first duty of every man who is convinced by the word of God. Equality in the eye of the law, is a generally admitted principle. Of this it is a necessary consequence, that no invasion should be made upon this equality, in consequence of any men's opinions, whether the governing or the governed. Another truth, which all experience proclaims, is, that, if religious intolerance is invariably mischievous and every where decried, civil intolerance, a practice utterly at variance with all principle, is a thousand times more unjust, more cruel, and more destructive of every thing that is good. The law should punish crime, disturbance, sedition: but error, opinion, whatever it may be, can never come into the domain of the law.-What! a Protestant government, while it grants, and that most properly, toleration to Catholies and Jews, refuses it to fellow-Protestants. By the grossest selfcontradiction, it allows a general toleration, but denies private and domestic toleration for the meetings of those opprobriously called Mômiers, against which the persecution is carried on, are held, not in the churches, not in the fields, but in the dwelling-houses of peaceable and estimable citizens. What! drinking meetings and meetings for play may be held openly, but one sort only of meeting shall not be suffered, as being the most dangerous of all. Of what description, then, is this intolerable meeting? It is one for the reading of the Bible, and for prayer even for those who would prevent it from being read. This is then the excepted case, in which all the insults of the mob must be permitted: this is the case which is to require that a police-officer should by night violate the citizen's domestic asylum;extemporaneous divine (théologien improvisé), to him it belongs to decide upon religious doctrines! But all his learning consists, not in knowing any of those doctrines, neither the law nor the edict designate a single one, but in being able to vociferate the maddening words, These are Mômiers!-Woe to that people whose mind does not revolt at iniquitous laws! Woe, greater still, if they obtain the general approbation! Pity on those governments which cannot, or will not, restrain the furious passions of a mob! Always and every where, violent measures double the moral strength of the persecuted. Their wrongs plead eloquently for them; their calamities conciliate all hearts, and soften even those of their enemies.-Let religious zeal meet religious zeal [in the field of fair and candid argument]; let notions meet notions, let belief meet belief; or rather, let mutual charity every where establish a healing union. Let those who would separate and those who persecute, think of the triumph with which they are feasting infidels and intolerant men of other communions. Let them reflect that, though they now are blaming each other, soon God in his mercy may touch both their hearts in a very different and a very happy manner. Let them think less of discussing their dis agreements, than of shewing the faith that works in the heart and in all the conduct. Let their religion appear in something more than words and writings. Let them not say to real religion herself, as they drive her from their hearts, like the Athenian to Aristides, I exile thee, because thou art just;' or, like Ahab to the prophet, I hate thee, because thou prophesiest only evil of me.' It is by

never deviating from the gospel doctrines of the primitive church, it is by reviving in our hearts the fervour of the first believers, it is by earnest prayer that God would bless all our labours, and grant us the sanctifying faith of the apostles, that, by his grace, we shall unite all minds and all hearts. Let us strive to maintain the unity of the spirit by the bond of peace:' and, if this unity be yet unattainable, still let peace, let love continue, for love never faileth!''

When we read such sentiments as these from French hearts and French pens, we no longer wonder (if we ever could have wondered) at the efforts of Jesuitry and its royal puppet to carry the infamous law against the press, for which they are now convulsing their country.

A few months ago, eleven petitions were presented to the Lausanne Council of State, by as many distinct bodies of Evangelical Reformed Christians' separating from the National Church, praying for religious liberty, or at least for toleration, and inviting the Government to inspect their meetings by the police, if it thought proper, and even to fix the places and hours of their public worship. One of these interesting papers is before us. We give a few words from it.

The undersigned &c. have separated from the National Church of this Canton, and have formed themselves into a Church according to Scriptural order, as appointed by Jesus Christ and his apostles, and under which discipline they desire to live and die. They cannot live without social worship; and they regard it as their duty, and a part of the submission which the Bible requires to the higher powers, most earnestly to beseech your fatherly benevolence to grant them what you refuse not to Roman Catholics, nor to English Episcopalians, nor to Jews, nor to various other communities; and what consequently they would have no need to ask, if, instead of attaching themselves as they do to the faith of their fathers the Reformers, they had taken a course the very reverse, and had joined the Roman Catholics.'

Honour and admiration to the judicious heads and tender hearts which dictated the answer to this petition! The request of the petitioners, being contrary to the law of May ⚫ 20, 1824, cannot be taken into consideration.'

On September 21, another Memorial was presented to the Government, signed by M. Augustus Rochat, authorised by the written request of the Dissenting Churches throughout the Canton. In selecting this gentleman for the delicate and important commission, the Dissenters shewed their Christian wisdom; for, if learning, talents, piety, and weight of character had been recommendations to the attention of Messieurs the Landamman and the Members of the Council of State,' his name would have commanded success. He was

one of the clergymen to whom was committed the charge of revising and correcting the edition of the Bible, which has been (with sorrow and shame we reflect upon it!) the subject of so much intemperate and truly persecuting abuse in our own country. The object of this address was to repel the charge, which had been industriously propagated, that they had concealed intentions, that they were disaffected to the state, and similar absurd calumnies. We cannot refrain from citing a part of this interesting document.

That we are in a position of disobedience to the laws which have been enacted against our religious assemblies, is only because we have believed that we ought to obey God rather than men; and because, on the other hand, we are obliged by the commands of his word, to render unto Him the duties of social worship. But we have not acted thus from any motive of disaffection to you; and we have mourned over the situation of disobedience to which you have reduced us. We declare that, if we should be still unsuccessful in obtaining from you that toleration which we shall not cease to request, our sentiments of respect and submission to you would be in no wise diminished; and we should not hesitate to exclude from our Churches any person who was known to us as opposing directly or indirectly your administration, or as engaging in any secret political proceedings against the established order of things in our Canton.We earnestly request (nous demandons hautement) that you would condescend to inform us of the grounds of the reproaches charged upon us of having political views: and we are ready to bear all due punishment if we do not justify ourselves in the most triumphant manner. Such is our object, Most Honourable Sirs; we know no other; we have no other. That we continue to pursue it, notwithstanding oppositions and contradictions, is by no means from obstinacy or a spirit of disaffection; but because a Christian is not at liberty to turn out of the path which God in his word marks out, and because his commands must be fulfilled, and fulfilled with all perseverance, without permitting any human consideration or any danger whatsoever to prevent us. We trust that God will give us that firmress which he requires from us; but, at the same time, that he will grant us grace to suffer with meekness, patience, and humility, and above all, that he will never leave us to be wanting in the respect which we owe to our civil superiors. This is what we earnestly pray that he would work in us, by his Holy Spirit, and for the sake of his dear Son our only Lord and Saviour.-We request that this declaration may be made as public as possible; and we hope, Most Honoured Sirs, that, in making this request, we prove to you our sincerity. Hypocrites, or men who have secret intentions, would

See the Minutes of the Committee of the British and Foreign Bible Society relating to the Edition of the French Version, &c, in Lausanne, in 1822. page 22.

not, with their full desire, thus lay themselves open to be so easily unmasked and convicted of falsehood.'

The answer to this honourable appeal was the following, dated Oct. 5, 1826.

The Council of State, by its letter received this day, desires me to let you know that, as it cannot recognize in the Canton the persons calling themselves a Church separate from the National Church, in whose name you say that you act, it cannot take any notice of the contents of your petition.'

Such is the present state of things between the Lausanne Government and a numerous body of its best subjects.

It is with sincerest joy that we add, from very recent communications, the intelligence that, though the Government maintains its ridiculous obstinacy, it has at last found itself unable to keep up respect for its own laws. The public spirit of the Canton has, of late, shewn itself so favourably on behalf of the patient sufferers, as deserving and having "a "good report of all men and of the truth itself," that meetings for worship are held, in many places, without molestation, and without subsequent prosecution. The spirit of evangelical piety has most delightfully displayed itself in the National Church, as well as among the Dissenters; mutual esteem and affection are demonstrated by both parties towards each other; and the evidences are satisfactory of an extended awakening to true conversion and the practice of sincere religion. At the same time, the temporal distress of many excellent persons in the lower classes of society, in consequence of fines, expenses, deprivals, and injuries of various kinds, is very severe. Some time ago, a subscription was opened in London, as a testimony of respect and sympathy to the exiled ministers. Whether the gentlemen who have had the conduct of it have been sufficiently energetic, we presume not to say; but it grates very hardly upon our British and Christian feelings to have observed, that our country, so exalted in religious blessings, has not raised more, on an occasion so touching and so commanding, than about Two HUNDRED AND FIFTY POUNDS; and that that sum was principally obtained from a very small number of munificent individuals. Not six congregations in Great Britain have as yet taken the trouble of making a small collection for SUCH AN OBJECT! "O tell it not in Gath!" Publish it not in Paris, Madrid, or Rome!

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Art III. Babylon and Infidelity foredoomed of God. By the Rev. Edward Irving, &c. &c.

(Continued from page 207.)

EVERY book of the New Testament, it will be admitted, was written with a specific intention, and for an express object, which related to the persons to whom it was addressed, and to the existing circumstances of the Church. Nor is it difficult, in general, to ascertain what that primary object was. The gospel of St. John, for instance, is believed to have been written for the express purpose of refuting the opinions of Cerinthus and the Gnostics; and the Epistle to the Romans was written to vindicate the universal necessity and efficiency of the Gospel method of justification through faith. Prophetic discoveries were in like manner uniformly vouchsafed for a specific object. This has been shewn in the instance of our Lord's prediction respecting the destruction of Jerusalem; and in that remarkable passage in the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians, we find St. Paul introducing the prophetic disclosure he was commissioned to make to that primitive Church, with a caution which clearly shews for what purpose it was given. It appears that considerable agitation had been produced among them by the mistaken notion that "the day of Christ" was at hand. By which, it is evident, the fall of Jerusalem could not be intended; for, in that event, the Christians of Macedonia had little immediate interest. To counteract a notion which has always been found to have a prejudicial effect wherever it has prevailed, by diverting men's minds from the discharge of their proper duties, and rendering them the easy victims of delusion, the Apostle informs or reminds them, that the predicted apostacy must first take place, together with the revelation of the man of sin, the son of perdition; an event remote as yet, for existing circumstances prevented the development of the mystery. There is an allusion to a previous conversation in which the Apostle had adverted to the subject, probably at greater length; but, from the indefiniteness of the phraseology, it may safely be presumed, that the precise nature of the events predicted was left in salutary obscurity.

When we open the Revelation of St. John, we find the same marks of a specific intention in relation to the persons to whom its series of predictions was addressed. At that period,* Je

* About A.D. 97., according to Lardner. See also Woodhouse's Diss. P. 24.