which it would have given him, but arrayed himself in an attitude of most determined hostility to its truth and influence. Such, however, is the fact, for Owenism presents itself as the dire antagonist of the religion of Jesus. Whe ther or not its author has ever studied that religion in its own unadulterated qualities, I am unable to say, but certainly his hostility is as indiscriminating as it is decided. To no small extent, indeed, is Owenism, in its bearing on religion and morality, an attempt to erase all the impressions which hold the first rank in the religion of Christ. It sets aside, with no gentle hand, the disclosures which it makes respecting the Deity, a future life, man's responsibility, and the sanctity of marriage, and ascribes to the prevalence of the Christian religion most of the evils which infest society. 'In one thousand eight hundred and eighteen,' I quote Mr Owen's words, I proclaimed that ignorance and error, crime and folly, had their sources in the different religions of the world.' 'I now denounce the marriages of the old world, as I then denounced its religions.'* "Such, in brief, is the character of the assailant whom I would endeavour to repel. I offer no apology for entering on a task, which, howsoever, unpleasant, the actual condition of society, at least in this vicinity, seems to render necessary; and if I can succeed in rescuing one person from the demoralizing tendency of this new philosophy, or show one person a safer and more useful path, I shall consider my efforts not ill rewarded." We cannot conceive of a better antidote to atheistic unbelief than this work of Dr Beard's. It is popularly written, so much so as to make it level to the capacity of the most ignorant and prejudiced of the masses, for whose use it is mainly designed. It should be in every Unitarian library. It is right that the specious sophistry of the sceptic should have its fitting answer published and ready at hand, for the use of the enquiring of our body, wherever a church is planted. However we may differ from the Owenite in curing the evils of the world, it must be admitted that its present state of misery is a great and appalling fact-a fact which should not be blinked at, but which every practical disciple of Jesus should look manfully in the face. Doubtless, its investigation involves questions highly intricate, but the great point for settlement is, are the principles of the sceptic or the Christian best adapted for the world's moral and social reformation-which opinion, or which theory, is best calculated *The Marriage System, p. 13. to extinguish wrong and exalt right, to expel selfishness and nourish benevolence, to change the damp and pestilential abode of poverty into the comfortable and happy home, to furnish the means of moral and intellectual improvement, to change the moody and discontented artisan, into the thankful, pious, and contented man? What is the history of the poor man? In the generality of cases, it is this :His parents are usually poor, ignorant, and superstitious. In infancy, he is stinted in the necessaries of life. The formation of his character is never thought of. The drunken revel is often exhibited before him during the week. On Sunday, he is taught his catechism. A belief in the infallibity of its teachings is impressed upon him. He gets to believe himself and fellow beings as a race of creatures utterly corrupt in nature and perverse in disposition; and as a punishment for being born in this way, doomed to everlasting physical, and mental torture, and that, as far as his own power is concerned, he has no chance of escape. If he be presumptuous in his nature, he fancies himself one of the elect. The reprobate he avoids. How can he, so pure and holy, look with else than scornful hatred on the doomed votary of vice and woe. If he be of modest nature and sensitive disposition, he will shrink from the idea of being one of the chosen few. Despair will enter his bosom; the drunkard's cup will become his solace, or his reason fails, and he is sent to the lunatic's cell. It sometimes happens that the parents of the poor man live wholly without God in the world. The shrewd and partially cultivated minds of the masses frequently exchange the absurdities of Calvin for those of Owen, it being seldom that pure Christianity is presented for their choice and acceptance. The consequence is, that we have rising amongst us a youthful race, without the advantage of moral training, rational religious instruction, or intellectual culture; or a race equally ignorant, but bred to adhere to a pernicious theology, which, however moral it may make its disciples, in some respects has the direct effect of making them narrow-minded, persecuting, and intolerant, and afraid to wander into the fields of impartial and truth-loving inquiry, lest their conviction of the truth of their creed suffer from the excursion. After a deep and careful consideration of the subject of society and its evils, we have arrived at the firm conviction that society can never be lifted up from the depths of selfishness and misery, unless from the prevalence of two doctrines, simple as they are sublime-the doctrines of the paternal character of God and the brotherhood of man. We, however, despair of these doctrines becoming prevalent enough to ameliorate our social evils, until an untrammelled and rational education become universal. The ignorant man will never cease being bigotted and prejudiced. It is only the enlightened portion of a community who have strength enough of will to distrust their nursery-bred convictions, and inquire for truth beyond the narrow circle of their creed-bound conventicles. Other reasons, doubtless, operate in stifling inquiry, but ignorance we believe to be its most powerful enemy. It not only hinders the will, but renders impotent the capacity. The crafty priest, taking advantage of its prevalence, holds up Unitarianism to the minds of its victims as a thing to be avoided, a frightful meteor, a lure into the paths of death. That, therefore, which they should cherish as their bosom friend, they repel as an insidious foe. It has always been so with the ignorant. The Jews cried, Crucify him, crucify him, in ignorance. The Holy One, for whose death they thus cried, was their greatest friend. It is an encouraging fact, however, and one which should cheer the Christian reformer, that education is making a sure, though slow and silent progress. It will be seen, from the preceding remarks, that we think social must proceed from Christian reform, and that any outward prosperity, apart from intellectual and moral improvement, is not desirable, although it were possible to be obtained. For which reason, we despair of extreme poverty being permanently cured until purer principles of religion and morals than now prevail obtain a universal hold over the judgments and affections of men. We have pointed out the means of accomplishing this. Let all, then, who feel for the poor man-and who does not feel for him, as he beholds him plunged in intemperance and ignorance, looks at his care-worn features, his attenuated frame, his heart-broken wife, his starving and squalid children, and miserable home?-let all who feel for him work for his redemption, moral, intellectual, and physical. Let each work in the way as seems to him best; but oh! let something be done, for a brother's blood may yet cry to us from the earth: our consciences may yet upbraid us for having seen him stinted of those means which were necessary to his eternal progress,-at which we shut our eyes and hardened our hearts, and did not help, while he who rejected Christ strove to cure the sources of his earthly misery. The Spoiled Child of the State. An Allegory, in illustration of National Establishments of Religion. By a Christian. London: John Chapman, 121 Newgate Street; Septimus Fletcher, 7 Cross Street, Manchester; John Wilson, Victoria Bridge, Salford. This is an excellent, beautiful, and spirit-stirring production. The characters are admirably drawn, and many of the scenes are quite overpowering. The reader is led on imperceptibly, until he becomes so interested with the subject, that he sees, as it were, the individuals by his side, and the circumstances taking place before him. We know not when a book has impressed us more; and no one, we should think, could read it without perceiving its truthfulness and applicability. It will unquestionably do great good, particularly at this critical period of our denominational affairs. Many, no doubt, will be induced to read it in its allegorical form, who would, perhaps, scarcely look at its truths under any other. We trust that it will be most extensively circulated; for the more it is known, the more good will be the result. Endeavours after the Christian Life. By James Martineau. (Continued from page 36.) The fourth sermon in this volume is entitled "Eden and Gethsemane." It opens by sketching the impressions received by the original human being, dropped silently at dawn from infinite night upon this green earth. They can never be repeated. "Worthily does the Bible open with the story of Eden, the fresh dawn, the untrodden garden, of our life." The preacher incidentally offers a metaphysical defence of dating the creation of the universe from the birth of Adam. He argues, that, whatever geologists may say, there could, in no intelligible human sense, be any universe till there was a soul filled with the idea thereof. This is both beautiful and ingenious; but it has not altered, and was not meant to alter, the well-established geological doctrine, that the material universe of suns, and stars, and worlds, is older than the human race. Greater, however, was the day of Christ's birth. To him it was given to observe, not how man is materially placed, but what he spiritually is: to shew us the Father, not as the great mechanist of the universe, but as the Holy Spirit moving us with the sigh of infinite desires. There is a fine parallel sketched between Adam and Jesus, which, however, would be spoiled if we attempted to extract a part. The preacher then passes over to the nature of man in which he finds Adam and Jesus,-the natural and the spiritual. The individual mind is conducted through a history like the sacred record of the general race it begins with paradise, and ends with heaven. Ere Jesus became the Christ, he was led into the desert to be tempted; and before the Messiah within us- -the Messenger Spirit of God in the soul-can make his inspiration felt, we too must have been called to severe and lonely struggles with the power of sin. There follows an animated picture of the spiritual resistance of a holy mind, which quickened our moral sympathies as we read, and to every word of which we gave an unhesitating and experimental acquiescence. Mr M. makes a fine use of the well-known fact that Christ was a nian of sorrows. He observes that so it is with the Christ within us. Heaven and God, says he, are best discerned through tears, scarcely, perhaps, discerned at all without them. It is this thought which is so well expressed in the following lines, ascribed to the noble pen of Lord Morpeth,-one who, by his personal worth, lends lustre to nobility: "How little of ourselves we know, Before a grief the heart has felt. The energies too stern for mirth, The reach of thought, the strength of will, 'Mid cloud and tempest have their birth,-- Through blight and blast their course fulfil ; And yet, 'tis when it mourns and fears, And through the mist of falling tears, We catch the clearest glimpse of heaven." With his customary tendency to trace things to their ultimate principles, the author shews that when the blow of calamity, or the sense of loss awakens the latent thought of God, this is only a particular instance of a general truth, namely, "that religion springs up in the mind wherever of the infinite affections and senses press severely against the finite conditions of our existence." Page 57. any We discover incidentally that Mr M. is an uncompromising opponent of the system of utilitarianism in morals. "Human nature, trained in the school of Christianity, |