it did in the old paganism, that the idol will reflect the weaknesses of the worshipper.

Something better than either.

But happily there is no need to wait. The choice is already made. It was made by a higher than human wisdom, when more than eighteen hundred years ago a DIVINE LIFE was exhibited in a human form, and mingled for ever with the general life of humanity. Then was laid the only foundation for all human reforms and all human hopes. That is what I believe. I am not ashamed to wear what have been called those "Hebrew old clothes." I believe that they never will grow old. But the proof? The proof lies in the fact, patent to every eye, that this, and this only, has been the regenerating influence in the history of the world. Except this, the Greeks had everything: philosophy, poetry, history, eloquence, artand all could not avert decay. If decay is now to be averted, this Christian faith alone can do it. It is this which is doing the saving work, so far as it is done, even now. While philanthropists are planning in their easy chairs-while philosophers are speculating, economists calculating, and statesmen making laws those true ministers of Christ, who show his spirit in their lives, whether they be or be not marked out by formal ordination, are actually, in the abodes of poverty and ignorance and sorrow, carrying on that process of individual personal communication, without which nothing effectual is accomplished for the moral redemption of mankind.

Practical Argument for Christianity.

In the original design of the present work, it was intended that an attempt should be made to exhibit the position in which Christianity now stands in reference to the latest forms of scepticism both in England and in Germany. That design, to be adequately executed, would, indeed, have required a scholarship

to which in the present case no pretension exists; but such a piece of work, even in the brief and popular form which was contemplated, was found to be too large for combination with what the reader has before him. But, in truth, this is not a critical, but a practical question. The proof, which, as Paley said, clenches the matter, must always be that practical one which touches not the head but the heart. Put the critics and commentators on the shelf, and study the Christian evidences in the lives of Oberlin, and Neff, and Howard, and Mrs. Fry; or, if picked specimens do not seem fair, go into the Sunday school, where neither fame nor philosophy comes in to confuse the result. In a word, find out and examine what persons they are, who, upon any large scale, exhibit practical energy and self-denial in the cause of humanity.

The Practical Argument not for Sects.

Numbers would heartily concur in this practical conclusion, who will recoil and fly off to all points of the compass from the inference to which it inevitably leads. That inference is, that this argument, decisive as it is in behalf of Christianity, is worthless in support of the exclusive pretensions of any one church. It will not make out the case of the Church of Rome against the Church of England, nor of the Church of England against the Church of Rome, nor serve in the least degree to sustain any one of the forms of Dissenting infallibility. It follows that Christianity must be looked at, not as some one sect would have it, but as the world actually has had it. The warfare against it has been moved off to new ground. The old bulwarks are built up in a quarter where the contest no longer rages. That work of defence which was carried on before by isolated and mutually hostile champions, will no longer avail if it cannot be conducted on some principle of combination. The basis of any successful defence against the modern scepticism must be the conception of Christianity in its historical integrity. It did not dive under ground, as has been sometimes supposed, for ten

centuries, nor abandon for that long period the great active life of Europe to take refuge in the caves and hiding-places of the Paulicians and Albigenses. It was there throughout, blended always with more or less of human error and weakness, but still alive and potent in Hildebrand himself as certainly as in Luther. One cannot survey the churches of Great Britain at the present day without seeing that those works which are the fruits and the proofs of faith do in fact proceed from all of them. This is no reason why any one church should yield what it believes to be truth, or accept what it believes to be error, but it is a reason why all the criminations and malignities of controversy should be at once and for ever abandoned. Externally, and in their exclusive aspect, all the churches, are repulsive. Internally and in their Christian aspect, all are beautiful'. Let every man be held disqualified for sectarian controversy, until all that is angry and impure and selfish in his nature has been purged away. Let the desire for reform be everywhere turned within, and then that inner beauty of the churches would all come out, and the whole visible front of Christianity would become radiant like the ranks of the celestial host, by which in the great English epic the power of Evil is overthrown!

Fraternization with Popery.

There are many, very many, ready to join in a larger and more comprehensive principle of Christian fellowship than we have been accustomed to, provided it be strictly and exclusively Protestant. But to fraternize with Popery, or acknowledge it for Christianity—no, never!

1 What an event that was which occurred a few years ago at Liverpool. A Roman Catholic priest, and a Unitarian missionary, two religious pariahs, were the only visitors of a poor fever-stricken family. One of the family died, and the neighbours in terror avoided the body. The pestilential corpse was put into the coffin by the priest and the missionary, acting together like brothers in that work of charity. God chose to seal in his own way the bond of brotherhood between them, for both took the fever and shortly after died.

This question of Popery is just now of great importance. It is important in a religious sense, and no less in a political sense. To dispose of the lower question first. It appears to me that the Anti-Papal agitation and legislation have placed the integrity of this empire in at least as much danger as it ever has been in, since that remote period when a handful of Norman knights effected the conquest of Ireland. I apprehend no revival of the repeal cry, and still less any such absurdity as another Irish rebellion. Ireland is too crushed and depopulated, and worn out with chronic misery, to be anything but passive in the presence of a superior force. Lord Palmerston has great confidence in the loyal zeal with which the Irish peasantry would turn out to repel a foreign invader. That opinion is honourable to him; but considering how much more of his time has been spent amongst the English nobility than amongst the Irish peasantry, it is scarcely a solid ground for legislation. What a peasantry so wretched have to fight for, it would be difficult to show. At all events, the contingency is not one to be overlooked, that if a foreign army of any force could once be landed on the Irish soil, its reception might be different from what it would be in Kent or Devonshire. Such an event might render it necessary to line the whole western coast of England and Scotland with defences as strong as can ever be required on the south. Some will think these remarks imprudent. They may be so. But the case is a desperate one, and requires a desperate remedy.

Effect of the Anti-Papal Bill.

In view of these possibilities it is to be observed that, with a few most honourable exceptions, the chief public men of England did, not long ago, combine their efforts to place Ireland exactly in that state of just irritation which an enemy of British connection would most desire. Lord John Russell is a man eminently deserving of respect. England is deeply indebted to him, but Ireland has not equal cause to be grateful.

He has done more than any one but himself could have done to destroy even the hope of seeing a moderate and liberal Catholic party acquire strength in Ireland. The measure directed against the Roman Catholic Church in that country did nothing for Protestant, but much for ultramontane principles. The Irish prelates were insulted, but they were in no way weakened. On the other hand, the Irish friends of Lord John Russell himself did receive a heavy blow and a great discouragement. Such an example could not fail to be followed. The Maynooth endowment has now become an embarrassment to every popular member of parliament who is intelligent and scrupulous respecting the relations in which the two countries stand, and further attacks are threatened by the present occupants of ministerial power upon the general policy of the last twenty years. All these things hang together. If the church of the Irish people is to be treated as an alien and dangerous power, the policy of repression should be carried out with vigour. The Anti-Catholic Bill ought in consistency to be followed by the hostile inquiry into Maynooth, or rather by the summary repeal of the endowment, and then by the break-up of the Education Board. Nor is there any good reason for stopping even at that point; for many of the old penal laws were adapted with great ingenuity to their purpose, and if this be the proper way of upholding Protestantism, it is a pity that such excellent weapons should lie by as mere historical curiosities. It is impossible to look at what is going on in any other light than as a warfare, carried on, indeed, with electioneering and parliamentary weapons', but still a warfare, both fierce and dangerous, between the two countries. I see no way of ending

While the last sheets of the present work are going through the press, the warfare has ceased to be confined within those limits. It has become a matter of grave doubt, whether it has not perverted the administration of justice; and it has led to extensive riot and bloodshed, under circumstances which promise to leave no doubt at all about the necessity of increasing the standing army, for if our present dissensions are continued, ten or fifteen thousand additional troops, at least, will be wanted, merely to keep the peace in the great towns throughout the north of England.