Church is to suspect. The Church, however, directs her chief blow at the more natural and much more common errors which lie on the other side. Her great object is to assert the corruption and insufficiency of our nature, the necessity of regeneration through the divine Spirit, and the doctrine of salvation by grace through the atonement of Jesus Christ, which we have already observed are the doctrines peculiarly meant by the term Evangelical.

That which we deem indispensably requisite in a Christian, however, is not merely giving a barren assent to a form of sound words containing these doctrines, but the practical application of the doctrines themselves to the heart. We shall endeavour to explain ourselves on this subject.

It is material, as we conceive, that Man should feel himself to be a sinner, saved not by any deeds or merits of his own, but by an act of undeserved grace. It is essential that he should come as a suppliant to God, not claiming heaven as the just recompense of his works, and not indulging any self-complacent thoughts on account of the assumed goodness of his character, which is the common feeling of the world; but deeply bewailing that corruption which he has discovered in his heart and life, and applying for the pardon of his offences and reconciliation with God through Jesus Christ his Saviour. This application to Christ necessarily implies faith in him, meaning thereby a cordial and firm belief that he is the Saviour, the only Saviour of men. Thus apply ing he obtains the mercy he implores; in other words, he through faith is justified, or accounted just before God.

We have thus endeavoured to explain what we mean, when we say with our Church, that we are justified by faith alone by which we are to understand being justified by grace through faith. Faith in this view of it, as the means of our justification, evidently stands opposed to works. Salvation, as the Scripture says, "is of faith, that it might be by grace;" and again, "by grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast ;" and

again, "Now to him that worketh not but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness."

Faith, however, if it be genuine, fails not to produce works, and it can only prove itself genuine,by producing them. It is thus we hold with our Church, the great doctrine of justification by faith alone; a doctrine, the very terms of which have given much offence; for it has been assumed by hasty and unthinking men, that they who speak of being justified "by faith," and especially "by faith alone," in conformity to the Church of England and to the Scriptures, are altogether the enemies of good works; are Antinomians, who make void the whole law of God; are sectaries within the Church, and are the very children of sectaries by whom, in former periods of our history, Christianity was disgraced.

We reject the accusation. We quote the Articles which affirm the justification of man by faith alone; and we retort on those who thus accuse us the charge that they, sometimes by speaking both of a first and second justification; sometimes by giving to faith the credit of justifying only because it includes good works, instead of regarding it as opposed to good works, in as much as it implies a renunciation of them as a means of our justification; take away the strength of that doctrine which our Articles assert, and fail in beating down sufficiently that pride of man which is the great obstacle to the reception of the Gospel of the Grace of God, and which is also the worst enemy to the real practice of those good works which both sides profess to be so zealous to recommend.

We have mentioned two of the chief doctrines which are denominated Evangelical; we will speak also of another, which is no less essential to the attainment of real goodness or holiness; namely, a sense of our own inability to produce this goodness in ourselves by the exercise of our natural and independent powers, and the consequent necessity of humble and habitual dependence on the grace of God, and of constant and earnest prayer to him for the attainment of it. The virtue acquired in this manner will be a devout and humble, a pure

them even abound in what some higher Calvinists of the present day might be inclined to call legal or moral preaching; for they dwell on particular sins, and they describe at large individual graces. They aim not merely to point out the true faith, but also fully to direct, inform, and instruct; and they assume that there is in all religious hearers a mind patient and attentive, and disposed to learn the details of moral duties. If, therefore, they appear to those who are jealous on this point to be at one time too Calvinistic in their views, and even to gratify for a moment an Antinomian taste; they presently redeem their character by the plainness and abundance of their exhortations to right practice. They often inveigh against a barren faith as being a mere phantasie;* and in speaking of good works they give to them in general not a cold and guarded, but a warm and zealous praise.

We have entered into these observations, because we think that the question agitated by Mr. Overton, namely, how far those of our Clergy, to whom the name of Evangelical has been given,† have a claim to be considered

sufficiently according with the greater delicacy of modern times) on particular sins and individual duties. In the preface to it is the following passage-" Considering how necessary it is that the word of God should at all convenient times be preached to the people, that thereby they may both learn their duty towards God, their prince, and their neighbours, according to the mind of the Holy Ghost, expressed in the Scriptures, &c. &c." The first Homily then begins by asserting that Scripture contains "God's true word, setting forth his glory and man's duty," and it ends with observing, that "he most profiteth by reading that book who is most changed into that thing which he readeth; who is daily less and less proud, less wrathful, less covetous, and less desirous of worldly and vain pleasures." In the homily on Faith is the following passage: "Let us, therefore, good Christian people, try and examine our faith what it is. Christ himself speaketh of this matter, and says, the tree is known by the fruit, therefore let us do good works, and thereby declare our faith to be the lively Christian faith. Let us, by such virtues as ought to spring out of faith, shew our election to be sure and stable, as St. Peter teach eth-Endeavour yourselves to make your call ing and election sure by good works."

See Book of Homilies.

By the use here made of the term Evan

as the followers of our first reformers and of the earlier luminaries of our Church, depends not simply on the proof that the former agree with the latter in certain great articles of faith, but also on another point not always sufficiently adverted to; we mean on the attention which is given to practical subjects, and the practical use which is made of religious doctrines in the two cases. It is possible that a minister may plead an adherence to the doctrines of the reformers, in justification of his departure from their mode of attacking individual sins and inculcating particular precepts.

There is, undoubtedly, an anxiety to be right in points of faith, which belongs to every mind properly occupied with religious subjects. There is, on the other hand, an exclusive zeal for doctrine, and a critical taste for soundness, which indicate, as we conceive, a somewhat unsound state of the heart; for doctrines are in order to practice; and whenever a practical mode of preaching doctrine, and the inculcation of moral precepts on Evangelical principles, acquire the name of legal or moral preaching, the true faith may be considered as endangered; not perhaps through the denial of it, but through the silence which prevails respecting those Christian tempers, and that strict and self-denying practice, which ought to result out of it.

The silence of the preacher produces negligence in the hearers, and this negligence will, in time, bring the faith itself into disre pute.

Antinomianism, in this case, may be beginning to spring up, even while no Antinomian tenets are asserted; for it is a weed which will grow in any soil, not excepting that of orthodoxy itself.

It may be said, that in a time of too general inattention to doctrine, it becomes the ministers duty more particularly to dwell on the greater doctrinal truths. This is, no doubt, a just and important remark. It is, however, to be remembered, that in these days (we

gelical, we are far from intending to affirm that those are exclusively entitled to it, to whom it is sometimes exclusively applied: we know the contrary; we use it because it is understood.

speak more particularly of the metropolis and of our larger towns) hearers select their own favourite minister, and that, therefore, a very doctrinal preacher is likely to address a congregation which is already, perhaps, of a too doctrinal cast. He may possibly be confirming the faults of his own followers, and gratifying their particular taste, even while he is opposing the errors which are the most common in the

world.

The point then, which we mean to affirm, is this; that the asserter of the soundest doctrines, unless with great diligence and distinctness he probes the heart and reproves the sins of that class of hearers by whom he is surrounded, may very possibly prepare the way for Antinomian successors. It becomes easy for them to build on his foundation. They have only to push his too barren doctrine to a greater barrenness, and his too unpractical Calvinism to a Calvinism less combined with practice: they may then teach the people to despise the moderately Calvinistic and practical preacher as a man who is unsound, and, in no long time, soundness of doctrine may be considered by their hearers as the appropriate description of Antinomianism itself.

We know that many of that highly valuable class of men whom Mr. Overton defends are free from the fault which we have described, and that not a few hold a course directly opposed to it; and we have every reason to believe that the same might be truly said

of numbers who have not been within the sphere of our observation. We are also firmly persuaded that the peace and good order of society, the cause of morality, and the interests of our holy religion which is the bond and cement of both, have been at least as zealously and effectually sustained and promoted by the efforts of the whole of this class of men as by those of any other body whatever; but we apprehend that there are a few to whom the friendly caution we have now given, may prove useful. These may, in general, have deviated in no great degree from the right line; nay, of most of them, perhaps, charity would only say that they were in dan

ger of deviating; but the welfare of their people is so highly interested in their scrupulously avoiding the error we have pointed out, that we trust they will not think it requisite for us to of fer any apology for the preceding observations.

We profess to be ourselves zealous for those doctrines which we have shewn to be included under the name of Evangelical, and to be little anxious on the subject of the Calvinistic and Arminian controversy. As an apology for our moderation on this point, we beg leave to offer to our readers the following passage from the works of one of our Bishops, who flourished towards the close of the seventeenth century; a passage which may, perhaps, contribute to inculcate candour on two

opposing parties, at a period in which

the union of the moderate and the pious on each side is particularly called for by the general circumstances of the Church.

Each opinion has some practical advantages of its side. A Calvinist is taught by his opinions to think meanly of himself, and to ascribe the honour of all to God, which lays in much inclined to secret prayer, and to a fixed him a deep foundation for humility; he is also dependence on God; which naturally brings his mind to a good state, and fixes it in it. And so, though perhaps he cannot give a coherent and care of himself; yet that temper arises account of the grounds of his watchfulness out of his humility and his earnestness in prayer. A Remonstrant, on the other hand, is engaged to awaken and improve his faculties; to fill his mind with good notions; to raise them in himself by frequent reflection; and by a constant attention to his own actions, he sees cause to reproach himself for his sins, and to set about his duty to purpose, being assured that it is through his own fault if he miscarries. He he tempted to undue security; or to swell up has no dreadful terrors upon his mind; nor is in, perhaps, an imaginary conceit of his being unalterably in the favour of God.

Both sides have their peculiar temptations as well as advantages: the Calvinist is temptminian may be tempted to trust too much to ed to a false security and sloth; and the Arhimself and too little to God. So equally may a man of a calm temper and of moderate thoughts balance this matter between both the sides: and so unreasonable it is to give point. If the Arminian is jealous to assert way to a positive and dictating temper in this liberty, it is because he cannot see how there can be good or evil in the world without it :

he thinks it is the work of God that he has made for great ends, and, therefore, he can allow of nothing that he thinks will destroy it. If, on the other hand, a Calvinist seems to break in upon liberty, it is because he cannot reconcile it with the sovereignty of God and the freedom of his grace, and he grows to think that it is an act of devotion to offer up the one to save the other.

The common fault of both sides is, to charge one another with the consequences of their opinions, as if they were truly their tenets: whereas they are apprehensive enough of these consequences; they have no mind to them; and they fancy, that by a few distinctions they can avoid them. But each side thinks the consequences of the other are both worse, and more certainly fasten to that doctrine, than the consequences that are urged against himself are. And so they think that they must choose that opinion that is the least perplexed and difficult; not but that ingenious and learned men of all sides confess, that they feel themselves very often pinched in these

matters.

But besides the diversity of sentiment already noticed, it may be observed, that there are wide differences of opinion among those who interpret the Seventeenth Article in the Arminian sense, and are, therefore, indiscriminately called Arminians, and likewise among those who interpret it calvinistically, and are therefore classed under the general name of Calvinists. There are, also, many Arminians who, as was before remarked, are sepa. rated from many Calvinists only by a nice line. We think that Mr. Overton has not sufficiently adverted to these circumstances. He has classed together the high and the moderate Calvinist, who in fact is not, strictly speaking, a Calvinist, as he differs more widely from Calvin than he does from many who are called Arminians. He has, moreover, ranked among the Calvinists some who are on the Arminian side, and who are zealous only for what may be more properly termed Evangelical than Calvinistic sentiments. He has classed the Arminian, who, though not a Calvinist, yet agrees with him in many if not all the Evangelical doctrines, with some of that very heterodox and almost Socinian party, against whom the Church of England Articles are principally pointed. He has, for example, placed to

gether on one side, Mr. Fellowes, and Mr. Daubeny, many of whose opinions stand in diametrical opposition to those held by some of his warmest admirers; and on the other, Mr. Romaine, Mrs. More, and Mr. Wilberforce. The two last indeed strenuously plead, in their writings, for those doctrines which may be properly termed Evangelical; but so far are they from approaching the Calvinism of the former, that one line cannot be pointed out in the works of either of them, which contains exclusively Calvinistic sentiments.

That there are many truly religious persons, who agree in all the fundamental points of faith, who yet disavow the names of Calvinist and Arminian respectively, is well known. It is also plain, though there be a mass of evidence in favour of the Calvinistic principles of our earlier divines, that the most which can be extracted from our Articles and Homilies falls far below the rigour of John Calvin's system, as Mr. Overton himself, (p. 96) acknowledges; and that the Liturgy seems at least equally to favour the opinions of the Evangelical Arminians on the subject of Redemption. We therefore regret that there should be. any thing in the construction of Mr. Overton's work, which, notwithstanding the qualifying passage at the 97th page of his book already noticed, is calculated to leave an impression on the reader's mind (an unfair one we admit) as if he regarded Calvinists as the only true Churchmen. are true Churchmen, Mr. Overton has most satisfactorily proved, as well as that many of their opponents have no claim to that title; but yet we maintain that there is a large body, we trust a very large and increasing body, who, disclaiming equally the invidious appellation either of Calvinist of Arminian, cordially concur with us in holding, that man's salvation is wholly of grace applied through that faith which is the gift of the Holy Spirit and which uniformly issues in love and obedience; and that his perdition is wholly of himself. (See Christian Observer, No. 1, p. 10.)

That they