Church all proceed from one motive, or by necessary consequence they all involve this one position, that there ought to be no National Church. Let this then be the rallying point for uniting the members of the Church in their civil capacity; and while we are careful to observe the rule of living, as far as in us lies, peaceably with all men, let us offer an uncompromising resistance to every design which tends to weaken ourselves, or to strengthen the hands of those who wish evil to our Sion.

That the state of the Church in this Diocese has greatly improved of late years, and is continually improving, in all those respects which depend upon the conduct of the Clergy, I assert with confidence, and with a grateful acknowledgment to Almighty God for His blessing and protection. In the condition of the Churches, in the residence of the Clergy, in the regular performance of divine service at stated hours, in the increase of parochial duty both within and without the Church, in the establishment of daily and Sunday schools, in the building of glebe-houses, where there was either none or no fit house of residence, in all these points we have abundant cause for congratulation. If sectarian habits still prevail, there is every year less and less excuse for them, on the plea that the ministration of the Church is negligently, or coldly, or inadequately performed. Separation from the Church is not now to be laid to the charge of its ministers.

If the people wilfully and without cause put away from them the word of life offered by us, on them be the blame. We are not partakers in the sin. Neither be you, my brethren, disheartened and cast down, if those whom you invite turn away from you. So did they often from One who is greater than you; and who submitted perhaps to this wrong in His own person, among other wise and benevolent reasons, in order that, having this example ever before your eyes, you should not faint and be weary in your minds, or apprehensive that His care is withdrawn from your ministry, or that you are deemed unworthy labourers in His vineyard. The disciple is not above his Master. If there were men who rejected Him, and walked no more after Him, so is it not to be wondered if they should often reject you. Only be careful that you give no just cause for this apostacy,—that you disclose to them faithfully the whole counsel of GOD,-that you instruct them in the duty of Church union, the last and most earnest injunction of their dying Saviour to His disciplesthat you warn them of their peril, and earnestly and affectionately exhort them not to sin against their own souls; not to "do despite to the Spirit of grace:" not, by despising you, to despise Him that sent you.

Lastly, I would entreat you, my reverend brethren, not to disparage your Church, or give encouragement to those who disallow it and break from

it, by yielding even in name to their pretensions. To bestow the title Catholic upon the Romish Church as contradistinguished from our own, is practically injurious, not only with uneducated people, but it has actually been employed in controversial argument as a proof of their superiority, and of our recent origin. To speak of theirs as the old faith or the old religion, and of the Protestant confessions as a new form of Christianity, has an equally injurious tendency. The truth as you well know is, that ours is the old faith. Let us, however, drop altogether the distinction of old and new, and adopt that of genuine and corrupt. There is but one faith, one religion, one Church, from the beginning :-that Church has been for ages grossly corrupted by the influence of Popery; and it has been more or less reformed, and restored to its original purity, by Protestants in different parts of the Christian world. We of this land have accomplished the work more thoroughly and yet more temperately than any other nation. Let us cherish this great and glorious work as our dearest possession; at the same time never let us give way by submission, no, not for an hour, to that spirit of schism and separation, which is directly opposed to the very constitution of the Church as founded by Christ and his Apostles, as placed on record in the Holy Scriptures, and as transmitted to us through the uniform practice of the first and purest ages. Do not, I beseech you, under a false plea of liberality and charity, counten

ance that pernicious error, by which self-appointed teachers usurp the ministry and distract the Church, to draw away disciples after them, when they already have a faithful minister at hand able and willing to lead them in the way of salvation. Be not deterred, by the fear of incurring the reproach of men, from maintaining steadily the high privilege and the sacred dignity of your calling; but rather bear in mind the saying of our Lord, (which has especial reference, not to moral conduct, but to this temporizing and spurious liberality in the messengers of GOD) "Woe be unto you when all men shall speak well of you; for so did they of the false prophets who were before you :" and, be assured, that in so doing, you will have ample recompence for any transient persecution in the peace of your own conscience here, and in the approval hereafter of that Divine Master whom you serve.

THE END.

GILBERT & RIVINGTON, Printers, St. John's Square, London.

A

CHARGE,

DELIVERED TO THE

CLERGY OF THE DIOCESE OF QUEBEC,

BY

GEORGE J. MOUNTAIN, D.D.

LORD BISHOP OF MONTREAL,

(ADMINISTERING THAT DIOCESE,)

AT HIS

PRIMARY VISITATION,

COMPLETED IN 1838.

QUEBEC, PRINTED 1839:

LONDON:

RE-PRINTED FOR J. G. F. & J. RIVINGTON,

ST. PAUL'S CHURCH YARD,

AND WATERLOO PLACE, PALL MALL.

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