which she exhibits; the ripe, rich beauty of Autumn, and the changes she occasions; the cold, white shiveriness of Winter, and the mutations and sequences which he introduces; and the laughingness and glee of Spring, with her contrasts and her progress—all the appearances which, in her different aspects, Nature wears, are, so far as they are known, chronicled and registered for us in books. It needs not the gaudy mimicry of eloquence to convince our readers of the vast help to self-culture books supply. History therein recites her tale of deeds of marvel done by living men; Science unfolds the vast record of her discoveries; Poetry thrills the soul with its potent lays; Fiction reveals her world of witcheries; Biography introduces all great men to us as friends; Philosophy informs us what men have thought regarding the mystery of being; Morals presents her estimate of right and wrong; while Religion "With radiant finger points the way to God." What need, then, for enlarging on the benefits the study of all these may confer, and their immense importance to the student of books. Verily, he who careth not for good books, my soul, come not thou into communion with him! The soul of man is constantly exposed to influences which leave their impress on his nature. To determine, therefore, in the full plenitude of self-hood—to accept and welcome all and every influence which may aid in adding efficacy to the efforts of the intellect in its eager upward aspirations, is the duty of each earnest student. Nature should be mirrored in our souls truly and fully; Society should be the excitant to pure and noble thoughts and deeds; and Books should be our chief counsellors. Let enthusiasm nerve the mind; reason regulate its activity; imagination flash her intense irradiations over all our thoughts; morality reign in our hearts; scientific truth direct our work-day labours; and religion shed her hallowing incense over and around our whole mental life-and we need not fear that in the nobility of self-hood, we shall constantly advance. The full energy of one single soul devotedly consecrated to any great and heaven-loved object is powerful against innumerable objects; undismayed amid difficulties and disasters, success never fails the earnest. If we succeed in nothing else we at least fail not in showing how bravely and heroically the human soul may bear the destiny allotted it-fail not in manning the spirit to vigorous endurancy, to indomitable resistancy, and to nobility of being. "Fail! fail! In the lexicon of youth which Fate reserves For a bright manhood, there is no such word True self-culture will enable us to utter with our latest breath the words-" I have not failed!" For my own part, I have ever gained the most profit, and the most pleasure also, from the books which have made me think the most; and, when the difficulties have been once overcome, these are the books which have struck the deepest root, not only in my memory and understanding, but also in my affections. If you would fertilize the mind, the plough must be driven over and through it. The gliding of wheels is easier and rapider, but only inakes it harder and more barren.-Archdeacon Hare. Religion. WHICH SYSTEM IS MOST IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE SCRIPTURES, AND PRODUCTIVE OF THE BEST RESULTS-EPISCOPACY, PRESBYTERIANISM, OR CONGREGATIONALISM? First, true Christian government, EPISCOPACY.-REPLY. In my previous articles on this subject, I had occasion to state briefly what appeared to be the leading arguments in favour of Episcopacy from the scriptural and from the utilitarian point of view. It becomes now my duty to consider some of the specific objections which have been urged against it, and also the arguments adduced in behalf of the other two systems. The number, variety, indirectness, and occasional obscurity of the latter, render a formal and systematic reply to every allegation they contain impractic able; but, taking up the chief of them in the order of importance, I shall, according to their nature, sometimes give a formal refutation, sometimes show the consequences to which they lead, so as to leave, I trust, no question raised by them unsettled. Now the opponents of Episcopacy, as T. R. and J. S. J. have pointed out, attack it not directly, but the Church of England, of which, in common with most other churches, it is a feature only. Losing sight of its scriptural origin, and of its fundamental principle, which is its regulative and corrective power, they fix upon what are mere accidents of English Episcopacy:—the subordination of the Church of England to the State; the temptations to secularity and subservience to political ends in the clergy; their wealth, &c.-though the example of the Free Episcopal churches of Scotland and America might have taught them that these do not bear at all upon the abstract question of Episcopal regimen, as proposed for comparison with the other systems. Now, falling into this error, "Aristides" complains that the independence of the English Church is destroyed by her subordination to the State. If by independence he means her power of free healthy action upon the masses of the people, his assertion is belied by the actual and well-known condition of the Church, which never showed so much vitality, or made so much progress, as now; but if he means by it a power to sel the State at defiance, I can tell him that there are very few English Churchimen who would ever wish to have this independence, which history proves to be dangerous alike to civil and religious freedom, restored. If, however, he intends by it such freedom as the Kirk of Scotland enjoys, I may remind him that the presbyteries are really subject to the Crown, which is represented in their highest court by the Lord High Commissioner; and as they dare not make any enactments contrary to State provisions, are as really subject to the State as the English Church, while at the same time, the form of their relation to it renders them utterly incapable of influencing the higher and more intellectual classes of society. "Aristides," then, arraigning the hierarchical system of England, asserts that it leads to a servile spirit in the clergy, and afterwards drawing a comparison favourable to the ministers of the Kirk, says:—“ No inequalities of rank exist to abstract their minds from their avocation." The first assertion has been ably rebutted by T. R. With respect to the Scotch clergy, I may ask does not the nominee to a ministerial charge ever feel himself in galling dependence on his synods and presbyteries, and on his parishioners? And if not in inequality of rank, does the minister of the Kirk find in nothing else aught to abstract his mind from his true avocation? As "Aristides " plumes himself upon the fact that "all the ministers are working members," I may venture to consider this question further. I might add at once, "hence the need of a proper check upon their almost certain ignorance and corruption." But as "Walter" doubts a statement I made as to the nature of part of their work, illustrated from the experience of Dr. Chalmers, it may be as well to give at greater length the substance of the passage referred to. In the large towns, we are told, ministers are entrusted with the administration of innumerable charities-in Scotland called "mortifications"—to old and infirm paupers. Mortifications indeed they prove to many a poor clergyman, who would, but cannot, devote himself wholly to the ministry of the word. 'His study is continually broken into by hundreds of applicants for these charities, nor can any remonstrances prevent a minister of a city being expected to perform a whole host of secular services. He is encumbered with the disposal of numerous vacancies, each of which gives rise to innumerable candidates, and each candidate engages in his behalf a host of acquaintances, who worry the minister out of all patience by innumerable written and personal entreaties." Such is the testimony of one of the Kirk's most distinguished ministers, to the state of things in his time (which "Aristides" and J. N. appear to admire so much), and who, after showing the serious losses which the learning and efficiency of ministers must suffer from this cause, and the great advantages it gives to the enemies religion, exclaims, in words of burning indignation against the folly of those who would have their clergy thus overworked, when the interests of religion require that they should be a learned, spiritual, separated order, and rich in mental accomplishments-which, as every one knows, they can only become by being allowed to give "their ample and exclusive leisure to the labours of the closet." And this is what at present, on J. N.'s own showing, if the quotation from Defoe be applicable still, the ministers of the Kirk can rarely do; and this I believe is the reason why, despite the examples of Drs. Chalmers, and Candlish, and Gordon, paraded by "Walter," in England so many, and in Scotland so few, of the most distinguished names in literature and science have been clergymen. Notwithstanding the vaunted superiority of the Scotch to the English "in vital religion and intelligence," I yet find, from the same authority, that in Dr. Chalmers's time, in a single portion of Glasgow only, "swarming multitudes" were found, "living in ignorance and guilt, and dying in darkness." What is there to wonder at if parochial influence was a mere name, not systematic, not understood; if there was no machinery for the moral elevation of a town population; if the people were left alone, when the entire responsibility fell on the poor and overburdened clergy? Could such clergy ever effectually bring the religion of Jesus before the attention of those who most need to have its claims forced on their notice," the purse-proud and the titled of the earth?" Were the Presbyterian model forced on this country, the result would be to drive all the superior clergy from the Church's ministry. Aristides," therefore, and his coadjutors have utterly failed to prove that this system has any claim to that catholicity, that adaptability to all the external and internal condition of states and empires, that suitability to all classes and degrees of men, without which it can never fulfil the true mission of the christian teacher, to "become all things to all men, if by any means he might gain sorne." 66 Now, the union, in England, of the spiritual and temporal Lords in the House of Peers, cavilled at by "Aristides" and others, preserves at least the semblance, if not the reality, of religion in that august assembly; it secures, at least, the outward inoral decorum of the aristocracy; and living, as they do, one and all, under the very eyes of the nation, their example must tell immensely upon the general religious tone of all classes of society. I doubt not, but this union of the Spiritual and temporal powers-the one re-acting upon and preventing the undue influence of the other has been the means, under God, of raising England to the high moral position she enjoys among the nations, and has been powerfully instrumental in raising the standard of European civilization. The Church cannot safely rule the State: but had religion been kept upon her knees, or with her face in the dust, to move the contempt of the "purse-proud and the titled of the earth," this country never could have attained her present intelligence and freedom. "And if two hemispheres prosper, the cause Lies in Old England's religion and laws." In J. N.'s papers there is little which is not already satisfactorily disposed of by ordain. In his second paper J. N. has enlarged upon the comparison made between the Jewish and Episcopalian distinction of orders; and "L'Ouvrier" has carped at my employment of it. I may observe, that in referring to the aralogy between the two orders, which, He contrary, undoubtedly exists, I did not intend it to be understood, as J. N. and others appear to think, that I considered the analogy a necessary one, the direct result of Divine ordinance, or as in any way giving a sanction to the continuance of three orders, except in so far as a threefold ministry, distinguished into a ruling, a pastoral, and diaconal function, is essential to the true order and well-being of the Christian Church in all ages.' "* 66 J. S. J. and T. R. It can scarcely be neces-tles, or their deputed successors, ever did sary to point out how the scripture quotations he has given will not answer his purpose. Paul and Barnabas, it is evident, were not first ordained ministers by the presbyters of Antioch; that was impossible. Paul was already an apostle, called by Jesus Christ himself; but in this place, was merely set apart by the Holy Ghost to a particular notwithstanding what has been said to the work, the preaching to the Gentiles. was undoubtedly previously a minister himself (see Acts xii. 25, and ix. 20). And where does J. N. find proof that Timothy was ordained" by the laying on of the hands of the presbytery?" What is there to show any more than in the case just cited, that this "laying on" occurred at his ordination to the ministry, that it constituted him a presbyter, or was in any way connected with his ministerial character? The circumstances of Barnabas, and Matthias, who were chosen by lot, being apostles, combined with that of the plenary powers delegated by St. Paul to Timothy and Titus, prove that the apostolic powers, of governing the church, of ordaining ministers, and enforcing discipline, were transmissible. But, as "L'Ouvrier" supposes I was ignorant of the text on which he and J. N. lay so much stress, I may inform him that I had referred to it in the original, and, nevertheless, was unable to detect in it any satisfactory evidence that "elders "" ever did lay hands, in order to ministerial ordination, on Timothy. For the word which he has transposed into "those very officers,"-translated in the English version," presbytery" is in the Greek presbuterion, which Calvin himself, the great apostle of modern dissent, did not understand of the persons, but of the office, and accordingly did not apply it in the way " L'Ouvrier" and his friends have so confidently done. Now, in this, Calvin's, sense, the "presbytery" might refer to the ordinance of Paul, of Barnabas, or of other apostles. It was most probable Paul would ordain Timothy, who was "his own son in the faith;" and this is almost set at rest by his words in the second Epistle, i. 6, where he says, "Stir up the gift of God which is in thee, by the putting on of my hands." Here at least is no doubt as to whose hands were laid on. And there are plenty of texts (as Acts vi. 6; viii. 14—17, &c.) which seem to me to warrant the assumption that only apos In "Walter's" article there is not much requiring separate remark. How he could make that singularly unfortunate reference to the Council held at Jerusalem, I cannot conceive; for a close inspection of the whole account of it gives strong reason to believe that no laymen whatever took part in the discussion; and, secondly, from a comparison with other passages, and the testimony of the early christian writers, we know that James the Less, surnamed the Just, was at this time Bishop of the Church at Jerusalem† (which Church, be it observed, now probably included great numbers of persons, far more than could be comprised in a single congregation), and on this occasion he presided at the council. We find him authori.. tatively claiming to be heard,—“ Hear me,” and shortly after,-"My sentence is," ¿yw pivw, "I thus decide, judge;" had all in the council been equal in authority, would he have ventured to employ so judicial a tone? And in the other passage cited by 'Walter," he shows a want of candour in trying to make it appear that St. Peter addresses the "scattered strangers," as co-elders of the same authority with himself. In the churches he addresses, scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, there must have been many bishops, and St. Peter evidently refers to the heads of the Church-the bishops and presbyters vol. ii., p. 198. + Bingham's "Antiq.," book ii., c. 1. 66 -and in ver. 5 adds, "Ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder," where elder is the same word-presbuteroi. With far greater reason might this text be quoted as proving that apostles had successors in the Church, as far as equal powers are concerned. Further, "Walter" brings an unfounded charge against me of asserting that "the priests are equal to the bishops of apostolic times." Our priest" is derived from the Greek word presbuteros," signifying a superior, properly in age, and thence also in worth and gravity; and the terms bishop and presbyter, or priest, never meant the same thing, though they sometimes may have designated the same person, who was called episcopos with respect to his office, and presbuteros with respect to his age and dignity."" Neither has the Anglican Church abolished an office, or brought in a new one, for we have strong evidence not only that the term "apostles" came to be distinctively applied to the Twelve, with only three exceptions, but that immediately after, if not during apostolic times, the term episcopoi was applied only to the highest officers of the Church, the presbuteroi or priests being the second. Neither is to be understood as involved in the term 'priests" the offering of sacrifice. Their duties are, as defined by Richard Baxter"To be the guides of the congregation in public worship, and to stand between them and Christ in things pertaining to God as subservient to Christ in his priestly office; and so both for the people, and in their to put up the public prayers and praises of the Church to God. It is their duty to administer to them, as in the name and stead of Christ, His body and blood; and to subserve Christ, especially in His priestly office."+ 66 names, on religious worship, that the Church of England has attending its three services more persons than all the other bodies put together (3,773,474 against 3,487,558); and moreover, the inaccuracies in the attendance tables, which are probably considerable, go against the Church. Dissenters in workhouses usually leave to go to a neighbouring chapel, not so Episcopalians. At Preston, the evening attendance at church is put down at 180, while frequently, at one church there, the evening congregation has amounted to a thousand. "But if clergymen will not give answers to Government inquiries, as they at Preston did not, they cannot find fault if misrepresented."* My own personal knowledge of more than one dissenting chapel and its minister, and of their general eagerness to depreciate the Church's strength, and "make the most of themselves," leads me firmly to believe that the tables do not adequately represent the Church's strength. They prove, however, that she out-numbers all the dissenting sects put together; which is enough to satisfy one that Episcopacy is not at fault. Now, a word as to Episcopal revenues. On this subject much misapprehension, and I must add much misrepresentation exists. In the report of the Commissioners appointed to inquire into the ecclesiastical revenues of England and Wales, in 1835, it appears that the total Episcopal revenues amounted to £160,292, in the proportions of £120,568 to the see of Canterbury, and £39,724 to the see of York, distributed in various proportions among the archbishops and bishops.† Since then, however, the Episcopal revenues have been, I believe, reduced, and more equally distributed. Then, with respect to the incomes of the inferior clergy, they are by no means great-scarcely enough, on the average, to keep a family upon.‡ And, with respect to deaneries and cathedral dignities, which offer far more ground for animadversion than Episcopal revenues, even Dr. Chalmers said that he would be glad to have them in his own church; his opinion being there should be some learned men maintained for this month (September) on "The Church See an able article in "Fraser's Magazine" among the Tall Chimneys," p. 281, &c. + See the "Penny Cyclopædia," under “Bishops," p. 456. Parties;" and " Fraser's Magazine," as above. See "Edinburgh Review," No. 201, "Church |