secret thoughts, till it has become not less easy to him to search into the heart of the adult. His illustrations of common truths, and of the way in which the application of them to the conduct of life is continually eluded by petty sophistries, is more various, more ingenious, and more engaging than any I have met with. I have sometimes been tempted to say-of what use is it that others can dive into the recesses of the heart, if they cannot solve the hidden mysteries discovered there, nor raise a blush upon the cheek of the self-deceiver? There is an air of sincerity also about him, which shews that he will admit of no compromises; a moral probing which makes us feel that, if we do not go along with him, we are not sincere ourselves.

Holding this very favourable opinion of Mr. Abbott, I am satisfied that no one will blame me for endeavouring to prevent any possible danger arising from writings which are calculated to produce so much good; and it is not without deep regret that I feel myself compelled to point out some passages in the "Corner Stone" startling, to say the least of them, and which, I fear, cannot be passed over without animadversion.

I can easily understand that Mr. Abbott's transatlantic habits of thinking have made him hostile to ceremonies in religion; but I can neither see the logic nor propriety of confounding empty with substantial forms; and I shrink from the boldness with which he asserts that the elements used in the Lord's Supper were such as accidentally fell in the way of our Saviour at his last parting with his disciples. I can also imagine that all church government, as it is conducted in the eastern world, presents a frightful anomaly to Mr. Abbott's eyes; but I cannot admit that the outline of a spiritual hierarchy was not first drawn by our Lord himself, and afterwards filled up, in some measure, by his immediate followers. I merely allude to this latter point because Mr. A. has touched upon it; but he has dwelt at length upon his peculiar views relating to the fortuitous appointment of sacramental emblems; and it is this misrepresentation which I think it my duty to lay before your readers.

For this purpose, I shall first extract a passage from the "Corner Stone," ch. iii. p. 91, Philip's Edition :

we

"It is remarkable how little he [our Saviour] specified as to forms. He did not even arrange any form of church government for his own times, nor give many specific directions in regard to any Christian ceremonies; an example unparalleled, w believe, among the founders of religions. There is something peculiarly striking in this point of view, in his manner of instituting the celebration of the supper. Instead of having a sort of code drawn up, specifying the various parts of the ceremony, the kind of elements to be used, the frequency, and the attending circumstances, he simply says, at the close of his last supper, as they were about to depart, 'Do this in remembrance of me.' This. One word contains the whole description. He could not have left it more vaguely and indefinitely expressed; and they who press the forms of Christianity, while they forget its spirit, cannot be more pointedly reproved than by asking them to contrast the clearness, the point, the emphasis, the distinguishing precision, with which Christ pressed spiritual duties upon men, with the unconcerned and almost careless air with which he dismissed the whole subject of the most solemn ceremony he established-with Do this in remembrance of me.'"

One would almost think that the pregnant relative here noticed had no antecedent. But what was the antecedent to which it referred? I

need scarcely put before your readers a statement of the circumstances attending the appointment of the eucharist. Here, however, is one which has been thrown together by one of our soundest divinesWaterland, vol. vii. p. 44, of the Bishop of Durham's edition:—

Matt. xxvi.; Mark xiv; Luke xxii.; 1 Cor. xi.

"The night in which the Lord Jesus was betrayed, as they were eating, or did eat, Jesus took bread, and, giving thanks, blessed it, and brake it, and gave it unto. his disciples, and said, ' Take, eat, this is my body, which is given and broken for you; do this in remembrance of me.' After supper, likewise, having taken the cup, and given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, 'Drink ye all of this, for this is my blood of the new covenant, the new covenant in my blood, which is shed for you, for many, for the remission of sins: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me, [and they all drank of it.] Verily I say unto you, I will drink no more of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I shall drink it new with you in the kingdom of my Father, in the kingdom of God.' And when they had sung an hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives."

Our author's opinions on these points, respecting which he believes that Christians are in complete darkness, are more fully developed in the seventh chapter of the same Treatise, pp. 220, 221, 222:

"At the close of the interview, he [Jesus Christ] established the great Christian ordinance, which has been celebrated, without interruption, from that day to this. The circumstances under which that ordinance was established teach us a lesson, as we have already briefly said in a preceding chapter, in regard to the manner in which the Saviour regarded forms and ceremonies, which it is strange that Christians have been so slow to learn. In the first place, he made, apparently, no preparation for it. The articles used were those which, we may literally say, happened to be there. In fact, it seems as if the Saviour, when the time arrived for his last farewell, his very last act of intercourse, as a mortal, with his disciples, and he wished to leave something as a memorial of himself, did not devote a thought, not a moment's thought, to the consideration of what the thing itself should be. They are sitting, or standing, around the table, about to separate, and he takes up the very first thing which comes to hand. It is no matter what the action is, which is commemorative of his affection and sufferings; the only thing of consequence is, that it should be done in remembrance of him.' He does not look around, and choose some act, or arrange some ceremony with care, adapting it to its purpose, and prescribing nicely its forms. No; he selects a portion of the very transaction which was before him, and consecrates that. He just takes the bread, which was upon the table, and pours out another cup of wine, and says, 'Take these, as emblems of my sufferings and death, incurred for the remission of your sins, and henceforth do this in remembrance of me; as often as ye do it, you will represent the Lord's death, until he come.' Had he been walking in a grove, instead of being seated at a table, when his last hour with his disciples had arrived, he would, perhaps, on the same principles, have broken off a branch from a tree, and distributed a portion to his friends; and then Christians would have afterwards commemorated his death by wearing their monthly badge of evergreen ; or, if he had been returning to Jerusalem, he would, perhaps, have consecrated their walk, and then, during all succeeding ages, the sacred ceremony would have been performed by a solemn procession of his friends. No matter what the act was which was thus set apart as a memorial. The feeling of which it is the symbol is the most important."

Here we find, in the first place, that our Saviour apparently made no preparation for the great Christian ordinance. How this should appear to Mr. Abbott I am at a loss to know. The evangelists give a very different account of the matter. We will take that of St. Luke, ch. xxii. 7 to 16 :—

"Then came the day of unleavened bread, when the passover must be killed. And he sent Peter and John, saying, Go and prepare us the passover, that we may eat. And they said unto him, Where wilt thou that we prepare? And he said unto them, VOL. VII.-Jan. 1835.

I

Behold, when ye are entered into the city, there shall a man meet you, bearing a pitcher of water; follow him into the house where he entereth in. And ye shall say unto the good man of the house, The Master saith unto thee, Where is the guestchamber, where I shall eat the passover with my disciples? And he shall shew you a large upper room furnished: there make ready. And they went, and found as he had said unto them: and they made ready the passover. And when the hour was come, he sat down, and the twelve apostles with him. And he said unto them, With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer. For I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God."

So much for the preparation actually made. It was not assuredly such a preparation as would have been made by a human being, for divine knowledge and foresight was exercised in making it. Nevertheless the time, the place, and the materials were all arranged. We are not informed that any other materials for the supper were placed there excepting bread and wine. Still it was a passover: our Lord calls it so. It is the Christian's passover. The rites of baptism and the holy communion are to the Christian what circumcision and the paschal supper were to the Jew. Our Lord was the bread, to represent his body about to be pierced; and the wine, to represent his blood about to be shed for the sins of mankind. Have we any right to say that this was fortuitous? Is the idea of fitness to be excluded from the emblematical representation of the bloody sacrifice? Would a branch of a tree, or a walk in the fields, have pointed to the cross? So far from thinking that any other materials would have answered the purpose as well, I should be inclined to look upon the paschal supper as a double type; a type both of the sacrifice of Jesus and of this second passover-this substituted rite, this holy emblematical ordinance, which was to recall the memory of the great event when past. However this may be, we recognize in this ordinance that admirable correspondence which is always to be found in the types and antitypes of sacred history. "It is the Lord's doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes." We should think ourselves ill-employed in considering projects for the improvement of the form of the eucharist upon Mr. Abbott's principles. Indeed, so closely connected does this ordinance appear to be in its form and substance with the death of Christ, that I do not see how any alteration can be proposed in the one, without, at the same time, setting aside the typical nature of the paschal lamb; and, in that case, we should be called upon to believe, not only that our Saviour made no preparation for the last supper, but that the Almighty made no preparation, 1500 years before, by the appointment of a rite which should prefigure the coming event.

It must be supposed that Mr. Abbott has been led into all this light talking by horror of formal ceremonies. Why, we will buckle on our armour, and join him in his crusade; but for our own church, we may be allowed simply to submit that she follows the form which was ordained by her heavenly Master closely, and without daring to ask whether it might not have been altered or improved; that, in her hands, it is cleared from all superstitious tendencies; that she holds it to be a means of spiritual grace when it is spiritually received; and likely to lead to the destruction both of body and soul when it is received in sin.*

Service of the holy communion.

After having thus dealt with the holy sacrament, Mr. Abbott proceeds to treat the form of baptism in a similar manner. But I spare your readers any further discussion upon points of this nature. They have perhaps had enough already.

It would surely be well if Mr. Abbott would reconsider these tainted pages, and blot them from his valuable book. I confess, however, that I can scarcely hope for such a consummation. Feeling his strength increase as he goes on — "Caput inter nubila condit." Scarcely has he concluded his observations on the sacraments, when Mr. Abbott finds out that it was a mere matter of accident that the rainbow was appointed as a sign that God would never again visit the earth with a flood. We read in the book of Genesis that "God set his bow in the clouds" for that purpose; and so strong is the expression, that some persons have doubted whether the conformation of the elements previously to the flood was such as to have produced that phenomenon. But what says our author, p. 222? "It reminds us of a transaction that occurred twenty-five centuries before, when Jehovah, after the flood, wishing to quiet the fears which clouds and storms might awaken in human breasts, just takes the rainbow, the object most obvious on the occasion when it is wanted, as the token of his promised protection."

Once more, I lament the necessity for making these observations. There is much good to be derived from Mr. Abbott's works-much awakening virtue in them; but I doubt the prudence of putting publications, which contain such passages as have been quoted above, into the hands of young or uninformed persons without a sufficient caution.* I am, Sir, &c. &c., CAURUS.

MY DEAR SIR,-If you will be so good as to admit this into the "British Magazine" for January, you shall not be troubled with anything farther from me on the Vindication of the Early Parisian Greek Press. I have been told by a few persons-but those, men whose

Every judicious reader of Mr. Abbott's works will be ready to offer his warmest thanks to the author of this excellent letter for its salutary and most necessary caution. We are apt in England to let everything go by fashion, and there happens just now to be a fashion of admiring Mr. Abbott. That he is an acute, shrewd, and vigorous writer is very true; but his popularity will be short. There is very little or nothing of original thought about him. What is original is his extreme famiharity in treating the most sacred subjects, which, with his natural vigour in writing, surprises and awakens the reader at first, but will not charm when it has ceased to surprise. To talk of our Lord as the only boy who never gave his parents uneasiness, and to say that he would have been more admired if, with the common faults of man, he had been occupied in improving his own estate, &c. &c., is, in point of fact, only expressing very common thoughts in a very vulgar and improper tone and manner. The representing all the most awful institutions as mere every-day household matters, is only part of the same system, which is not the system of a man of either large, just, or accurate views. Mr. Abbott works for effect, and occasionally produces it. His chapter on the terrible vengeance of God is of this kind, but his picture is not that of the Gospel.-ED.

decision it is impossible for me to controvert-that it is my duty to reprint the papers that have appeared in the "British Magazine." If this be done, I think that I ought to give an index, and two appendixes-one to meet distinctly the accusation that Stephanus, in his folio, followed the fifth edition of Eramus, implicitly, with blind zeal ; the other, to examine the text which Stephanus gave in all his editions at the two disputed verses, John v. 7, 8, which has been purposely kept as much as possible out of sight in the previous discussion. When, however, I shew my readiness to obey the injunction of these excellent men, by sitting down to write the appendixes, I must be clearly understood to make one stipulation. They must, I think, go on the supposition that the reprint would not be left to incumber Messrs. Rivingtons' ware-room. They will not, then, think me un reasonable in desiring to have a previous assurance that one hundred copies will be taken. Messrs. Rivingtons will kindly receive the names at Waterloo-place; or they may be transmitted by post to me, directed to me at Talaton, near Honiton. It is calculated that the book would cost about half-a-guinea.*

Nov. 26th, 1834.

I remain yours, FRANCIS HUYSHE.

HEAVENLY WITNESSES.

SIR, The disquisition of Mr. Huyshe on the merits of the Stephanie text of the New Testament appears at last to be brought to a conclusion. Since you have had the liberality to say that the pages of your Magazine are open to any refutation of the statements of Mr. Huyshe, I shall not, I am sure, have miscalculated on your candour in forwarding for insertion a few remarks in reply to your correspondent, especially as both my name and my language have been introduced by him in such a way as necessarily to require from me a

short vindication.

In entering on this task, I beg to avow, once for all, that it forms no part of my design to argue the general merits of Robert Stephens, either as a critic or as a printer, nor yet of any one of his three editions of the Greek Testament. The real conflict between myself and Mr. Huyshe, or any other that may choose to follow in the rear, relates to the authenticity or spuriousness of the text of the heavenly witnesses. Therefore, whatever there may be of argument in the

The Editor begs leave to express his hope that Mr. Huyshe will not consider himself as having given any pledge not to write any more in the "British Magazine” on the important subject on which he has bestowed so much labour and time. It is very true, indeed, that the subject requires too much accuracy and too much learning to be interesting to careless or unlearned readers. But the English church must indeed have "lost her cunning" when her sons at large can be careless or indifferent about so vital a question as the Greek text of the New Testament. This work, at all events, will always be open to him, and to others who display the same learning and the same zeal on so important a point. When such subjects deter readers or purchasers, it will be time for this and every respectable publication to cease.