cause on my side, but, since de non existentibus et de non apparentibus eadem est ratio, in the absence of all appearance of the civil courts having ever exercised such power, and in the absence of all express affirmation by competent persons of their being possessed of such power, I will make free to doubt and to deny the existence of it. When Mr. Goode or any other shall adduce, or the court of Queen's Bench shall establish, a precedent on the other side, I will hold myself as free to withdraw my denial as I do now to maintain it. And so, with my best respects to Mr. Goode, and my thanks to him for his courteous conduct, of his side, and to you for your impartial and most patient admission of this long and tedious correspondence, I am, Sir, yours very faithfully, ARTHUR PERCEVAL. MR. AUSTEN ON RATING TITHES. SIR,-I am compelled, contrary to my purpose and wish, to trouble you once more with a letter on the subject of rating tithes. I declared in my last, of December, that I was willing to leave all the advantage of a reply with those who might take the trouble of making one; for it was neither my business or my wish to be counsel for the landowners in this matter. Mr. Metcalfe, however, in your last number, says that he shall consider my silence as a confession, that " I have no standing-place for a reply." I am therefore forced into one more intrusion upon your pages. I will be as concise as possible, for I will not enter into altercation. It would be well, by the by, if correspondents in general would or could avoid disputing with each other; crimination and recrimination, neither amusing nor profitable to the reader, is apt to be the burden of the correspondence in periodical publications. I must once more state the cause of the decision in Rex v. Joddrell. The rateable value of a farm was thus estimated :— £ s. d. Value of produce amounted to 1459 18 0 | Expenses of labour......... Corn rent It was decided that this balance was the net profit, and therefore the rateable value of the farm. In giving the decision, the judge also said, that "no allowance was to be made for the interest of capital." When the case was carried back to the sessions, it was ruled, that by this method of estimation the rateable value of a farm should be set at two rents, one for the landlord and one for the tenant. By this decision, the occupier was rated in respect of his personal ability. He was rated upon the whole profits of his business, just the same as if a butcher, miller, or shopkeeper, should be rated on the balance of his accounts for the year. One rent is all the profit which the land produces to the owner, but the occupier throws his capital and personal labour into the business of the farm, and thereby obtains another rent for himself; and being assessed at a second rent, he is rated in respect of his personal ability. This rating in respect of personal ability, Mr. Metcalfe requires me to confess that I had very ignorantly considered to be "a new thing." In proof of my ignorance, he has referred-1st, to Nolan on the Poor Laws; 2ndly, to various decisions in the court of Queen's Bench; 3rdly, to the opinions of sundry persons who have written on the subject. 1st. The decision was, "allowance is not to be made for interest of capital." Nolan says the contrary (225)—“ Deductions for capital, necessary to render the subject productive, to be considered as drawbacks upon the profit." 2nd. Of the cases cited by Mr. M., those in which the question of rating in respect of personal ability is brought to issue are Rex v. Brown. The farmers let their cows to dairymen, and Brown appealed against the rate because they were not assessed on the profit of the milk,--i. e., on the profit of their business, or in respect of their personal ability. Lord Ellenborough said, "The appellant complains of the rate without any grievance, because the farmer has been rated in respect of the cows.' The dairymen were thus declared rateable only in respect of the cows, and not in respect of their profits or personal ability. Mr. Metcalfe cites Rex v. Oxford Canal Company. In this case, Chief Justice Abbot said, "This canal is rateable on the principle of being so much land covered with water." Thus the principle of rating the company in respect of the profits of their business or their personal ability was altogether rejected. Mr. Metcalfe's third proof of my ignorance he supports by the following observations of Chief Justice Hale, A. D. 1676-" They lay all the rates upon the rents of land and houses, although it is very plain that stocks in trade are rateable;" of Mr. Corry, 1700-" Poor rates should be made with more equality;" of Sir F. Eden-"It is certainly equitable that personal property, as well as land, should contribute towards the support of the poor." "He then," says Mr. Metcalfe, "adverts to the difficulty of rating stock in trade." These observations were all made on the fact of there being no such practice as that of rating in respect of personal ability. So, for this time, I am not reduced to act Dogberry. One word more, and I conclude. Mr. Metcalfe says, "all respectable writers, excepting Mr. Austen, give up the equity of the case, and content themselves with urging the difficulty." I reply, that it was not the equity but the practice that I denied. The particular equity which I did deny was, that of rating the person engaged in agricultural business in respect of his personal ability, when it was found impracticable to rate in the same manner persons engaged in any other business whatever. For thus the case stands. Another last word, for Mr. Metcalfe's satisfaction. In regard to Mr. Lefevre's proposed bill, I never commended that. When my first letter was written, it had been withdrawn, at Sir Edward Sugden's suggestion, upon its own defects; besides, not being honestly introduced, the measure was ill considered. I am convinced that within six months of the passing of the bill there would have been fifty cases before the courts, as to what should be considered "occupier's profit," in the meaning of the act. But the petitions presented were to maintain the Joddrell decision, and such I thought unadvisable. I am really ashamed of being obliged to trouble you with this long reply, which contains very little that was not anticipated in my second letter. Your obedient servant, JOHN THOMAS AUSTEN. Aldworth, Feb. 8. ON THE COMMON AND ERRONEOUS INTERPRETATION OF THE LAST TWO CHAPTERS OF THE APOCALYPSE. DEAR SIR, However much we may owe to those writers who, during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, advocated the literal exposition of the general scheme of prophecy, we have certainly suffered by the inconsistency with which the same writers adopted a strained and unnatural explanation of the symbolical language in which the last book of canonical scripture is couched. Nothing can be more delusive than the interpretation which protestant writers have commonly given of the seals, the trumpets, and the vials. Although in some instances it seems to contain a germinant fulfilment, and most especially in the case of the fifth trumpet, as expounded by Dr. Laurence Ffrench, (see Foster's "Mahomedanism Unveiled,") these cases are but few, or at least extremely uncertain. The whole source of this was, I doubt not, the notion that the pope is the antichrist of prophecy, and that the prophetic days are synonymous with ordinary years, both of which fancies are now happily well nigh exploded. I One error seldom comes alone; or rather, a defect in an exegetical system never fails to lead to a variety of less considerable errors. wish in the present letter to direct the attention of yourself and of the readers of the British Magazine to another mistake which has been committed by these millenarian writers, to whom for the general scope of prophecy we owe so much. I refer to the notion that the twenty-first and twenty-second chapters of the Apocalypse belong to the same period of time with the millennium. Surely, the cotemporaneity of the twentieth chapter with those which succeed it is incapable of establishment, unless the practice of minute and careful observation on parallel texts be utterly laid aside. For we are assured respecting the new earth, that "there was no more sea;" yet we hear frequently of a sea in the prophetic scriptures which relate to the millennial time. Death also is to be no more; and here there is another distinction between the two states of being spoken of. Moreover, the language is peculiarly strong respecting the blessedness of the new Jerusalem state-and "they shall reign for ever and ever," (εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων.) The arrangement of the book confirms me in my judgment. On the other side, I know nothing that can be urged, excepting first the impossibility of our knowing anything about the employments of eternity, an argument which, I think, proves too much, and secondly, the prediction that the kings of the earth shall bring their honour and glory into the beloved city; to which latter objection it is surely a sufficient reply to say, that we do not understand that passage. We shall ever find some difficulty in the completion of a scheme of interpretation while we dwell in these frail tabernacles, although God may not entirely withhold the dew of his blessing. Respectfully yours, R. W. JOHNSON. ON THE DOCTRINE OF THE FATHERS RESPECTING THE SEVENTH CHAPTER OF THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS, AND THE MILLENNIUM. WOULD the Editor or some of his correspondents kindly ascertain a clergyman, very slightly read in the writings of the fathers, of the precise history of the interpretation of the seventh chapter of the Romans? Grotius thanks God that the construction according to which the apostle is not considered to be speaking in his own person or in that of a regenerated man, has the unanimous support of the fathers" of the best or three first centuries" of Christianity; and Mr. Newman (on "Romanism") apparently considers the authority in favour of it to come near to the highest kind of tradition. The writer would feel thankful could he be informed of the way in which these allegations are substantiated; for he cannot find that in the writings of Clement, Polycarp, and Ignatius, as recently edited by Mr. Jacobson, there is even an allusion to this chapter of the Romans; and the remark extends to those selections from some still later writers, as well as from those fathers which have recently been published by Mr. Bickersteth. He finds moreover, from a recent work of Mr. Faber's, (on "Justification,") that St. Augustine quotes St. Ambrose as concurring with him in the contrary interpretation which he sanctions, and describes himself (in going over to it) as adopting not a novel, but the current and ordinary interpretation, as coming round to the construction which divines generally (ceteri doctores) put upon the passage. The writer would be glad also to learn in what extent the millennarian doctrines derive authority, or whether they derive any, from catholic antiquity. Mr. Newman represents them (apparently) as held as matters of private opinion only by particular individuals. Gibbon and Mosheim seem, on the contrary, to represent them as the generally received doctrine of the early church; and Whitby quotes Justin and Irenæus as familiarly and expressly speaking of the Christians holding them as the orthodox. On the other hand, even these fathers apparently admit that the reception of them was not absolutely universal in the church, putting out of the question those Christians who were regarded as heretical. The writer thinks it also some confirmation of Mr. Newman's sentiment, that (to the best of his recollection) Irenæus's rule of faith is constructed without any reference to this class of view, devoted as this father appears to have been to it himself. The writer would feel thankful for any additional information with which he could be favoured on these points. REV. M. GOURRIER'S CHAPEL AT PARIS: SIR,-I am sorry that "Another Presbyter" should have misunderstood my proposition with regard to the seeking permission of the bishops of foreign dioceses for our clergy to minister to our people there according to our rites and ceremonies, which amounted to no more than this, that we should not treat those bishops as innovators or schismatics until by their own conduct they had so declared themselves, which it is clear they would do by refusing such permission, seeing that the one faith, to which the canon I cited alludes, is that which the church of England at this day holds, and which at the time of drawing up that canon was the only one known in Christendom. But leaving my suggestion on this point, and my opponent's comment on it, to go for what they are worth, let me call his and your reader's attention to the following questions: : 1. Who was the "bishop of the united church of England and Ireland" at whose hands, according to your correspondent's information, M. Gourrier received ordination in December last? a title 2. On what plea were orders conferred upon him? on within that bishop's diocese, or by letters dimissory from another bishop? or was he ordained at large, without any title at all? These questions have reference to canons 33 and 34; which see. 3. Under what episcopal superintendence are Mr. Gourrier and his people placed? The answer to this question will enable us to judge how far the chapel is fitly called episcopal. If M. Gourrier is not under episcopal superintendence, and, being a presbyter, is himself the highest ecclesiastical or spiritual officer acknowledged as vested with authority over the congregation which he serves, then it is, I suppose, unquestionable that that congregation is PRESBYTERIAN OF INDEPENDENT, but NOT EPISCOPALIAN; and that to obtain money for it as episcopal is neither more nor less than to obtain money under false pretences-most undesignedly on the part of the promoters of the scheme, I am quite sure. But if some British bishop has undertaken the episcopal charge of the said chapel, in which case the term episcopal will be fully justified, then I hope it may be permitted to a member of the church to ask, whether the British episcopate has or has not given its consent to the undertaking? If the British catholic bishops, being fully satisfied of the schismatical position of their brethren in France, have determined to receive under their care any portions of the Gallican people who may desire catholic communion and worship, and to provide them ministers for that purpose, I am far from saying that they are not warranted in such determination, though I think it questionable. All I say is, that as it will form an entirely new era in the history of the British churches, so it is of that grave importance as to demand the consideration and consent of the whole British episcopate, and that, if taken in hand ex mero motu of any single bishop, it may be productive of much inconvenience. In all these observations, I design no offence to any one. I write VOL. XV.-March, 1839. 2 s |