Men

THE licence and effrontery with which corrupt practices were carried on at the last General Election excited the shame of Englishmen, and the animadversions of our European neighbours. Four boroughs gained an unenviable notoriety, not perhaps because they were worse than some others, but because they were found out. The enquiries of the Royal Commission brought before the public gaze, in these four instances, the most flagrant and disgraceful bribery, and brought upon them scorn and rebuke, which were quite deserved, but from which the ill-desert of other boroughs was only screened by concealment. of the world confidently affirm that professing Christians are just as bad as other men in practical morality, just as unscrupulous in their dealings in the market, and quite as unprincipled in the conduct of exciting elections. Christian men know that such assertions too frequently proceed from illwill; but they were not without their fears that some of their brethren, in the heat of a party contest, and knowing that bribery was being practised on the other side, might be carried away, and resort to measures which their calmer judgment would condemn. We are all in danger of making the conduct of others the rule and standard of our actions.

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"III. That by this resolution the Church passes its most severe censure upon its members implicated in such proceedings, declaring them to have been guilty of a heinous moral offence, alike displeasing to the Holy God, and injurious to the highest and best interests of society.

"IV. That this Church do content itself with thus censuring such of its members as have been involved in the illegalities of the last General Election, believing that, owing to the long continuance of corrupt practices at elections, the sin of these had come to be wellnigh overlooked, and that certain members of the Church, trusting thoughtlessly to themselves, rather than consulting the revealed will of God, suffered themselves to be drawn into doings of which they are now ashamed, and for which conduct they are truly penitent."

With the exception of one, who has since been cut off from Church-fellowship, the eight or nine persons censured were present, and held up their hands to these resolutions. We are glad to know that none of the cases were

flagrant, and for the most part they were mixed up but very slightly with the affair. The concluding statement of the fourth resolution must also be

taken in mitigation. And we may infer that the proper course of private expostulation preceded the open notice of the matter in the Church, since it was already ascertained that the erring brethren were "ashamed" and "truly penitent." The pastor and the Church must have felt themselves in a very delicate and painful position, but they did not shrink from their duty. The scandal was public, and they did right in publishing the resolutions. Mr. Dothie delivered a long, faithful, and pointed address at the Church-meeting, and on Sunday, December 16th, preached a sermon on "The Sin of Bribery," the publication of which was earnestly requested by "various gentlemenChurchmen and Dissenters, Conservatives and Liberals." We are glad he has at length printed it.* And we would commend the unsparing exposure and inflexible tone of the preacher to those aspersers who say that a Dissenting minister lives to please, and must please to live.

in

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'Bribery," Mr. Dothie says, comes many forms. But, however it comes, whatever it says, its real meaning is, Are

you for sale? What's your price? The man who offers you this insult is a trafficker in souls, guilty before God, and arraignable at the tribunals of man. And as such your house should not harbour him for a moment; having heard his speech you should on the instant close your ear against his voice. Slave-masters are ye who thus buy! Slaves are ye who are thus bought! You have forfeited your claim to the privileges of freemen, for you sold your birthright for a miserable mess of

* "THE SIN OF BRIBERY." A Sermon preached in High Street Chapel, Lancaster, by Elvery Dothie, B.A. London: Elliot Stock. Lancaster: J. Nevatt. Price Twopence.

pottage. Perhaps you may say to me, 'If we like to buy, if we like to sel ourselves, it is no business of yours!' No business of mine Am I not then indeed my brother's keeper? Am I not still bound to you by the ties which none can loosen-of universal brotherhood and universal sonship? Am I not bound by all the laws of righteousness. love, and mercy, to chide you for your sins against the commonwealth, and to urge you to turn your feet again into the ways of virtue? As members of the same commonwealth with you, are not we who are innocent interested in the evil doings of you who are guilty? Are not our privileges infringed, if to serve your own ends you seek to buy the voices of others? Are not our rights betrayed if you for a paltry bribe sell your votes to the highest bidder? We must speak, and in proportion to our value of our rights and the appreciation we have of the importance of our privileges, will be the depth and earnestness of our language. No business of mine! Are we not obliged to trade with you, to associate with you, to live with you? Must not then your dishonesty touch us? Must we not reprobate it? Must we not try to cure you of it? If you can be dishonest in one thing, what guarantee have we that you will not in another? If you can traffic in your political principles, and give your political conscience over into the keeping of the highest bidder, you may be in business the most honest and upright man alive, but you must own that there are good reasons for grave suspicions."

But Mr. Dothie's sermon has tenderness as well as invective, sympathy as Iwell as declamation. After meeting several objections that might be raised against preaching on the subject, he selects four texts, in each of which he finds a principle applicable to the case. The first, Neh. v. 9, refers to Nehemiah's vigorous reform of abuses, especially those of exorbitant usury, and the

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nobles buying the poor inhabitants of the land. With holy indignation he declares it to be a great "reproach." The second text, Rom. ii. 24, speaks of the name of God being blasphemed among the Gentiles through his own people, who make their boast in the law, and yet, through infractions of the law, dishonour God. You boast of the Christianity of your land, and yet you bow down at the shrine of the god of drunkenness, and seat your senators in the Imperial Parliament by buying up with accursed money and drink the bodies and principles of them that have votes! You talk of the blessings of your religion, and quote your constitutional liberty and freedom as proofs, and yet you lend yourselves, or sell yourselves, to the service of those who have most money, and will stick at no unfair means to gain influence and power in the State! And the world takes knowledge of you; you may be sure of that. And God takes knowledge of you; you may be equally sure of that. You will perhaps plead in your defence the heat of the contest, and the height of party feeling. Your penitence, my friends, will be more fully shown by your making no excuse, for there is one Scripture statement that robs you of all excuse,—' God will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able."" The third text, 2 Sam., xii. 14, is used to show that "the good that comes to us through the commission of evil shall be unsubstantial and unlasting." The last text, 1 Pet. ii. 12, shows that the stain of the past can only be wiped out by

*

reformation in the future: "that whereas they speak evil of you as evil doers, they may by your good works, which they shall behold, glorify God in the day of visitation." "Some who have defiled their hands have professed to me their determination never to have anything more to do with an election. Now, there I say these are wrong. Who should be found in the forefront of the battle for civil and religious liberty if it be not Christian citizens? Are all municipal and parliamentary elections to be left to the conduct of irreligious men, because God's people have not the courage to contest them purely? * **We shall be defeated if we fight so,' you say. And what of that? Who was ever the worse for an honourable defeat? It is out of such defeats, out of the determination and the courage which they inspire, that honourable victories grow.”

We would especially commend the ground which Mr. Dothie takes in requiring as a proof of penitence that the money taken as bribes should be restored. All true-hearted men will now sympathize with a Church which has thus vindicated its honour. We would fain hope there are no other Churches to which it might be held up as an example of what they should do. We pray that the minister and people who have spared no sacrifice to clear themselves of this evil, having cast out 'the old leaven," may, by the blessing of God on their holy and united service, be the true leaven of the Kingdom in the town of Lancaster.

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Kingdom. It seems desirable that all those persons who are possessed of materials, or documents, or authentic records which would shed light on the early struggles of Dissenting communi

ties, not only in the counties and cities, but in the towns and villages of the kingdom, should place them at the disposal of those who might be deemed competent to prepare them for the public

eye.

For some considerable time I have waited in hopes that some person better qualified than myself would undertake the History of Dissent in the City of Bath, with materials more abundant, and capable of rendering the sketch more complete. Not finding this accomplished, I have employed my time, and I hope not unprofitably, for myself and the Church of God, in collecting and arranging every fact of importance that fell under my notice, and the information that I am providentially possessed of. These sources united I hope will furnish me with a tolerably faithful account of the rise and progress of Nonconformity in that once fashionable resort, which for so many years was the centre of attraction to the rank and wealth of the United Kingdom; and I hasten to lay my narrative before the public immediately, before the oblivion which time naturally produces should render the subject less eagerly sought, and the distance of the events make them read with greater indifference.

About the middle of the seventeenth century, a Mr. Richard Gay preached at Hay-Combe, near Bath. He was pastor of a Baptist Church in that place, and was a most respectable and useful minister of Christ. His name is appended to some of the early letters of the Bristol Association; copies of which may be seen in "Ivimey's History of the Baptists." Living in persecuting times, both the preacher and hearers in the chapel, which he had erected on his own estate, were frequently subjected to fines for worshipping in what was opprobriously termed a conventicle. Their enemies being wearied in punishing Mr. Gay in this manner, came to the determination of committing him to prison. The good man was confined in Ilchester

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Gaol at the same time that John Bunyan was immured in the prison in Bedford; and whilst thus similarly situated, a correspondence was maintained between these two eminent men.

I have failed to ascertain at what time Mr. Gay was removed to the society of the spirits of the just made perfect, but after his departure it appears that Hay-Combe was for many years supplied by various ministers, amongst whom I may mention Messrs. Hugh and Caleb Evans, of Broadmead, Bristol, and Mr. Beddome and Mr. Newton, of the same place. To this village a few serious people from Bath were accustomed to resort, at a time when there was no dissenting place of worship in that city.

The Society of Friends appear to have been the first Dissenters in Bath, for whom a meeting-house was erected soon after their organization as a religious body. Their place of worship stood in what was called Marchant's Court, but afterwards Northumberland Passage. Thomas Story, a very celebrated preacher amongst them, is said to have attracted great crowds, and several of the nobility of both sexes went to hear him. He was very popular, and continued to labour with great zeal down to the year 1719.

About the commencement of the last century, a small congregation of Presbyterians used to meet in an obscure place for religious worship. In process of time the numbers increased, and in the year 1720 it was resolved to erect a meeting-house for this society, in what was then called Frog Lane, but since New Bond Street. The first minister who preached there was Dr. Bennett Stevenson, who continued to officiate till his death, which happened in the year 1756. To him succeeded Mr. Frank, whose career was terminated in 1780. Mr. Armstrong was then called to occupy the pulpit, but in a very few years a fit of paralysis affecting his speech, rendered him incapable of