what is offered, and most assuredly to rest persuaded of this, THAT CAN WE BUT EAT, WE ARE SAFE." [Vol. ii., p. 2.]

Such was the doctrine of the "Judicious Hooker:" and such was the doctrine prevalent in the English Church in the latter part of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. It is not the doctrine of the Thirty-Nine Articles; but that it is the doctrine of the offices of the Church in the Prayer-Book, every one may see by a careful recurrence to those offices; and we have before seen how this confusion between the Articles and the offices arose. Thus: in the office for Baptism, the minister is directed to say, "Seeing * that this child is now regenerate," &c., then follows the prayer: "We yield thee hearty thanks, Most Merciful Father, that it hath pleased thee to regenerate this infant with thy Holy Spirit, and to receive him for Thine own child by adoption," &c. So in the Catechism before Confirmation; the child is made to answer, "My sponsors in Baptism, wherein I was made a child of God, and an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven." Many evangelical churchmen have tried to explain away these words: but to all such attempts the recent charge of the Bishop of Connecticut has given an everlasting quietus, at least in Connecticut. "I know," says the bishop, "that there are some whose views are, perhaps, tinctured with the theology I have referred to" [of Edwards, Wesley, and Whitfield]" who would willingly explain away the language of our baptismal office. But after all I have heard and read, I believe there is but little real difference of sentiment among churchmen on this subject." "How

ever amicable it may be to make the doctrine more acceptable to dissenters, the effort must be unavailing. THE FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLE OF THEIR THEOLOGY STANDS DIRECTLY OPPOSITE IT." (Charge, p. 22.)

It is well. This doctrine of Baptismal Regeneration is indeed DIRECTLY OPPOSED" to the "FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES" of the evangelical denominations who agree with the theology either of Edwards, Wesley or Whitfield. Let no Jure-Divino Churchman hereafter tell us that the two systems are the same. The bishop has spoken no less truly than authoritatively, that the two systems are DIRECTLY and FUNDAMENTALLY opposed: and that all efforts to reconcile us to that doctrine "must be unavailing." We hold it as "another Gospel."

The doctrine of Hooker on the Lord's Supper is the doctrine evidently implied in the office for administering the same, in the Prayer Book. The consecration; the laying on of hands on" all the bread, and on every vessel in which there is any wine to be consecrated;" the going over again with the ceremony of consecrating more when the first supply is not sufficient; the Oblation

(the poor remains of the lifting of the Host, under the notion of offering the body of Christ as a renewed sacrifice), the remaining after the communion reverently to eat and drink what remnants are left of the consecrated meats, that nothing be carried out of the church; all these things come from the same popish origin, and are but in accordance with the same popish notions of the sacrament which Hooker maintains. I think it must be evident, that Hooker's scheme, as it was the scheme of those who gave the offices of the Church of England their final establishment, is the true exposition of those offices: and that those who have labored to" soften or explain away" the language of those offices, are entirely mistaken. Puseyism is but the legitimate revival of that scheme which was laid down more fully and unequivocally near three centuries ago, by that great Oracle of the English Church," the Judicious Hooker."

One thing is further necessary to be noticed to complete the system of Hooker, and that is the account which he gives concerning the power of Orders; i. e. the ghostly power conferred upon priests by the mystery of ordination. He says (vol. ii., p. 82), "The power of the ministry of God" [of God's ministers] "translateth out of darkness into glory; it raiseth men from the earth, and bringeth God himself from heaven; by blessing visible elements it maketh them invisible grace; it daily giveth the Holy Ghost; it hath to dispose of that flesh which was given for the life of the world, and that blood which was poured out to redeem souls; when it poureth malediction upon the heads of the wicked, they perish; when it revoketh the same, they revive. O wretched blindness, if we admire not so great a power! To whom

Christ hath imparted power both over that mystical body which is the society of souls, and over that natural [body] which is himself, for the knitting of both in one (a work which antiquity doth call the making of Christ's body); the same power in such is both termed a kind of mark or character, and acknowledged to be indelible."*

With this scheme of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, and of the power conferred by Ordination, set forth by Hooker and revived by the Oxford Tractarians, Mr. Chapin (Editor of the Chronicle of the Church, at N. Haven) appears fully to agree. In his recent work entitled “A Churchman's reasons for not joining in sectarian worship," in which he sets forth the impropriety and sin of an Episcopalian's partaking of the Lord's Supper, or joining in acts of public worship with other denominations, he declares that the elements "at the time of consecration," become "a means WHEREBY grace is given to us;" that "all the power that has been transmitted from the apostles vests in the ministers of our" [the Episcopal] " Church;" that Episcopal ministers and they alone" have this power of consecration * ** "by the act of consecrating" [the bread and wine] "to make" them "the AUTHORI TATIVE sign," * and "not only a sign, but also a MEANS WHEREBY GRACE IS GIVEN;" that for this reason, in regard to the Lord's Supper administered by other denominations, "We" [Episcopalians] "know it is not the same table that our Father gives us" * "that their table is not the table our Father has erect

Can we wonder at the terrific power of the Popish priesthood, and at the abject submission in which they hold the souls of their votaries, when such a doctrine concerning priestly prerogatives is put forth in the very bosom of Protestant Christendom; while the great author of such a scheme of despotism and superstition continues to be held in the highest reverence, and retains for two centuries, and more, the epithet of "The Judicious," given him by one of England's worst, weakest, and meanest kings?

Hooker's biographer notices with becoming exultation, that when Hooker's work was first printed, one of the Cardinals at Rome declared to Pope Clement VIII., "That though he had lately said he never met with an English book whose writer deserved the name of author, yet there now appeared a wonder to them, and it would be so to his Holiness, if it were in Latin; for a poor obscure English priest had writ four books of laws of Church Polity, and in a style that expressed so grave and such humble majesty, with clear demonstration of reason, that in all their reading they had not met with any that exceeded him." And the Pope, when he had heard the books of Hooker read, declared that "this man deserves indeed the name of authornothing is too hard for this man's understanding." It is to us no matter of wonder that Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity should meet with such favor at Rome.

It is well known how much Rome thinks of such "Holy mortifications" as fastings, flagellations, going barefoot, and wearing sackcloth. In some austerities of this sort Hooker also seems to have engaged to some purpose; for his biographer records, as one of the things for which Hooker is to be had in veneration, that "his body was worn out, not with age, but with study and holy mortifications."

Nor did Hooker seem to be altogether freed from all ideas of the efficacy of Auricular Confession and priestly Absolution. His biographer records, that " About one day before his death, Dr. Saravia, who knew the very secrets of his soul (for they were supposed to be confessors to each other), came to him, and after a conference of the benefit, necessity, and safety of the CHURCH'S ABSOLUTION, it was resolved that the Doctor should give him both that and the Sacrament the day following. To which the Doctor came, and after a short retirement and privacy, they returned to the company." Thus died Hooker, enveloped still in the fogs of the "necessity and safety" of auricular confession and priestly absolution! We wonder still less that Hooker should be in such esteem at Rome.

ed for us" (these Italics are his own), "and consequently we may not join our. selves to it" and he adds, "If they are right, we have corrupted this Holy ordinance; but if we are right, they have lost sight of its true nature.”

These principles both of Church Polity and of doctrinal faith, were the principles against which the Puritans of that day were called to stand. They are the principles which are now once more raising their front, and with honied accents striving to win their way once more to the reverend acceptance of the world. Happy will it be, if the friends of freedom and of Christ, warned by the sad lessons of days that are past, take the alarm and stand manfully for the truth and for freedom before it shall be too late.

X.

KING JAMES I., AND THE GOING TO HOLLAND.

Change of James' Principles on his accession to the English throne. Hampton Court Conference. Hundred and forty-one Canons. Extrajudicial decision of the twelve Judges. Gathering of the Pilgrim Church. Flight to Holland.

KING JAMES, of Scotland, came to the throne of England, A. D. 1603. The prelates dreaded his accession, and spoke of it with apprehension as the coming of the "Scotch Mist." The Puritans entertained hopes of relief; for King James was not only a Presbyterian, but he had subscribed the solemn League and Covenant. He had, often and solemnly, declared his full conviction of the pre-eminent purity and excellence of the Church and worship of Scotland. Once standing in the General Assembly at Edinburgh, with his bonnet off and his hands lifted up to Heaven, he praised God that he was born in the time of the true light of the Gospel, and in such a place as to be king of such a Church, the sincerest [purest] kirk in the world. "The Church of Geneva," said he, "keep Pasche and Yule " [Easter and Christmas]," what have they for them? They have no institution. As for our neighbor kirk of England, their service is an evil said Mass in English; they want nothing of the Mass but the liftings. I charge you, my good ministers, doctors, elders, gentlemen, and barons, to stand to your purity, and to exhort the people to do the same."

While James was making these professions, he was at that very time "carrying on a correspondence with the English nobles and bishops, and promising to continue that very Liturgy which he derided as an ill-said Mass.* The whole character of James was that of a false and lying prince: and he used to glory in his double dealing as the art and mystery of "kingcraft." After his arrival in England, he sank into drunkenness and low debauchery; and would yet from time to time with tears express his hopes, that "God would not impute unto him his infirmity." Queen Elizabeth and her courtiers saw through this shallow *Bogue and Bennett, p. 52.