already mentioned unfavourable to Comprehension, the triumph of Presbyterianism in Scotland, which involved the abolition of Prelacy in that country, produced in Prelatists a great deal of bad feeling, and stood in the way of the present attempt; this obstacle was greatly increased by Nonconformist attacks at the time upon the use of Liturgies, and by a constantly augmenting number of Nonconformist ordinations. Besides, although extensive alterations came under discussion, very few Episcopalians were disposed to go to such lengths as were proposed; some who were active in the affair were also cautious, and an immense majority outside the Committee utterly disliked the whole business, and were opposed to any alteration whatever in the formularies.

"The changes proposed did not touch any articles of faith, and therefore exhibit the English Latitudinarian party in a very different position from that of the foreign Latitudinarians, who threw down all the barriers of orthodoxy, and opened the doors of the Church to Unitarians. D'Huisseau, a distinguished professor and pastor at Saumur, proposed the re-union of Christendom on the broadest doctrinal basis, and received support from several Calvinistic Divines of considerable note. The English Episcopalians, who moved in the matter as just described, rather resembled Jurieu, an eminent French theologian, ordained by an Anglican Bishop, yet officiating as a Presbyterian clergyman in France and in Holland. He advocated Comprehension on an orthodox basis, and treated Church organization and forms of worship as of minor importance. "The sittings of the Commission ended on November the 18th. Convocation had assembled on the 6th of the same month.

"The labour of the Commissioners was labour in vain. It came to nothing. All that remains of it is a royal octavo pamphlet in blue paper covers, published some years ago by order of the House of Commons.

"History records many a lost opportunity, which students of the past, looking at events each from his own point of view, must needs lament. To the Catholic-the old Catholic of the Döllinger typethe Reformation appears a lost opportunity for removing abuses and uniting European Christendom." It comes before him as a crisis, which, if the Catholic party had been wise, they would have used for the purpose of purifying the Church and conciliating opponents, and so retaining them within the same fold. By the Puritan, freeing himself from party bias, I should think, the era of the Long Parliament and the Commonwealth must be regarded as a lost opportunity for treating Episcopalians (their inveterate persecutors) in the spirit of Christian justice and charity, by granting admirers of the Prayer-Book a freedom of worship which admirers of the Prayer-Book had never granted to the Puritans; thus returning good for evil, and so reading with emphasis a priceless lesson to the whole world. In like manner, surely, the liberal Churchman of the present day, whatever he may think of Tillotson's Commission, must mourn over the Revolution as a lost opportunity for enlarging the boundaries of her communion, of recovering Dissenters-not to the extent Calamy supposed, yet in considerable numbers-and of reVol. 73.-No. 439.

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moving from the Church of England many incumbrances, which have ever since been points of attack and sources of weakness.” (pp. 136-139.)

In these remarks of Dr. Stoughton we most heartily concur; and although we fear the recovery of Dissenters is further removed than ever, we do not see why encumbrances should not yet be got rid of, or at least diminished in number, so that, stumbling-blocks being removed, there could be a gradual recruiting of multitudes of godly persons who might well feel disposed to find rest and freedom in the comprehension and order of an Established Church. That such a desire of improvement is not inconsistent with loyalty to the Church, may be made sufficiently manifest by the use of language which no rational or orthodox Churchman can with decency object to. "It is but reasonable that upon weighty and important considerations, according to the various exigency of times and occasions, such changes and alterations should be made (in the particular forms of Divine worship, and the Rites and Ceremonies appointed to be used therein) as to those that are in place of authority should from time to time seem necessary or expedient." (Preface to the Book of Common Prayer.)

As regards Convocation itself, Dr. Stoughton notices what he terms a remarkable fact, that whilst the official members of the Lower House included many distinguished men, nobody of any mark was elected, except Dr. John Mill, the eminent Greek scholar. The squabbles which occupied the time and attention of its members when it was permitted to transact business during the reign of William and Mary, are told with singular moderation. For the most part, it was simply a history of Writs and prorogations; but when it was permitted to exist under William III, Convocation was really a mere form, and that a very troublesome one. Archbishop Tenison and his friends in the Upper House were tired out of all patience with their impracticable brethren; and when we read the record of the futile and undignified disputes in which they indulged, we cannot quarrel with his statement to them, "that such heats as theirs had given great scandal to those who understood not the controversy, but were much concerned that there should be any differences among men who were, by profession, ministers of the gospel of peace." Perhaps the history of Convocation generally has never been more tersely and more ably summarized than in that pregnant sentence of the Archbishop.

We cannot undertake to follow Dr. Stoughton into the mass of interesting matter which constitutes the bulk of his scholarly and pleasant volume. It may most heartily be commended to the perusal of all who would wish to acquire, within moderate

compass, information upon ecclesiastical problems still unsolved in our own day, and it will be a great pleasure to us if we may have directed the attention of any reader to it. With the volumes which precede it, it may be considered a valuable accession to our English literature.

Very different, we are sorry to say, is the verdict we feel constrained to pass on the work of Dr. Waddington, which, from the kindred nature of its subject, we have added on to the present article. A more perfect contrast to Dr. Stoughton's labours it would be hardly possible to imagine. Much research has probably been expended in gathering the materials together, and with that remark any favourable judgment concludes. We presume that Dr. Waddington is himself aware that all Puritan History is not Congregational History, and that Presbyterians and Quakers were in many essential points distinguished from Independents, and that their feuds were bitter; but it would not be easy for an ill-informed reader, who had little or no previous knowledge of the subject, to come to this conclusion, and Dr. Waddington has no right to assume that this knowledge is possessed. The title of his book is simply a misnomer, we will not say a deception, for we dare say it would be possible to extract a Congregational history out of it. But we would be very sorry to undertake the task. There are lumps of information scattered through the book, but, generally speaking, they are of the dullest and most miscellaneous cha

racter.

We have not calculated accurately, but nearly half the book consists of extracts, in small type, connected together with a few sentences of original matter. In his Preface the author takes credit to himself for presenting his materials in this rude and undigested mass. If his argument is valid, that it is only by such a process that history can be written, and exact truth be exhibited, avoiding "a colouring that would be deceptive," Dr. Stoughton, to go no further, has been guilty of a great mistake. Our own impression is, that Dr. Waddington has a secret consciousness that his own qualifications fit him only to be a "hewer of wood and a drawer of water," and that he wholly lacks the skill of a Bezaleel or an Aholiab to fashion the rough contributions which he has gathered into goodly shape and form. We must honestly confess that we have not read the book through with care; it was a task distinctly beyond us. But we made sufficient acquaintance with it to be aware that it is one of those unprofitable productions which can discover no faults in the partisans of its own opinions, and cannot extend a shadow of sympathy to adversaries. Throughout it the Church of England is held up as the oppressors, and the Puritans are the oppressed. There is sympathy expressed for those who were

ejected on St. Bartholomew's-day; there is none for those whom they had themselves ejected. And yet we think it possible that a Church of England rector or vicar might have felt as keenly when with his "weeping wife" he quitted his pleasant parsonage, as did his successor when it came to his turn to remove. Dr. Waddington has not explained why it was that England was so weary of Puritan dominion that it vanished like a dream, or an ice palace at the first breath of summer. Perhaps he thought it superfluous; for most assuredly, if his book is a fair representation of the cantankerous and quarrelsome spirit which animated Nonconformists, there must have been millions of patient Englishmen who had become at length thoroughly weary of them. The author may be assured that a reproduction of all this bitterness and prejudice will not tend to promote his cause; fortunately, however, for those who hold with him, few will find themselves in a position to judge of the question. As a notable instance of faulty style leading to unwarrantable statement, we quote a few lines from the first page of the Preface. In it he says, "our first Churches were formed in an extremity of weakness, in the depth of obscurity, and in the midst of violent persecution. The powers of the State and of the Hierarchy were combined, and persistently directed to stamp them out of existence. Imprisoned, banished, or put to death, it was supposed for a time they had really become extinct; but they grew in secret, multiplied exceedingly, and were found in every part of England." Now, in the sense of the Independents, a Church is not what we hold to be a Church; it is what we understand by a Congregation, and that of a peculiarly limited and exclusive character. We might concede, therefore, that in the early days of Congregationalism it might have been possible to imprison or exile a "Church," which would simply mean that half a dozen or a dozen people were dispersed or sent to prison. But where, when, and under what circumstances, and by whom, was a "Church" put to death? What, no doubt, Dr. Waddington means is, that certain individuals, out of particular " Churches," were put to death, and they were very few and very far between. This, however, is not his statement, which, as it stands, is simply a foolish and baseless exaggeration. We do not for a moment suppose that he meant his readers to believe what he has asserted in his opening sentences, but out of common regard for truth he should have made his statements with precision, and not have laid himself open to the charge of writing what, on the miidest construction, is nonsense. Certainly, with every desire to make out an extreme case, he has not adduced any instance of a "Church” being put to death; and if he has failed to do so, it may fairly be assumed that no "Church" suffered a fate which could only

have been paralleled in the times of Nero or Diocletian, or in the most furious persecutions of the Papacy. We are thankful that the days of Laud and the Star Chamber are at an end; but we suppose that there must be something of his spirit still left in Episcopal breasts, for we could not, as we laid down the ponderous tome, help entertaining a lurking desire that the eminent members of the Liberation Society, to whom it is dedicated, and indeed the body collectively, should, when Parliament has risen, and men in general are betaking themselves to rest and peace and quietness, after the feverish and anxious labours of the year, be doomed to sit down and read through Dr. Waddington's book. As a most notable Independent sang of old, in its confusing pages,

"A gulf profound as that Serbonian bog

Betwixt Damiata and Mount Caseus old,
Where armies whole have sunk,"-

there might be an absorption of at least the faculties of those valiant champions who are threatening ruin and disestablishment to the Church. It would be hard for them to struggle out of Dr. Waddington's accumulations into consciousness, and there might be peace. By comparison, so far as our experience extends-but we have by no means read them all-Blue Books are cheerful and refreshing literature, and are certainly infinitely more instructive.

HEMANS' ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY AND SACRED ART IN ITALY.

A History of Ancient Christianity and Sacred Art in Italy. By Charles J. Hemans. Williams and Norgate. 1866.

THE pleasure of reading this most interesting work is much marred by the bad printing and worse spelling which characterize it throughout.* It is to be regretted that a work which, both as a vade mecum to the tourist, and as a book of reference for the student, can hardly be too highly commended, as regards the mass of useful information contained in it, should not only be thus defective, but, in addition to this, be printed on such inferior paper, and so closely, that both eye and brain are fatigued before the reader has gone through many pages.

It would be a great improvement, also, if there were more

The fact of its having been printed abroad sufficiently exonerates the wellknown publishers, whose names are given above, from any blame for the carelessness with which it has been carried through the press.