse that beats,

Throbs like an echo to the cheer of heaven !

Behold him ! — grateful raem'ry, come and gaze,

See Luther, from eternity decreed,

Rise in the majesty of moral force

To heave the world from superstition's grave,

And bid it look upon the cross, — and live !

And oh ! what marvels did that mind achieve,
Which in itself a reformation form'd ! —
For cent'ries, deep the night of falsehood reign'd.
Mildew'd the soul, and mannacled her powers
With fett'ring darkness ; learning pined
In cell monastic ; science grew extinct ;
The bible rotted in scholastic rust ;
That fountain from the Saviour's wounded side
For sin once oped, by sealing lies was shut ;
And, 'stead of that bright garb, which mercy wove,
Of perfect righteousness, by JESUS wrought,
Spangled with graces, rich as God's own smiles, —
The filthy rags of ineffectual works
Clad the cold skeleton of naked souls ;
While on his throne of sacerdotal lies,
The arch impostor, Satan's brother, sat
Self-deified, and ripen'd earth for hell ! —
Then, LUTHER rose ! — and liberty and light
Unbarr'd the soul, and let salvation in. —

LUTHER. 275

Hark ! the dead scriptures, toned with Godhead, peal

Salvation's tidings ; lo ! the gospel lives,

Swift from the cross the Roman darkness flies,

Martyrs and saints, like baffled mock'ries, sink

To nothing, — by victorious truth dispers'd ;

O'er fancied merit, free redemption reigns,

And in the temple 'of the soul illum'd,

No mortal priesthood, with its pomp of lies

And sacraments of sin, — can enter now ;

There CHRIST himself in triple office rules,-

King, priest and prophet on the Spirit's throne.

IV.

GENERAL CHARACTER OF THE REFORMER'S MIND.

Thee would I vision, thou colossal Mind !
The solitary monk that shook the world
From pagan slumber, when the gospel trump
Thunder'd its challenge from thy dauntless lip
In peals of truth round hierarchal Rome, —
Till mitred pomp, and cowl'd imposture quail'd ;
And the fell priesthood, like a fiend unmask'd
And stripp'd of light fictitiously assumed,
By some detecting angel — shrunk dismay'd
And shiver'd, in thy vast exposure seen ! —
For what though sad humanity's broad taint
Of weakness, here and there thy soul beplagued ;
Or, harshly quick, or too severely loud
Some intonations of thy spirit rose, —

276 LUTHER.

When from the thunder-cloud of sacred ire
Within thee, falsehood call'd the lightnings out,
Or, temper's flash round principle did flame ; —
Yet, in the greatness of thy glorious work
Right nobly art thou, like a second Paul,
Apparent, — grac'd with apostolic mind,
Waving that banner, on whose blood-stain'd fold
Thy name, IMMANUEL ! at each ruffling blast
Of conflict, beams with sudden brightness forth !

Thee would I vision ; and on mem'ry's glass
Some traces of thy many-colour'd life
In lines of holy miniature reflect.
For in thy destiny our God we find
Himself expounding, — in thy truth unveil'd ;
Upon thy mind, as some prophetic map,
Almighty love mysteriously engrav'd
An outline wondrous of thy work decreed ;
Thy moral self the reformation seems ;
And in each phasis which thy soul presents,
An imaged counterpart of all we trace
Hereafter in the world's vast scene evolv'd. —
And therefore, hero of a hundred fights
Celestial ! — Lion star of Jesus ! rise,
Rise in full radiance, through the cloud of time
Dart the rich beam of evangelic day,
And cause the Church's heart to glow with thee.

LUTHER. 277

V.

THE BIRTH OF LUTHER.

E'en like an instrument whose chorded depth
Enwraps the unheard music, but awaits
The master-touch, of some awaking hand
To make it vibrate, — did the high-strung world
Of truth and feeling, for th' impulsive soul
In solemn hush abide, beneath whose sway
The moral harmonies of ransom'd mind
In mingling swell of holiness and love
Once more should waken ; — LUTHER was that soul
Predestin'd ! — who by grace divinely arm'd,
From the foul grave of papal sin and gloom
The buried gospel came to disinter,
With breathing godhead to be all instinct,
Where ev'ry promise a pulsation seems
Of CHRIST'S own heart, that in redemption throbs !

But ah ! how low, to reason's carnal eye
That measures all things by the scale of sense,
The means appointed for the end pursu'd ;
How strangely small those intermitting ways
By which, to great results, God's wisdom moves ! —
Yet, once a manger did the ALMIGHTY hold,
When first Messiah's human life-pulse beat,
When first his breath our fever' d world of woe
And sin refresh'd? — and were not they, who hurl'd
Philosophy from off her Babel throne

O 3

278 LUTHER.

To speechless ruin, and our rescu'd souls
To the rich fountain of celestial blood
Directed, — were not they, the peerless TWELVE
Whose words like arrows pierc'd the heart of Hell
With fire and fearlessness, — the low and weak,
Unlearn'd of man, but learn'd in much of God? —
E'en so, from out a shepherd's mountain hut
Far in the wilds of Alpine bleakness hid,
The Swiss apostle ran his high career ;
And he, who with the sun-like mind compar'd
That LUTHER in his flaming boldness shew'd,
Soft as the moon in mellow radiance seem'd, —
The mild MELANCTHON ! — from a clanging home,
A martial workshop, dates his lowly birth ;
And thou ! the Reformation's mental spring,
The Bible's lov'd redeemer from the cell
Where monkish falsehood barr'd its glory in, —
Not from the loins which heraldry admires

V

Didst thou proceed ; of poor but pious blood
Wert thou ; — a simple miner call'd thee son.

VI.
HIS EARLY DAYS AND SUFFERINGS.

On Mansfeld plains behold the destin'd boy,
Or else by Wipper's shelving bank, alone
In bounding lightness ; or some blue-eyed throng
Of playmates, round him fond and free rejoice;—
And who that then, on his gay forehead smil'd,
Or saw his glee, in laughing outbreak glance

LUTHER. 279

Like sunbeams from a shading cloud escap'd, —

Could e'er have dream'd that brow would soon outbrave

The thund'ring Vatican's avenging roar

Of bigotry, and spirit-blasting ire ?

A few short years, by dark experience wing'd,

Shall fly, — and quailing Rome beneath his words

The heart of Europe set on fire shall see !

0

And on the forehead of her blushless pride

His brand shall burn — THE MATRICIDE OF SOULS !

But bleak the lot his boyish prime endures,
And sad indeed, and mercilessly dark
The shades of circumstance around him fall ;
While yet no precious dawn of grace appears
To light him onward through domestic gloom : —
But on his cheek a blanching terror comes
When HE is named, within whose wreathing arms
Of mercy, once the folded infant smil'd ! —
Foodless and friendless, oft the fainting boy
Far from his home — with none, save God, his guide,
(And HE by Rome's deforming darkness veiled) —
In Magdeburgh from house to house was doom'd
His meal to beg ; and thus by Heaven was schooled
To hard experience, for hereafter framed.
" Bread for the love of God!*' — hark ! Luther chants ;
From door to door through Eisenach's street he wends,
Mix'd with a group as wan and worn as he,
Of students poor : — but lo I as once he lay
Beneath the umbrage of a cottage tree,
Alone and pensive, while the leaf-shades fell

280 LUTHER.

Like soft expressions on his speaking face

Of suffring, — sad and sweet the hymn he sung ;

The very echo of his soul was there,

And like the fragments of a broken heart,

The shatter'd feelings trembl'd into song! —

But not in vain the plaintive scholar pled,

For on the ear of Ursula they sunk,

Those tones of truth, — like tears upon the heart

Of friendship, dropp'd from friendship's genial eye !•

Never again shall that pale youth despond

In famine's grasp through days of pining gloom :

At once both heart and home their shelter ope,

And like the Shunamite, her all she shares

With him, the homeless boy of sorrow, now. —

Blessings be on thee, Cotta's lowly bride !

And praise immortal, for the feeling hand

Which dealt thy substance, and the angel voice

That rich as dew-fall on a summer eve

Descending, when the fev'rish earth doth pine,

Besooth'd the world's great benefactor then !

VII.
LUTHER IN THE CALM OF HIS NEW-FOUND HOME.

And here, by want unchill'd, by care unworn,
Bosom' d in calm domestic, LUTHER builds
By soft degrees, his intellectual being up.
Science, and art, and lore, that lovely trine,
Around him throng, and with their blended smiles
The budding energies of mind attract

LUTHER. 281

To bloom and blossom with expanding force
And freshness, — e'en as sunshine tempts
The hue of flowers and harmonies of spring
To full expression : — home of halcyon ease !
When the loud roar of his hereafter-life
Deafen'd the heart, how oft did Luther love
That hush'd oasis of the soul to haunt
With mem'ry's eye ; and once again recal
The bliss of tranquil being, — when the noise
Of man's great world with no disturbing sound
The mind distracted ; — like the far-off waves
To one, who pensive at his window dreams,
When twilight meek upon the palpitating breast
Of ocean melts in rosy calm away, —
The soften'd echoes of a distant world
But serv'd to make the hush of home more dear.

And Music too her poetry of sound
Evoked ; — for oft when evening's pallid veil
Curtain'd the clouds with beauty, or the Moon
The mild entrancement of her beam inspir'd, —
Did Luther hymn the golden hours to rest
With deep-ton'd chants, and melodies divine ;
Where voice and lute each other's echo seem'd,
So richly one their combination grew. —
When years had flown, and Europe's grateful hand
Round Luther's name a wreath of homage tvvin'd,
And at his feet the heart of empires bow'cl
Admiring, — Cotta's home still unforgot
Was outlin'd in his mindful heart of love,

282 LUTHER.

Serene as ever ; while his voice proclaim'd,
By gallantry and grace at once inspir'd, —
There's nothing sweeter than a woman's soul,
When Truth divine erects her temple there !

VIII.
HE ENTERS THE UNIVERSITY OF EBFURTH.

Who prays the most will study best ! — so spake
In noble response to official pride,
The young Reformer, — when th' unfolding gates
Of ERFURTH from his asking eye retir'd,
As pale he stood her letter'd walls beside
Intreating entrance there. And now commenc'd
The waking myst'ries of the mind within !
Around him more and more dread shadows fell,
That seem'd reflected from Almighty frowns ;
While conscience, that pale miniature of God !
In outlines faint the Holiness Supreme
Began to image. Morning, noon and night,
In deep simplicity's adoring hush,
With soul intense, and heart of upward gaze,
How oft did Luther, on the wings of hope,
Rise out of earth, heaven's tearless home depict,
And on God's bosom pillow all his cares !
And now, when sensitive at ev'ry pore
His soul lay open to the pregnant beams
Of truth eternal, out of Godhead sent, —
The Mercy-seat of everlasting mind
Itself, — that true SHECHINAH, where enthron'd

LUTHER. 283

In mystic radiance gospel wisdom speaks,

And LOVE DIVINE oracularly dwells, —

The BIBLE first on Luther's spirit smiled !

But little thought he, when the dust-worn shelves

Were traced, some intellectual food to meet,

That God in syllables was there enshrin'd !

And scarce could seraph wave his wings of light

With ecstasy of more celestial glow, —

Than did the student with his raptur'd eyes

To heaven upraised, the heart's rich anthem peal

Of thankful wonder, — for this costly boon.

That moment was the Reformation's seed ;

That volume then the universe outweigh'd

In mental preciousness, and moral power !

For in its pages couch'd those slumb'ring germs

Of principle, from out whose depths have sprung

The faith and freedom of a Christian world !

IX.
A SPIRITUAL CRISIS,

Say, how can man be justified by God?
Thy vaults, eternity ! would echo, — HOW ?
But from the cross a solemn response rolls
In the deep music of almighty grace
Back on the spirit — faith in Christ is life
And love, and righteousness completely squared
To each vast claim of violated law.
There conscience finds no compromise involv'd,
While Mercy from the hand of Justice plucks

284 LUTHER.

The sceptre, and her awful head uncrowns ;

But where all attributes divinely blend

In one rich centre of consummate light,

And God with most emphatic glory smiles

His goodness forth, o'er ransom'd minds and worlds !

But he, pale thinker ! in portentous gloom,
Robed in the rags of papal righteousness,
Was shiv'ring yet ; around his spirit coil'd
The clankless fetters of condemning law ;
And upward, when his heart to gaze presumed
A moment,— soon it shrunk appall'd and dim
From God's dread eye-glance, flaming with the curse, —
Unquench'd — save when the cross absorbs its fire !
Dark wrestler with the pangs of sin untold,
Silence and solitude his haunt became ;
Transforming nature, till the soul was typ'd
In all he witness'd of the bleak and wild, —
Down lonely vales, and paths of soundless gloom
He loved to meditate, and learn'd to mourn ;
But chief the night-blast, with its hollow yell
Rung from the tempest's riven heart of sound
Becharm'd him, when beneath the wat'ry moon
Late roaming : — but the crisis came at last ! —
'Twas summer ; and with crimson eye of fire
Full o'er the pine-tree boughs the west'ring orb
Sunk flaming ; like a furnace glow'd the air
In breezeless trance, while not a bird-wing mov'd,
And the fine leaves, as by some fixing spell
Enchanted, like the lids of slumber hung

LUTHER. 285

Subdu'd and motionless : — so deep the hush

Your very heart-pulse strangely loud appear'd ! —

When, lo ! the blacken'd cope of heaven divides

And flashes, — re-divides — and with one fold

Of sheeted flame the firmament involves ;

Hark ! peal on peal redoubling and return'd

With raging echo, -till heaven's arches ring

And vibrate ; then, in one convulsive burst

The clouds are clash'd to thunder, and descends

Down at his feet in supernat'ral roar

A death-bolt : — harmless as the rain-drop fell

The blasting ruin ! — Luther, in the shade

Of that GREAT HAND whose hollow hides the church

From storming earth and hell, — was all secure,

Though death glar'd round him : — what a scene was

there !

In kneeling agony, with eyes of awe
To heaven upturn'd, as if the judgment-pomp
And equipage of heaven's Almighty King
Emerg'd apparent, — Luther throbb'd and pray'd,
And vow'd his after-life to God alone
If safely rescued from the yelling storm. —
So sank the great apostle, when the blaze,
Bright as THE FORM of glory whence it fell,
Abash'd him into blindness, and he heard
The mournful thunder of Messiah's lip
Rebuke him, — till his conscience rock'd and reel'd !

286 LUTHER.

X.

LUTHER ENTERS THE CONVENT OF ST. AUGUSTINE.

Hark ! on their hinges grind the massive gates
Of St. Augustine's cold and cloister'd pile,
And in the clang of those reclosing doors
The knell of Luther's freedom ! — Darkly bound
By stale theology's remorseless web
Of monkish falsehood, in the deep of night,
Fresh from the heart of social youth he comes
Self-exiled and sincere, — in convent gloom,
Amid the graves of unproductive mind
Where dead religion putrefies to fear,
And fear to superstition, — there to form
His soul to God, and fashion it for heaven ! —
Yet, mark in this Eternal Wisdom's plan :
The dungeon'd martyr, on whose haggard limbs
The rust-worn chain hath delv'd its branding trace,
When free again beneath the skies to walk.,
Inhaling liberty from each lov'd breeze
That carols round him, — chief o'er all can tell
How priceless to the heart pure freedom is ! —
And thus did Luther, by whose dreadless hand
Of truth the fetters from the mind were fell'd,
As captive first by dark experience learn
How deep that dungeon of the spirit was
Where Roman witchcraft plung'd and plagu'd man-
kind !—
Yes ! — he, the champion of JEHOVAH'S cause,

LUTHER. 287

Whose bold harangues, like Alpine thunder-peals,
Hereafter shook the Vatican to shame, —
Himself once crouch'd, in martyrdom of zeal
Beneath the lashes of a monk's stern lip,
In silence ! — wound the clock, and swept the floor,
And begg'd, a charter'd mendicant, from house
To house, the bread of blushless charity !

But did he find the holiness he sought ?
Did peace divine in purity descend
Down on his conscience, like the calming dove ?
Ah ! no ; — in vain the convent's round of rites,
The fastings dull, the macerations dire,
The penance long, the midnight watchings pale, —
All the mean clockwork of monastic life,
Wheel within wheel, by superstition turn'd ! —
From righteous acts no righteous nature flows ;
First form the nature, then the acts arise
Spontaneous, free, by fertile love produc'd,
Not pleading merit, but proclaiming CHRIST
Within, by transcript of his life without. —
For how in self can man salvation find,
When self is sin, compounded and corrupt ? —
But, like that Bible, which his hungry eyes
Read oft and oft with most devouring gaze
Of faith and feeling, — Luther wore the chain
That round the soul rank superstition wound.
And how the heavings of his spirit rose
In dark reflection to his pale-worn face ! —
While e'en the whisper of that still small voice

288 LUTHER.

Which cowards all, but Christians maketh none,-
Beneath the roof of his o'erarching cell
Raged into moral thunder ! — when the thought
Of God in judgment, tore with tort'ring might
And mystery, the troubled mind within ! —
Thus like a spectre through the cloisters mov'd,
With fruitless sigh and ineffectual groan,
Day after day, all spirit-crush'd and worn,
The helpless Luther ; — till the CROSS appear'd,
From holy love then true repentance sprang ;
And faith, like Mary at the feet of CHRIST

«/

Attending, — hung upon his lips, and lived !

XI.

A PROGRESS IN THE DIVINE LIFE.

Thrice holy love ! no self-created sound
In the cold depth of man's corrupted heart,
But rather a responsive echo, waked
By love preventing, — art thou when sincere.
By God's to man, man's love to God begins,
And Christianity is CHRIST receiv'd,
The soul possessing, and himself possess'd.
Then thaws the heart, however iced and dead,
In tears that glow with gratitude and God !
So LUTHER felt, when Love's almighty voice
Becalm'd him ; round the cross he ever read
The page of heaven, and in that fountain wash'd
His soul to whiteness, which for sin unclos'd

LUTIIER. 289

In streaming mercy from the wounded Lord.

Light, peace, and order round his being throng'd

In rich communion ; prayer and praise arose

Like native incense from the soul renew'd ;

And holiness — man's paradise regain'd,

No effort now, but second nature seem'd,

Not labour done, but life itself enjoy'd. —

Yet, who can tell, as stern-ey'd Law retir'd,

And the mild Gospel o'er his conscience breath'd

Like Jesus, when he sigh'd the breath of peace,

How on his heart the Bible's image grew,

Till like a throbbing counterpart it beat

In living echoes to the truth it loved ! —

While doctrines no\v, that once with scowling front

Black as the shades that over Sinai hung

Appall'd him, — smooth as Christ's own forehead smil'd;

No more the penance vile, with venal aim

To bribe Eternal Justice, now was \vrought.

In CHRIST, her all-in-all stern Conscience found,

And, sprinkled with his blood, her claim withdrew

For ever ! — penal law its lightning veil'd ;

And when from sickness, pale and purified

The convert of the cross in health arose,

He clung to Jesus with a clasping soul

Devoted, — fir'd \vith faith's intenser flame,

And from His wounds saw Earth's atonement flow.

290 LUTHER.

XII.

LUTHER PREACHES HIS FIRST PUBLIC SERMON
AT WITTEMBURGH.

u Go ! stand the living and the dead between,
Take the rich censer of Messiah's grace
And stop the plague !" — so looks the office high
To him appointed, who the tidings glad
Proclaims of liberty to souls condemned
In the black dungeon of the curse to writhe
And weep for ever ! — well may dread sublime,
Or holy, soften'd o'er with human shades
Of feeling, round the youthful herald steal,
Wlienjirst the embassy of pardon rolls
In strains of heart from his excited lip,
That vibrates, like a chord by music thrill'd,
Master'd by young emotion ! — What a theme !—
God in flesh to save that flesh, array 'd,
The INFINITE within the finite lodg'd,
The form ALMIGHTY in the frame all weak,
The dread CREATOR on the cross unveil'd
In bleeding glory ! — Heaven, and Earth, and Hell,
Eternity and Time, and Sin and Grace,
The swelling anthems of the blood-bought church
Circling the Lamb with coronation joy,
Or, howlings of the lost, in lurid flames —
Stretch'd on the rack of self-tormenting ire, —
These are the elements combin'd to throw
Around the preacher that commanding spell

LUTHER. 291

Of awe, that makes the earthen vessel bend
To think it treasures such a peerless trust !

And who can dare himself sufficient deem
For work like this, round which seraphic minds
Would travel in the greatness of their strength,
And yet not scale its altitude divine ! —
Oh THOU ! whose office 'tis THE WORD to bless
And quicken, till it breathes that living grace
That makes each syllable with Godhead shine, —
THEE may we ever prove, in presence nigh,
The GREAT INSPIRER, — whose anointing power
Alone can tune the sounding brass to heaven's
True note, and bid our tinkling cymbals do
In mortal accent an immortal's work ! —
Whether beneath the bow'd cathedral's roof
Of vastness, while the organ's billowy peals
Roll like a sea of melody and might
Down the dim nave and long-retreating aisles, —
Thy word is preach'd ; or in some Saxon fane
Where rude simplicities of ancient mould
Linger in stone's most exquisite decay, —
Wherever on the tide of human breath
Floats the rich argosy of gospel truth,
As Christ appointed, — may dependence be
The preacher's motto, and the preacher's mode ;
Dependence meek on that concurring grace
Of HIM, the Bible's author, — by whose light
Alone our sermons live, and souls are saved.

292 LUTHER.

So felt the young reformer, when he rose
Within thy square, high-fated Wittemburgh !
Where the grey walls of St. Augustine's fane
Crumble in low decrepitude and dust ;
And from his pulpit, piled with simple planks,
Blew that loud trumpet of salvation's truth
Whose echoes yet the heart of empires wake
To fine pulsations, free as Luther lov'd ! —
Eye, cheek, and brow with eloquence array 'd,
As though the spirit would incarnate be,
Or mind intense would burn its dazzling way
Through shading matter, — like a second Paul,
Flaming with truth, the fearless herald pour'd
Himself in language o'er the listening hearts
Around him ! — like a mental torrent ran
The rich discourse, and on that flood of mind
Nearer and nearer to the LAMB'S white throne
The soul was wafted: — Christ for man,
And man for Christ, and God for all he prov'd,
And hid himself behind the cross he rais'd !

A more than Hercules, to cleanse the church
Where priestly falsehood stabled all its guilt,
Through cent'ries dark of domineering crime, —
So preach'd he then ; and in that sermon gave
A noble prelude of the trumpet blast
Predestin'd from his daring lip to roll
Hereafter ; — when from lethargy and lies
He rous'd the great high-priest of hell to man,

LUTHER. 293

In cruelty and curses, — till there came

An avalanche of everlasting truths

Down on the popedom, in those thund'rous words

That crash'd it, like descending Deity !

XIII.

LUTHER GOES TO ROME.

To shameless Rome, the capital of sin,
Where crime in canoniz'd pretension smiled,
And pride and lust pontifically reign'd,
At length great Luther comes. The glare of skies
O'er which the mercy of no soothing cloud
Had floated, — vainly tried his burning frame ;
For still, o'er Alpine crags, by torrents wild,
And hoar ravines, within whose haunted depth
Plung'd the loud stream with everlasting yell, —
The monk of Wittemburgh, with eager step
And soul expectant, sought the seven-hill'd queen
Of cities ; — till, behold ! in glimm'ring haze
The turrets, towers and giant-temple spires
Emerge at length, — and low upon the ground,
In kneeling homage, falls her duteous son,
To breathe his blessing o'er maternal Rome,
Mother and mistress of the churches all ! —
But when indeed her pillar'd streets he trod,
And on the ruins, eloquently vast,
Around him in sublime confusion pil'd,
Gaz'd with devotion, — what a flooding sweep

P

294 LUTHER.

Of ancient glory through his being swept ! —
The past in tow'ring resurrection rose
Bright from the tomb of ages, while the air
That Peter breath'd, and Paul himself inhal'd,
Play'd round his temples like a breeze from heaven
New-wafted ! Rome and rapture were combin'd ;
And Luther, in one lofty dream of soul
Enchanted stood, and drank the glorious scene, —
As if religion from the very stones
Was preaching, where apostles once had trod,
And over which the martyr's flame of death
Gleam'd in dread radiance, like a glory there !

But soon the bandage of imposture fell ;
And then, e'en like the arch-fiend's mystic pomp,
In cheating vision on the mountain call'd
Before IMMANUEL'S calm resisting eyes, —
So vanish'd into vile and viewless air,
Thy pageantries, — thou Babylon of guilt !
Thou scarlet monster, with the costly blood
Of God's elected, drunken and bedew'd ! —
When plain revealed in all thy hideous truth
He saw thee, like a huge and leprous mass
Of sin, — one moral putrefaction stretch'd
In foul immensity of papal form,
Fearless ! — and yet beneath the flashing eye
Of God, and angels, and astounded man !

Oh grace superb ! — and wonderful as deep,
That Rome and Luther should confronted be ;

LUTHER. 295

And there, in Superstition's heart, one text

Almighty, like a thunderbolt of truth

Down from the throne of revelation huii'd, —

Should raise him, while he crouch'd in faith

Deluded ! — Thus the champion for his cause

Was meeten'd ; thus from Rome herself he drew

Weapons of might, whereby her powers would fall.

So, swift recoiling from his task abhorred,*

Uprose the brave reformer ! — free and firm

For ever ; — " BY HIS FAITH THE JUST SHALL LIVE," —

Thus roll'd the truth from Inspiration's lip : —

Religion, then, and Luther's mind, arose

Erect, upon the rock of faith alone,

Together did they face the frowning hell,

And bid our spirit, like her God, be free I

XIV.

THE PREACHING OF INDULGENCES.

" Lo ! at yon gate" (the mercuries of Sin
Are crving) " stands the awful grace of God !
And in one moment, like a moral wave,
Heaves far and wide the town's excited heart : —
Council, and nuns, and priests, and monks advance,
And motley crowds from every dome and street
Are trooping, while the booming town-clock peals

* See D'Aubigne for a description of Luther ascending St.
Peter's staircase on his knees !

p 2

296 LUTHER.

A loud hosannah from its lofty spires,
And tapers flash, and greeting symbols sound,
To meet the great PROCESSION. — See ! they come
In robes how costly ! — there, in cushion'd pomp,
The BULL of grace ! — whereby the Godhead's hands
Are bound, and His dread thunders must awake
Or sleep, as priestly conjuration bids !
For now, before the wooden cross uprear'd,
Bedeck'd with Leo's blazonry of pride,
The loud-voiced Tetzel takes his stand profane ; —
Prime vender he, beneath whose venal lip
Heaven's attributes, as in a mart exposed,
Are purchas'd by Indulgence; — God is sold
In pardons ! Sin itself, before conceived
Or acted, by the Pope's almighty bull
Shall not be damning ;* whatsoe'er desire
May dream hereafter, all by this high charm
Shall be forgiven ! — " down this cross there flows
A grace like that the Saviour's bleeding side
Dispers'd; but hark! from deeps of ghastly woe,
Where yelling spirits clank their chains of fire ;
Tormented parents, friends and children lift
Their tongues uncool'd, and cry for needed alms
To bring them from that red abyss of wrath
Where scorch their souls in purgatorial flames ! —
Let but your money, with its golden clink,
Yon chest descend, — and, lo ! at once escaped

* By a reference to the Records of the Reformation it will be
seen that the picture here is by no means overdrawn.

LUTHER. 297

Those dungeon 'd spirits, wing'd by papal grace,
Full into heaven's bright welcome flee !"

So cried the curs'd impostor; and the souls
Of myriads, by his damning spell of lies,
Murder1 d ! — CHRIST himself, in blacker shame
Than once the cross of Calvary o'erhung,
Was openly to mocking hell expos'd :
Eternity a mart of sin became,
A papal auction, where that grace was sold
For filthy lucre, which the costly blood
That warm'd IMMANUEL'S veins, alone procur'd ;
And 'gainst the purity of heaven's high throne
The mud of human blasphemy was hurl'd
By pope and priesthood : — seal'd the Bible then !
And sure, if ever down a seraph's cheek
Roll'd the rich tear immortal feeling sheds,
It trickled now — when thus Religion darM
In words divine God's heart of gracious love
To libel, Christ's own pangs for venal lies
To barter, till the truth of heaven betray 'd, —
In priestly suffocation sank and died !

But there is mercy in thy myst'ry lodg'd,
ETERNAL ! — out of darkness cometh light
By thee evok'd ; and while the anarch Sin,
To mortal judgment, in its depthless gaze,
O'er time and circumstance sole monarch looks
Ascendant, — all the waves of human will
In lawless riot though they toss and rage,

298 LUTHER.

Within the circle of THY will supreme
Alone are plunging ; — if they rise or fall,
'Tis only as THY helming word decrees !

xv.

LUTHER OPPOSES TETZEL.

Pale with devotion ; wrestling long and lone
With God in pr'ayery — behold ! the lion heart
Of Luther beats with supernat'ral pulse, —
It throbs with deity and great design !
Stung to his very soul with piercing shame,
Beneath a lie to see heaven's truth expire,
And trampled scripture gasping in the dust
Of low venality and priestly lies, —
Upon the door of Wittemberg's dark pile
He fasten'd then, with hand divinely firm,
Ninety and five of those all-fearless truths
That shook the popedom, and the world redeem'd
From charms infernal, to the cross alone.
Faith, Hope and Love, upon the ROCK of souls
Were founded ; grace in gospel freedom rose,
From schools and sophistry at length escap'd,
And in the fountain of IMMANUEL'S blood
Both peace and pardon in conjunction flow'd
Free, full and glorious, from the heart of God, —
Giver and gift in amnesty combin'd ! —
And yet, what eye, save His, before whose beam
Time, place, and all contingencies retire

LUTHER. 299

As though they were not, — in this daring act

Of Luther, saw the REFORMATION'S pulse

Of life and liberty began to beat ?

Or who, among the crowd that rush'd to read,

In tumult wild, upon the church's gate,

Those words that dash'd Indulgences to air, —

The silent thunder of their strength presum'd

Upon thine eve, All-Hallows ? — -Monk, and priest,

And pope, and hoary-headed falsehood, then,

Were death-struck ! — in those few fine truths

The germs of unexpanded glory slept,

As in the acorn future navies float ! —

And when at night the lonely cell was sought,

Could the brave monk his deed of might

Have measur'd ? in the greatness of the act,

Oh ! was he conscious of th' ALMIGHTY there?

XVI.

THE REFORMER FINDS A FRIEND.

O friendship ! when thou art indeed the fruit
Of sacred principle, by love inspir'd,
Thy bloom is fragrant of yon world of bliss
Ethereal, and with fadeless beauty rife. —
And such, when Luther and Melancthon's heart
In oneness holy blended their deep powers,
Wert thou ; a friendship from the cross that sprang
In the green fulness of a common faith.
And in the annals of the soul, how few

300 LUTHER.

The feelings that more lovingly have twin'd

A wreath of nature round the brow of grace,

Than those which, from the young and verdant breast

Of their twin manhood, did together rise !

Distinct in tone, yet undivided, both
Their hearts in melody combin'd and met.
But if in nature, poesy would find
Their fancied echo, — hark, the torrent's fall
In liquid thunder foaming loud and fierce,
From crag to crag precipitously bold, —
And there is Luther ! — while along the banks
Tree-shaded, list, the low and quiet stream, —
And there is mild Melancthon ! — each to each
The grace of contrast, and the charm that glows
Round minds that vary while the hearts embrace, —
Imparted : both in one vast work converged,
And ah ! what hours of evangelic peace,
What hymns of soul, what praises blent with prayers.
What feelings high, amid the ancient woods
Of Wittimbergh, — were oft by both enjoy'd ! —
And in the lassitude of lofty cares,
When, crush'd beneath his adamantine wrongs
The soul of Luther lay in bleeding gloom,
How the calm sunshine of Melancthon's face
Around him shed the heart-restoring smile ! —
But o'er THY page, unerring AUTHOR ! most
Did their high friendship in communion blend,
As truth on truth, from out the classic grave
Of language, where dead meanings darkly slept, —

LUTHER. 301

Started to life in Luther's noble tongue,
Till FATHERLAND its own free Bible hail'd,
And God in German to his country spake ! —
Thus day by day the Book of Heaven became
A sabbath port from earth's tempestuous cares
That rag'd and roll'd around them : scene and time
And circumstaace, — those mast'ring three
That make or mar the all that worldlings dream I —
To them were shadows, which the radiant WORD
Dazzled to nought, as clouds in sunbeams die.
The monarch's palace, or the monk's low cell,
Or chamber dim, from out whose frescoed walls
In massy framework look d the pictur'd dead
That live in hues immortal, — 'twas alike
To them, who on this world, were in the next,
By faith, or feeling, ever wafted there !

XVII.

LUTHER BURNS THE POPE'S BULL, AND APPEARS BEFORE
THE DIET OF WORMS.

But now, the noble climax is arriv'd
When Luther's soul must in meridian shine :
And soon the haughty Medici shall quail,
Defied and daunted by a miner's son
In that high scene, heroically great
And unsurpass'd, — save when the fetter'd Paul
Lifted his eyes of light and brow of truth
Before Agrippa, till that prince of lust
Shook ! like a fiend beneath the Saviour's glance

302 LUTHER.

Soul-piercing ! — From the hills of Rome

In vain the thund'ring Vatican had roll'd ;

And thy huge palace, dark-wall'd Pleissenburgh !

Witnessed the brave defender, when he fell'd

Those Anakims of intellectual might,

The proud Goliaths of theology,

Under that sword, whose bladed fire

Cleaves the dark spirit, like a flash from God ! —

But, lo! at length, the very MAN OF SIN,

That crown'd blasphemer who travestied Christ,

Himself upon his throne of lies shall start

And quiver ! — " Pile for pile shall kindle now,

Bull, law, and canons, and Clementines, all

Shall in one sacrifice of flame expire !" —

So spake the monk immortal ; and the blaze

Redden'd and rose beside the eastern gate

Of Wittemberg, above that putrid mass

Of fictions papal, and impostures vile ;

hile with a shout, that should for ever ring
The heart of Europe with responsive tones, —
Applauding thousands hail'd the deed sublime
Which kindled that protesting flame of truth
Whose faint reflection scorches popedom now ! —

Vict'ry on vict'rv ! but another still

«,' *>

To grace thy majesty, redeeming truth. —
Again behold him take his lofty stand,
That lone and excommunicated monk,
Ready to storm the very gates of hell, —
Fearless in fight, when battling for his God !

LUTHER. 303

Yes, lie who once in Erfurth's convent pin'd

A pale and pensive, wasted, woe-gone man,

In tearful darkness groping for the truth, —

Millions of hearts do now with love enshrine,

And rev'rence ; at his name young bosoms leap ;

While crowding students, from afar arriv'd

To see TH' ALMIGHTY in his word unveil'd

By him, the truth's restorer, — when the spires

Of Wittemberg in airy distance gleam,

Arrest their horses, and with lifted hands

And lauding voices, to the heavens outpour

High songs to greet the home where Luther dwells !

And now another conflict; he whose voice
Encounter'd Tetzel with victorious truth,
At Augsburgh made the Roman legate quail,
And crush'd the Stagyrite with all his schools
Of dead theology in Leipsic halls ! —
Again the champion of the soul must be,
And plead for Christ, before the bar of kings
Within thy diet, un forgotten Worms !

And there he stands ! — in superhuman calm
Concenter'd and sublime : round him, pomp
And blaze imperial ; haughty eyes, and tongues
Whose tones are tyranny, in vain attempt
The heaven-born quiet of his soul to move ;
Crown'd with the grace of everlasting truth
A more than monarch among kings he stood I —
And while without, the ever-deep'ning mass

304 LUTHER.

Of murm'ring thousands on the windows watch'd
The torch-light gleaming through the crimson'd glass
Of that throng'd hall, where TRUTH on trial was, —
Seldom on earth did ever sun go down,
Or evening mantle o'er a grander scene ! —
Then priest and baron, counts and dukes were met,
Landgrave and margraves, earls, electors, knights,
And Charles the Splendid, in the burning pride
Of princely youth, with empires at his feet, —
And there — the miner's son to match them all ! —
With black robe belted round his manly waist

t,

Before that bar august, he stood serene,

By self dominion reining down his soul.

Melancthon wept, and Spalatinus gaz'd

With breathless wonder, on that wond'rous man ;

While mute and motionless, a grim array

Of priests and monks in combination dire,

On Luther fasten'd their most blood-hound gaze

Of bigotry ; — but not one rippling thought disturbed

The calm of heaven on his majestic face !

Meek but majestic, simple but sublime

In aspect, — thus he brav'd the awe of Rome

With brow unshrinking, and with eyes that flash'd

As if the spirit in each glance were sheath'd ! —

And then, — with voice that seem'd a soul in sound

Made audible, — he pled the Almighty's cause

In words almighty as the cause he pled, —

THE BIBLE'S — God's religion, not the priest's

By craft invented, and by lucre sav'd —

For this, life, limb and liberty he vow'd

LUTHER. 305

To sacrifice ; though earth and hell might rage ;
Not pope, nor canon, council, nor decree
Would shake him ; from the throne of that resolve
By fiend, nor angel, would his heart be hurl'd ;
Truth and his conscience would together fight, —
The world 'gainst them — and they against the world ! —
And then, with eyeballs flashing intellectual fire,

0

Full in the face of that assembly roll'd

The fearless monk, those ever-famous words —

" God help me ! — here I stand alone, — Amen I1' —

*

*

*

*

*

*

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*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

And now awhile to this high theme, farewell !
But in thy heart, heroic England ! long
May Luther's voice, and Luther's spirit live
Unsilenc'd and unsham'd. — Thou peerless home
Of liberty and laws, of arts and arms,
Of learning, love, and eloquence divine,
Where Shakspeare dreamt, and sightless Milton soar'd,
Where heroes bled, and martyrs for the truth
Have died the burning death, — without a groan ;
Land of the beautiful, the brave, the free !
Never, oh never I round thy yielded soul
May damning popery its rust-worn chain
Of darkness rivet ; in the might of heaven
Awake ! — and back to Rome's vile dungeon hurl
Her shackles base, and slavery abhorr'd ! —
Without the Bible, Britain's life-blood chills
And curdles; in that book, and by that book,

006 LUTHER.

Almighty, freedom can alone be kept

From age to age, in unison with heaven.

Without it — life is but a ling'ring death, —

A false existence, that begets decay,

Or fevers only into restless life,

Whose blood is madness, and whose breath despair I —

For not philosophy, with Attic grace

Bedeck'd and dazzling ; nor can science deep,

Sounding with searchful eye the vast abyss

Of things created ; nor politic weal

Transcending all that earthly patriot dreams

Of pure and perfect — our great country guard : —

And though our banners on the four winds waft

Defiance in the face of this huge world,

Our swords flash vict'ry, and our commerce vie

With more than Tyre, upon her throne of waves

Once free and famous, — till our country prove

The banking centre of all climes and creeds, —

Reft of her Bible, not a drop remains

Of holy life-blood in the nation's heart !

Land of the LORD ! my own maternal isle
Still in the noontide of celestial love
Basking, beneath the cross of Christ ador'd, —
How bounds the heart with patriotic throb
Devoted, till each pulse a prayer becomes, —
When oft upon thy sea-dash'd cliff we stand,
While ships by thousands haunt thy favour'd shores,
And in their bosom half the world discharge
Of riches and of splendour! — GOD is thine,

LUTHER. 307

My country ! — faithful unto deatli be thou ;

For He has made and magnified thy strength,

E'en like a second Palestine, to prove

The ark of scripture, where a Christless world

May find the truth that makes her spirit free ! —

Thy bulwark is the Bible, in the heart

Of Britain like a second heart enshrin'd

»

For inspiration, purity, and power :

And long o'er principle, and law and weal,

O'er public virtue, and o'er private life,

May scripture be sole paramount and test ;

The source and standard of majestic faith,

Where morals form, and whence our motives flow. —

Our glory is our God, and he alone

Will shield the empire where MESSIAH reigns !

T. C. Savill, Printer, 107, St. Martin's Lane,

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RUTHERFORD'S LETTERS AND LIFE.

A New Edition of the heavenly and unequalled Letters of the
eminently pious and learned Samuel Rutherford, late Professor
of Divinity in the- University of St. Andrew's, in the original
text, carefully revised and corrected from the first and third
editions printed in 1664 & 1692, with Explanatory Notes by the
Rev. CHARLES THOMSON, of the Scotch Church, North Shields.
2 vols. 12mo, cloth. Price 105.

NATIONAL RELIGION; or, The Voice of

God to the British Church and Nation. By the Rev. R.
SHITTLER, Melcomb Horsey. Demy 12mo, extra cloth, 45. 6c?.,
published at 6*.

CHRISTIAN PATRIOTISM ; or, The Claims

of Home and Country to Christian Consideration. By the Rev.
JOHN GUMMING, M.A. Price 2s,

PSALMS & PARAPHRASES of the CHURCH

of SCOTLAND, with Notes and Introduction by the Rev.
JOHN GUMMING, M.A. Cloth. Price 6s.

AN APOLOGY for the CHURCH of SCOT-

LAND ; or, An Explanation of its Constitution and Character.
By the Rev. J. GUMMING, M.A. Price Is.

SPEECH of the REV. J. GUMMING, M.A.

at the Annual Meeting of the Reformation Society in Exeter
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THE MARRIAGE RING. By JEREMY TAY-

LOR, D.D., with Preface and Prayers by the Rev. J. GUMMING,
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bound in silk, 2s. ; in cloth, Is. 6d. A most suitable Wedding
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THE NOVELTY of the PECULIAR DOC-
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2 PUBLISHED AND SOLD BY F. BAISLER.

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The above embrace a great variety of interesting and important
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THE THIRTY- NINE ARTICLES of the

CHURCH of ENGLAND, on a handsome broad sheet. Suit-
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STRENGTHEN THE THINGS WHICH

REMAIN. A SERMON preached on the Anniversary of the
Deliverance of Londonderry, by the Rev. ARCHIBALD BOYD,
M. A., Curate of Londonderry. Price 8d.

THE POPERY OF OXFORD. By PETER

MAURICE, B.D., Chaplain of New and All Souls' Colleges,
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A KEY TO THE POPERY OF OXFORD.

By the same Author. Price Is. 6d.

STATISTICS of POPERY in GREAT BRI-
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Seminary, throughout England, Scotland, and Wales. Price 9c/.

FIFTY MOTIVES for BEING a REFORMED

CATHOLIC, and not being a Roman Catholic. Price 6d.

THE PROGRESS of POPERY in the BRI-
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THE SACRED CASKET; containing Gems

from the best English Authors, in prose and verse, with some
original pieces. Price Is. 6d., published at 3s.

LETTERS FROM A COTTAGE; or, High

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All the Publications of the Protestant Association.

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THE PROTESTANT MAGAZINE, under

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THE PENNY PROTESTANT OPERA-
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THE SENTINEL, published under the Direc-

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Just published, royal ISmo, cloth, price 3s. 6d.

A DIALOGUE between a POPISH PRIEST

and an ENGLISH PROTESTANT, wherein the principal
points and arguments of both Religions are truly proposed and
fully examined. By MATTHEW POOLE, Minister of the Gospel.
A new edition, carefully revised and corrected : with an Ap-
pendix, containing such portions of " The Nullity of the Romish
Faith" as are referred to in the Dialogue. Edited by the Rev.
PETER HALL, M.A.

ERRORS of ROMANISM. A Series of Six

Lectures, delivered on the Wednesday Evenings during Lent,
at Sir George Wheeler's Chapel, Spitalfields, in 1838. Price
Is. 9c?., published at 2s.

TRUTH and ERROR. The Series delivered

in 1837. 2s., published at 2s. 6d.

THE FAITH & PATIENCE of the SAINTS,

exhibited in the Sufferings and Death of Mons. ISAAC LE
FEBVRE, a Protestant of Chatel Chignon, in France, who
was condemned to the Galleys, in the persecution which fol-
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world was not worthy." Heb. ii. 38. - - Price 3s. Gd. cloth bds.

THE PROTESTANT CATECHISM; or, The

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COTTAGE DIALOGUES on the GOSPEL

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DIALOGUES on the GOSPEL of ST. MARK,

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PLANTS of PARADISE ; or, The Record of

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INTERESTING NARRATIVES from the

SACRED VOLUME, Illustrated and Improved. By the
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PASTORAL RECOLLECTIONS. By the

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LIVE JOYFULLY ; or, The Duty and Means

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PLAIN THINGS for PLAIN PEOPLE.

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