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administered to our long-neglected brethren. The weekly offertory produces on an average 11. 5s.; which for the number is, I think, exceedingly handsome. Mr. Gray is much liked. A grant of some land has been obtained, and it is intended very shortly to commence the building of a small church and school; but its progress must of course be more or less tardy according to the amount secured for that special object. It is a thousand pities the Bishop cannot afford to send his missionaries in pairs--a priest and deacon together. Not only would this be a more scriptural (St. Luke x. 1,) but a more complete and efficacious plan than that of placing the cure of souls in the hands of deacons or catechists. Besides, it would allow of regular church-service at the village or station, while one or other might alternately peregrinate, and superintend, and keep up "schools for the poor and for the heathen in different parts of the district." It is very much to be regretted that this plan cannot be adopted; for the ignorance and heathenism of many of the isolated farm population is truly lamentable; and it is hardly surprising when these poor creatures are cut off almost entirely from all intercourse with their fellow-men, and wholly deprived of any means of grace. Mr. Gray's nearest neighbour-or, rather, brother clergyman-is Mr. Pain, of Somerset, fiftysix miles off! How many therefore who are not within the immediate range of the village parson can be much better than if there were none at all! And yet one ought to be exceedingly thankful that the principal villages are now supplied with clergy-they can baptize many-bury at least-and by these offices alone they keep together the scattered flock, and perform the last offices over them. Their very presence is something, inculcating and enforcing by precept and example, English manners, customs, usages-checking vice and ungodliness, and pointing the way to a better land. Still, to do any visible good, and especially to take the heathen at all into account, we must strengthen their hands by additional labourers in the Lord's vineyard-we must have permanent foundations planted here and there in the centre of darkness and irreligion, a school at once of prophets and of teachers, as well as of industry and labour. Hardworking, self-denying, practical men, are those we want, whose devotion shall be made manifest by their zeal, activity, aud earnest

ness.

I fear I shall have wearied you, and you may perhaps justly reprove me for appearing to usurp functions which do not belong to a layman. GRAHAM'S TOWN, Sept. 1850. K. T. K.

Reviews and Notices.

The Bombay Quarterly Magazine and Review, October 1850. We have received the first number of this new Indian periodical. The Prospectus states that its "object is not to make money, but to be useful," and we sincerely hope that its success may be such as to enable it to run a long and useful career. The

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Bombay Quarterly Magazine will embrace the various subjects of interest-literary, political and religious-which commonly find a place in our own Reviews: but we may expect from the place of its publication far more accurate and detailed information on the history, languages, and customs of India. Its theology will be that of the Church of England. We cannot, of course, enter into a particular examination of the several articles contained in the first number, but we have been struck with one on "Church Government" as eminently a question of the day. The reviewer strongly advocates the restoration of the powers of Convocation, and to those who object from apprehension of divisions in the Church, he points to the state of things which has arisen in our Communion, during the suspension of all synodical action. We must confess ourselves unable to see how it can be consistent with religious liberty, and the ordinary rights of citizens, to refuse to any Communion the privilege of meeting in conference to adjust its own affairs, and agree upon the measures which may be necessary for its own efficient action. But most of all are we shocked to hear veteran advocates of liberal opinions appeal to the doctrines of arbitrary power and prerogative in order to check and keep down the growing desire of Churchmen, lay as well as clerical, for some form of Church Government, whether Convocation, or Convention, or Ecclesiastical Board. The Convocation is at present as much a part of the British Constitution as the House of Commons, and, to use the emphatic language of Mr. Roundell Palmer, the Crown, by suspending its sitting in Hoadley's case, "did to the Church of England what Charles the First attempted to do to the State when he dissolved Parliament after Parliament, and prevented the Legislature meeting for the despatch of business." The Bombay Magazine contains a series of book notices and other miscellaneous information. We think the proprietors would do well to add on the title-page the name of a London publisher.

A Sermon preached in St. Paul's, Halifax, on Nov. 14th, on the occasion of the death of the Bishop of Nova Scotia. By the VEN. ARCHDEACON WILLIS. Halifax, N. S.

WE notice this affecting discourse, not for the purpose of criticising it, but that we may have the satisfaction of placing on record the following tribute to the memory of Bishop Inglis from one to whom his ministerial life was intimately known. The Bishop was Rector of St. Paul's for the eight years preceding his consecration.

"In early life our lamented Bishop had the advantage of being made intimately acquainted with the Ecclesiastical affairs of the

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Diocese. Brought up and educated under the eye of that excellent man, his father, the first Bishop of Nova Scotia, and first Colonial Bishop, every object of his youthful training was for the Church; and, as I have already observed, he had privileges and opportunities which could be rarely enjoyed. He availed himself of his highly favoured position, and became thoroughly conversant with every circumstance and matter connected with the Church in this Province. And so attached was he to this Diocese, that he resisted the most flattering solicitations to be ordained in England, and to connect himself with the Church in that country. His affections were centred in the Diocese of his father; and who can blame him? His attachments were here fixed, and they were lasting. During his life he made many visits to England, and had constant intercourse and communication with the most influential and leading members of the Church ; and it was in that country he laid the foundation for obtaining those benefits for the Church in this Diocese, which it has been our happy lot to receive through his zeal and instrumentality."

After enlarging on his attention to the temporal welfare of his Clergy, the fostering care which he extended to the Collegiate Institution at Windsor, the increased number of Missionaries (from twenty-eight to fifty-four) and of congregations during his episcopate, the Archdeacon proceeds to say :

"But while our lamented Bishop laboured for the present advantage of the Church committed to his care, and strove to strengthen the bond of respect and affection between all the Ministers of God's Word and their Chief Pastor, he looked forward to future times, and endeavoured to make provision for those who might succeed in the great work of disseminating the truths of the Gospel. He knew that the Church in this country must, at no very distant period, be dependent on the people-on their own voluntary contributions, for support. He knew also the many evils and discomforts ever accompanying that mode of support. To remedy the one, and alleviate the other, he succeeded in establishing the Diocesan Church Society, which, while aiding the general efforts of the children of the Church throughout the Province, might give unity of design, and stability of purpose to their exertions. He foresaw that this Society would become the channel through which the general contributions of those who are taught in the word, would be ministered to their teachers; and that it would eventually be the source to which the Clergy of the Diocese would look, if not for their entire maintenance, at least for some suitable provision. Through his instrumentality and representations, the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts regards this Society as a branch of itself, and extends to it the aid and protection of a mother.

His successful exertions in this respect will remain a lasting monument of the prudence and foresight with which he established its principles, and the wisdom with which he guided its counsels. Its

members will long remember that, when for the last time he was leaving the shores of his beloved Diocese, he spoke of this Society as one of the children which he left behind him."

Elements of Natural Theology. By JAMES BEAVEN, D.D. London: Rivingtons.

THE unsparing hostility of dissenters, favoured by the indifference of professed Churchmen, bears sway, as our readers are aware, in the government of Canada. In King's College, Toronto, the teaching of Theology is abolished, even in the lifetime of (we believe) its first professor. It is, however, to be hoped, that the varied acquirements of Dr. Beaven will yet be secured to that portion of the Church in which he has for some years laboured so successfully. In the present volume, instead of suffering himself to be led by his attractive subject into a superfluity of illustration, he has confined himself to the more useful task of compiling a careful digest of those arguments by which, in various ages, the probability of the fundamental truths of religion has been evinced, without appeal to the word of Revelation. The reasonings of ancient and modern philosophers on the subject are ably reviewed. The work will be found to be very valuable both as a text-book, and as an appendix to various popular treatises on the subject.

Sermons for the Holy-days observed in the Church of England, &c. By the Rev. J. PINDER. London: Rivingtons.

THIS book is in every way worthy of the high reputation which Mr. Pinder has earned, as Principal, in former years, of Codrington College, and latterly of the Theological College at Wells. The forty sermons contained in the present volume are characterized by a quiet but earnest strain of religious meditation, and, as to their mode of expression, by the simplicity of finished scholarship. There is abundance of close practical application, generally referring primarily to the life of Christian ministers. Occasionally, there are brief, but able historical summaries, and elucidations of difficult texts, e.g. the nineteenth sermon on 1 Pet. iii. 18. From the twenty-second sermon, Prayer the Soul's Support," preached on St. Mark's day, we take the following extract:

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"And while other branches of the African Church have been swept away like the sands of the desert, while the Church of Carthage, where the holy Cyprian lived, and was martyred; and that of Hippo, where St. Augustine wrote and laboured, have left no trace

of existence, the Church of Egypt still exists. That patriarchate, one of the four so distinguished, that which the great St. Athanasius so splendidly adorned, still has its lingering traces; and along the Nile, and deeper in the country, churches yet remain to testify to the Grace of God, which sent St. MARK to bear to Africa the glad tidings of salvation. It is one of the best proofs of life in our branch of the Church, that we are beginning to think more and more of the perishing souls of the heathen. And if one country more than another seems to demand from us some recompense for wrongs towards her children, it is Africa, the centre of slavery, the land of Ham. We have burst the fetters which bound the limbs of the African and his descendant in our own possessions. But our work is only half-accomplished; it remains for us, by greater acts of self-denial and labours of love, to break the bonds of Satan which enslave the soul; to send forth ministers of Christ from England, in something like proportion to the necessities of the heathen. We must see more among our Clergy ready to spend and be spent in missionary labour; and we must contribute more bountifully than we have yet done, in the propagation of the Gospel."

It is a volume which might well be placed in the hands of every candidate for Holy Orders in our Church.

Calendar of the Missionary College of St. Augustine. 1851. Canterbury: Ward. London: Rivingtons.

THE public will hail this small but carefully compiled volume as one of the gratifying signs of progress which St. Augustine's College has lately put forth. The features which distinguish it from other almanacs are, a record of memorable days connected with events which have marked the growth of the English branch of the Church, an account of the existing state' of the college, and the studies therein pursued, and a useful appendix, bearing on the character of the English missionary. All who are interested in the cultivation of a missionary spirit at home, or in the propagation of the Gospel abroad, will have pleasure in making themselves acquainted with this little work.

Dr. WORDSWORTH has added to his valuable series of Occasional Sermons, two on the subject of Romanism in England, one being entitled St. Peter at Antioch, and the Roman Pontiff in England; the other, the Christian Soldier a Christian Builder. It will suffice for us to notify the publication of these sermons to any persons who desire to take a just view of our present

1 We trust that the attention of some of our wealthy Churchmen may be drawn to the last page of the appendix. The funds of the College are by no means in so flourishing a state as is generally imagined. Two recent attempts to found scholarships have not yet met with the success which they deserve.

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