The estimate formed of Tractarianism by the Bishop of Rochester may be summed up in the following brief sentence-“I certainly believe the system to be most pernicious."

"I charge you," observes Prebendary Townsend," in the name of Christ, to shun these novelties, to despise such teaching, to abhor such perversions of learning."

I have, at present, but two other quotations to which I would call your attention.

Dr. Lee (Regius Professor of Hebrew, at Cambridge,) on Dr. Pusey's late Sermon, thus

writes

"The Holy Truth,' which it seems to be your object to propagate, is, as you must see, daily creating and increasing an unholy division among us. Dissent is, on the one hand, rejoicing in your progress, and gathering strength under it. Romanism is still more anxious for your success, daily congratulates your heroism and your blindness, receives now and then one of your deluded followers into its bosom, and anxiously looks forward for the period when your leaven shall have so leavened the whole lump, that darkness, superstition, and cruelty, shall again extend their ravages over this so long and so richly favoured land! Infidelity, too, hails with no less enthusiasm the mystified reserve, the priest-ennobling projects, the superstitious, blind, and irrational theology of the Tractarian school, as something well adapted to its extension. These, wiser in their generation than the children of light, know full well how to appreciate efforts,

from which the well-informed and well-intentioned cannot but turn with sorrow, and over which the true disciple cannot but lament and mourn.”

The last quotation is from Dr. Dibdin's Letter to the Bishop of Llandaff:

“My Lord, even these [crosses, genuflexions, &c.] are little mischievous, compared with the doctrine which has been delivered from the pulpit of a surpliced preacher, by one who dares to receive the pay of a Protestant clergyman, while inculcating some of the most audacious dogmas of Rome. In the afternoon sermon of Christmas Day, the congregation of were deliberately told, that the body of Christ had been as absolutely upon the altar-table of the communion, as it appeared to the shepherds in the manger; in other words, transubstantiation in its most flagrant character. I know that this is true."

My Christian friends, let me now ask, taking it for granted that you admit the importance of the quotations which have been brought before you,— let me ask, I say, what are we to think of a system, when, with any appearance of truth, it can be spoken of as "the glaring imposition"-which "threatens a revival of the worst evils of the Romish system "-which substitutes "for the worship in spirit and in truth, the observance of days, and months, and times, and years,' -a system, the patrons of which are deemed " to be in grievous and dangerous error,"-the supporters of which "have proved themselves to be blind,

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leaders of the blind, entirely in the dark as to God's plan for the justification of a sinner,”— which is considered as " a revival of anti-christian heresy, and opposition to the truth as it is in Jesus, which cannot be dreaded too seriously, or resisted too earnestly,"-in short, when it can, with any degree of truth, be said to be a " pernicious" system, " inculcating some of the most audacious dogmas of Rome;"-and when, lastly, we are solemnly charged," in the name of Christ, to shun these novelties, to despise such teaching, to abhor such perversions of learning,"-what, I repeat my question, what, under such circumstances, can we think of such a system ?* I scarcely need observe, that I might have gone on making similar quotations, from other sources, to an almost indefinite length,-quotations which, more or less, condemn the Tractarian errors. I refrain, however, from doing so, because the laudatory strains which have accompanied many of these strictures, with reference to certain fancied benefits which these writers are supposed to have conferred upon the Church, have so completely neutralized the effect of them, that the very censures themselves have lost their power; and I cannot but think that a much greater service would have been rendered to the Church, had the authors of these censures

* Let it be observed that, if I have used strong language, it is all borrowed from the Bishops and the Clergy themselves.

altogether refrained from noticing the errors in question. It required no great depth of penetration to foresee the natural consequence of such a mode of dealing with a heresy-it was foreseen, and almost every step of its subsequent progress has been just what was anticipated. What should we think of the defenders of our Church against the inroads of Arianism and Socinianism, if, while opposing the doctrines, the persons who held them were so lauded for their learning and piety, and other supposed superior qualifications, as to render them rather the objects of envy than of distrust! And this is precisely the case with the persons in question. Doubtless, it has had the unhappy effect of throwing a shield over the errors of which we complain; nay, more, I believe they have even had the further effect of producing a sympathy in favour of the individuals so eulogized, and hence the fearful consequences which have resulted to the Church. That the Tractarian system is, indeed, undermining the Church, its avowed enemies are too well assured of; and the following quotations from Roman Catholic authorities are no mean testimony upon such a point. The Roman Catholic prelate, Dr. Wiseman, says of these

writers

"It seems impossible to read the works of the Oxford divines, and especially to follow them chronologically, without discovering a daily approach to our

holy Church both in doctrine and affectionate feeling. . . . Their admiration of our institutions and practices, and their regret at having lost them, manifestly spring from the value which they set upon everything Catholic; and to suppose them (without an insincerity which they have given us no right to charge them with) to love the parts of a system, and wish for them, while they would reject the root, and only secure support of them-the system itself—is to my mind revoltingly contradictory."

Again, a Roman Catholic bookseller in Liverpool, thus writes:

"We Catholics are much indebted to Dr. Pusey, the Rev. Mr. Newman, and other leading Puseyites, for the number of converts from Protestantism to the Holy See, hardly a day passing away without an addition to Catholicism. Our priests circulate Dr. Pusey's Sermon on the Eucharist, as abounding in Catholic articles of faith, the Tracts of the Times, and Newman's Lives of the Saints. Indeed, our priests refrain from controversy, seeing in the conversion of so many individuals from Protestantism to Catholicism, that Puseyism is wonderfully preparing the speedy return of England into re-union and conciliation with the Holy See."

The last quotation upon this head is as follows: "We Catholics look on these Oxford divines as nothing more or less than the light troops of Catholicity, and clearing the way for us."-Letters to Dr. Hook, by Verax.

With such sentiments, then, as I have already quoted against the Tractarians, on the part of those who saw, and deprecated, the tendency of their destructive system, backed as they have