Correspondence-Qld Mortality on Esthetic Cant. 59 'Old Mortality' that for this Church | minded, large-hearted Dissenters, martyrs have perished, saints endorse these severe and passionate have laboured, whose names are words? Can Old Mortality' look sacred and dear to every section of fairly round him and honestly say God's large family. This is the that the character and efforts of the Church of Latimer and Leighton; majority of the clergy are not of Hooker and Butler; of William maligned and parodied in the Wilberforce and Henry Martyn. picture which he offers for our It was as a faithful minister of this approbation? 'Old Mortality' misChurch that the brave old Ken takes violence for strength, decharged upon the dying Stuart the clamatory intemperance for the vices of his life; and it was within genuine afflatus, and in closing his its hallowed precincts that Herbert diatribe has with consistent perchanted his devout and thoughtful versity preferred a prayer in the verse. Can such a Church be fitly spirit of an indictment,' (as Robert described as a 'mountainous power Hall once wrote of Bishop Horsley), of evil?' Can that Church be a and inscribed on his schismatic monster of iniquity' out of whose banner the names of some of the bosom Keble has poured forth the most illustrious chiefs of British music of the Christian Year;' in Nonconformity, irrelevantly as it whose communion Arnold lived and seems to me, and vainly; for I cannot toiled, teaching alike by life and lip but believe that those saintly spirits the nobleness of duty and reverence, in their catholic sympathy would the priceless worth of truth in word have waved a deprecating hand above and work-Arnold, to whom the these testy ebullitions of sectarian Rugby boys said it was too bad to bitterness, and earnestly conjured us tell a lie, he always believed them to look though accidental divergArnold, the footprints of whose encies of verbal creed and ecclesiasintellectual pathway are luminous tical polity to the substantial affiniover all England now? Are we ties of faith and feeling-to those well-advised when we are invited to fundamental needs and instinctiva 'fling ourselves with deadly antago- aspirations of a common nature nism on a Church in which a which impel us to the same allWhately is yet enforcing Christian merciful Saviour, and point us to logic-a Milman still writing Chris- the same eternal home. tian history—a Stanley, an Alford, an Ellicott, devoting to the use and comfort of the universal Church the fruits of Christian scholarship? I shall be told that the adhesion of men pious and gifted does not of itself constitute a cause or an institution righteous and true; but it presents at least presumptive proof that it contains elements of good; that it is not an engine of sheer mischief and unmitigated evil; and if on this ground only, I will take emphatic exception to the sweeping assertions of a writer who has sufficient temerity to announce that the Established Church of England is using every conventional motive, every worldly motive, every fleshly bait * to seduce to its embrace the man of mere taste ?' Will thoughtful, broad * OLD I remain, dear Sir, Very faithfully yours, OLD MORTALITY'S NEPHEW. MORTALITY ON ESTHETIC CANT. To the Editor of the Gen ral Baptist DEAR MR. EDITOR,-I am a General Baptist, a liberal, a working Nonconformist, and a regular reader of your Magazine, and cannot but take exception to some portions of 'Old Mortality's' paper on Esthetic Cant in the current number. Against the system of that worldly corporation that passes by the style and title of the Church of England,' I could feel as strongly as 'Old Mortality himself. But in the | Lord, even Christ, educate our face of Christ's injunction, Love your enemies, and Paul's advice in 2 Cor. xiii, I could not feel, much less write, in the strain which is indulged in by your generally very acceptable contributor, Old Mortality." It is this fighting churchmen, and not the system of an establishment, that I complain of. 'Old Mortality,' speaking through a more interested witness,' says:'All the upward looking flunkeyism of the empire, which is not troubled with religious scruples, gravitates toward that which Archbishop Synge called the gentleman's religion. The Church of England is the hereditary spiritual house of the proud British aristocracy and of the landed families.' Further on in his own words he says, 'If this were true of the vulgar herd merely, whose ignorance or coxcombry render them the natural prey of priestcraft and affectation, we could bear it.' Why this importation into the argument which forms our quarrel.' This is not argument, but inflammatory personality, barely applicable to the worst sections of the members of the Church of Rome. This will not 'gain' our brethren, and especially if we tell them if we cannot destroy we must hate.' If Old Mortality' had been giving us a picture from life of the effects from this 'system' of church and state religion, I should have been silent. I could even have understood his 'crying still for war; but I cannot think with him, that 'for every damage, every insult, every cowardly robbery, every bloody oppression we would exact penalty and ransom.' Our church brethren were born into this system.' This system existed, as we had shewn so well last year, two hundred years ago. Again, I say, as a young working Nonconformist I regret this fighting at the church, beating the air, or worse. Let us rather quietly, but not the less surely, and as loving brethren, knowing that one is our young men to be Christian, ‘Freechurchman,' our aim being not to overturn, overturn, overturn,' but to work, work, work, till the Establishment itself becomes a church 'free indeed.' Yours truly, YOUNG MORTALITY. LANCASHIRE DISTRESS. [The following circular, sent to every church and subscriber to the Leeds Relief Committee,' explains itself. We entirely sympathize with the course recommended by the Yorkshire Conference, and greatly rejoice at the truly fraternal feeling exhibited by our brethren of the Particular Baptist Body.-ED.] DEAR SIR, At the Yorkshire Conference, held at Birchcliffe, the following Resolution, moved by the Rev. R. Horsfield, Leeds, seconded by the Rev. T. Gill, Shore, and supported by the Rev. J. Tunnicliffe and G. T. Woodson, Esq., Leeds, was animously passed : un 'Having heard with great pleasure, that the Baptist Relief Committee do not recognize, in their distribution of Money and Clothing, any distinction between the different sections of the Baptist Denomination, and that all Baptist Churches within the distressed districts are equally eligible to receive relief from their funds; this Conference instructs the "Leeds Relief Committee," on ascertaining that these statements are correct, to request that all the churches in the connexion, forward in future their contributions to the "Baptist Union," to be transmitted to the Lancashire Baptist Relief Fund.' This Resolution was submitted to the Lancashire Committee, whose Secretary replied as follows:- The information received by your Committee is correct. No difference has been or will be made with Correspondence-Treasurer's Account. respect to any section of the Baptist! Denomination. All are alike cheerfully aided, and I should be exceedingly delighted if our closer and more manifest union be the result.' On receiving such an answer, it did appear most undesirable that two Committees should exist, when one, so efficient and laborious, was already assisting all needy Baptist Churches. Moreover, we found on further inquiry, that while our resources were daily diminishing, the distress was more intense and wide-spread than we had described or imagined. Intimations, also, were given us, that the liberal sums that had been promised, and had been so cheerfully sent (amounting to between £800 and £900), could not be continued. For these reasons, hailed with unfeigned admiration and joy the noble generosity of our Particular Baptist Brethren. we We now affectionately and earnestly urge continued and large liberality, not only because of the terrible distress of our churches, but for the sake of our Denominational honour. All grants will in future be made by the Lancashire Committee, and all Contributions should be sent for them to the REV. J. H. MILLARD, Mission House, 33, Moorgate Street, London, E.C. Yours truly, RICHARD HORSFIELD, Secretary, Leeds Committee. G. T. WOODSON, Treasurer, Leeds Committee. LEEDS, January 14th, 1863. TREASURER'S ACCOUNT. Contributions received by the Committee at Leeds from December 17th, 1862, to January 17th, 1863, for the Relief of Distressed General Baptist Christians in the Cotton Districts. £ 8. d. Wisbech, R. Wherry, Esq. 10 0 0 Loughborough, Wood-gate, per Mr. Timms, £53s. 2d., 61 £ s. d. 6 15 0 0 14 6 0 12 6 4 10 6 5 14 11 1 0 6 2 18 6 Smarden, per Rev. J. H. ... ... ... Mrs. ... ... 1 0 0 0 12 0 4 19 3 6 Chapel, Rev. F. Tucker's, per S. Pewtress, Esq.... 14 12 0 Hitchin, per R. Johnson, Esq... Nottingham, per Beverley Berkhampstead, per Rev. J. Lawton, £2 17s. 3d. and £2 2s. Derby, Osmaston-road, per Rev. W. Jones, 6th, 7th, and 8th donations, £30, 9th donation, £1043. 6d. 40 4 Stoke, per Mr. Taylor 6 15 0 Leicester, Dover-street, per Rev. J. J. Goadby, £3 and £3 Nottingham, J. Heard, Esq., 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th donation. Loughborough, Baxter-gate per E. Stevenson, junr., £1 2s. 9d., £1 11s. 2d., £1 8s., and £1 9 11d..... 5 11 10 Kirkby and Woodhouse, per Mr. Cotes £4 0s. 4d., £7 1s. 6d. 16 5 0 Bourne, Mr. White... do. 600 37 0 0 190 1 7 0 7 12 6 100 2 10 0 1 13 1 0 14 6 030 1 18 0 To the Editor of the General Baptist DEAR SIR,-The following additional SUMMARY OF THE TREASURER'S CASH of the people, the Lord is affording them pleasing evidence of His presence among them by sending them showers of spiritual blessings. One brother says, they have as Correspondence-Acknowledgment of Clothing Received. 63 many as 150 at their prayer meeting | ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF every week, and a delightful feeling exists. Another brother, whose troubles have been augmented by family affliction, remarks, 'the spiritual condition of our little church is very promising, and I doubt not, but that when the present ordeal is past, we shall find that it has been a means of drawing us nearer the Saviour. If our brethren, however, are to maintain their position, continued help will be needed for the present, which we trust will not be withheld.' J.Heard, Esq., Nottingham 3 00 per Mr. E. Stevenson, Sutton 1 00 Mrs. Poile, Leicester per Rev. T. Goadby 2 6 6 Dover-street, Leicester, per Rev. J. J. Goadby 1 0 0 From Melbourne 2 10 0 Billesdon, per Misses H. and K. Allen... CLOTHING RECEIVED. To the Editor of the General Baptist DEAR SIR,-The following is an additional list of clothing received up to the 16th inst. I am desired to say, that the instructions given by the Birchcliffe Conference to the Leeds Relief Committee' apply to clothing as well as money. All packages should now be directed to the Rev. F. Bugby, 96, Fishergate Hill, Preston. Before they are despatched a letter should be sent him, and a reply obtained. to While sincerely thankful for all that has been done, we are compelled say, that the want of warm clothing is still distressingly felt. Yours truly, MARY HORSFIEld. To the Editor of the General Baptist DEAR SIR,-Will you permit me to Your pages are already replete |