melted down by the warmth of Christian love and charity. When I see the doughty champions of any sect, drawn up in martial array, and engaged in the hostility of wordy argument,-deeply conversant in all the tactics of the church militant, and directing the canon of their esta blishment against those who differ from them only in points, as to which revelation hath not explicitly and distinctly declared the divine will, and about which Christians who refer to the Scripture as the only unerring rule, and agree in all essential points, may yet conscientiously differ,-I hold them to be defec tive in true policy, as well as in genuine Christianity; and I venture to apply the words of OUR BLESSED LORD, and to say, "Ye know "not what spirit ye are of."-While the breach between sincere and honest believers is thus increased, our pure and undefiled religion is injured and deformed; and the very cause, in behalf of which hostilities are waged, is injured and deteriorated. These are not the means, by which the interests of genuine Christianity are to be promoted ;-this is not the way in which the English church, that pure and reformed part of it to which we have the happiness to belong, is to be defended against its open and concealed enemies. Love and meekness Become a christian better than ambition. - He who induces me to extend my interest and my affections, to other climates, and to other states, to different sects, opinions, and classes of men, who enlarges the circle of my benevolence, who instructs me that we are all children of our heavenly Father, all united by one common sympathy, all subject to the same trials and afflictions, and all inheritors of the same blessed hopes,-He is my kindest and my best friend:He is the friend and benefactor of mankind. These are principles conducive to the happiness of all mankind; they are applicable to all nations, and to all ages. But if ever there was a period, if ever there was a country, in which the practical adoption of them was an essential act of political wisdom,-if ever there was a subject to which they were peculiarly applicable, it is to the present state of our sister island. It is upon the wisdom or folly, the justice or injustice, of our proceedings,-upon the Christian orfanti-christian spirit of our counsels,-that will depend the secure preservation of Ireland, as a blessing to us,—or its precarious possession, as a thorn in the sides of Britain. The late application from, some Roman Catholics of affluence and rank in Ireland, called upon many statesmen, and among others upon our respected President to declare his sentiments freely and unreservedly, in the Upper House of Parliament.-To all of toler ation, that could be asked, he was a friend: but he objected to the demand of power. He wished that something had been applied for, in which the general mass of Irish Catholics was concerned; something that was connected with personal toleration;-something that was to promote the social and domestic habits of the labouring class, or to improve their resources; -something that was to have a general operation in bettering the condition of our Catholic fellow subjects in Ireland. But as to granting to Papists the power of sitting in Parliament, of exercising corporate franchises, and of acting as Sheriffs of counties, he called upon the noble Lords to pause, until they had ascertained, whether such after concessions, we should be able to obtain toleration for our Protestant fellow subjects in Ireland; and whether we should be able to keep inviolate the barriers of our religious and political communion, and to preserve that entire, which can only be preserved by its entirety. We shall proceed with an extract from that part of BISHOP BARRINGTON'S speech on this occasion, which is peculiarly applicable to this subject. "After a period," says his Lordship, "of religious difference and civil discord, it is "indeed of the utmost importance, that we "should be influenced by an increased anxiety, "to guard against every unfair or unfavour"able impression, from recent injuries, or from "internal discontents. It is essential that we "should resolve to preserve inviolate and "sacred the principles of the establishment; "and to extend that toleration, forbearance, "and Christian charity, which are its distinc"tive marks, to their utmost practical limit."RELIGIOUS TOLERATION is the primary principle, and peculiar characteristic, of our "established church. By the practice of it, "we have been habituated to respect and revere even the errors of the conscientious Chris "tian; and we have been able to preserve harmony and good will, not only between "Protestant sects, but between every denomi "nation of Christians." "How far it is the disposition of the English "to shew, not merely toleration, but real and. "and active beneficence, to persons differing " from them in articles of faith, may have ap. 'peared by the reception and protection which "this country has recently afforded to the "French priests: where to religious preju"dices was superadded political danger; and "when we had no security against the intro"duction of spies and enemies; nor any rea"sonable assurance that there might not be "individuals among them, desirous of pur chasing their return, on almost any condi"tions, which the usurped power of the French 66 government might think proper to dictate." "In that instance we had also to encounter "religious danger, from that bigoted spirit of "conversion, which characterises their reli 66 gion;-from the unfavourable sentiments "which they had nourished from their in"fancy, with respect to English protestants; "--and from a peculiar species of domineering "intolerance, which distinguishes the French |