ral rule in such places that no dry games,' as they are termed, shall be played. But, with the exception of these houses, there is no place where they can assemble for dancing, singing, reading, or society; so that they know nothing of enjoyments which are not associated with expense or debauchery. It is this absence of all lively and innocent amusements which has stamped upon our peasantry the heavy clownish air which all foreigners remark. It would be well if this were the only consequence of a want of amusement; but, besides rendering men dull and heavy, it tends to make them brutal and savage, and incapable of deriving any pleasurable excitement except from debauchery or fanaticism. In these matters, not unimportant points in civilization, we have positively receded since the days of Elizabeth. That Princess, who was imbued with a better philosophy than that of our ascetics, encouraged the enactment of laws not merely to promote, but to provide for, the amusements of the people. She was aware that the drunken, the idle, and the vicious are not usually found amongst the cheerful and active; but amongst those whose morose and gloomy habits render them incapable of joining in simple recreation, and who draw their pleasures from darker and more dangerous sources. (Pages 46, 47.)

If Queen Elizabeth, or any other ruler, ever provided amusements for the people," under a notion that they had any intrinsic efficacy, or even tendency, to ameliorate the moral condition of man, it is clear that all Governors are not Solomons. These in themselves are nothing better than "vanity and vexation of spirit; " yet they are capable of receiving a healthful infusion from without; and since it is impossible to hinder these effervescences of the youthful mind, and might sometimes be dangerous to check them, it is desirable, as far as can be, to turn them to some good account. Our author states that

"The instruction given in the Sunday-school," at Herne-Hill," as in most Sunday-schools, is entirely of a religious nature. The object (as described) has been to make the children practically acquainted with moral and religious truths. With this view, after repeating the answers in the Catechism, the children are required to give the substance

of the answers in their own language. By these means many of them became (to use the words of my informer) as well instructed in the principles of religion, and were as capable of giving pertinent answers concerning them, as the generality of the children of the opulent. There were, however, complaints that, notwithstanding this apparent progress, the children could never be brought to connect what they learned in school with their practice in life, and remained as idle, mischievous, and vicious as before."

(Page 35.)

The friends of other schools have been heard to make the same complaints. Nor is it any wonder that education should end in disappointment, when religion has been confined to the school, and shut out of the play-ground. If the teaching consist in imparting moral and religious maxims, to be laid up, like lumber, in the memory, never to be used, and the practice, while at play, be for the strong to oppress the weak, and the cunning to overreach the simple, no wonder if the habits remain, while the maxims are forgotten, and the result of such a training be, in the one instance, to make a tyrant, and in the other a knave. But when those entrusted with the care of youth shall feel it to be a primary duty to be present on the play-ground as often as practicable, and to be all attention to what is passing there, they will have many golden opportunities, during the unfettered play of the passions, of instituting comparisons between the lessons and the practice of their charge, and that in such a manner as will make a deep and salutary impression upon them, and lead them to make similar comparisons on more important occasions.

Of course the "Central Society" have no notion of giving any thing but secular knowledge; yet this they propose to bestow in liberal abund

ance.

Beside the common arts of reading and writing, the poor are to be taught geography, chemistry, astronomy, history, law, and what not. It is proposed to call in the aid of Government, to organize the coun try, to qualify suitable masters, to multiply books, and to crane up the whole of our youthful population to

66

such a pitch of intelligence, as shall make them look down upon such vulgar vices as riot, drunkenness, and debauchery with indignation and contempt. As a religious people, we can have no sympathy with such golden dreams as these; but surely, however much these gentlemen do to impart the wisdom of men, we shall not do less to impart the "wisdom of God;" and if we duly consider who has said, Freely ye have received, freely give," we shall, at least, be equal to our neighbours in liberality. The Agents of the "Central Society" say, that our Sundayschools are notoriously inefficient. There may be some slander in these reports, but they are not altogether destitute of truth. Let the scholars in some of these institutions be examined, and it will be found that the sacred knowledge which they possess is very scanty in its amount. our own Catechism, to say nothing of the New Testament, is very imperfectly understood. Although it is possible that this has not been obtained without much expense of money and time, yet it is a gross abuse of terms to call it a religious education. It is our solemn duty, under present circumstances, to give our people something far better than this. We have also the power to do it. An organization might be easily formed, simple, efficient, comprehensive, and cheap, which would enable us systematically to visit, examine, and stimulate our existing Sunday-schools,-to establish others where they are needed, to open week-day schools for infants, and older children, under properly qualified teachers, in those buildings

Even

which, by being either empty six days in the week, or merely let for a nominal rent, reproach our want of enterprise and zeal; and so to arrange and classify our youth, as to keep them under religious instruction for years after they had ceased to attend school, and to allure them onward to greater lengths in the knowledge of Christ. Are we not bound by our principles and professions to attempt this? We expect and desire a millennium without being Millenarians; for we have long prayed, Thy kingdom come,' declared that we exist, as a religious body, for the express purpose of " spreading scriptural holiness through the land," and have been making the most vigorous efforts to evangelize the Heathen: yet we expect the "knowledge of the Lord will cover the face of the earth," not by a new epiphany, but by the brightening and extension of that "light" which has already "come into the world." There is no reason to doubt the moral omnipotence of Christianity, when applied as vigorously and extensively as ordinary methods will admit. When, in addition to all that is doing at present, the light of the Gospel, in its unsullied purity, and unrestrained abundance, is freely poured upon the popular mind, by an efficient system of scriptural schooling, beginning at the earliest, and continuing to the latest, practicable period, we shall begin to perceive the approach of the latter-day glory! For crime and misery will be seen to fly "like clouds before the mid-day sun."

MR. CONDER himself shall be quoted as describing the certainly very important subject of his volume. How the subject is treated by him can be afterwards inquired :—'

"The first question which presents itself is WHAT IS RELIGION? Without

involving ourselves in etymological researches, we may answer this by saying, that as religion signifies, in common acceptation, our duty to God, a religion

must be taken to mean that which teaches or prescribes the matter of religious duty; or, in other words, that which is due to God, including what is to be

believed respecting him, and the homage and service which he claims. By religion, as a quality of the mind, or religiousness, we understand a habit of reverence towards the divine Being. But by a religion, we understand a system of religion; that is, a system of faith and worship.

"According to this received definition, a religion, whether true or false, presupposes a divine revelation as its basis. Without some communication from the Deity, faith, which every religion prescribes and demands, would, at best, be limited to a belief in the divine existence. But the uncertain guesses of the bewildered mind could never afford a solid foundation for devout belief or intelligent worship. Accordingly, every religion is professedly derived from a revelation from heaven, and rests its pretensions either upon the immediate inspiration of its Ministers, or upon the divine authority of its sacred books. belief in divine inspiration, therefore, is a first principle of religion in the human mind, ranking next, in importance, to a belief in the divine existence.

A

"A religion, being founded upon a revelation or divine communication, must be true or false, according as such revelation is authentic or spurious. The credibility of the religion depends upon the marks of authenticity, the evidence of divine authority which it bears. But its authority does not consist in its credibility, or in the means of ascertaining its divine origin, but in its being really what it professes to be, prescribed by the Deity, or, as to the matter of belief, given by inspiration of God. He who does not believe in the inspiration of the sacred books of the religion, cannot believe in its divine authority; and not believing in that, he cannot be regarded as believing the religion itself.

"If, then, every religion presupposes a revelation from which it derives itself, and that revelation is, for the most part, professedly contained in its sacred books, we are prepared to answer the next question which presents itself; namely, How

MANY RELIGIONS ARE THERE IN

THE WORLD? Just as many as there are revelations, real or pretended. All the religions of the world may, therefore, be reduced to a very brief catalogue. Considering the Jewish religion, for the present, as an imperfect Christianity, we may thus enumerate them: I. The Religion of the Bible. II. The Religion of the Koran. III. The Religion of the Zendavesta. IV. The Religion of the Brahminical Scriptures; the Vedas,

and Pooranas. V. The Religion of the sacred books of Boodhism. To which we may add, as a sixth class, those illiterate systems of superstition, which, while professedly resting upon supernatural communications and traditions, have no sacred books." (Page 3.)

Mr. Conder adds,

"The next question that arises is, WHICH IS THE TRUE RELIGION? The proper answer is, That which is derived from the true revelation." (Ibid.)

And after an observation or two on the point thus suggested, the conclusion is thus stated:

"There being, then, but one true revelation, there can be but one true religion, and that is found in the Bible."

(Ibid.)

Among the ancient Pagans there were "gods many and lords many," and therefore their philosophers recognised the possibility of "religions many." Some who "profess and call themselves Christians," though to the Christian name their claim is very disputable, would argue in the same manner. It is an infidel philosophy which first classes all religions together, thus scarcely disguising its hatred of Christianity by placing it in the same category with Brahminism or Budhuism, and, in point of fact, endeavouring to prepare the way for its ulterior rejection, by arranging it with systems that are indisputably false. It was thus that Lord Bolingbroke imposed upon Pope, (if indeed he were imposed upon at all,) and induced him to embody, in his own elegant and generally instructive strains, the maxims of that false and vain philosophy which sets all religions on a level. Mr. Conder takes the right ground at once. According to him, religion is not a mere mental conception, one of the emanations of the human intellect or fancy, all proceeding from a common source, and therefore, how. ever varying in expression, entitled to equal respect; but a mode of thinking and acting according to a prescribed rule, that rule being the manifestation of the will of God. Religion, it should never be forgotten, rests upon two facts, "the

than expressed, but still censuresinto his coolest descriptions. The one sees no virtue but in connexion with what he conceives to be apostolic order; the other seès all excellences united in religious freedom: and the religious opinions or practices which such writers as these have occasion to notice, are presented to the reader, not in their own proper simplicity, but as connected with, sometimes as disguised and even distorted by, the accidents with which they have become associated in the mind of the describer.

The only way by which these inconveniences (not to call them by a more serious name) can be remedied, is the one we have already suggested. Let the author, in the first instance, manfully avow his own particular creed, and thus afford the reader the opportunity of correcting the description by his knowledge of the position from which the observation was taken,-of the angle, so to speak, under which the object was

seen.

Of these difficulties Mr. Conder seems to have been in some measure aware. He thus writes in his preface:

"The most difficult, or at least the most delicate, part of my task has been, to preserve that impartiality which may reasonably be looked for in an account of religious opinions, without affecting an irreligious neutrality, or compromising my own most sacred convictions of truth. To conceal my opinions would have been fruitless hypocrisy ; and I can only hope that I have not suffered them to betray me into any defect of candour or violation of charity. I have not attempted to

treat of the Roman Catholic tenets in the character of a Romanist, or of Mohammedanism in that of a Mussulman; nor have I scrupled to speak of sects as sects, or of heresies as heresies." (Preface, page vii.)

True; but whether such and such practices are schismatical and sectarian, or such and such opinions heretical, depends very much on the system espoused by the observer. It is not necessary to truth, when the object is simply a lucid, faithful description of the fact, that the fact should be described with the feelings of an admirer; but neither is it neces

sary that it should be described with the feelings of an opponent. What is wanted is what the writers of books like the one before us profess to give us,-"A View of all Religions; "that is, a clear and honest statement of the religious opinions and practices-including the worship and disciplineof the various classes into which, in reference to religion, men are to be distributed.

Mr. Conder certainly has not concealed his opinions, but neither has he distinctly stated them. They may be collected from the work, but we should have liked to see them avowed in the preface. The reader, who does not happen beforehand to be acquainted with Mr. Conder's religious position, should have been made aware, at the very outset, that he was in the company of a writer who was (honestly and conscientiously, we doubt not) most decidedly a Calvinist, an Independent, and an opposer of the principle of religious establishments. They who know Mr. Conder know all this very well; but still it is possible that a book with such an attractive title may go where Mr. Conder does not happen to be known, and for such a case the volume itself does not distinctly provide.

It was very natural that we should feel inclined to test the general accuracy of Mr. Conder's "Views" by referring to his description of Wesleyan Methodism. The result of the reference we shall now proceed to point out.

As a specimen of what we mean by the influence exerted on the mind by its own religious convietions, in the views which it takes and gives of others, we give some of the first sentences of Mr. Conder's account of the Wesleyan Methodists. It will at once be seen from his language, that his object was not to give a simple description of certain facts, as contemplated by another party, but as contemplated by him with feelings which supply a very important colouring to the description. He says,―

"Some difficulty occurs in classifying the large and important body of Protest ant Nonconformists, known as Wes