Let us here spend a little time upon this new view of the question, and see what is meant in Scripture by the term 'the Spirit of Christ.' If the phrase contained nothing in it, distinguishable from the old term'the spirit of God, I believe the apostles would not have been led to use it. In the first place, the viii. Romans to verse 27, sets forth the spirit of God dwelling and ruling in believers, and bringing them into the glorious liberty of the children of God. The spirit of bondage and of fear being replaced by the spirit of the adoption, in which they ery Abba unto God;—Also by the spirit of prayer, helping their infirmities and making intercession for the saints according to the will of God. The spirit of Christ, then, in the members of his church, is the spirit of sonship by adoption; of intercession and prayer, thro' Christ unto God. Again Gal. ii. 6, Because ye are Sons, God hath sent forth the spirit of his son into your hearts, crying Abba! and Ephes. ii. 18, For through Him we (both Jews and Gentiles) have access by one spirit unto the Father: 1. Cor. iv. 22. Who hath also sealed us, and given us the earnest of the spirit in our hearts: iii. 6. 17. Who also hath made us able ministers of the New Testament, not of the letter [of the law] which killeth [denounceth death,] but of the spirit [which] giveth life-now the Lord is that spirit, and where the spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty: I. John iii. 24, And hereby we know that he abideth in us, by the spirit which he hath given us: ii. 13. Hereby we know that we dwell in Him, and He in us, because he hath given us of his spirit.-In all this we have the Spirit of God, as in and from God towards the believer; and the Spirit of Christ, as in and from the believer towards God: but all in the affections, and in the exercise of faith and prayer: nothing of the imparting of light or knowledge to the understanding-the office of the Word. The Holy Spirit has the rule, producing in us the acts and character of the adopted sons of God-the power in the ministry, and the oneness of spirit, as well as the filial attachment, and fervent prevailing (tho' inarticulate) prayer. It is idle, therefore, to attempt to make figures into realities, or the mystery into literal doctrine, by such changes of terms as these.

To proceed now with George Fox in the mystery. He says further, p. 8, Christ who had enlightened me gave me his light to believe in [this is consistent with John xii. 35, 36]: and gave me hope, which is Himself revealed in me. [Here we have another fruit of the Spirit in believers hope, according to Rom. viii. 24; Coloss. i. 27-29; 1 Tim. i. 1; Heb. vi. 18, 20 ;] and gave me his spirit, [the sum of all;] and grace, which I found sufficient in the deeps and in weakness. Thus in the deepest miseries, in the greatest sorrows and temptations that beset me, the Lord in his mercy did keep me.” Here we are again at Christ the fountain head—here is confession, full enough, of his own weakness and insufficiency, but no lessening of his master's honour! This was in 1647, five years before the date of that obnoxious letter; and I must consider him as having gone through the necessary repentance, and attained to a living faith in Christ, many years before that:

to

for he would have sunk else, under his many temptations and sorrows. These were but the preparatory exercises of a soldier in the Lamb's warfare, called to an extraordinary and dangerous service. Can we suppose such a man to have been blaspheming, in act and purpose, in 1652, and to have recovered a sound mind, and judgment against others in their ranting proceedings, in 1656? However, to cut short the argument, George Fox from this time appears to have preached Christ in the mystery: not indeed altogether without the history, for he says, p. 9, "So Christ, the Word of God, that bruised the head of the serpent, the destroyer, preserved me; my mind being joined to his good seed [to the good seed of Him] that bruised the head of this serpent, the destroyer. This inward life [I put in a note a passage which this refers]* sprung up in me to answer all the opposing professors and priests, and brought scriptures to my memory to refute them with." Let us compare with all this the plain words of Christ in John xiv. 26, xvi. 7—15, together with the accounts given of their experience, by spiritually minded Christians of all denominations, in various ages of the Church-and consider whether, because of some obscurity in terms (which yet, by a charitable rendering, may be made to consist with scripture in substance,) we will deny to George Fox, the common help of the Holy Spirit, in his ministry to others? It may suffice with some (but it is surely insufficient as an argument) that they are opposed to us in this controversy, to pronounce him destitute of all help of the kind; which yet to a preacher of their own they would allow freely. The author whom I have already censured says, It appears to me this may be considered an epitome of the main error of Quakerism, which has continued unabated from its founder to the present day. George Fox read the scriptures; and afterwards, when insulated portions of what he had read came vividly to his recollection, he imagined that God revealed them to him immediately; and by putting the construction upon them which the bent of his own mind inclined him to do, [I understand nothing at all by this], he was of course induced to suppose the turn which was given by his own thoughts [equally unmeaning with the former] to the passages of scripture which occurred to his memory, or which he had heard quoted, was a revelation to himself."+ Quakerism Examined, p. 89.

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** Again I heard a voice which said, Thou serpent, thou dost seek to destroy the life, but cannot: for the sword which keepeth the tree of life shall destroy thee."

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† Robert Barclay makes two kinds of immediate revelation'-the subjective and the objective. In the former, the person is enabled by the help of the Holy Spirit to discern clearly things already before him : in the latter, he has the things also presented to his view. The former definition conveys all that I should ask for Geo. Fox in the case: and the error I should admit in his profession, would be the not referring this help at once to the Holy Spirit. However, it may be asked here, what gave the bent to his mind, the turn to his thoughts on this occasionwhat brought these truths, which he had learned so vividly, to his recollection? The Bible is not wont of its own accord to leave the shelf, and open itself at the right place before us. It was then, I conclude, the Holy Spirit.

To conclude for the present in reply to this, I am not willingly and officiously in this controversy about the light.' I find my peace concerned in it; and can plead a little of the necessity, under which this author proclaims himself to be placed, of shewing my own mind at the risk of being censured by others. I am entirely of the judgment (and have been for many years) that our founder and his associates did err in doctrine, in so far as they identified their own knowledge of the things of God, derived to them by reading and hearing, and matured and built up by reflection, with the Holy Spirit visiting and indwelling in the hearts and minds of believers; but I am far indeed from accounting this "notion of immediate revelation" (tho' it does assimilate too nearly the work with the workman) to be a delusion of the devil-" the very fountain of error of the most incurable and hopeless kind." I must still beg leave to follow my Lord's own rule of judgment, and try the people by the fruits' of their conduct. In this respect, then, the quakers have not been that people which the supposition of such a delusion must imply. I do not claim for them more than I will allow to an equal number of serious characters, of any other Christian denomination; but I may be permitted, surely, to state that my own knowledge both of their history, and of the men of my own times, presents me with very many, who have lived useful and died happy-who have visited the fatherless and the widows in their affliction, and have kept themselves unspotted from the world! Am I to throw away all this practice, the fruit of a sound faith, and pronounce these persons deluded and damned, because of some mistake in the terms of their profession? We shall come closer to the question by and bye. In the meantime let me say, that with some of us it is emphatically a practical one-nothing else could have now brought us to it. There is nothing in the contemplation of abstract truth, powerful enough to excite men to press it upon others at the risk of contempt and scorn, of the loss of friends and ruin of temporal interests, and with the certainty of bitter opposition at every step. The conduct of speculative men, of mere philosophers, has served to demonstrate this, in every age. There must be benevolence at least-a measure of love to God and good will to man, to make any one a teacher of others with such prospects before him! What was it, let me say to my fellow christians, that George Fox and his Friends were so earnest that others should receive, thro' them, from Christ? It was the substance of his religion, in whatsoever terms conveyed: the power and efficacy of which they had largely experienced in themselves. Does the fact, that another and yet another generation, (when the furnace of adversity had once gone out), succeeding in a formal testimony to certain neglected truths, have lost the life and neglected those truths themselves,-have slid from the foundation on which the society stood at the first, lapsing into formality and worldly mindedness-do these lamentable truths make all they taught error? ED.

ART. I.-A Chronological Summary of events and circumstances connected with the origin and progress of the doctrine and practices of the Quakers.

A.D.

(Continued from page 237.)

The Test and Corporation Acts repealed. Friends' affirmation 1828. is made valid in criminal cases.

I had last occasion to make mention of the subject of the Tests under the date of 1787 (Vol. iv. p. 322). The proceedings of the Society now had in relation to it are as follows:

MEETING FOR SUFFERINGS, 5TH MO., 1828.-"The Committee appointed on the subject of the bill for repealing the Test and Corporation Acts report, that the same has now passed into a law; the Royal assent having been given to the Bill on the 9th inst. The clauses to which the attention of the Meeting was turned were the two following: "Be it therefore enacted, that every person who shall hereafter be placed, elected, or chosen, in, or to the office of mayor, alderman, recorder, bailiff, or town clerk, or common councilman, or in or to any office of magistracy, place, trust, or employment, relating to the government of any City, Corporation, Borough, or Cinque Port, within England and Wales, or the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, shall within one calendar month, next before or upon his admission into any of the aforesaid offices, or trusts, make and subscribe the declaration following:

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"I, A. B., do solemnly and sincerely, in the presence of God, profess testify and declare, upon the true faith of a Christian, that I will never exercise any power, authority, or influence, which I may possess by virtue of the office of * to injure or weaken the Protestant church as it is by law established in England, or to disturb the said church, or the bishops and clergy of the said church, in the VOL. V.

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possession of any rights or privileges to which such church, or the said bishops and clergy, are, or may be, by law entitled."

From an apprehension that members of our Society might have to fill certain offices described in the said Act, and that they might consider that they could do so without violating our religious principles, it was thought desirable to apply for a simple form of declaration.

This arose from a conviction that, whatever might be the opinion of members of the Society on the terms in the presence of God' and, ' upon the true faith of a Christian,' whether some might think that they contain too much of the substance of an oath, or others might object to the mention of the Divine Being and an allusion to a Christian's faith,-all would agree in greatly preferring a simple

declaration.

The alterations in the form of declaration, which more especially claimed the notice of Friends, were introduced into the bill in the House of Peers; and as its progress was rapid an opportunity was taken on Seventh-day evening, the 26th of last month, immediately after the occurrence of the Meeting for Sufferings, to gain some needful information. On the Second-day morning following, three of the Committee made further enquiry, and afterwards obtained an interview with Lord Holland, who had introduced the bill into the Upper House: they were received with much kind attention, but he was apprehensive that it was then too late to attempt to obtain any relief; at the same time he undertook, when in the House of Lords that evening, to make those remarks on what had been laid before him, which he thought might prepare the way for the views of Friends being met at the ensuing session, if that were asked for. He also encouraged an application to the members of administration.

An attempt was made to see the Duke of Wellington, the head of the present ministry; but this was unsuccessful, from his pressing engagements. The Earl of Rosslyn was called upon, and kindly listened to the representations which were made. He saw the propriety of a provision, and engaged to speak to the Duke of Wellington; which he did, and afterwards told the Friends, the same afternoon, that the ministry was of the opinion, it would be better not to press for any amendment; but that, if relief were wanted, it would be better to obtain it, by a special act, in the next Session.

The three Friends above alluded to left with Lord Holland, and forwarded through the Earl of Rosslyn to the Duke of Wellington, a brief statement of the case, into which they introduced the following remarks: In making this representation we desire to remark, that the object of it is to obtain a provision for the relief of the conscientious feelings of any members of our Society who may reside in corporate towns; and who may be liable to fill offices of trust or employment in such towns, without in any way committing the Society, as to its future proceedings, in advising or not advising its members to avail themselves of the privileges of the present act.

We would take the liberty of adding, that members of our Society