tual sin committed by us after baptism, if we truly repent and convert anfeignedly again." The testimony of the Augsburg Confession is not less express. We have, on a former occasion, extracted a passage from the XXth Article, De Fide, which says, "Quanquam igitur contritio aliqua seu penitentia necessaria est, &c." and "Evangelium prædicat pœnitentiam nec existere fides potest nisi in his qui penitentiam agunt." Many other expressions of the same sentiment may be adduced. Art. XI. "De Pœnitentiâ docent, quod lapsis post baptismum contingere possit Remissio Peccatorum, quocunque tempore, cum convertuntur. Et quod Ecclesia-talibus, redeuntibus ad Pœnitentiam, impertire ab solotionem debeat." With what horror must the adversaries of the Necessary Erudition, find Luther and Melanchthon thus offering absolution to those who return to penance. They insist indeed upon the penance with the most Popish ignorance and obstinacy. "Cæterum de hac obedientià etiam docemus, eos qui admittunt peccata mortalia non esse justos, quia Deus requirit hanc obedientiam ut resistamus vitiosis affectibus. Qui autem non repug. nant, sed obtemperant eis contra mandatum Dei, et admittunt actiones contra conscientiam, hi sunt injusti, et neque spiritum sanctum neque fidem, id est fiduciam misericordiæ retinent. Nam in his qui delectantur peccatis nec agunt pænitentiam ne potest quidem fidu. cia existere quæ quærat remissionem peccatorum." Todd, p. 161. The same page also informs us, "in Evangelio promitti Spiritum Sanc. tum, qui animos eorum qui agunt Pænitentiam et Evangelio assentiuntur, adjuvet et gubernet." We have thus completed our de fence of the Necessary Erudition, or rather, of those' parts of it which were printed by Mr. Todd; In undertaking that defence we have also vindicated ourselves; for the criticism, of which so much has been said, was not directed against that not misquoted Collier, garbled Hooker, misrepresented Barrow, and falsely accused Mr. Todd of declaring that he preferred the Necessary Erudition to the Homilies. But as it is impossible that this challenge should be accepted, and we therefore must consider ourselves as taking a final leave of a work which has occupied more attention than it deserves, we shall here subjoin the answer that has been given to the statement in our 23d Number, p. 656, respecting a letter which appeared originally in the Christian Remembrancer, and was subsequently registered by the Christian Observer among the correspondence of the Church Missionary Society. The following note upon the subject appears among the answers to Correspondents, Christian Observer, p. 784. "We are obliged to a correspondent for pointing out to us a charge contained in a contemporary publication, of our having copied from their work a Letter from a Clergyman in India, which we inserted in our Number for August, (p. 561) under the head of Church Missionary Society, knowing it not to have been written by a friend or correspondent of that society. The simple fact is, that we had never seen the letter, except in the Missionary Register for July, (p. 283) where it appears under the general heading India within the Ganges: the testimony of a Clergyman to the rapid advance of the natives will be read with great pleasure: Great things,' he writes, are going on, &c. And there being no statement of its having appeared in any other quarter, we took it for granted that it was copied from the correspondence of some friend of the Church Missionary Society. The charge of an intentional mis-state ment of this kind, is as little plausible as courteous; for even if we were dishonest enough wilfully to attribute to one society the merit that belongs to another, we should hardly be so silly as to do it at the certain risk of prompt detection." Upon this statement we must offer a few short remarks, and we will do it openly in this place, with names and references at full length. The Answer to Correspondents says, we charged the Observer with inserting the letter, &c. knowing it not to belong to the Society to which it was ascribed. In the first place we made no such charge, but told a simple fact, from which such a charge might certainly be inferred. In the next place, the inference would not have been very incorrect, for the writer admits that he ascribed it to his favourite Society, not knowing, but taking it for granted, that it might come, or ought to come from that quarter. He must therefore be acquitted of stealing a purse; but having found a trinket upon the high road, he puts it in his pocket, and asks no questions. We beg leave, in the most courteous terms that we can select, to declare ourselves perfectly satisfied with this explanation; and we thank the Observer for having called our attention to the proceedings of the Missionary Register, which has been kind enough to give additional circulation to our correspondent's welcome tidings, and liberal enough to conceal the name of the Prelate and of the Society under whose auspices the good work of native education is making so much progress at Calcutta. At the same time we must beg leave to maintain that our former opinion, however erroneous, and however unpolite, was not merely plausible, but was such as the most unsuspicious man might be excused for entertaining, if he happened to be acquainted with the following circumstance. The letter in question formed part of our review of Bishop Middleton's Sermon at Prince of Wales's Island. And the very same Number of the Christian Observer in which the letter was reprinted, is also furnished with some extracts from that excellent discourse. Now as that discourse has never been offered for sale in Eng land, and every extract in the Observer is to be found in the Remembrancer, it appeared probable that the former had made a reprint from the latter; and not the slightest objection could be taken to such a proceeding. A letter then, and an extract from a sermon, both appeared in the same page of the Remembrancer in June, (p. 370, 371) and in August they re-appeared almost in the same page of the Observer, (p. 558. 561.) That this should have occurred without the conductors of the latter publication entertaining any suspicion of the circumstance, is as remarkable an instance of the power of chance, as we have ever yet seen upon re cord. Assuredly it was enough to excite and to justify a suspicion, (and the charge never extended beyond a suspicion) in one whose recollection was fresh from the perusal of Todd's Introduction, and Collier's History, and whose astonishment at the misrepresentations of which they were the subjects, had not yet had time to subside. The disagreeable dispute which has been forced upon us, being thus brought to an end, we conclude our remarks upon the anticalvinistic tendency of the Homilies, by the following short, but important passages upon the subject of final perseverance. "The thief that was hanged when Christ suffered did behieve only, and the most merciful God justified him. And because no man shall say again that he lacked time to do good works, for else he would have done them, true it is, and I will not contend therein: but this I will surely affirm, that faith only saved him. If he had lived, and not regarded faith and the works thereof, he should have lost his salvation again." Hom. On Good Works, p. 1. "For whereas God has shewed to all them that truly believe his Gospel, his face of mercy in Jesus Christ, which doth so lighten their REMEMBRANCER, No. 25. hearts, that they, if they behold it as they ought to do, be transformed to his image, be made partakers, of the heavenly light, and of his Holy Spirit, and be fashioned to him in all goodness requisite to the children of God: so, if they after do neglect the same, if they be unthankful unto him, if they order not their lives according to his example and doctrine, and to the setting forth of his glory, he will take away from them his kingdom, his holy word, whereby he should reign in them, because they bring not forth the fruit there. of that he looketh for." Hom. On Declining from God, "He saith" (of the vine that bears no fruit) "he will not cut it, he will not delve it, and he will command the clouds that they shall not rain upon it; whereby is signified the teaching of his holy word, which St. Paul, after the like manner, expressed by planting and watering, meaning that he will take that away from them, so that they shall be no longer of his kingdom, they shall be no longer governed by his Holy Spirit, they shall be put from the grace and benefits that they had, and ever might have enjoyed through Christ, they shall be deprived of the heavenly light and life which they had in Christ, whilst they abode in him; they shall be, as they were once, as men without God in this world, or rather in worse taking. And to be short, they shall be given into the power of the devil, which beareth the rule in all them that be cast away from God, as he did in Saul and Judas, and generally in all such as work after their own wills; the children of mistrust and unbelief. Let us beware, therefore, good Christian people, lest that we rejecting or casting away God's word, by the which we obtain and retain true faith in God, be not at length cast off so far, that we become as the children of unbelief." Hom. On Declining from God. C Thou shalt not let any of thy seed pass through the fire to Moloch." Levit. xviii. 21. “But he walked in the way of the kings of Israel, yea, and made his son to pass through the fire according to the abomination of the heathen whom the Lord cast out from before the children of Israel." 2 Kings xvi. 3. and 2 Kings xxi. 6. And they caused their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire, and used divinations and enchantments." 2 Kings xvii. 17. "We went through fire and through water." Psalm lxvi. 12. "He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire." Matt. iii. 12. "In some ancient Mexican hie. roglyphical paintings we trace the ceremonies practised on the birth of a child; the midwife invoking the gods who reside in the abodes of the blest, sprinkled water on the forehead, and the breast of the new born infant, and after pronouncing different prayers*, in which water was considered as the symbol of the purification of the soul, the midwife bade the children draw near who had been invited to give the child a name. In some provinces a fire was lighted at the same time, and the infant was seemingly made to pass through the flame, and undergo the double purification of fire and water. This ceremony reminds us of usages, the origin of which in Asia appears to be lost in the darkness of the remotest ages." Humboldt's Researches, Vol. I. p. 183. "The Natchey Indians are nations of Indians west of the Mississippi, who worship the sun, and used to offer to that luminary human sacrifices, which they consumed in fires attended by priests, whose office it was to renew and keep them up perpetually. Human sacrifice being forbidden by the United States, the Indians now make offer * Clayigero, vol. ii. p. 86. ings of the most valuable articles, sun, 盛 7 and often burn property to some thousand dollars amount. Their manner is on the adoration day to assemble round the eternal fire, as they call it, light a calumet, and present it to the sun. Then certain persons called children of the cast the sacrifice into the fire, and while it consumes, the warriors and f young men, women, and children, around." Ashe, Vol. III. in separate circles dance and sing p. 202. "The Indians have a feast of fire, during which, the zealous devotees among them walk on that element. On the last or eighteenth day, they assemble to the sound of instruments, their heads crowned with flowers, and their bodies besmeared with saffron, and follow their idols, which are carried in procession three times round a fire kindled to the honour of those deities. After this, the devotees actually pass through the fire, which is extended to about forty feet in length, walking through the flames slowly or quickly, according to their zeal, and often like the superstitious votaries of Moloch, carrying their children in their arms." Sonnerat's Voyages, p. 153. Maurice's Indian Antiquities, Vol. V. p. 708. "On the lofty eminences of the Carns, it was a custom amongst the Druids on May eve, to light up prodigious fires, in honour of beal or bealan, the Irish and Celtic word for the sun, and hence it arose that bealteine is still used for May day by the Highlanders of Scotland. Two of these fires, according to Toland, were kindled on May day, in every village of the nation, between which the men and beasts to be sacrificed were obliged to pass: one of them being kindled on the Carn, and the other on the ground. * Toland's Hist. of the Druids, Vol. I. p. 71. Maurice's Indian Antiquities, Vol. VI. p. 71. These fires were supposed to confer a sanctity upon those who passed through them, as was the intention in the Persian rites of Mithra when the candidate for initiation was alternately plunged in baths of fire, and water, at once to try his resolution, and to purify him. "In an idolatrous temple near Bereng, in Cashmire, the Persian historian says, at this place, the devotees surround themselves with fire till they are reduced to ashes, imagining they are by this act pleasing the deity." Ayber Akbery, Vol. II. p. 158. To the Editor of the Remembrancer. SIR, I HAVE long been convinced that the subject so ably treated by your Oxford Correspondent in the 19th Number of your Magazine, "on the Effects of the manufacturing System" is one of such vital interest to this nation, that it must sooner or later imperiously demand the attention of the public. I rejoice to find that the alarm has at length been given, and I fervently hope that some effectual measures will be taken, ere it be too late, to check the alarming growth of immorality and vice, unhappily so prevalent in the manufacturing districts of England. Having from my earliest infancy been continually resident in one of the principal manufacturing towns, and certainly the most populous district of England, I can bear positive testimony to the statement of your Correspondent with respect to the general demoralization of the people. The picture, however appalling, is by no means exaggerated. I had almost said it falls short of the reality. I have been an eye-witness to the facts which he relates, but it would be superfluous to attempt any addition to the lively representation he has given. Surely, then, it becomes the duty, as it is unquestionably the interest of all, who have any regard for the welfare of their country, or the peace of themselves, diligently to enquire into the causes of so extensive an evil, and devise some means of arresting its desolating progress. It is the duty of the Go-· vernment: for what permanent security can they expect against the machinations of traitors and conspirators, except from the sound and virtuous principles of the people. If these be tainted, if vice has ceased to disgust, if impiety be suffered to stalk abroad with unblushing front, if our holy religion be held up to derision, and sentiments of direct hostility to the ordi-' nances of God and man be openly avowed, where will hereafter be our defence against the enemies of order and good government? It is the duty, in a most especial manner, of the Clergy. They have a commission delegated from above. The souls of their flocks are in their hands, and they must one day answer for the use or abuse of this trust. It behoves them therefore to exert all the means they possess in endeavouring to trace this inundation of wickedness to its source, for until the causes which produce it are ascertained and removed, it is useless to attempt to stem the torrent. Yet I am reluctantly compelled to say, that too many of the Clergy of the Church of England slumber on their posts. Some there are, who far from co-operating with the exertions of their fellow labourers, even throw obstacles in their path, and who, unwilling to discharge their duty themselves, will not, from spleen or jealousy, suffer their more conscientious brethren to discharge their's; but there are far more, who, satisfied with fulfilling the mere routine of their office, and with giving no occasion to the ene mies of the Lord to blaspheme by unbecoming and immoral conduct, sit down in a pathetic indifference, without an effort to promote, by any |