Free Church or elsewhere, we are happy to be able to say to all those beloved brethren, that facts, at present, lead us to hope that, as far as the Free Church itself is concerned, we shall be, by the blessing of Him to whom the silver and the gold belong, enabled to provide for its support out of our own resources; and should He continue to bless us as he has hitherto done, and our churches persevere in the course of self-denial on which they have entered, we shall be able also to furnish our contribution to the maintenance of missionaries and evangelists beyond the limits of our own country. With this view the Committee of Evangelisation has just founded an evangelical school, in the Canton of Valais, where religious liberty was introduced, at the close of the same events as were the cause of its banishment from our Canton. You will not be surprised to hear that after listening to these details, which I have much abridged, and to others of a similar kind, our Synod could not refrain from joining in the language of praise contained in the 103rd Psalm. In the discussion of the budget for this year, a proposal was made to raise to 1,000 francs (Swiss) about £60 sterling, the annual stipend of the pastors, which is now 800 francs. This measure was supported at the express solicitation of our brethren of the Free Church of Scotland, when they transmitted to us the fruit of their liberality. The pastors themselves have, however, entreated the Synod not to increase their salaries at the present time. We have, therefore, been obliged to vote a sum of 8,000 francs, which the Committee of the Synod is authorised to employ for the aid of those pastors who, having numerous families, are not able to provide for them with their present fixed salary. In the discussion of measures proper to be taken in the present juncture, the Synod was unanimous in recommending to the churches that they continue humbly, and from a sense of their duty to God, in the path which they have hitherto trodden. It was thought that, on our part, there is not at present any step to be

taken with regard to our magistrates, in order to obtain a recognition of our rights; but we resolved unanimously to redouble the fervour of our prayers to God, alike for our churches, our people, and our magistrates, and to invite all our brethren to consecrate especially the hour from eight to nine on the Saturday evening to supplication, relative to the state of oppression under which we are now suffering. Without doubt, your readers, who have hitherto so faithfully remembered us in our af flictions, will not fail, in compliance with this invitation, to bear us on their hearts before the Lord.

I cannot conclude this long letter without informing you that we had the delight, on the 10th of April last, of admitting to the ministry of the word of God three young men, who appear to be animated by a sincere faith and enlightened zeal for his glory. It was the third ceremony of that kind which the Free Church has had the happiness to witness. One of our young brethren, M. Meyor, is now at Nice, to which place he has been called by the little flock which has been gathered together there within the last few months. The two others, Messrs. Megroz and Panchaud, will probably continue to exercise their ministry amongst us. M. Megroz, who comes from Payerne, has already had conferred upon him the honour of being sent back to his commune, in consequence of his having presided at a meeting in a neighbouring village. The pastors who were separated from their flocks, or sent back to their original communes, number at present twenty. Some of them will endeavour to return to the bosom of their flocks; we shall see what the Council of State will do with them.

The feeling prevails among us that a new struggle has commenced. Continue then, dear brethren, to pray for us. The church of God scattered over the whole world is waiting for some great event, but they are preparing to welcome it with confidence and joy, for "the lion of the tribe of Judah" has triumphed. Let us, then, strengthen ourselves in the Lord, and

1. All religious meetings which do not belong to the National Church, and are not recognised by the constitution, nor authorised by law, are forbidden in the canton until further orders.

2. The Council of State will have power to dissolve all religious meetings which may be held contrary to this prohibition.

3. Independently of the penalties to be hereafter set forth, and as a measure of public order, the Council of State, on a report of the communal authorities and the prefect, will send back, when it shall think necessary, (for any period not exceeding a year) those ministers who have sent in their resignation, (les ministres démissionnaires,) and others who have officiated in the meetings forbidden by this decree, from the commune where they are at present settled, to their own commune, or to that which shall be designed for them.

If, amongst the persons officiating in these forbidden meetings, there are found any strangers to the canton, the administrative authorities may expel them.

All civil functionaries who shall assist at these meetings shall be dismissed from office.

4. The Council of State may, moreover, according to the gravity of the case, cite those persons before the tribunals who have disobeyed the commands mentioned in Articles 1 and 2, to be punished as follows:

5. Those who shall have resisted the authority ordering the dissolution of a religious meeting prohibited by the present decree, and those who shall have formed a meeting again, after

the dissolution of the assembly, shall be punished according to the provisions of the penal code for acts of resistance to authority.

6. Whoever presides over, or directs one of those meetings mentioned in Article 1, or whoever takes part therein, or whoever shall have provided the place of meeting, shall be punished by a fine, which shall not be less than fifty, nor more than a hundred francs.

In case of a repetition of the offence, the minimum and the maximum of the fine instituted in the above paragraph shall be doubled. In case of a second, or of further repetitions, the minimum and the maximum of this fine shall be trebled.

7. Those who are condemned according to the articles foregoing, shall pay the expenses of the proceedings.

8. Every person, who has been conducted into another commune than his own, conformably with Article 3, and who shall attempt to re-enter, without permission, the commune from which he had been sent away, shall be re-taken at his own expense, to that where he had been sent. He may also be cited before the tribunals, to be condemned in the penalties contained in Article 6.

9. The above regulations are not applicable to domestic worship which is held at home by the members of a family. This worship remains under the government of the law respecting private dwellings.

10. No search can be made for those who break the foregoing rules, except at the instance of the Council of State.

11. Half of the fines inflicted in virtue of the present decree shall be appropriated to the hospital of the canton, and half to the poor of the place.

12. The Council of State is charged with the publication and execution of this decree. Given, &c.

THE CHURCH.-We are so deeply impressed with the great and peculiar dangers to which our beloved Church is exposed in the present day, that we are more and more anxious that she should present an aspect as little vulnerable as possible even to her greatest enemies. With this feeling we naturally watch, with peculiar interest, the movements of those who are placed in the foremost ranks, viz. the reverend heads and fathers of our Church. The Archbishop of York has just delivered a most important Charge on the subject of baptism. He does not hesitate to express his full belief that the Reformers to a man were Calvinistic in their sentiments, and that as such they could not possibly, by virtue of their fixed principles, regard any infant as a partaker of the Holy Spirit's regenerating influence, save the elect; and if so, a sense must necessarily be put upon the baptismal service utterly at variance with the sentiments which so many are advancing in the present day. It is manifestly a great point gained to determine the animus of the Reformers; and the archbishop's admission ought at all events to secure a forbearing and tender consideration for those who cannot but accord in principle with the Reformers.

We

We hear with deep grief and amazement that a most respectable candidate was refused orders, at the late ordination by the Bishop of Ripon, because his views on baptism were not considered orthodox. should not wonder at any length in such a course which the bishop's chaplain might wish and attempt to take; but though we have heard the fact from a most respectable quarter, we are unwilling fully to credit it till we hear further. But really, if our bishops are intending to follow the example of Exeter and Salisbury herein, what is to become of our poor Church?

It is well that the country is in possession of the creeds of our two primates on this subject, and espe

cially before the decision in the Court of Arches on Mr. Gorham's case.

We may be thankful at least for the union of Church and State as it regards the Madeira chaplain's case. The Bishop of London defends himself on the ground of impartiality. It is such impartiality as is more to be dreaded than anything else in the present day, for it is nothing less than a spurious liberalism, a latitudinarian spirit which, under the semblance of charity, tolerates and fosters error as readily as truth. Here is the root of much of the mischief which is prevailing in high influential quarters.

We cannot but regret that the bishops took part in the Navigation question in the House of Lords. We are sure that we have almost the unanimous voice of the clergy with us, when we say that they had better have been silent on a subject so entirely political, and on which there is so much excited feeling throughout the country. The minority compose no mean array of influential persons, amongst whom the most gloomy prospects are entertained; and what must be their feelings towards the Bench when they reflect that their interference has been the means of carrying the bill? It must necessarily lead to much alienation and prejudice: and the question was so entirely political, so entirely apart from all moral and religious considerations, that we cannot wonder if they should be suspected of only taking the opportunity of offering a tribute of gratitude to their exalted patron. We deeply regret that they should have laid themselves open to the unmeasured language with which they have been assailed.

THE JEWS' BILL. We think our readers will not be displeased to see the speeches of the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Oxford, on the above bill, transferred to our pages. The bill was rejected in the House of Lords by a majority of 25.

The Archbishop of Canterbury (who was very indistinctly heard in the gallery) observed, that having on a former occasion given his vote against a measure similar to the present, he should have refrained from trespassing upon their lordships, if present circumstances were exactly what they were a year ago; but it appeared to him that what had taken place within the last twelve months made this season above all seasons most peculiarly inopportune for the legislature to pass such a measure as that now before their lordships. The principle of the bill, or, as the noble earl who commenced the debate said, the distinctive character of the bill, was to lower the qualification of members of either House of Parliament, by making it immaterial whether they were or were not members of the Christian church. It was to place in the same category persons who were Christians and received the New Testament as the revelation of God, and Jews, who rejected it as an imposture and a cheat. It was to say that members of the Church of Christ and disbelievers of Christ were to be equally admitted, and were equally qualified to legislate for a Christian people, and that they were equally fitted for those legislative honours which were so eagerly sought after, and the possession of which was considered amply to compensate the discharge of very laborious duties, and very heavy responsibilities. England, at present, stood in a very peculiar position. She was at this moment the envy and admiration of the world. She stood alone amidst the nations of the earth as a monument and an example of freedom, and of social order. She stood as a column among other columns which a short time ago seemed to be as erect as herself, and to stand upon as firm a foundation, but which were now tottering to their fall, and showing that their foundations were very different from those on which this country rested. The nations of the world, in thus contrasting the peaceful and stable state of England with their own broken and disorganized condition, did not hesitate to

attribute the vast advantage England possessed over them to her national and Scriptural religion; that religion which, cementing together the various orders of society, giving stability to our social institutions, and a holy character to our laws, enabled us to stand clear against the storms of error by which other nations were overwhelmed. England had been the scene of peculiar privileges, and the subject of many blessings and mercies. The great achievements which had been recently made in their vast Indian empire were ascribed by the conqueror to the glory of Him who nerved his arm and inspired his counsels. Those victories had consolidated our Indian possessions and placed them in a state of tranquillity which he humbly hoped would be the harbinger of most important mercies to the millions of inhabitants of that extensive region. It had been said that they had already, notwithstanding the present oath, "On the true faith of a Christian," admitted persons within the walls of Parliament who were not less likely to do injury to the Christian religion than they could ever expect to be done by Jews. He hoped this was not the case; but granting, for the sake of argument, that it was so, their lordships were not accountable for such a state of things. Those parties were not there by their lordships' wish, and still less by their permission. It was a very different thing to admit within the walls of a city a person who might come really and openly as an enemy, and to admit one who, though an enemy, nevertheless came with the name and in the garb of a friend. To open their gates to friend and foe alike, without distinction, was a policy which he apprehended few would be disposed to pursue. It was quite possible that there might be amongst them, in certain cases, a very low practice and a very high standard of profession, but that ought not to be made a ground for doing anything which would tend to sap the foundations of truth, or to perplex men's minds by confounding truth and error. These were the reasons that led him to think they ought to pause

before they passed the bill now before the house. He had stated his own views; but, at the same time, he was not ignorant that there were others not less sensitively alive than himself to the high interests he thought involved in this question, who held sentiments and views different from those which he entertained. That had not the effect, however, of making him distrust his own judgment, and he would only further say, that it would be his consolation, whatever vote their lordships might come to, that his mind had remained unchanged since this subject was last broached in that house.

The Bishop of Oxford begged to be allowed to say a few words before the debate concluded. Having last year stated somewhat at length the general principles upon which he objected to a measure strictly analogous to this, he would not have troubled their Lordships with any remarks upon the present occasion but for the remark of the noble earl (Wicklow), that he rested the vote he was about to give entirely upon the unanswered speech of the noble earl who had moved the second reading of the Bill that evening. Now, no one was more ready than himself to acknowledge the singular felicity with which that speech was framed for the purpose of inducing their lordships to adopt the measure. The feeling of Christian earnestness and Christian kindness which pervaded that speech, and the large admissions it contained, had all won upon him as they must have won upon all their lordships; but after the impression created by the accidents of the speech had faded away, he found that the thread of the argument was not so convincing as the flow of sentiment was alluring. The principal argument of his noble friend resolved itself into this, that, inasmuch as the country had admitted Jews to a great deal of social and civil power, they were bound in consistency to give them admission into Parliament. Now, he (the Bishop of Oxford) begged the house to weigh the fundamental difference between those two steps. It seemed to him to be a

difference not of degree but of kind. If they believed the Jew to be an honest man- -if they were convinced that he knew the law as a matter of intellectual acquirement, and was able, upon the common principles of universal justice, to apply particular laws to particular cases-they might naturally trust him as much as a Christian to administer those laws. It was the same as intrusting a man to weigh goods according to certain standard weights. All that was required of him was that he should be honest, and should understand the weights. But if you asked a man to make weights for you, it was necessary that he should have in his mind the general principles upon which the value of the weights depended. And such was the position of a legislator. His duty was to make new laws, not to administer old ones; and, in doing that, the principles of religion, if he had any, must come in. It had been argued, that the exclusion of the Jew from Parliament was a stigma upon him. It was no such thing. The clergy of the Church of England were excluded from the other House of Parliament, and nobody considered that to be a stigma. The right to sit in Parliament was not given as an individual honour, for a man's own delectation. It was a trust given by the State to those who were deemed best qualified for the duty. He maintained that there was great danger to be feared from the passing of this Bill. The first danger would be that men would be returned to Parliament from the mere power of money. There were no Jewish constituencies in England, and therefore if returned at all a Jew must be returned by a Christian constituency, between whom and himself upon questions of the deepest and greatest concern there could be no possible sympathy. He must therefore trust to his money power for his election, and this was no small danger. There was another danger not to be overlooked, and that was that the moment you admitted into the hall of legislation a man professing peculiar opinions, that moment they lost the power of objecting to the public profession of those