lieve, the Greek church. From these forins the life had mainly gone out, and the object was to pour the light and heat of divine truth upon them, that those which would bear the application might be revivified and remain, and that what would not bear the test might be removed. Heaven smiled upon the labors of the missionaries, gave them success, and won for them the confidence of the people. A bishop of the Nestorian church visited this country, in company with one of the missionaries. He was asked by those who were interested in such matters, if any attempt had been made to disturb their ancient order of church government. His reply was, that not a stone of the church edifice had been touched. Noble testimony! And the halo of glory becomes still more resplendant when we understand that this Nestorian bishop was threatened with exclusion from the catholic heart of American Episcopacy, if he would not abandon those who had hazarded their lives to teach him and his people the way of God more perfectly, without of fering to move a single stone in their ecclesiastical structure.

These are some of the more obvious grounds on which we claim for the churches and the Congregationalism of New England, a legitimate descent from the patriarchal church in the direct line of the apostles and prophets. We are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh.

Some in our own times have seem. ed disposed to render Congregationalism more sectarian in its spirit, and more aggressive in its operations. If it be wished to make the churches only more coy of the tricks of proselytism, and better able to advocate the cause of a free and spiritual religion, there may be good reason for the movement; but for ourselves, we desire nothing more, at this point, except that all the mem

bers of the Congregational churches may fully understand the nature and tendency of the concision, so that they may have no temptation to resort to it in self-defense. Let them beware of the concision; and if that does not make them Congregationalists, we will be content with their being Christians. Nor would we establish on the walls of Zion an ecclesiastical sectary, if we could. To extend the boundaries of Congregationalism, it is only necessary that the watchmen upon her watchtowers should beware of the concision, and the world will, sooner or later, know the spirit and power of Congregationalism, even if it does not adopt their name and form. Before her, as she comes up from the wilderness, leaning on the arm of her beloved, the firmest and proudest hierarchies that were ever reared upon the footstool of Jehovah will melt away and ultimately perish, as by an invisible hand.

Much pains has been taken to fix reproach upon those who consecrate their offspring to God in baptism, as if they must, of course, symbolize with the Jewish Christians, who insisted upon circumcision in order to Church membership; and for us to assert our right to be regarded as the circumcision, seems to be suffi cient ground for suspicion. But, like the Apostle and his associates, we are neither gulled nor offended with the word. As it was a term appropriated by the early Christians, we have no doubt that it is capable of an unobjectionable construction. We are therefore the circumcision; not because we are the observers exclusively of any life-giving forms, or know of any particular form of church government which has exclusively letters patent from on high, but because we worship God in the spirit. We are the circumcision; for we rest in no succession or natural descent for acceptance with God, but we rejoice in Christ Jesus. We are the circumcision; for we

have no confidence in washing away the filth of the flesh as to the saving of the soul, but require that it should be the answer of a good conscience towards God. With us, natural descent from pious parents has not been a passport to the privileges of the divine household. Credible evidence of spiritual legitimacy is invariably sought for and demanded. No body of men has been more cautious, or exacted more in the candidates admitted to the hospitalities of God's house. Let the reproach, therefore, be fixed where it belongs; on those who make the mode of a form, or the manner of church organization an indispensable term of communion. We have no such custom, nor has the true circumcision any such mark.

And what a broad platform does this view of the matter place before us, on which to preach the gospel of the kingdom!—to besiege the consciences of sinners!—and to batter down the fortresses of formalism! A minister taking this position may truly have a single eye; for he does not need to look hither and thither, lest those who come to Christ at the call of the gospel should not come under this arch, or through that pool -he does not need to be anxious lest this laver or that turret should be forgotten or misplaced. He can take his stand before the sinner's conscience, armed with spiritual weapons, not to take him through a set of forms, but to take possession of him for God, and in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Does he appear entrenched in a rampart of

forms, and ask whether he shall surrender by going down the banks of Jordan, or by passing under the hands of the bishop, we do not say either or neither. But we say, surrender your hearts to God, to be renewed by the holy spirit and washed in the blood of Christ-surrender yourself and yours, to be used for your Redeemer's glory.

In conclusion, then, let us ask our readers, here and now, if they have anything to say why their souls should not be the subjects of this salvation? We come not to introduce them into the kingdom through an imposing display of Gothic architecture, nor by training them in through a rich variety of graceful ceremonies-for they might be tempted to forget whether these belong to the material or the spiritual world. We would introduce them at once through the parted vail of the Savior's flesh, by which the eyes of his followers were holden for a time-to the things of the spirit. The great Master and Teacher, when on earth, did not select the strange and the beautiful as the indicators of his grace. Ye have this treasure in earthen vessels. We are only as the clay spread upon the eyes of the blind-the fingers of flesh inserted in the ears of the deaf-and as the voice of the Son of Man at the sleeping place of the dead. Now, then, while the Holy Ghost condescends to make use of us to anoint your eyes, to probe your ears, and to sound the alarm over the slumbers of your tomb, look up-be openedhear! and your souls shall live.

ALMOST every man in this country has read Dr. d'Aubigné's three first volumes of the History of the Reformation, as many have read, or are reading, the fourth, published within the last year,-the volume before us is a collection of this author's sermons and tracts, written and published on various occasions, and forming a very pleasant miscellany for all such as care for truth, and who would also obtain a further idea of a man, who has, within these few years, become so widely and favorably known.

There is prefixed to this volume -prepared by his friend, Dr. Baird -a brief yet interesting memoir of its author, in which we notice with singular interest the fact, that Dr. d'Aubigné's blood and stock are, by a sort of necessity, anti-Romish, and Protestant; since his ancestors, for three or four generations back, have been the objects of Rome's abhorrence, and consequent persecution. We take from this brief memoir the following:

"John Henry Merle (or, as he is called in England and this country, Merle d'Aubigné,) was born in the city of Geneva, in the year 1794. Consequently he is a little more than forty-eight years of age.

"Although a Swiss by birth, Dr. Merle is of French origin. His family, like that of many of the inhabitants of Geneva, is descended from Huguenot ancestors, who were compelled to leave their native country because of their religion, and to take refuge in a city upon which one of their countrymen, John Calvin, had been the instrument, under God, of conferring the blessings of the Reformation.

"The great-grandfather of the Rev. Dr. Merle d'Aubigné, on his paternal side, was John Lewis Merle, of Nismes. About the epoch of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, (1685,) this worthy man, who was a sincere Protestant, fled from his country, and took refuge in Switzerland,

*D'Aubigné, and his Writings: with a sketch of the life of the author, by Rev. Robert Baird, D. D. New York, Baker & Scribner, 1846.

His son, Francis Merle, married, in the year 1743, Elizabeth, the daughter of a Protestant nobleman residing in Geneva, whose name was George d'Aubigné. Agreeably to a usage which exists at Geneva, and, I believe, in many other por tions of Switzerland, by which a gentleman adds the name of his wife to his

own, in order to distinguish him from other persons of the same name, Mr. Francis Merle appended that of d'Aubigné to his own, and was known as Francis Merle d'Aubigné. Since his day, the d'Aubigné. At least this was the case family have retained the name of Merle

with the son of Francis Merle,-the father of our author,- -as well as with our author himself.

whose daughter Elizabeth, became the "George d'Aubigné, just mentioned, wife of Francis Merle, was a descndant of Theodore Agrippa d'Aubigné, who left France in the year 1620, on account of Agrippa d'Aubigné was no common man. This Theodore religious persecution. The old chroniclers call him un Calviniste zélé, si oneques il en fut; 'a zealous Calvinist, if there ever was one.' He bought the domain of Lods, near Geneva, on which he built the Château of Crest, which still remains. The old Huguenot warrior handled the pen and the lyre as well as the sword; and his Tragiques, a poem full of life and genius, drew a vivid picture of the court of the imbecile Henry III. of France, and his infamous mother, Catherine de Medici. His Historie Universelle de la fin du 16me Siècle_had the honor of being publicly burnt at Paris in the year 1620, by order of Louis XIII. He wrote also the Confession de Saucy, and several other works. It is related of him, that, at the age of eight years, he knew well both the Latin and the Greek

languages. At the age of fourteen he went to Geneva, to finish his studies in the "Academy," or University, of that city. Having completed his course in that Institution, he returned to France; whence, as has been stated, he was compelled to fly in the year 1620. Upon establishing himself at Geneva, he became allied by marriage, with the families of the Burlamachi and Calandrini, two of the most honorable families in that city, both of Italian origin; for Geneva was a "City of refuge" to persecuted and exiled Protestants of Italy as well as of France.

"Francis Merle d'Aubigné had many children, one of whom Amit Robert Merle

d'Aubigné, was born in 1755, and was the father of three sons; the oldest and the youngest of whom are respectable merchants in this country-the former in New York and the latter in New Orleans -and the second is the Rev. Dr. Merle d'Aubigne, the subject of this notice. Amie Robert Merle d'Aubigné had a strong desire in his early years to consecrate his life wholly to the service of his God; and his parents allowed him to pursue the studies requisite for the right discharge of the office of the ministry of the gospel. But on his father's death, his uncle and guardian, par un caprice qui fit le malheur de ma jeunesse,' (through a caprice which rendered my youth miserable,) as he says in his memoir, written for his oldest son, William, caused him to give up his studies and embrace other pursuits.

"The end of this excellent man was truly tragical and deplorable. In the year 1799 he went on an important commercial mission, to Constantinople and Vienna. On his return from the latter city to Geneva, through Switzerland, in the autumn of that year, he was met on the road near Zurich, by the savage and infuriated hordes of Russians, who had recently been defeated by the French forces under the command of Massena, and by them was cruelly murdered!

"His widow, who is still living in Geneva in a vigorous old age, devoted all the energies of an active and enlightened mind to the care of her fatherless children; and now daily thanks God for having supplied her with the means of giving them a liberal education.

"The preceding paragraphs will suffice to give the reader some knowledge of the ancestors of the subject of this biographical sketch."-pp. 13-15.

From the above it would seem that Dr. d'Aubigné has a sort of right to be Protestant in self-defense, even if there were not in his own life and individual convictions and conscience other reasons, why the system of Evangelical truth, as taught in Protestant churches and countries, should find him one of its chiefest lovers and defenders.

To give some idea of d'Aubigné himself, and also as affording interesting information, in respect to the Protestant Seminary with which he is connected at Geneva, we quote again from Dr. Baird.

"The Rev. Dr. Merle d'Aubigné was educated in the Academy'-or, as it is more commonly called by strangers, the VOL. IV.

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University-of his native city. After having completed the course of studies in the Faculties of Letters and Philosophy, he entered that of Theology. I am not certain as to the time when he finished his preparations for the ministry; but believe that it was about the year 1816.

"The Theological Faculty in the Academy of Geneva, when Dr. Merle d'Aubigné was a student, was wholly Socinian in its character. Whatever were the shades of difference in regard to doctrine, which prevailed among its professors, they all agreed in rejecting the proper divinity of the Savior and of the Holy Spirit, salvation through the expiatory death and intercession of the former, and regeneration and sanctification by the influences of the latter. With these cardinal doctrines of the Gospel, others which are considered by all Evangelical Christians to be fundamental in the system of their faith, were also renounced. Alas, the same state of things exists at this day, in the school which Calvin founded, and in which that great man, as well as Beza, Francis Turrettin, Pictet, and other renowned men taught the youth, who gathered around them, the glorious doctrines of the Gospel and the reformation.

"It was under such instruction that Dr. Merle pursued his studies for the sacred ministry. But it pleased God to send a faithful servant to Geneva about the time that he was completing his theological training. This was Mr. Haldane of Edinburgh, a wealthy and zealous Christian, who still protracts a long and useful life, which has been spent in the service of his Master. This excellent man, deploring the errors which prevailed in the theological department of the Academy, endeavored to do what he could, during the sojourn of a winter, to counteract them. For this purpose he invited a number of young men to his rooms in the hotel in which he lodged, and there, by means of an interpreter at first, he endeavored to teach them the glorious Gospel. In doing this he commented on the Epistle to the Romans at much length. God blessed his efforts to the salvation of some ten or twelve of them.

"Seldom has it happened that an equal number of young men have been converted about the same time, and in one place, who have been called to perform so important a part in building up the kingdom of Christ. One of these men was the excellent Felix Neff, of blessed memory. Another was the late Henry Pyt. The greater part of them, however, still live

and Switzerland. But none of them have to adorn and bless the church in France become more celebrated than the subject of this notice.

"Not long after his ordination, Dr. Merle set out for Germany, where he