lect of its use, what do we, but loosen one of the ties, by which they might have been drawn to desire a more public celebration of the sacrament?

And now what have we to plead in our defence? Is it antiquity? no sooner were Churches built, and matters brought into a regular train, but baptisterics and fonts were erected, and in these alone was baptism performed. Are the several articles of visitation, canons, and constitutions, that have been made from time to time, in favor of the practice? they are expressly against it. Is the practice calculated to raise the sacrament in the eyes of the people? It is more likely to lower it. Is it agreeable to the words of the Rubric and the intention of our Church? What then shall we say to the last of the three injunctions that are prefixed to the ministration of the public baptism of infants, wherein are these words, "And the priest coming to the font, (which is then to be filled with pure water")-How can we be said to comply with this Rubric, when the font that common baptistery or fountain of baptism, (as the old offices term it) is not so much as used on the occasion? Again, in the prayer of consecration, when having prayed to the Almighty and everliving God to "sanctify the water to the mystical washing away of sin," we farther beseech him to grant that the child now to be baptized therein, may receive the fulness of his grace." But may we not well ask, baptized in what? on the supposition that the font itself is filled with water, the expression is strictly appropriate; but where this is not the case, few I think can use the prayer without wishing to substitute the word "therewith" in its stead. And to give one instance more, in a following Rubric the priest is enjoined (if the sponsors shall certify him that the child may well endure it) to dip it in the water

discreetly and warily" Does not this injunction then suppose the font to be duly filled with water? When I consider therefore that the use of the font is strictly agreeable to the practice of the early Church, at least from the time of the third century, that it is expressly enjoined by the oldest canons and constitutions down to the present time, that the Rubric and a part of the service suppose the font itself to be filled with water, and that when so filled it is at once appropriate and respectful, and calculated to excite proper and devotional feelings in the minds of the people, I cannot but indulge the hope of seeing the time, when the bason will be altogether discarded, and the font restored to its primitive honours*.

I have been so long on this first irregularity in our ministration of baptism that I have not room to do more than briefly to notice the remainder. It is a remark of Archdeacon Sharpe's, that our Church doth not direct sprinkling or aspersion, but affusion or pouring of water upon the children to be bap tized; and, though the quantity of water to be used is no where prescribed, yet he gives it as his opiuion that the action should be such as is properly a washing to make the administration correspond with the institution: and secondly, such as is properly a pouring of water which is the Rubrical direction to express that washing at all times, when dipping is not practised. "And this," he adds, we are bound to observe, as members of the Church of England in particular, taking it always for granted that there is a reason for whatever is prescribed in the Rubric, and such a one as is not to be contradicted by

By a little search the hole through which the water was formerly carried off through the shaft, might still be discovered in most if not all the older fonts; and again secured, as then, with its stopple.

our private practice, or rejected for the sake of any modes or customs brought in we know not how." Notwithstanding these judicious remarks, which require neither comment nor addition, aspersion, and that in a very slight degree, is too much the prevailing practice of the day...

A third irregularity is the using the ministration of public baptism in houses, together with the two frequent practice of privately baptizing without a sufficient necessity. For this latter deviation somewhat perhaps may be said; but the former is as indefensible in itself, as it would be, I am verily persuaded, unwished for by the laity, wherever its impropriety should be kindly, and fully, and impartially stated,

I will only add in conclusion that much benefit would arise from a frequent allusion in our public discourses and private admonitions to the nature and necessity of the holy sacrament of baptism; from the seriousness and fervency of our manner in administering it-from our attention as far as is possible to the fitness and behaviour of the sponsors, and the distinctness with which they make the answers *; from the cleanliness and order in which every thing is kept in and about the font, and the careful provision of hassocks for the people to kneel on, where the service requires it; all these precautions could not fail of exciting and keeping up under God's blessing, a due sense of the importance of that rite, which is in very truth

the appointed door of our admission into the Church of the living God.

In the preceding remarks I trust that I have not been betrayed into any inadvertency of feeling or expression. I have ever thought that much good would accrue to the Church, if the clergy could be roused to a freer communication of their observations and experience relative to the discharge of their pastoral duties. Much practical information that would otherwise have been confined to the small limits of a private parish, would thus be made general, and afford valuable hints and assistances to their younger brethren, who are but fresh in the vineyard. Your Remembrancer, Sir, offers a safe and easy channel of communication, and deserves to be duly prized. I am,

&c. Yours, C.

To the Editor of the Remembrancer. Sir,

YOUR Caen correspondent L. seems surprised to find a false translation of 2 Cor. v. 18, 19, in the French Testament circulated by the Bible Society. His astonishment will, perhaps, be increased when he is informed that this is by no means a rare occurrence, either in the Society's French or many other translations. Their Islandic Testament has been "revised and corrected," till it is said that the honest unsophisticated beings for whose use it was principally designed, have in their simplicity declared, that "it broke their hearts" to see the liberties that had been taken with their Scriptures. And their Spanish Testament has undergone a similar treatment, till it is nearly unintelligible to Spaniards.

All these "revisions and correc-' tions" are, no doubt, like those of their French Testament, made from

the Greek text;" and a Society which has such a laudable dread of the contaminating effects of notes and comments, will be more than ordinarily careful that the Sacred Text be not sophisticated in the translating this would be polluting the waters of life at their very source, and consequently they never translate from a translation, but always from the original, as well as revise and correct by it. Their French Testament is however an exception to this rule; which, although on the title. page it is said to have been " revised and corrected with care after the Greek text," is, in fact, servilely translated word for word, errors and all, from Diodati's Italian translation, which is chiefly remarkable for its ultra-calvinistic constructions; a recommendation to the Bible Society, perhaps, which Martin's French translation may not possess. Diodati's translation of the passage in question, is as follows:

"Ora il tutto è da Dio, che ci ha ricon ciliati a se, per Gesù Cristo, ed ha dato a noi il ministerio della riconciliazione.Poichè Iddio si riconciliò il mondo, in Cristo, non imputando loro i lor falli; e pose in noi la parola della riconciliazione.”

re

I do not mean to affirm that " vised and corrected with care after the Greek text," as it stands on the title e-page of the Society's French Testament necessarily includes, strictly speaking, that it was also translated from the original Greek, although I think it calculated to convey this impression. But I think it must appear to every one to amount to a guarantee on the part of the Bible Society, that a very faulty translation had not been adopted for their text book, and the original Greek only resorted to for correcting the press. But even in this humble capacity, after a toler rably careful search, I cannot find that the Society have made any great use of the original Greek; for as far as I can discover, they stick close to Diodati, and make common cause

with him through good report and through evil report, even in his most violent aberrations from the ori ginal, so that their "revised and corrected with care after the Greek text," amounts to neither more nor less than a bookseller's puff.

If you express any distrust to a member of the Bible Society, either of the qualifications or disinterestedness of their translators, or of the accuracy of their translations, the only reply you get is, Look at the Archbishops, Bishops, and other Dignitaries associated with us. But these Right Reverend and Reverend Divines, I fear, have little sway over the Society's proceedings. They leave their Episcopal authority with their hats and great coats in the passage when they attend the Committee-Room, and the vote of a calvinistic or socinian dissenter will at any time neutralize that of an Archbishop. It is, therefore, in vain for your correspondent to hope that these Prelates can be any check upon the dissemination of corrupt translations or the consequent proBesides, pagation of Socinianism. it may be fairly questioned, whether the rapid strides of Socinianism” be so ungenial to the sentiments of the Bible Society as your corres pondent seems to imagine. Certain it is, that no two persuasions make more frequent exchanges of proselytes than Calvinism and Socinianism, a notable instance of which is recorded in your Remembrancer for September. The two creeds are separated. but by thin partitions. The Calvinist never blushes openly to affirm, that the sacraments of his Redeemer are not means of grace; that baptism has no regenerating influence; that the Lord's Supper has no renewing effect; with him they are only badges, tokens, signs, symbols, any thing but reality; and thus Christ having failed in endowing his sacraments with spirituality, the obvious inference is, had he the power? was he divine?

Up to this point, or nearly the

its list of books this very Testament deemed by your correspondent so objectionable. I allow, that if any authorised version were heretical, it would be blameable in this or any other Society to circulate it; and such was actually the view taken by our Committee, who when solicited to print the Bible for Geneva, stipulated that it should be Ostervald's, and not the one in use in that Canton. Ostervald's version has, no doubt, like other human works its mistakes; but certainly the instance selected is an unfortunate one, for great authorities might be urged in favour of Ostervald's translation. It is rendered in the same manner in the Zurich translation, in Diodati's, in De Sacy, and in Cal. met, and certainly such respectable names, to which others might be added, are sufficient to vindicate the Society from the charge either of a mischievous design or of gross negli gence in sanctioning the version in question.

I am, Sir,
Your humble servant,

Oxford, Oct. 19, 1821.

M.

To the Editor of the Remembrancer. PERMIT me Sir, through the medium of your pages, to make a few comments on a passage from Mr. Wilson's Sermon on the Death of the late Rev. J. Scott, quoted in the thirty third Number of the Remem. brancer, p. 560, in which after giving a sketch of the principles and practice of the deceased, he concludes with these words: "Now I

ask whether any fair solution can be given of such a case but the truth of the principles from which it sprung?"

It is with extreme regret I perceive an intelligent and exemplary

This is a mistake: the translation

man (for such I esteem Mr. Wilson to be) drawing an inference which every reflecting observer of times and histories must know full well to be one which if pursued to its consequences would lead of necessity to bigotry or scepticism; the infidel will gladly avail himself of an assertion upon which he may establish an argument of no inconsiderable weight against some of the most valuable and vital doctrines of Revelation.

I wish not to give offence to any individual who from conscientious motives may have adopted the peculiarities of the creed in question. Whatever may be my own opinion as to its merits or demerits, I will if you please admit with Mr. Wilson that the doctrines of Mr. Scott contained whatsoever things were true, whatsoever things were honest, whatsoever just, or whatsoever pure.

But having admitted. this, if Mr. Wilson's solution is equally admissible, thousands with myself must be forced to the awful conclusion that as long as other characters can be found pursuing a course lovely and virtuous as Mr. Scott's, as piously sought, as conscientiously adopted though influenced by opinions diametrically opposite, the Deity has vouchsafed no certain guide to direct our steps, and that all is doubt and error: for alter, pervert, entangle the question at pleasure, the substance remains unchanged. If the only fair solution of a case similar to Mr. Scott's, viz, exalted purity and piety resulting from the adoption of certain principles and opinions, be that they are founded on truth, where is the

pure and pious man of a different persuasion who has not a right to consider his own creed stamped with the mark of certainty. And where is the sceptic who may not with equal confidence amidst the contradictory assumptions of the divided followers of Christianity

tian Knowledge is that of Martin. Ep.

ring guide from which there can be