afterwards to make the restriction more distinct; accordingly we have the following:

A.D. 1552. . . . "To the intent that these orders (bishops, priests, and deacons) may be continued, and reverently used and esteemed in the church of England, no man shall be accounted or taken to be a lawful bishop, priest, or deacon in the church of England, or suffered to execute any of the said functions, except he be called, tried, examined, and admitted thereunto, according to the form hereafter following, or hath had formerly episcopal consecration or ordination.”—(Preface to the Ordinal.)

To which may be added the following canon, re-enacting that ancient discipline which we have seen by the foregoing extracts to have obtained in the church from the very earliest ages:

A.D. 1603. Canon 48. "No curate or minister shall be permitted to serve in any place without examination and admission of the bishop of the diocese, or ordinary of the place having episcopal jurisdiction, in writing under his hand and seal, having respect to the greatness of the cure, and meetness of the party. And the said curates and ministers, if they remove from one diocese to another, shall not be by any means admitted to serve without testimony of the bishop of the diocese, or ordinary of the place aforesaid whence they came, in writing, of their honesty, ability, and conformity to the ecclesiastical laws of the church of England."

From all which it appears that, even if the Scottish ministers, for whom Mr. Cumming is interested, had been episcopally ordained, we could not admit them to officiate, except they came with the approval, expressed or understood, of the Scottish bishops. This being according to the universal discipline of the church from the beginning, which discipline, for 1500 years, only contemplated episcopal orders, none others being then pretended. And that our admission of them, seeing they have not been episcopally ordained, is still further barred by the provisions which, since the rise of the presbyterian error, the church catholic (in England at least) has expressly made to meet the same in her regulations of 1549 and 1552. All this being wholly irrespective of the subsequent statute of 1660, (13, 14, Car. II. c. iv. § 14,) which merely, to a certain extent, adds civil sanction to that which had already been determined by the church.

When Mr. Cumming affirms that by this statute (Act of Uniformity) the bishops of Ohio, Nova Scotia, and Vermont are excluded from officiating in the English church, he says that for which I can find no warrant in the act, which merely prohibits any person not in episcopal orders from holding ecclesiastical benefice, or administering the Lord's Supper.

States are excluded They are excluded enable the English

That the bishops of the church in the United is very true, but not by the statute of Charles II. by the act which it was found necessary to pass to bishops to confer consecration on White, Provost, and Madison, without incurring a præmunire.

The colonial bishops are also excluded, (unless specially licensed by the archbishop ;) but that also is by special acts, and not by the Act of Uniformity.

The bishops of Edinburgh, and the rest of the Scottish bishops and clergy, are likewise excluded; but that again is not by the Act of Uniformity, but by the statute of 1792, which released our brethren in Scotland from the persecution which their religion had endured on

account of the political attachment of its professors to the house of Stuart. There is, as I said before, reason to hope that this exclusion will shortly be withdrawn, as far as respects the simply occasional officiating. Has not Mr. Cumming confounded these different statutes with the Act of Uniformity?

To prevent misunderstanding, I will cite the clause in the Act of Uniformity to which I suppose him to allude. If I have overlooked any more express clauses" bearing upon this case, I will thank him to correct me; if not, he will see, first, that this is a mere repetition of the canon prefixed to our ordinal; and secondly, that the American bishops are not excluded by the clause which excludes the presbyterians:

:

13, 14, Car. II. c. iv. § 14. "And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that no person whatsoever shall thenceforth [i. e., after the feast of St. Bartholomew] be capable to be admitted to any parsonage, vicarage, benefice, or other ecclesiastical promotion or dignity whatsoever, nor shall presume to consecrate and administer the holy sacrament of the Lord's Supper before such time as he be ordained priest according to the form and manner in and by the said book [our English Ordinal] prescribed, unless he have formerly been made priest by episcopal ordination, upon pain to forfeit," &c.

I will only further submit to Mr. Cumming, that until he can shew that the church itself has rescinded the regulations cited above, no accumulation of instances that he can adduce of individual members of the church acting or speaking contrary to her directions can avail to do more than prove the inconsideration or inconsistency of those individuals their inconsideration, if they acted in forgetfulness of the church's rules; their inconsistency, if they acted in conscious violation of them. I remain, Sir, yours very faithfully, ALPHA.

THE LATE REV. THOMAS SIKES OF GUILSBOROUGH. SIR,-Your pages being liberally open to explanations or defences from living churchmen who may consider themselves misrepresented, I have no doubt you will afford me space for a few remarks on a charge that has been brought against an excellent clergyman deceased, who has now for many years been called from a life of mercy and almsdeeds to a better world. The charge was first pointed out to me in a journal too little respectable, and too notorious for its common slander of the dead, to admit of any direct reference in your pages; and there it would have remained without notice from me or any other friend of the late Mr. Sikes, had it not sought support from a late publication of a learned clergyman, the Rev. Dr. Nolan, of Prittlewell, Essex.

The charge in brief is this. It is pretended, 1st, That the Hon. and Rev. George Spencer, lately a presbyter in the orders of the church of England, and now a convert to the church of Rome, in his "Account of the Motives of his Conversion," published early in this present year, alludes to the late Mr. Sikes, where he speaks of a "protestant minister, by whose conversation he was prepared to come to a

right understanding of the true rule of Christian faith proposed by the [Roman] catholic church." 2nd, That at some earlier period the same hon. gentleman, in a letter to a friend, expressed himself as "owing his conversion to the light which Mr. Sikes's work on 'Parochial Communion' had let in upon his mind." For this the authority of the Rev. Dr. Nolan is alleged, who in a late publication has affirmed that he has seen this letter, in which Mr. Spencer "imputes the merit of his conversion" to the work of Mr. Sikes.

The whole aim of the above charge, I need scarcely explain, is to point out, by the valuable evidence of facts, how such principles as are now maintained in the "Oxford Tracts" lead by plain consequence to the adoption of popery, the late Mr. Sikes being supposed to have held similar principles. It is at least true that the late Mr. Sikes was one of the first to point out to me the great ability and promise shewn in some of the earliest of those Parochial Sermons which the excellent vicar of St. Mary's has since published, and which no longer need a herald for their praise.

When this charge was first shewn to me, I determined to write to the Hon. and Rev. George Spencer, knowing that the effect ascribed to the arguments of Mr. Sikes, whether in his writings or conversation, was very different from that which I had been used to hear in his lifetime from himself, and of which other evidence may be adduced if necessary. Mr. Spencer, in his answer to me, has given in the main such an account as is not inconsistent with what I had heard; and in reference to the two parts of the charge above specified he has enabled me to state :

1. That the allusion to a "protestant minister" in his "Account of his Conversion" is not made to the late Rev. Thomas Sikes, but to another clergyman of very different sentiments, whose name is stated in Mr. Spencer's letter, but which I do not publish, as my sole object is to ascertain and establish the truth as it regards the late Mr. Sikes.

2. That as to what Dr. Nolan says about having seen a letter in which the merit of Mr. Spencer's conversion is imputed to Mr. Sikes's work on "Parochial Communion," Mr. Spencer remembers no letter in which he has said anything which could have been so interpreted; and he is well assured he never intended to say what is there alleged, as, although he possessed Mr. Sikes's work, he never read it through; and at that period of his life he used to read very little of any books except the scriptures.

On receiving this very candid and satisfactory answer from the Hon. Mr. Spencer, I wrote to the Rev. Dr. Nolan, requesting to know "to whom the letter he referred to had been addressed, or, now that he had made the contents public, to be favoured with a sight of the original, or a copy;" stating at the same time that I was in possession of information which made me to be of opinion that he must have been misinformed.

Dr. Nolan tells me that the letter he has referred to was addressed to the late George Wharton Marriott, Esq., by whom it was shewn to him" without any obligation to secrecy." It does not appear that Dr.

Nolan thought it necessary to refer to the document before he printed his account of its contents; nor does it appear of how many years' standing is his recollection of those contents; but I believe from reference to dates it will appear that Mr. G. W. Marriott's death was an event of more than five years ago. Dr. Nolan, however, adds, "Nothing in your possession can invalidate the fact that I saw the letter." This fact it was certainly never my intention to invalidate. As to his statement of the contents, and to the manner in which he has relied upon a long memory to fix a charge upon the doctrine of a deceased brother clergyman, there will possibly, after the above statement, be different opinions from his own.

Crayke.

I am, Sir, yours, faithfully,

EDW. CHURTton.

P.S. Dr. Nolan states in his letter to me, that the letter of which he speaks "conveyed a reflection upon two bishops, whose names he is not at liberty to give up; to whom Mr. Spencer had applied without effect for satisfaction of the doubts which had been excited by the work of Mr. Sikes." This is unfortunate: for Dr. Nolan must be aware that those two bishops, if now living, must be the most proper persons to substantiate his charge; if dead, still their names might assist to develope the case, and there seems no obvious reason why he should spare their memory, any more than he has that of the late Mr. Sikes. It is by no means likely, that at this late period the letter itself will be retrievable; though I have applied for this purpose to one of the representatives of the late Mr. G. Marriott.

"ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY."

MR. EDITOR,-With many of my brethren in the ministry with whom I happen to be acquainted, I have read the several numbers which have hitherto appeared of "Ancient Christianity." Most thankful am I to find that the subject is likely to be taken up by some of your able correspondents. I feel it to be one of paramount importance, as well as of absorbing interest; and being much occupied by the duties of a large parish, I am most grateful to my brethren who have the leisure and ability for the light which they are able to throw upon topics of interest to us as Christians and as churchmen.

The author of "Ancient Christianity" assuredly has startled me. Being perhaps somewhat less than "mediocriter doctus" in patristical theology, I cannot pretend to decide upon the fairness and correctness of the author's quotations. But this I must say, (and I am speaking the views of many of my brethren-men of no sectarian or party bias,) that unless the accuracy of those quotations can be disproved, or any unfairness be proved against the writer, that he has done much to clear away a considerable amount of mistiness with which my vision was beginning to be clouded. I humbly trust that my assumed signature expresses the real state of my mind. I am really an "inquirer after truth;" and since I have read the work of which I am writing, I have been most anxious to arrive at the real state of the

case. Indeed I am resolved to examine the quotations for myself as soon as I can enjoy the opportunity of searching the ponderous volumes of a neighbouring library.* I perceive from your last Number that a correspondent intends to favour your readers with a series of papers on the subject. Let me earnestly intreat him, if he wishes to convince, to direct his arguments to prove the inaccuracy of the translations of the passages referred to by the author of "Ancient Christianity," or at least to shew that they are unfairly quoted with reference to the context. Unless this be done, I must confess (again I speak the feeling of many brethren) that I am satisfied with the general force of the author's argument. I do not say that his style is not miserably out of taste. There is a kind of self-conceit and coxcombry about all his writings; but this does not affect the force of his conclusions. It really will not do to endeavour to throw contempt upon the book. It will not satisfy my mind to be informed that the writer is scurrilous and profane, and to be classed with such writers as Gibbon, &c. I do not approve of many of his observations, and think his work would have been infinitely more effectual had he written less and more chastisedly. But it is simply a question of fact-does he or does he not misrepresent the words and spirit of the writers whom he quotes? Are the facts which he states untrue? I am thoroughly convinced that unless the question be met by an open and candid investigation, "Ancient Christianity" will carry conviction to many minds. I shall feel obliged by your inserting this letter.t

I remain, Mr. Editor, yours, &c.,

AN INQUIRER AFTER TRUTII.

[The Editor sincerely wishes that all who have it in their power would do the same. It is because he is most deeply desirous to promote this that he ventures to add an expression of regret at the epithet here, and very frequently elsewhere, used, to the great terror of duodecimo-readers. "Take your Cyprian from the shelf" seems to be a challenge to some Herculean feat. No doubt there are big Benedictine editions, and they have not on earth a more enthusiastic admirer than he is. Every student would desire to possess them, on all accounts; but still he who wants to become acquainted with the works of any father without fighting out the details of every question of theology, history, geography, &c., which may have arisen on any part of them, can generally obtain the works on very moderate terms as to size and price. The edition of Cyprian which the Editor took from his shelf for this business is an old-fashioned book, printed before he was born, in a larger type than any used in this Magazine, swelled out by the addition of spurious works ascribed to Cyprian, and the genuine works of Novatian and Minucius Felix, and yet so far from being ponderous that, when placed in the scale, it was found that it weighed not quite half so much as the works of Sydney Smith. Whatever value they are to attach to them, it is most desirable that the clergy should be acquainted with the writings of the Fathers; and in order to this, that neither those who do, nor those who do not read them, should ascribe to them undue weight.]

† [The Editor does so with great pleasure, trusting that his reason for omitting one or two sentences will be apparent, and, on reflection, approved. The mode of meeting the work proposed in it is precisely that which he suggested when a gentleman previously unknown to him expressed a wish to write on the subject. It will be seen by the letter which follows that it has been adopted; and the Inquirer's way of writing leads the Editor to believe that he will read it with surprise and conviction.]

VOL. XVII.-Jan. 1840.