cultural class can prove that they are taxed more than their fair share, by all means let there be an equitable adjustment. But never again shall they be allowed to tax the poor man's loaf. They may talk as long as they please about a five shilling duty upon the quarter of wheat, but it is of no avail. As Moses said to Pharaoh, "there shall not an hoof be left behind;" so we say to Earl Derby, there shall not be one farthing of taxation upon bread. The nation has been taxed for thirty years already, which was thirty years too long. Be thankful we do not demand compensation.

Dissenters have a most important duty to fulfil, at the approaching general election, for it must come soon, and we hope they will act out their principles. In Scotland, two-thirds of the population are Dissenters; and we should certainly have something to say, in determining the qualifications of Members of Parliament. There are many friends of civil liberty, who are compulsories in religion, and who do not understand the great lesson which all history teaches, that civil freedom is based upon religious. There are many distinguished advocates for commercial freedom, who cry out against the iniquity of taxing the bread of the people, and yet see no harm, but much propriety, in taxing the majority of the empire to support those ecclesiastical institutions, whose authority and worship they repudiate. Many can speak most eloquently of the injury which is done to the interests which have long been protected by Legislative enactments and privileges, but who will not acknowledge that, of all the interests protected by acts of Parliament, and propped up by compulsory bounties, religion has suffered the most. Many cry loudly for free trade in corn, in timber, and in sugar, who do not perceive that Voluntaryism is just free trade in religion; and who require some sharp lessons to convince them, that Dissenters care for truth as well as for liberty, and that they value liberty principally for the sake of truth. Dissenters may be of eminent service in the approaching election, even when they cannot carry out their own views in the pollingbooth, by acting as the teachers of mere worldly politicians, and by dropping some seeds of truth, which may subsequently spring up and bear good fruit. The responsibilities of dissenting electors are most momentous at this crisis, as regards even the Whig and Liberal politicians, who neither understand nor appreciate the position of the millions in this empire who support their own religious institutions,-who are the conscientious opponents of established churches, because they deem them unjust and unscriptural,and who are seriously of the opinion, that the public money expended upon ecclesiastical endowments would be better employed, were it cast into the sea. "To your tents, then, O Israel! Quit ye like men, and be strong!"

Printed by THOMAS MURRAY, of 2, Arniston Place, and WILLIAM GIBB, of 12, Queen Street, at the Printing Office of MURRAY and GIBB, North-East Thistle Street Lane, and Published by WILLIAM OLIPHANT, of 21, Buccleuch Place, at his Shop, 7, South Bridge, Edinburgh, on the 27th of March 1852.

THE

UNITED PRESBYTERIAN MAGAZINE,

FOR MAY, 1852.

Miscellaneous Communications.

CHRISTIANITY SUITED TO MAN.

THIRD ARTICLE.

IN our former communications, we have endeavoured to show the suitableness of Christianity to man's intellectual and moral constitution, as manifested in his restless desire to obtain some revelation; in his delight in the assurance of immortality; in his deep conviction of his own sinfulness; and in his presentiment of the final judgment. We shall endeavour now to demonstrate the suitableness to man of the christian plan of mercy. We have been hitherto among the outworks, but we come now to the citadel. What we have said was necessary to bring us up to this position, and we must occupy it, or very little has been gained. The doctrines mentioned above, though belonging to Christianity, and though revealed in the New Testament with a distinctness and power of evidence altogether unequalled, are not peculiar to Christianity-so that even if all our reasoning hitherto has been conclusive, we have only established the fact that some things about Christianity, some doctrines which that system has in common with other systems of religion,—are in accordance with man's intellectual and moral nature, rather than that Christianity itself is in accordance with it. Let us look, then, at the great truth of Christianity,-the salvation of man from guilt and depravity through the atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ.

We have already said that man is distinguished by a conviction more or less decided of his sinfulness, and that the consciousness of guilt has shown itself in all ages in the sacrifices of slain beasts. Disturbed and perplexed, man is afraid to approach a holy God. He sees in the world many indications of benevolence; he looks on the fields covered with corn, and the hills with flocks; he listens to the singing of birds, and marks with delight rejoicing nature--but he cannot shut his eyes to facts that tell of anger rather than of love,-to indications of justice, to the famine and the pestilence, the earthquake and tornado,-confirmed as these indications are by his own mental forebodings. Hence, in order to avert the displeasure of God, painful rites have been observed; flocks of sheep and hecatombs of oxen have been im

VOL. VI. NO. V.

H

not recommend a dissolution of Parliament in the present circumstances of the country and of the continent, and hence he had no choice but to resign the reins of government into the hands of Earl Derby." But if this were a good reason a month ago for not making an appeal to the constituencies, why is he now taking an active part in a policy, the object of which is to compel a dissolution of Parliament? It is a matter of common calculation, that the government burghs have about sixty votes, which, in the event of a dissolution, are always given to the party in power. This is no slight loss to the cause of free trade; and it may not be such an easy matter, when a general election comes round, to make it up. Reasons, no doubt, may exist, which do not appear upon the surface, which, were they known, would justify the extraordinary proceeding of the Whig Prime Minister. Perhaps he had no other means of getting rid of Earl Grey, as a Colonial Secretary, whose peevish, inconsistent, and impracticable character has done mischief to our colonies, which will not soon be repaired. Perhaps he had no other means of getting rid of Sir Charles Wood, that notable Chancellor of the Exchequer, who, if he has ever mastered the multiplication table, furnishes abundant evidence that he cannot work a question of simple interest. Perhaps he had no other means of reconstructing a cabinet upon a broader basis, in which talent and practical knowledge would be considered of some importance, even though the possessor could not boast of a long pedigree. We are not initiated into the secrets of statecraft; but we may take the liberty of predicting, that it will be the fault of the people themselves, if they do not gain something by the Whigs being out and the Tories being in. The people have too long consented to be made a shuttlecock, tossed from Whig to Tory, from Tory to Whig, at the pleasure of the contending aristocracies. We must rise up to the dignity of our own importance. What is the fourth estate? was a question asked by a proud aristocrat, before the first French revolution broke out, with all its horrors. It is the French nation, was the calm reply-minus the king, minus the clergy, minus the nobility. The people are the nation; and we must fight for our own hand, not for either of the aristocratic parties. We would exclude no man from the counsels of her Majesty because he is a lord, if otherwise qualified; but just as little would we exclude a man of undoubted ability, because he has sprung from the people. And the constituencies should not degrade themselves by any further exhibition of the flunky spirit, which has too often led them to select a lord or lordling nobody, when they could have had a man of real talent and worth, who belonged to themselves, and whose sympathies were all upon their side. In this country, the people are the nation, minus the Queen and the aristocracy. We do not except the clergy, for their sympathies, generally speaking, are upon the side of those to whom they minister in sacred things.

The Earl of Derby is now Prime Minister; and a question has been put to him ;-do you or do you not intend to reverse the commercial policy of this country? Do you or do you not intend to tax the peoples' bread? He has refused to give a direct answer, ay or no, to this important question. His explanations are cumbrous and confused, and sound very much like the dubious oracles of pagan antiquity; and as his Lordship has a clear head and a sharp tongue, and could easily make us understand him if he wished to do so, there is some purpose to be served by this studied ambiguity. One of two things must hold good: it is either his object to betray his own party by abandoning protection as henceforth an impossible principle to be

carried out in this country; and if so, he is bouud at once to undeceive the miserable dupes who are trusting in him, and expecting that his advent to power will enable them to-cut off a large slice from every poor man's loaf. Or it is his object to repudiate the principle of free trade, and, under the name of protection to the agricultural interests, to re-impose, in some form or other, that tax upon the necessaries of life, which the people of Britain were good natured enough to submit to, for the long space of thirty years. In either case, his Lordship has assumed the government upon false pretences, and we have a right to insist upon a categorical answer, for doubt upon this matter cannot but injure our trade and commerce. If, as he says, it is the country, not his party, that are to settle the question of free trade or protection, then the opinion of the constituencies should be asked as soon as possible. It will not do to postpone this matter, as is alleged, until we obtain Chancery and other legal reforms. Chancery reform is much required. It is a melancholy fact. But all have not estates in Chancery, while every man, woman, and child in the kingdom eats bread, and lives by the labour of the field. The bread-tax is a more urgent matter than the processes in the Court of Chancery. Ambiguity here cannot, and shall not, be endured. The protectionists must either throw down their arms, acknowledge that they have been beaten, and that they will never again disturb the peace of the commonweath on this question; or we must rally our forces afresh, and beat them so soundly, that they will scarcely have strength left in them to peep or to mutter. And most assuredly, if they compel us to form our ranks again, and enter upon the battle-field, we shall expect to gain something more as the rewards of victory, than the re-establishment of the free trade principle. Holding these views, we are glad to find the Anti-corn Law League resuscitated. It was asleep, not dead. It has awoke, like a giant refreshed with sleep. At its first meeting in Manchester, twenty-seven thousand pounds were subscribed in less than twenty-five minutes, an unprecedented sum to begin with, in the annals of agitation. When we write, about sixty thousand pounds are reported. The Earl of Derby had the bad taste to sneer at these paper subscriptions, as he called them. The subscriptions will be transmuted into gold, if required, and for a very sufficient reason. The merchant-princes of Britain would speedily lose far more than the sums they have put down, by the re-imposition of the bread-tax, or even by the matter being left undetermined for a season. And should these paper cheques even be converted into cash, and paid in full, the expenditure will not do much service to the exclusive privileges of his Lordship's class. In a controversy of this kind, should we be compelled to fight the battle again, there can be no doubt of success. If defeated in our first campaign, we shall enter upon it a second time. If beaten a second time, we shall resume the conflict a third time; and never shall we throw down our arms, until victory is unmistakeably ours, and our opponents effectually prevented from making farther resistance. The country has prospered under free trade, prospered more than its most sanguine advocates could have anticipated. The people eat more bread, drink more tea, consume more sugar, wear more clothes, and pay more taxes, than they did seven or eight years ago; and we shall not renounce such benefits for the aggrandisement of a small fraction of landowners. We say landowners advisedly; for a farmer has no more interest in paying a large sum for the land, the raw material out of which corn is produced, than a manufacturer has in paying an exorbitant price for the flax and cotton of which his fabrics are composed. If the agri

cultural class can prove that they are taxed more than their fair share, by all means let there be an equitable adjustment. But never again shall they be allowed to tax the poor man's loaf. They may talk as long as they please about a five shilling duty upon the quarter of wheat, but it is of no avail. As Moses said to Pharaoh, "there shall not an hoof be left behind;" so we say to Earl Derby, there shall not be one farthing of taxation upon bread. The nation has been taxed for thirty years already, which was thirty years too long. Be thankful we do not demand compensation.

Dissenters have a most important duty to fulfil, at the approaching general election, for it must come soon, and we hope they will act out their principles. In Scotland, two-thirds of the population are Dissenters; and we should certainly have something to say, in determining the qualifications of Members of Parliament. There are many friends of civil liberty, who are compulsories in religion, and who do not understand the great lesson which all history teaches, that civil freedom is based upon religious. There are many distinguished advocates for commercial freedom, who cry out against the iniquity of taxing the bread of the people, and yet see no harm, but much propriety, in taxing the majority of the empire to support those ecclesiastical institutions, whose authority and worship they repudiate. Many can speak most eloquently of the injury which is done to the interests which have long been protected by Legislative enactments and privileges, but who will not acknowledge that, of all the interests protected by acts of Parliament, and propped up by compulsory bounties, religion has suffered the most. Many cry loudly for free trade in corn, in timber, and in sugar, who do not perceive that Voluntaryism is just free trade in religion; and who require some sharp lessons to convince them, that Dissenters care for truth as well as for liberty, and that they value liberty principally for the sake of truth. Dissenters may be of eminent service in the approaching election, even when they cannot carry out their own views in the pollingbooth, by acting as the teachers of mere worldly politicians, and by dropping some seeds of truth, which may subsequently spring up and bear good fruit. The responsibilities of dissenting electors are most momentous at this crisis, as regards even the Whig and Liberal politicians, who neither understand nor appreciate the position of the millions in this empire who support their own religious institutions,-who are the conscientious opponents of established churches, because they deem them unjust and unscriptural,and who are seriously of the opinion, that the public money expended upon ecclesiastical endowments would be better employed, were it cast into the sea. "To your tents, then, O Israel! Quit ye like men, and be strong!"

Printed by THOMAS MURRAY, of 2, Arniston Place, and WILLIAM GIBB, of 12, Queen Street, at the Printing Office of MURRAY and GIBB, North-East Thistle Street Lane, and Published by WILLIAM OLIPHANT, of 21, Buccleuch Place, at his Shop, 7, South Bridge, Edinburgh, on the 27th of March 1852.