in newspapers, but with actual violence"; and "in spite of the universally acknowledged liberty of religion, the sect of the Mormonites was, after open fighting, actually expelled from the state of Illinois, in the year 1839, and no notice was taken of the outrage." Again, "the interference of the State is called for in the distribution of the national school funds but full impartiality is not observed even in this land of religious liberty; for when the Roman Catholics of the state of New York claimed their share, it was refused them by the Congress."

:

He speaks also with becoming indignation of the most unchristian line of partition drawn between white men and men of colour, by a people clamorous for liberty and equality in words, but in fact so repugnant from them, that a large class of their brethren are not admitted even into their places of worship. He quotes Col. Hamilton :

:

"People of colour are either excluded altogether, or are mewed up in some remote corner, separated by barriers from the body of the church. It is impossible to forget their degraded condition even for a moment. It is brought home to their feelings in a thousand ways. No white Protestant would kneel at the same altar with a black one. He asserts his superiority everywhere, and the very tone of his religion is affected by the colour of his skin."

And adds

"Should this imputation concern the Protestants only, the shame is theirs; but shame is due to the Americans in general, for their perseverance in upholding slavery, and, where this is not the case, for their contempt of the coloured race. The Clergy in the slave states dare not-thanks to the voluntary system-raise their voice against this wickedness."-Review, p. 160.

We fear it is too true that even the Church herself deserves this terrible rebuke; and that the Romanists are the only persons, who, in their churches at least, present in this respect, what must ever be one of the the most visible external notes of the Catholic Church, that it is equally free to all, without respect of colour or nation. There are so many respects in which the Church which derives its Orders from ourselves in that country is superior to that in communion with Rome, that we do not fear to confess that in this respect it is sadly inferior.

The literature of the Archbishop (probably also that of Sweden in general), seems to be in great part German; and his views of the several aspects under which Christianity presents itself in Germany, have been formed from a very general acquaintance with German theology. In common with all serious minded persons, he regrets the spread of rationalism over that vast empire; but his narrative ceases before the commencement of the late, or rather present religious movement, into which this element has attained too free admission.

Of the Swedish Church the Archbishop speaks, with the affection of a son; but we infer from his observations, that it is in some respects but just emerging from a very unsatisfactory state of supineness and inefficiency. In her "prophetical office" the Swedish Church seems to be still fettered, almost to slavery, by such restrictions as were necessary in our own Church about the time of the Reformation, to check erratic zeal, or to hide the intellectual incapacity of our Clergy; but which we have now cast off, with other marks of an untutored age. Of a few native

volumes of sermons which deserve commendation, the Archbishop speaks as if they were of a rare class. He even seems to feel himself called on to combat that jealousy of learning, which is seldom found where the reality is general.

"Christianity is intended to lead the time, not to be dragged in the track of its triumphal chariot; but it is the duty of the Steward of the Mysteries of GOD, to be made all things to all men, and thus to strive to gain as many as possible to the Kingdom of GOD. And while he should be especially well versed in the counsels of GOD respecting the salvation of man, he ought not to scorn the knowledge of man and of the world. The edge of the Sword of the SPIRIT does not require to be sharpened; but erudition, true mental discipline, and particularly self-experience, may cause the hilt to fit conveniently in the grasp of the swordsman."-P. 265.

That the homiletical exercises of the Swedes should not have attained in general a high degree of excellence, cannot be thought wonderful, when it is considered that according to the Swedish Ritual, the Clergyman is bound to preach in the forenoon service on the subject of the Gospel of the day, and in the evening service on that of the Epistle; free texts being allowed only in the early service, when such is performed. These postils are too much neglected, perhaps, by ourselves, yet we should hardly wish to be reduced again within such narrow limits. And the Swedish Church is labouring for her emancipation. The Clergy have ventured by a synodical decree to encourage a course of lectures on the whole Bible. It is not, however, very encouraging that the commentaries on which the Swedish Clergy are thrown, are not indigenous. A native theology, though less copious, less exact, less learned, less in anything except orthodoxy, would be infinitely preferable to a host of translations of German exegesis. We do not find how far the light of the ancient Fathers may have been shed on Sweden; but this is certain, that for practical theology and heartsearching discourses, no better foundation for a native system of teaching could be laid, than the homilies of Augustine or of Chrysostom : and this recourse to a stream, in one sense closed, though in another sense inexhaustible, would tend to the formation of a school which should be independent of any neighbouring theology or literature.

The Bible Societies of Sweden, which seem to be under better regulation than that which attracts so much attention here, being provincial or diocesan, and we presume under the Bishop's regulation, have been unable as yet to meet the demands upon them by their own exertions.

"The British and Foreign Bible Society, after having assisted the Swedish Society and its auxiliaries with large donations, has, for several years, through its agency at Stockholm, with great liberality further promoted the spreading of the Holy Scriptures in our country.”

But,

"Whereas the Bibles published by the English agency do not contain the Apocrypha, these books have been separately printed at the expense of the Swedish Bible Society, so that copies of the Bible can thus be had complete in Sweden."-P. 210.

Why are we practically less alive to the importance of having the

Bible complete? Is it because we cannot put a Bible, with the Apocrypha omitted, into the hands of our people, without challenging a comparison between it, and the Calendar and service of their Church, that we carelessly (and some, even worse, of set purpose) omit these books, though they are appointed to be read in churches, and though we ourselves, as many of us as are in Holy Orders, are bound to read them? Yet so it is. We fear that in district depots of the Christian Knowledge Society it is in general difficult to find even a Bible of that size usually appropriated to that good old English memorial of the connexion between the household of faith and the Christian family,-the Family Bible,-with the Apocrypha.

Our readers, we fancy, will not desire that we should follow the Archbishop in his remarks on other parts of Christendom. It may not, however, be without interest to collect from the appendix of the volume before us, an account of one of those phenomena which touch on the connexion between the physical and the psychological condition of man, and which always excite our interest, in proportion to their mystery.

There has appeared in Sweden a disease, for so it undoubtedly is, to which the Archbishop gives the name of THE PREACHING EPIDEMIC; and of the appearance of this disease in his own diocese, the Bishop of Skara gives an account in a letter. It seems to be a species of catalepsy, and to differ from other instances of the like kind chiefly in its attacking a larger number of persons: but for the rest, the subjects of its attacks, (for the most part young females, and persons of an excitable temperament,) and the religious tendency of their ravings, are not uncommon: although indeed this ought to be said in favour of the Swedish sufferers, that they do not seem to have made a schismatical use of their misfortune, as the Methodists, and after them the Irvingites, have done in England.

That bodily disease is a part of the malady is clear.

"Heaviness in

the head, a burning heat in the orifice of the stomach, a sensation of crawling and pricking in the extremities, convulsions and quakings in various parts of the body, copious perspiration, dropping down fainting, insensibility even to the pricking of a needle,"--all these are clearly physical conditions denoting bodily disease. The psychological and theological aspects of the disease we shall throw together, using for the most part the words of the author, and always much abridging his matter, while we throw in a few remarks of our own.

This

It cannot be disputed, the Bishop tells us, that those who are afflicted by the preaching epidemic are brought by it to a religious disposition of mind, and that they receive a further religious impression from the miraculous operation which takes place in them. arises, in all probability, from the disease having been connected from the first with a tradition of a Christian character, as well as from its having universally allied itself with what is already religious in its subjects. But its religious effects have a peculiar stamp: for besides the practical deviations from the order of grace, and the sickly abhorrence of certain words and things in themselves indifferent, there is a something which does not seem to correspond with the real religiousness of the patients, when they are free from the attack; their piety, if such

it be, is scarcely their own, nor are they themselves fully conscious of it: a kind of twofold influence which has induced some to attribute their state to the operation of demons.

Though the patients do not desire to form a new sect, yet there is in them an instinctive tendency to herd together; they seem unconsciously to form a portion of a class, among whom there is an intimate union; so that they will say we, when one would expect I; the presence of others in the same predicament seems to be attended with something the same effect as that of one with whom they are en rapport, on persons under the influence of mesmerism. There is also an indication, which we should hope is at present but slightly marked, of a tendency to a breach of the seventh and eighth Commandments, (i. e. the eighth and ninth, according to our reckoning,) in those under this influence ;— there, too, we find some correspondence between mesmerism and the preaching epidemic, and perhaps other forms of religious mania, as those excited by Methodist experience meetings, and American revivals, and wherever the Thcopatheia is excited without its due proportion of reverence and godly fear.

The more visible forms and symptoms of the disease, include singing and speaking in divers tones and forms, but these are the last results. In the province of Elfsborg it is commonly said, "This or that person has begun to quake, but he has not as yet dropped down, nor has he had visions, nor been preaching." Sometimes, however, the falling down comes first, and is often repeated without the preaching; but such variations are endless. The author visited three preaching girls, from eight to twelve years old, who had arrived at the highest stage of the disease. These children were well instructed, and had always been, but now especially, of a gentle disposition; simple and taciturn in their manners, they gave no account of the view which they themselves took of their situation. They declared themselves, however, particularly well and happy, but after awaking from their trance they would complain, sometimes even with tears, of weakness in the limbs, pain in the chest, head-ache, &c. While completely under the influence of their disease they partook of the usual abhorrence of certain things indifferent, though conscious at other times of the folly of such wayward fancies. These antipathies are in general so arbitrary, that not only maypoles, dancing, and ornaments are objects of deep abhorrence, but even simple words, such as yes" and "no," of which, strange to say, the latter in particular has been so odious to the patients, that it has often been depicted as "one of the worst of devils, tied with the chains of darkness in the deepest abyss."

The more serious accession of the disease first appeared in their falling down, preceded by quakings in the arms and legs, with a sense of crawling in the limbs. They always fall backwards, and with considerable violence. Two distinctly marked stages of the disease followed. In the first, the motions were violent, and in particular there was an action as if the patient was feeling for something: if a hand was offered, she would sometimes at once throw it aside; at other times she would keep it longer, pat it, and rub it, but at last even the "good hand" was thrown away. The patient would make signs and

mimic representations of actions which she disliked or reprobated: thus she would imitate one drinking, or firing a gun, or shuffling cards; or she would seem to dress herself for a dance; or, both with gestures and words she would dramatically perform a pugilistic contest, in which she alone had to sustain the trouble and pain of both parties: and, indeed, the action and the words are here violent to a painful excess; she uttered out of breath and exhausted, "That was a rascal, but wait a little. . . thou . . . I will give it thee . . . I will beat thee, so that thy brains shall spatter the wall," and so on.

At the change from this most violent stage of the disease, the patient would strike herself violently about the head and chest ; and sometimes her stomach all on a sudden swelled, and for some minutes was kept so strained, as to resist even force applied to repress it; then it would itself as suddenly subside, and be drawn into the chest: foaming at the mouth also sometimes occurred. But after these the more gentle crying or preaching began, "My friends! we should convert ourselves, my friends! For the SAVIOUR wishes that we should all convert ourselves. ... How pleasant it would be if we all were allowed to come to Him, and to get our wedding garment and our seal! Oh! how pleasant that would be! But if we won't convert ourselves, what a great sin we do Him, and grieve Him! . . . And you shall believe my little words. Although they are little, still they are well meaning. For God's sake, believe me, dear friends!" This and the like was said solemnly, and in better language than the child would use on other occasions. The greatest pain and a sense of sin, seemed to follow on the children being restrained in their preachings. They spoke as having a great charge, and as bound to deliver their "little word."

These patients recovered without medical aid. In some cases it has been proposed to treat persons under the disease with bodily severity ; but we trust this cure has not actually been applied. There can be little doubt, however, that in some degree the disease is under the control of the patient, though it is not on that account the less real, or the less pitiable.

Such, in effect, is the account given of these unhappy persons. Their state affords another case to be added to those already familiar to the world, under the various forms of Magnetism, Methodism, Irvingism, Somnambulism, and Catalepsy. Perhaps the reader will thank us for laying before him a similar well-authenticated case, which occurred in this kingdom, and was reported at length by eye-witnesses, during the great rebellion. We quote from Hunter's "History of the Deanery of Doncaster."

"In the year 1652, the attention of the public was directed upon Laughton [Laughton-en-le-Morthen, a parish in the West Riding of Yorkshire,] by an extraordinary circumstance. Miss Martha Hatfield was seized with a disorder which presented very violent, and very unusual symptoms. In the book which contains the account of her case she is described, as having been from her infancy of a weak constitution; but the peculiar symptoms which excited the attention, while they baffled the philosophy of the times, did not manifest themselves till April 1652, when she was in her twelfth year. "Her disease at last