In reply to this, we remark first of all, that it is to evangelism as a system that we object, rather than to the occasional reception of an individual, whom God shall seem to have raised up, for this very purpose. The case of Mr. Whitefield was a very singular one; and the circumstances under which he entered upon his course of itineracy, were altogether peculiar. The great body of the clergy of the church of England, among whom he was educated, were at that time not evangelical. They neither understood nor taught the way of salvation. His country was to him, therefore, like one great missionary field. Then it is to be remembered, that the pulpits of the church to which he belonged, were almost universally shut against him. A pastoral charge in that church, was out of the question. He must itinerate, or not preach at all. He was compelled, often, to preach in the open fields, and in the corners of the streets.

It is to be remembered, too, that most of his preaching tours were undertaken, not for the mere purpose of evangelism, but with a view to collect money for a charitable object. His orphan asylum pressed heavily on his hands, and he was obliged to take up collections, wherever he could gain access, for the purpose of supporting it. The circumstances here referred to, render the case of Whitefield so totally unlike that of evangelists at the present day, that there can be no reasoning from the one to the other.

After all, it must be admitted, that Whitefield was an extraordinary character. Extraordinary circumstances called him forth, and he met those circumstances as no other man could. He created some disorders, and was the occasion in some instances, more particularly in the early part of his life, of inflicting injury. But on the whole, he accomplished a vast amount of good. We are far from condemning or censuring the

course of life which he pursued. When the Lord raises up another Whitefield, and places him in the like circumstances, we will consent that he shall pursue a similar course. But let not every novice-every va grant vociferator fancy himself a Whitefield. Let not others rise up, of a different spirit, and under entirely different circumstances, and call themselves evangelists, and shelter themselves under the name of Whitefield. The imitators of Whitefield did not a little mischief, in his own age. They will be likely to do mischief in any age. For he was one whom no man living can imitate. We repeat, when God raises up another Whitefield, Christ's min isters and churches should be ready to receive him. But let no encouragement be taken from his example, to introduce a system of evangelism, and make provision for it, which must operate as a constant disturbing force in the church, and ultimately break up the established order of the gospel.

It may be said again, that churches and pastors often need to be awakened;-need just that kind of influence to be exerted on them, which a glowing, flaming evangelist will be likely to infuse. If a church has become stupid, and needs to be awakened, the pastor is the appropriate instrument for this purpose; and if the pastor is asleep, as well as the church, there are many ways in which he may be awakened, without making any stated provision for this purpose. To institute a system and make provision for it, with a view to awaken dull and sleepy pastors, would convey just that reflec tion upon pastors, of which we have before complained. It may be fear. ed, too, that it would induce more drowsiness than it would remove. The system would carry, on the face of it, that pastors were expected to be dull sometimes, and were to a certain extent excusable in their dullness. As little or nothing could be

done without the aid of the evangelist, the pastor might be excused, during the interval of his visits, in relaxing effort, and living somewhat at his ease, that in this way he might be the better prepared for future operations.

It has been further urged, in favor of evangelists, that faithful pastors have often more labor on their hands than they can perform, and stand in need of assistance. And are there not various ways in which burthened pastors may receive assistance, without raising up evangelists for this express purpose? Must the incompetency of pastors for the full discharge of their duties be presumed on before hand, and a corps in reserve be prepared to meet it? Or shall a pastor and church, when an exigency of this kind occurs, be left to provide for it as circumstances at the time shall seem to dictate? To propose questions such as these is virtually to answer them. The right answer is so obvious, that it can not possibly be mistaken.

Again, it is urged that evangelists, in some instances, have done much good, and God has signally blessed their labors; a thing which he would not have done, if he did not approve of the system. That evangelists, in some cases, have been a means of good, we do not doubt. And that, in other cases, they have done injury-much injury, can be, we think, as little questioned. That they have been productive, on the whole, of more injury than benefit, and that, should the employment of them be continued and brought into a system, their injurious influences would predominate over the good in greater proportion than has yet been realized, is to our minds exceedingly obvious.

That God has, in some instances, blessed the labors of evangelists, is no proof that the system of resorting to them meets his approbation. God loves and honors his own truth, by whomsoever dispensed. He has made it the means of conversions, and of revivals of religion, when dispensed (as it often has been) by unregenerate men. Yet who would infer from this, that God calls unregenerate men to preach his gospel, or that he approves of their course of life? No more can it be inferred, from the fact that God sometimes blesses the labors of evangelists, that the course they pursue is in accor dance with his will.

Finally, it is said that souls are perishing, and that no likely means of bringing them to repentance, are to be discouraged. It is admitted, indeed, that souls are perishing; but it has been often said, and said truly, that even souls may be saved at too dear a rate. If we enter upon a course of means, and are successful in it, for the salvation of one soul, which necessarily involves the destruction of ten; our instrumentality on the whole, is more an injury than a benefit. Convinced of this, many excellent men, once evangelists, have sought the pastoral office, and are now eminently useful.

God knows the worth of perishing souls better than we do. He appreciates them more justly, and values them more highly. He has instituted a course of means for their salvation. And it will be safe for us to follow the course which he has instituted, and await the result, rather than incur the hazard of breaking in upon it, and subverting it, by our own inventions.

OUR brethren of the Methodist Episcopal church, by their efficient agency for the publication of books, have put forth of late several works in defense of the common Christianity against the assumptions and errors of the self-styled Catholicity, which we hope will have a circulation like their character-truly catholic. One of these is the volume by Dr. Peck on the Rule of Faith. As we have lately discussed the Protestant principle at some length in our own pages, we will confine ourselves at this time to such an account of Dr. P.'s work as may answer the purpose of recommending it to the Christian public at large. This we shall do by giving the author an opportunity to speak for himself.

The volume is divided into four chapters. In the first the traditionary system is stated and examined. In the second the chief arguments in favor of that system are examined and refuted. In the third the author advances various "considerations in opposition to the claims of tradition as a divine informant." And in the fourth is given direct "proof that Scripture is a sufficient rule of faith and practice."

In the first chapter, the author after treating of the origin and nature of the question which he proposes to discuss, proceeds to exhibit "the twofold rule," as held by those who reject the Protestant principle that the Bible alone is authority in religion. The most accurate exhibition of the theory in any one statement is the following, which Archdeacon Manning in his work on

* Appeal from Tradition to Scripture and Common Sense; or, an answer to the question, What constitutes the divine Rule of Faith and Practice? By George Peck, D. D. New York, G. Lane & P. P. Sandford, 1844.

the Rule of Faith ("which work," says Dr. P., "being a temperate, learned, and sensible production, for one of the class, and held in high estimation by churchmen, I make the basis of the traditionary theory as held by them") adopts from Dr. Hammond, a divine of the seventeenth century, of the Laudean school, and now highly in favor with the Oxford divines.

"And to this also my concession shall be as liberal as any Romanist can wish, that there are two ways of conveying such revelation to us: one in writing, the other by oral tradition; the former, in the Gospels, and other writings of the apos tles, &c. which make up the sacred writ, or canon of the New Testament; the latter, in the apostles' preachings to the churches of their plantations, which are no where set down for us in the sacred writ, but conserved as deposita by them to whom they were intrusted."

tolical traditions, such as are truly so, as "I make no scruple to grant, that aposwell as apostolical writings, are equally the matter of that Christian belief, which is equally secured by the fidelity of the writing, so the other is apostolical tradiconveyance; that as one is apostolical tion."

According to all this," says Dr. P. after an extended examination of authors, posed of two parts, one written and the "the system of divine revelation is comother oral-the Scriptures and traditionone the record, and the other the expla nation, equally essential and of equal authority. This is precisely the view of the Tractarians and the Romanists."

"Let it not be pretended, then, that Roman Catholics are heretical and Anglican Catholics orthodox, when they maintain the same general ground. They are brethren, why should they disagree? They must stand or fall together, in spite of their mutual criminations, and exclusive assumptions of orthodoxy."

"Their fundamental principles are the same, their mode of development sometimes differs; but the discrepancies between the leading teachers of the two schools are scarcely so great as those which are discoverable between leading and learned doctors of each school respectively among themselves."

The Anglo-Catholics are at great pains to make out a difference be

tween their principle of tradition and the principle of tradition as held by the Roman Catholics. The difference, however, such as it is, lies not in the principle so much as in the application of it. One party proves some things by the authority of tradition and the church, which the other rejects by the same authority. Our author goes into an examination of the pretended distinctions as to the rule of faith between these two warring catholicities, and in conclusion he remarks: "To what, then, does this wonderful difference between Roman and Anglican Catholics amount? Why, simply that they have a somewhat different nomenclature that they have a different mode of expressing the same thing. Both hold that the authority of the church is paramount, and her decisions final. Both hold that Scripture is defective as a rule of faith without the definitions and explanations of tradition. And both hold that the church has a right to decree articles of faith not expressed in the creed."

Is tradition the rule and exponent of the Christian faith? If so, how are we to know what it is which tradition teaches? One of the sections of Dr. Peck's first chapter is entititled "Tradition a Witness—the Church a Witness."

"The asserters of tradition," says Dr. P. "represent it as a teacher of the sense of Scripture. In further explaining themselves, they tell us that the fathers are mere witnesses of facts; that is, their testimony goes to the fact that such and such doctrines were received by the church in their respective ages. But in collecting their testimony, they do not confine themselves to the formal statements of the fathers that such are the doctrines of the church, but they embrace all their didactic and other writings-the decrees of synods and councils-creeds, liturgies, &c. &c. From all these they make up a theology, and assume that the doctrines herein set forth are the doctrines of the church catholic, and that the authors of these various records are making formal and solemn depositions of doctrines believed and usages practiced by the church catholic."

"But the fathers are not only made witnesses of apostolical tradition, but 'the church' is made a witness of the sense of the fathers. That is, the church testifies to individuals what the fathers testify to her." Vol. II.

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How then is tradition made accessible to the people? Another section exhibits this part of the subject. If the church merely directs to the writings of her fathers and doctors as the authoritative exposition of Christianity, and as containing the true traditions, the people, obviously, will be left very much in the dark.

"It would be utterly overwhelming to an ordinary mind to be told that we must read a cart-load of Greek and Latin folios before we can certainly know what we must do to be saved. Well, what is the process by which the church' draws the precious treasure from the mine of antiquity, and imparts it to her hungry children, even without their seeking it?' Do all her priests read and understand all the holy fathers, the decrees of councils, &c.? Not one in a hundred of them has ever read, in the originals, half a dozen of the fathers. The English church, for the present, until she can, by the aid of her faithful sons and mighty champions at Oxford, save herself from her present degraded position,' points her children to her book of Common

6

Prayer as a faithful, if not an infallible

echo of antiquity. Mr. Newman says the church of England transmits the ancient Catholic faith simply and intelligibly-to follow the church, THEN, in this day, is to follow the Prayer-book.'

The last section of this first chapter is entitled, " Principles upon which Tradition is to be interpreted."

"When we come to particulars," says Dr. P. "we find that these infallible guides (the fathers) have left many things upon record which we must not believe, and so great is the difficulty, after all, of settling the true catholic doctrine by this means, that we stand in need of certain rules of judgment by which we must be governed in our conclusions. We must have a rule of faith to judge of the application of the rule of faith. The rule we are to carry with us in the study of tradition is embraced in these three words: 'universality, antiquity, and consent.' This rule is itself quite ancient, being proposed by Vincentius Lirinensis, or Vincent of Lirin, a monk of the fifth century."

"All we have to do, then, when we would find what God would have us to believe or do, is to find out from the fathers, 1. What has the sanction of the universal church-or what has been received every where. This we shall learn as soon as we can become acquainted with the opinions of every branch of the

Catholic church from the days of the apostles down to the time of Vincent, and collate and compare them, and gather out of them a common sentiment. And when this small task is performed, then we must find out, 2. What is most ancient. This will require no little attention, for some fathers and some doctrines are older than others. If, then, we find a doctrine or a usage to be older than its opposite, so far we are safe; but we must mind well our dates, or we are at once far from the course. 3. More than all this: all our doctrines and usages must have the sanction of consent. They must be, as our oracle says, 'the definitions and opinions of almost all, if not all, the bishops and teachers in the ancient church.' In find

ing out this we must, of course, consult with great care all that almost all the bishops and teachers' have said; a work which a monk, in the course of a long life of seclusion from society, might partially, and could but partially, accomplish. But we must go the whole course before we can be sure we are right. What a glorious way this! We may lay the Scriptures aside, and just find out what has been believed every where, at all times, and by all men, and then we understand the whole mystery of the faith !”

says:

Of this, Bishop Stillingfleet, as quoted p. 79, "He (Vincent) hath put men to a wild goose chase to find out anything according to his rule." But, as Mr. Newman and the Oxford divines have improved on this rule and given one more practicable, viz. the Prayer-book, this book, as a rule of faith, Dr. P. examines, and concludes his examination thus

"I will now submit the question to any churchman, high or low, after leaving out the selections from the Bible, which part of the Common Prayer came from the apostles? Will he say the creeds? These, we have seen, came into being piecemeal, and were not perfected until the fourth or fifth century. Will he say the liturgy and offices? According to the best highchurch authority, no liturgy was reduced to writing during the first ages of Christianity, and posterity were not precisely tied up to the use of the first liturgies, 'but might frame others at their own discretion; and after the liturgies were reduced to writing, which was in later ages, scarcely a vestige of the first of these compositions escaped the ravages of time. But will he say the Thirty-nine Articles came from the apostles? This would be too shocking to common sense; for there is the clearest prima facie evidence, to say nothing of the evidence of history, that either as to their language, or senti

ment, or both, these Articles originated subsequent to the Reformation. What now is left to which any sensible man will be disposed to accord the honor of apostolic origin? Nothing; absolutely nothing."

The arguments in favor of tradition as a part of the rule of faith are stated in the second chapter with much candor, in the words of the most learned and able traditionists, and are thoroughly refuted. Indeed, what a well instructed Christian needs on this subject is little else than a plain, full statement of the arguments by which the supposed authority of tradition is main tained. To a man who reads the Bible, the statement of such arguments is itself, for the most part, a sufficient refutation. For example:

"Mr. Newman asks, 'How do we know that Scripture comes from God?' and answers, 'It can not be denied that we of this age receive it upon general tradition; we receive through tradition both the Bible itself, and the doctrine that it is divinely inspired. The sacred volume itself, as well as the doctrine of its inspira tion, comes to us by traditional convey ance. We receive the New Testament in its existing shape by tradition."

the argument. Does it need to be This is one of the main pillars of refuted? Suppose we should say, it is by tradition that we are informed of the fact that Cicero wrote the Tusculan questions; therefore we can not presume to understand that book except as tradition informs us of its meaning:-would any man think of refuting such an argument?

The third chapter, containing considerations in opposition to the claims of tradition as a divine informant, consists of five sections. The first, treating of "the improbabilities oppose the system of tradi tion, is brief but forcible.

which

"The common sense of men, in all ages of the world, has uniformly decided that oral tradition is an uncertain mode of transmitting facts and principles from age to age."

With pertinence our author asks:

"Why did not the church of England leave her Thirty-nine Articles and her hundred and forty one canons to the safe and certain method of oral transmission