We

general information may be referred to with advantage. propose, in continuation of our Colonial Notices, to give so much of the detail from time to time as may appear important, and thus keep before our readers the general subject, pending a more particular survey at some future opportunity. The various foreign relations of our church, whether considered in its more strictly Colonial character, or with reference to its Missions among the heathen, can only be understood by a patient attention to detail: and having offered some general remarks on the great importance of the subject as connected with the vast extent of our Colonial Dependencies, the Colonial Episcopate. and Educational training, it may be useful perhaps to dissect a little this wide-spread map, and trace, in the first instance, the operations of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, as described in these parallel series of documents.

We shall begin with the Church in Canada and the other Provinces of British North America, which, as the Society's Report for 1845 states, "is yearly assuming a more organized form, educating her own clergy, and making provision for their permanent maintenance. From having been exotic, so to speak," the Report proceeds, "she is becoming indigenous: and though in respect to the new burdens which are cast upon her by a poor emigrant population, she must still look to the mother country for pecuniary aid, it is a good sign that she even now scarcely requires our assistance in regard to men. Indeed, not only are the two Canadian Dioceses furnishing a due supply of persons fitly qualified to serve in the ministry of the settled parishes, but they are even sending out missionaries among the scattered population of the forest." Such is the view of what we may call the Home Government touching the Canadian Church. The importance of the statement will be obvious. We wish we could more heartily respond to the unqualified commendation which it expresses. But we must not prejudge the question, and shall therefore pass on to the summary detail furnished by the documents touching the Church in Canada. The other Provinces of British North America may supply matter for a separate notice.

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velly, and Diocese of Madras.-No. II. Mission of Edeyen Roady, in the District of Tinnevelly. No. III. Mission of Sawyerpooram, Part 2.-No. IV. Mission of Cawnpore, in the Diocese of Calcutta.-No. V. Mission of Nazareth, in the District of Tinnevelly, and Diocese of Madras.-No. VI. Mission of Lake Huron.-No. VII. Mission of Sawyerpooram, Part 3. These Numbers are published at a low cost, varying from 2d. to 1s. The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel has published also a very useful Colonial Church Atlas, arranged in Dioceses; with Geographical and Statistical Tables and a Colonial and Missionary Church Map of the World; showing the Dioceses and Missionary Statistics, upon Mercator's Projection. Also Maps of the Colonies. 1. British North America. 2. British India. 3. Australia. 4. British West Indies.

Nos. 1 and 2 on our list have been referred to in a former article, and will require but a brief notice. We connect them with No. 9 of the Series in our present article as necessary to an outline view of the Church in Canada, and as bringing down its history so far as the Society's documents carry us. They contain very useful maps of the two dioceses of Quebec and Toronto, and a variety of statistical information. The Journals of our Colonial Bishops are obviously documents of great importance, and will form in some respects the best materials for the History of the Church in their vast dioceses. Several of them may be found in the Annual Reports of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel. The present scries, so far as we know, are the only ones which have been published in a separate form.

The Diocese of Quebec ought properly perhaps to take precedence of that of Toronto, but as we have already called attention (in part) to the latter, it may be well at once to conclude our notice.

First of all, however, let us give a brief view of the History of the Canadian Church from its first establishment, with the general statistics as stated in the above documents.

The following passage from the Bishop of Toronto's Primary Charge in 1841, (the See was erected and the Bishop consecrated in 1839), " contains," the Preface observes, "a summary of the previous history of the Canadian Church: "

"The history of the Church in this diocese, though doubtless resembling that of many other colonies, is not without peculiar interest. Many years after its first settlement, as the favourite asylum of suffering loyalty, there was but one clergyman of the Church of England within its extensive limits. This highly-revered individual came into the diocese in 1786, and settled at Kingston, in the midst of those to whom he had become endeared in the days of tribulation,-men who had fought, and bled, and sacrificed all they possessed in defence of the British Constitution,-and whose obedience to the laws, loyalty to their sovereign, and attachment to the present state, he had warmed by his exhortations and encouraged by his example. The Rev. Dr. Stuart may be truly pronounced the father of the Church in Upper Canada, and fondly do I hold him in affectionate remembrance. He was my support and adviser on my entrance into the ministry, and his steady friendship, which I enjoyed from the first day of our acquaintance to that of his lamented death, was to me more than a blessing.

"In 1792, two clergymen arrived from England: but so little was then known of the country, and the little that was published was so incorrect and so unfavourable, from exaggerated accounts of the climate, and the terrible privations to which its inhabitants were said to be exposed, that no missionaries could be induced to come out. Even at the commencement of 1803, the diocese contained only four clergymen, for it was in the spring of that year, that I made the fifth.

"It might have been expected that, on the arrival of the Right Rev. Dr. Mountain, the first Lord Bishop of Quebec, the clergy would have rapidly increased but, notwithstanding the incessant and untiring exertions of that eminent prelate, their number had not risen above five in Upper Canada so

late as 1812, when it contained upwards of 70,000 inhabitants. In truth, the colony, during the wars occasioned by the French Revolution, seemed in a manner lost sight of by the public. .

"From this period, the prospects of the Church in Canada steadily brightened. In 1819, the clergy in this diocese had increased to ten. In 1825, they had arisen to twenty-two-in 1827, to thirty-in 1833, to forty-nineand our numbers have now (1841) reached ninety."

The last statistical return, made up to June 6, 1844, gives, we observe, 105 clergymen, including the bishop, chaplains, and 47 missionaries of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel. The number of churches is 147, and the average attendance at all the churches and stations 32,249, out of a Church-of-England population of 106,567. The greatest number of communicants at one time (for 123 churches) is given at 5,993. Generally—

"Canada West" (we quote the Preface to No. 1.) "is divided into 324 townships, each of them averaging an area of 100 square miles-but in 80 of them only is any clergyman to be found (1843). The entire population of the province exceeds 500,000, and is rapidly increasing. Nearly 40,000 persons went out to settle there in the year 1842. Being for the most part poor agricultural labourers, they are in a great degree dependent upon their fellow-countrymen at home for the means of public worship, and of education for their children: and those who shall contribute to supply this want, may be the instruments, under a gracious Providence, of maintaining the cause of undefiled religion among a people destined to become the founders of a great and populous empire."

While touching on the statistics of the diocese of Toronto, it may not be unseasonable to state that, as one of the missions of the Gospel Propagation Society, its cost to the Society, for 1844, was as follows:

From this sum about £600 should be deducted, paid out of the clergy-reserves, and from the funds of the Upper Canada Clergy Committee. The rest falls upon the Society. The clergy not thus provided for are, we presume, parochial incumbents, chaplains, and the bishop in part. It would seem, however, that the voluntary contributions of the diocese towards local and missionary objects are by no means inconsiderable.

"We are indeed few," writes the Bishop, "and our people are scattered over a wide surface, and, for the most part, struggling with the forest and a very hard climate, for a scanty subsistence: but they begin to give, even out of their poverty: and this spirit will, it is hoped, greatly increase.......Our Church Society is endeavouring to mature a plan which, if successfully car

ried out, will enable us to increase our travelling missions to twelve or fourteen. This is a noble effort. Such a number labouring in the destitute back settlements will be of infinite advantage in collecting our scattered people, and preserving them in the Church. We may not be able to employ this number at once, but I feel assured, with God's blessing, that, in a little time-say within two years-the plan will be in full operation."

No. 1., as the title indicates, is a Journal of the Bishop's Visitation of the western portion of his Diocese, in the autumn of 1842. It was commenced July the 19th, and completed October 3rd.

"During my absence from Toronto," the Bishop states, "I consecrated two churches and one burial-ground, confirmed 756 persons at 24 different stations, and travelled, including my journeys for the formation of district branches of the Church Society, upwards of 2500 miles."

Such is the summary. Detail we have given in a former notice, so far, at least, as was necessary to illustrate the tone of the journal, and the spirit in which the bishop's diocese is administered. There are however some interesting references to the native Indians, which we would gladly quote; but it strikes us that we may do this with more effect in a distinct notice of this branch of the Society's missions to the heathen, which we hope soon to give in connection with Mr. O'Meara's "Report of a Mission to the Ottahwahs and Ojibwas on Lake Huron." The subject is a very interesting one, and deserves more attention than it has received. We shall therefore postpone this part of the Bishop's Journal, and content ourselves at present with a single brief extract, recalling the attention of our readers to the point of main interest and importance, as regards the diocese of Toronto-we mean the views of the Bishop touching the Church and Dissent.

"We remark, far and wide," his Lordship observes, "the prevalence of religious division, and its attendant is too frequently, in this diocese, a feeling of hostility to the Church of England, Both are to be lamented and deplored: the one is almost the necessary consequence of the other. The very rights of an Institution which claims to be apostolic and divine, and the assertion of whose principles is met, in general, by no better argument than invective, is sure to create jealousy and animosity in the minds of those who are conscious of having no foundation themselves to build upon, and who, when pressed for reasons, are compelled to acknowledgments which imply, in fact, that there is no such thing as a visible Church at all. And the very maintenance of such an Institution, is always a rebuke as well as a restraint upon the rampant spirit of division; while this spiritual citadel stands there in its strength, the advocates of religious disunion are forced to manifest more exertion in their proceedings: for to that citadel, experience assures us, not a few of the sober-minded are in the habit daily of resorting, who have become tired and distressed by the discord and animosity of rival sects and parties. But we must be just in our estimate of the causes of this religious dissension, and the unprovoked hostility which is so frequently manifested towards the Church of England. The people at large have not been made acquainted with her tenets, and have not had a fair opportunity of observing the working of her principles: we must not wonder, then, if misconceptions should have prevailed, and that these have been deepened and extended

through the selfish practices of agitators. Religious instruction, according to the doctrine and discipline of the national Church, was not made to keep pace with the settlement and population of the country: no clergymen were appointed to the several townships, as they became peopled, therefore the inhabitants of these townships necessarily grew up in ignorance of the Church. And if the teachers of various forms of doctrine occupied the ground to which the lawful ministers of the Church should have been appointed, it is not likely that such ignorance should be allowed to remain a passive feeling. The moment that ground was conceived to be trespassed upon by the lawful minister, it would become a matter of expediency and interest to paint the Church in the blackest colours, and, by the most unscrupulous misrepresentations, where honest argument failed-as it ever must fail-to alienate from her every heart, and render her, if possible, an object of suspicion and dislike.

"Such results cannot be wondered at: and when we fairly review their causes, it becomes us to be guarded in our condemnation of those who have admitted the prejudice, and indulged in the animosity against the Church. Of her friends, and especially of her ministers, it is clearly the duty to endeavour to disabuse them of such prejudice; and the experience of the last few years brings the complete assurance that we have only to develope the principles and pourtray the excellences of the Church, to convert the assailant into an advocate-the persecutor into a friend."-(Journal, pp. 37-39.)

Omitting comment upon these remarks, (as we have already noticed the point), we would simply observe in regard to the diocese generally, that we heartily concur in the statement of the Society's report for last year, that "all who desire to see the borders of Christ's kingdom extended through the instrumentality of the Reformed Church of England, will look with especial interest to this great diocese (the diocese of Toronto). Upper Canada is a country of vast extent; (100,000 square miles), blessed by Providence with a rich soil and many natural advantages. It is that colony in which the British population is most rapidly increasing, and which seems destined, ere long, to become a powerful and populous state. It is, therefore, of the utmost importance, with a view not merely to the present settlers, but to all future generations, that the foundation of their social system should be laid in the faith and fear of God-in the religious education of the young, and the full and frequent ministration of the word and sacraments to all." When we consider indeed how probable it is that the principles impressed upon the minds of the first colonists in a new country will be transmitted to successive generations, and how rapidly population increases in a young settlement, these remarks must commend themselves at once as in the highest degree reasonable and weighty. "The total population of the North American colonies, at the time when the Church established its first mission on the shores of New England, in 1702, is computed to have been 250,000; at the Declaration of Independence, it was about 3,000,000; it amounts now to 17,000,000 and should the same ratio of increase continue (of