BISHOP GIBSON. These considerations, Bishop of Worcester, may apply to the petty incidents of domestic life. But, even if we can guard our minds as to private calamities, how can we hope to exempt ourselves from other causes of uneasiness? The state of public affairs, for example, since the late Queen's death, the ambition of Princes, the hostile dispositions of

foreign courts, the violence of contending parties at home,-are not these subjects of alarm, Brother? and can we pretend to keep the mind entirely calm and composed, amid such a hurricane around us?

BISHOP HOUGH. In a free country like England, the energy of national character, and the union of those who

do not contaminate themselves by party politics, will always augment their power and exertions, in proportion as the exigencies of the community require it. Impressed with this idea, I view with composure, things that may be alarming to others. The personal character of those who, govern their petty jealousies and contests, their probable apostacies and contradictions, and the possible consequences of the future transformations of the EPHEMERAL POLITICIANS, are of little moment to me, while I look back with devout gratitude on the events of the last fifty years. Preserved from civil and ecclesiastical tyranny, I

ACKNOWLEDGE A RULING PROVIDENCE IN

THE HISTORY OF BRITAIN: and I confide in the continuance of that providential protection, so long as my country is not

I

wholly unworthy to hold its place upon this ball of earth. In an age of dissipation and profligacy, I feel that much good has been done by individuals among us. We have preserved the knowledge of divine truth; we have spread it among our own poor; and we have diffused it with active and well directed zeal over every peopled region of this habitable globe. I look up, therefore, to the God of mercy; and though I put not my trust in princes, or in the sons of men, yet while fifty righteous are to be found in this country, I have hope that we shall not be left, like Sodom and Gomorrah, a monument of divine justice.

BISHOP GIBSON. How say you then Brother, when the Church is in danger? -When the cause of anxiety refers not

merely to temporal and perishable concerns, but to the interests of our pure and reformed religion as by law established, are we to remain calm and composed, and is not neutrality at such a moment culpable? For example, the sectaries of the present day, tempted by pride and the desire of power, are busied in suggesting doubts and difficulties, hostile to the Establishment, and destructive of Christian unity and Charity.

BISHOP HOUGH. Let me not be supposed to approve of a factious opposition, tending to create schism and division in the church, and to mislead the pious and humble Christian. At the same time, let me say that my apprehension is about the progress of INFIDELITY, What I most dread is a relapse into that indif

ference about religion itself, against which you have so solemnly warned us in your excellent Pastoral Letters. My paroxysms of anxiety, however, have been slight and momentary; for I have an entire and unshaken reliance in HIM, who, speaking of pure Christianity, has assured us that, "the gates of hell shall "never prevail against it." I see with very great satisfaction, that eminent men among the dissenters are uniting with our own learned and pious divines, in defence of revealed religion. This union in a common cause gives me the more pleasure, because serious Christians, in proportion as they know more of each other, will love one another more. The Champion of our Church, Dr. Chillingworth, has well observed that the BIBLE

ONLY IS THE RELIGION OF PROTESTANTS.