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portance, as it appears to me. I allude to your administration of the Holy Communion some three or four weeks past, as it was related to me by those who partook of the Holy Mysteries. In so holy and engrossing a matter, I am sure it would be farthest from your intention to do any thing which should distract the thoughts and pain the feelings of any one of God's people; and in what you did I know you did all things for the best. I will not stay to object to the plan of giving the elements to a whole rail-full of communicants, and then pronouncing the words appointed once to them all, however much I dislike it as being contrary to order, usually unnecessary, and calculated perhaps to weaken (to some) the particular and personal application of what belongs in its fulness to every individual communicant; but my protest (as a friend and brother clergyman) is against the break which I understood you made in this beautiful service; and when all had communicated, your giving out hymn to be sung, when you are directed to proceed with the Lord's Prayer, and so to the end of the service.

"The plan you adopted (for I hope, by the way, it is not your usual practice), is, you are aware, against positive order-and a breach of order at such a time is painful to serious Christians, and I feel it now a duty to take you aside as it were, and tell you privately that I know very excellent and exemplary Christians who were very much grieved indeed at the innovation. Rest assured, my dear friend, the wish to gratify some, who think not with us in the hope of gaining them, is not worth indulging at the cost of the faithful brethren; and I am satisfied that upon reflection you will agree with me.

"Believe me,

"Your faithful Friend and Brother,

"IGNATIUS SMOOTHY."

There was something in the general carriage and bearing of the writer of this letter, which had strongly prepossessed Faithful in his favour. He was, indeed, a very different character from the old High Church clergy, and yet had none of the peculiarities of the Low Church. He appeared to be at once dignified and devout, humble and courteous, and yet not cringing, nor fawning, in his manner; but all his actions were accompanied with a winning gentleness, which made it almost impossible to resist his influence. It was his constant attendance and apparent devoutness at church, which first attracted Faithful's notice; and afterwards, when he became personally acquainted with him, he always found. that he conversed on the subject of religion with a deep seriousness and earnestnesss, and yet with something of a reverent reserve, which was to him quite uncommon. Faithful listened to all that he had to say with the utmost attention, for he felt as if he had now found a true Churchman,- one whose advice he might safely follow. The expression "Church principles," which Mr. Smoothy frequently introduced into his remarks, seemed to include just what Faithful was seeking, and wished to see realised. I shall now at length, he thought, reach the ultima Thule of my desire: I shall now rest on the terra firma of clear and fixed principles; and if I can but bring these principles into full actual operation, I shall be able to realise that perfect order and unity to which I so ardently aspire.

But, in order to carry out the principles which promised to lead to this blessed consummation, it became necessary that Faithful should remove to a new sphere of duty. As several years had now passed over him in his first curacy, not only had his views enlarged, but his condition had become changed. He had entered into the state of a Be

nedict, and had a family growing up around him, for which he required a suitable home. He determined, therefore, to put himself into a position to remove as soon as any curacy, with the requisite conditions, should offer; and his character being now pretty well known, it was not long before such a curacy was proposed, and accepted.

CHAP. VIII.

THE LAST LOW CHURCH CLERICAL MEETING.

"For what contend the wise?-for nothing less
Than that the soul, freed from the bonds of sense,
And to her God restored by evidence

Of things not seen, drawn forth from their recess,
Root there, and not in forms, her holiness."

WORDSWORTH.

AT one of the latest of the Low Church clerical meetings which Frank Faithful attended, the subject for discussion, which was of his own proposal, was the following: "How far may we regard the Old Testament as an example and an authority to us in matters of ecclesiastical polity under the New Testament dispensation ?"

As Faithful proposed this question, it is needless to observe that he felt a deep interest in it.

Mr. Courtly was again in the chair. He opened the discussion thus:

"The question to be brought under our consideration to-day is certainly one of no small interest, and appears to have an important bearing upon our discussions with those who separate from our Church, and refuse to acknowledge our ministerial authority. Perhaps, Mr. Faithful, as you have furnished us with this question, you will favour us with your views upon it first, that we may be able to see its bearing, and catch the points which you wish more particularly to be brought under our consideration."

"My reason for proposing this question," said

Mr. Faithful," is, that many of the ordinances of our Church appear to rest principally, if not entirely, upon Old Testament authority. Now most of the Dissenters (I include not the Wesleyans) reject the authority of the Old Testament altogether in matters of church government. They regard it as directly opposed to the New Testament in these points. Whatever is not expressly enjoined in the New Testament, they refuse to observe

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deny it to be of any obligation, although it may have been instituted and approved by God under the Old Testament dispensation, and no where abrogated under the New. Nor do they confine their abolishing propensities to the confessedly typical ordinances of the Mosaic ritual, which we all admit to be done away, being fulfilled in Christ; but they extend their levelling hand to the whole polity of the Old Testament to whatever was ordained or sanctioned both in patriarchal and prophetic times. Take, for instance, the law respecting murder: Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed:' although this was enacted long before the Mosaic economy was instituted, under circumstances that prove it to be obligatory upon the whole human race, (for the injunction was addressed to the then whole human race,) and the reason assigned for it is as real now as it was then for in the image of God made he man '-and this reason must continue as long as man shall exist; yet, in the face of these facts, some of the Dissenters would argue that capital punishment for murder is not obligatory, because it is not enjoined in the New Testament. Again: We ground the principle of an established national church, the payment of the clergy by a fixed impost, and the exercise of the regal power in favour of true religion, upon the example furnished us by the Old Testament: they, because they do not

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