England, with a proportionable aversion to all Dissenters from it, whether Catholic or Protestant, was almost universally prevalent among them. A due consideration of these distinct features in the character of a party so powerful in Charles's and James's time, and even when it was lowest (that is, during the reigns of the two first princes of the house of Brunswick), by no means inconsiderable, is exceedingly necessary to the right understanding of English history. It affords a clue to many passages otherwise unintelligible. For want of a proper attention to this circumstance, some historians have considered the conduct of the Tories in promoting the Revolution, as an instance of great inconsistency. Some have supposed, contrary to the clearest evidence, that their notions of passive obedience, even in civil matters, were limited, and that their support of the government of Charles and James was founded upon a belief, that those princes would never abuse their prerogative for the purpose of introducing arbitrary sway. But this hypothesis is contrary to the evidence both of their declaration and their conduct. Obedience without reserve, an abhorrence of all resistance, as contrary to the tenets of their religion, are the principles which they professed in their addresses, their sermons, and their decrees at Oxford; and surely nothing short of such principles could make men esteem the latter years of Charles the Second, and the opening of the reign of his successor, an æra of national happiness and exemplary government. Yet this is the representation of that period which is usually made by historians and other writers of the church party. Never were fairer promises on one side, nor greater generosity on the other,

says Mr. Echard. The king had as yet in no instance invaded the rights of his subjects,' says the author of the Caveat against the Whigs. Thus, as long as James contented himself with absolute power in civil matters, and did not make use of his authority against the church, every thing went smooth and easy; nor is it necessary, in order to account for the satisfaction of the parliament and people, to have recourse to any implied compromise, by which the nation was willing to yield its civil liberties as the price of retaining its religious constitution. The truth seems to be, that the king, in asserting his unlimited power, rather fell in with the humour of the prevailing party, than offered any violence to it. Absolute power in civil matters, under the specious names of monarchy and prerogative, formed a most essential part of the Tory creed; but the order in which Church and King are placed in the favourite device of the party, is not accidental, and is well calculated to shew the genuine principles of such among them as are not corrupted by influence. Accordingly, as the sequel of this reign will abundantly shew, when they found themselves compelled to make an option, they preferred, without any degree of inconsistency, their first idol to their second, and, when they could not preserve both church and king, declared for the former."-Fox's History, p. 153.

NOTE (*)-Page 75.

This quotation is from "A Letter to the Rev. Dr. Goddard, occasioned by his Sermon, preached August 8, 1811, at the Triennial Visitation of the Lord Bishop of

Chichester. By a Layman." In a sermon delivered at the consecration of the Bishop of London, Dr. G. replied to some parts of this work, though, according to the most approved system of controversial tactics, without giving his hearers, or readers, any direction where to find the heretical propositions which he undertook to refute. As he had administered the antidote, why send them to batten on the poison? This sermon called forth a "Second Letter" from the Layman. In both these productions, the claim of every man to Christian privileges who believes in the Messiahship of Jesus; the inefficiency of creeds to secure uniformity of opinion; the innocency of heresy unless that term be connected with party spirit, and not merely descriptive of erroneous opinions; alliance between church and state; the character of the clergy; and other topics discussed or alluded to in this Lecture, are touched with the hand of a master.

NOTE ()-Page 118.

Orthodoxy, as well as heresy, has its foreign alliances; witness Bishop Horsley's pedigree of unchristian Trinitarianism, in a charge to his clergy. "The inquiry becomes more important when it is discovered that these were notions by no means peculiar to the Platonic school; that the Platonists pretended to be no more than the expositors of a more ancient doctrine, which is traced from Plato to Parmenides; from Parmenides to his masters of the Pythagorean sect; from the Pythagoreans to Orpheus, the earliest of the Grecian mysta

gogues; from Orpheus to the secret lore of the Egyptian priests, in which the foundations of the Orphic theology were laid. Similar notions of a triple principle prevailed in the Persian and Chaldean theology; and vestiges even of a Trinity were discernible in the Roman superstition in a very late age. This worship the Romans had received from their Trojan ancestors; for the Trojans brought it with them into Italy from Phrygia. In Phrygia it was introduced by Dardanus, so early as in the ninth century after Noah's flood. Dardanus carried it with him from Samothrace; where the personages that were the objects of it were worshipped under the Hebrew name of the Cabirim. Who these Cabirim might be, has been a matter of unsuccessful inquiry to many learned men. The utmost that is known with certainty is, that they were originally three, and were called, by way of eminence, the great or mighty ones; for that is the import of the Hebrew name. And of the like import is their Latin appellation, Penates. Thus, the joint worship of Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva, the triad of the Roman capitol, is traced to that of the three mighty ones in Samothrace; which was established in that island, at what precise time it is impossible to determine, but earlier, if Eusebius may be credited, than the days of Abraham.

In a critique on these Lectures in the Eclectic Review, the following remark is made on the passage (pp. 113— 118) to which the above note refers: "If Unitarians are pleased to think of themselves as forming a sect of Deists, and to call themselves Christian Unitarians,' we may venture to say, that their opponents will be as

well content with the arrangement. Thus classed and separated, then, let us stand: on the one side, the

sages of Greece and Rome, who by wisdom knew not God,' and the Jews, who do always resist the Holy Ghost,' and the followers of the false Prophet,' and Deists, and Chinese, and Hindoos, and Christian Unitarians; and, on the other side, all those who call on the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost."-That Deist means properly a believer in God, and only accidentally a disbeliever in Christianity, and that it is solely in the former sense that Unitarians (and Trinitarians also) are a sect of Deists; that the Gentiles referred to were those who did "by nature the things contained in the law," thus uniting the approbation of the New Testament and the reprobation of the Eclectic Review; that it is not, nor ever has been, by maintaining the unity of God that the Jews" resist the Holy Ghost;" and that when that doctrine was asserted by " the false Prophet," it could no more cease to be an important truth, than Jesus could become an impostor in consequence of a demoniac's proclaiming him the Messiah; these are facts so obvious, that it would be unnecessary to point out the foregoing evasion of them, but to illustrate the mode in which an Evangelical Reviewer criticises an Unitarian publication. When he characterizes his own party as "those who call on the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost," his description is both correct and unscriptural: it marks their worship as neither known nor practised by Christ and his apostles. Had he read the note to which these remarks are appended, he would have seen that I was warranted by one of his brethren in not considering