conflict in the light. Socinianism, about Boston, already affects half the language of the church: it will probably be her next finesse to return to the whole Athanasian creed, with private meanings of her own.

ART. IV.-Essays on Various Subjects. By his Eminence CARDINAL WISEMAN. In three volumes. Vol. ii. London: Dolman. Pp. 494.

THE true spring of the English Reformation, and of whatever was new and distinctive in the religious life of the church and nation since that time, was the Word of God. As at Wittemberg, as at Zurich, as at Geneva, as at St Andrews, so was it emphatically here. The Bible reopened wide before the world, and re-enthroned within the Church of God,-that was the grand distinctive work of the men of that age, and their priceless legacy to all succeeding times. This was the one fulcrum on which rested the mighty lever that heaved the whole mediæval world from its foundations,-this the trumpetblast, at whose voice whole nations awoke and gathered together for a holy war, "because of truth, and meekness, and righteousness." It was the old seed of the eternal Word that was sown again broad-cast over the world, and sprung up over many lands in a fresh harvest of Pentecostal life and power. The English Reformation,-like every other true refor mation, whether in individual souls, or in nations and churches at large, was no mere organic change, hatched in cabinets or shaped in conclaves of bishops and doctors, but a living fire kindled in men's hearts by the same hand which sixteen centuries before had sent "fire upon the earth,"

It is of the utmost importance to keep this fact distinctly in view in every question which concerns the history, the principles, and the destinies of the Reformed Church of England. Thus alone can we understand its true genius, and the real source of its strength. We must remember that in its real essence and living spirit, it was not an institution, but a birth; and that not as one that should spring, Minerva-like, full-grown and full-armed, from the brain of a Henry or a Cranmer, but begotten" within the womb of earnest hearts, by the incorruptible Word of God. In point of fact, the movement was not only in its sources deeper, but in its date far anterior to those personal interests and political exigencies to which the malice of adversaries has striven to trace its origin. Latimer is already thundering forth his thrilling sermons from his pulpit

at Cambridge; Bilney is already poring in secret over the sacred page, or flits from house to house on errands of mercy amid the poor of the gospel flock; already are Protestant martyrs rotting in Oxford dungeons; already is John Tyndale skulking in foreign cities, and fleeing from town to town with the halfprinted sheets of his English Bible; already are bales of Bibles and Testaments arriving contraband at the harbour of the Thames, and eagerly bought up, passed from hand to hand, and devoured by greedy thousands;-thus already is the holy fire kindled, and is spreading far and wide,-years before the name of Cranmer had been heard in history, and while Henry VIII. still holds his place as the foremost champion of the Papal system. Henry, in short, for his own ends, availed himself of the Reformation spirit, not created it; and Cranmer and his coadjutors (a noble task in its place, but still not the highest) only gave form, and shape, and authoritative sanction to a principle which already existed as a living and triumphant power in the land, and which, with them or against them, must have still gone on conquering and to conquer.

Thus emphatically true it is that the Bible and the Bible alone is the religion of Protestants. The Bible, speaking directly home to the individual heart and soul, and interpreted and applied by the living Spirit of God, the Bible, the one test of truth, the one source of authority, the one spring of spiritual life and health,-the Bible, the one oracle of the living God, and mightiest instrument of his grace, that was the new wine which everywhere burst the old bottles of traditionary forms and dogmas, and which demanded the creation of new institutions to receive and conserve it for the use of all succeeding time.

This the Reformers in a great measure accomplished. Besides clearly enunciating in public deeds and formularies the principle of the sole authority of the Word of God, they endeavoured so to remodel the outward framework of the church as to give free scope to its operation. Whatever was manifestly contrary to its dictates, or palpably antagonistic to its spirit, they unsparingly removed. Here, however, they paused. In all other respects things were permitted to remain in great measure as they were. Unlike our Scottish Reformers, who with axe and mattock fairly cleared the ground, and dug their foundation anew for their new structure, our mitred and surpliced neighbours of the south were content to build on the old foundation, and work according to the old model; or rather, they left the shell of the old edifice standing, and only remodelled and refitted it as they thought best for the new inmate it was to receive, and the new purpose to which it was to be applied. We are not undervaluing the work of the English

Reformers. On the contrary, no one who remembers the state of things as they found them, and that in which they left them, and who takes into account the circumstances in which they did their work, can deny them the praise of having executed their task with a firm and an earnest hand. Let any one compare the Latin matins and vespers of the old ritual, with the vernacular morning and evening service; still more the pompous mass, with its endless bowings, crossings, genuflexions, kissings, turnings, unintelligible mutterings, and meaningless dumb-show, with the simple and scriptural majesty of the communion office; and let him call to mind the circumstances in which these men had to work, under the influence of old prejudices, a despotic court, and a divided people, and his wonder will be, not that they accomplished so little, but that they accomplished so much. Still the general contour and framework of the body ecclesiastical remained in many respects unchanged. Though no true Romish devotee could have be held that new temple without tears, yet there was much about it to remind him of former days. The episcopal and archiepiscopal thrones of the old sees; the majestic minsters and abbey churches of the old worship; the white-robed bands of prebendaries, canons, and youthful choristers, chanting as of old their matins and even-song; the Kyrie Eleisons, the litany, and the chanted psalm; the stone font and the altar rail; the glories of the stained window, and the pealing anthem; the feasts and fasts, and solemn commemorative days, in all this, albeit animated by another spirit and counterbalanced by other elements, there was much to revive in imaginative and susceptible minds the faint image at least of the gorgeous system that had passed away, and make men feel that the England of Edward and Elizabeth, all changed as it was, was still the England of Henry VII. and VIII. These things, indeed, occupy not now the place they did before. They form not now the essence and substance of the national religion. They are recognised and treated as the dress and drapery, not the living body of the church. Still they are there there in palpable form and presence. They stand forth before the eye as the marked features that go to constitute the distinctive visage of the Reformed English Church, and must continue to modify more or less the thoughts, feelings, ideas, and religious life of her members in successive generations. In short, from that moment and ever since, there have been two principles continually present and at work within the bosom of the Episcopal communion, and more or less acting and reacting on one another. The one is the Biblical, the other the Ecclesiastical,-the one the Evangelical, the other the Tradi tional,-the one magnifying the Gospel, the other magnifying

the Church; the one the glorious birth of the Reformation age, the other the inheritance of the ages of the past. The former is the spring of the low-church tendency in all its forms, the latter of the high-church element of every shade and degree.

We have now laid our hand on what we regard as the key to the whole question which forms the subject of the present paper. The two principles which we have now mentioned as so prominently marked in the constitution and working of the Church of England, are in truth more or less present and operative in every religious society. In every ecclesiastical community the religious life of the individual member is necessarily influenced on the one hand by the authority of the Word on his own heart and conscience, and on the other by the character of the body to which he belongs,-its forms of worship, its distinctive spirit, its traditionary opinions and principles. While we fully believe that an earnest soul might, through the sole guidance of the Word and Spirit of God, feel its way to the Cross, and thence to heaven; yet practically this is not the customary way of our education for eternity. The Church is a flock, not a multitude of isolated units; and, accordingly, however much broken into separate sections, its individual members do not, and cannot travel on separately one by one, but in groups and companies. Thus every one, however much he may magnify the supreme authority of the Word, and seek in all things to know and follow its dictates, does at the same time lean more or less upon his brethren, and the particular body to which he belongs. He is what he is, partly by what the Word and Spirit of God has made him, and partly by the influence which his own particular church-system or denomination has had upon him;-that is to say, the Biblical and Ecclesiastical principles have been both present and unitedly operative in moulding the particular form in which Christianity embodies itself in his case. The great and vital question here is, as to the degree in which these two principles are severally operative; which of the two constitutes, in a man's convictions and feelings, the dominant and controlling authority; to which he turns his eye as the tribunal of last appeal in adjusting his faith and guiding his practice; whether, in short, the Bible, speaking to the individual conscience through the power of the Spirit, is made to judge and control the Church, or whether the Church, by its dogmatic decisions and traditionary beliefs, is made to interpret and control the Bible. In the one case, we believe and act because God has in his Word declared and commanded; in the other, because the Church has authoritatively defined the dogmata of our belief and the rules of our practice. Both principles, indeed, as we have seen, may and will exercise an influence over us; but one or other must in the nature

of things be supreme. In the last resort we must either try the Church by the Bible, or interpret the Bible by the Church. On the one side, is Protestant truth and liberty; on the other, all Roman and Romanising error. The one is private judg ment-the other is authority. There may be many shades and degrees between the two principles carried out to their full and logical extent; but this is the border-line that divides the two regions from one another, the tropical circle, so to speak, which separates the torrid clime of despotic power and rankly-growing superstition from the temperate region of robust freedom, spiritual independence, and rational faith.

Let us now at once illustrate and apply this principle, by a brief examination of the leading points which enter into the great controversy which the volume at the head of this paper brings anew under review. The points we shall select are these three,-THE TEST OF TRUTH, THE PRINCIPLE OF UNITY, and SACRAMENTAL GRACE. These will be allowed by every one qualified to pronounce a judgment on the matter, to be the cardinal points on which the whole issue, as lying between Anglicans and Romanists, may be said to turn; and we shall be able, we think, demonstratively to show that in regard to each of these there is no tenable middle-ground between the full and loyal adoption of the Biblical principle of Protestantism on the one hand, and the Roman doctrine and claims of authority on the other.

1. As to the TEST OF TRUTH. We prefer this expression to other terms in general use in connection with this question, as "Rule of Faith," "Standard of Truth," &c., as indicating more simply the precise point of our present inquiry, namely, What is the final authority for regulating the belief and practice of the individual Christian man? The Protestant answer to this question is direct and clear: "The Word of God," he maintains, "which is contained in the Scriptures, is the only rule to direct us what we ought to believe concerning God, and what duty God requires of man." The voice of God speaking in the Word, by the Spirit, to the conscience and heart-that is the one and all-sufficient oracle for deciding every question of faith and law of duty. With him one sentence of the Word outweighs all the decisions of Fathers and Councils; one divine command, the canons and traditions of a thousand years. "Search the Scriptures," and by them "prove all things, and hold fast that which is good,"-that is his call to all men of every rank and degree. "To the law and to the testimony,"

We need scarcely explain that we use this term throughout this paper in the technical sense to which it has been generally appropriated of late,-not as designat. ing members of the Church of England, but that peculiar section of English Churchmen who have attached themselves to what it called the Anglican or Anglo-Catholic theory.