Christianity is a disputed, controverted, unsettled question; a question of criticism, of philosophy, of history; a question involving politics and literature; a question about which men differ as widely as at any former period, and which, though it be treated somewhat differently, is no nearer being settled than heretofore. The only demonstration which it owns, or will admit of, has been withheld. Its friends, instead of exemplifying its humility, benevolence, and heavenly spirit in their lives, and applying it to the young, the poor, the ignorant, the mass of the people, have regarded it as a difficult, abstruse, complicated subject, involving many uncertain and doubtful matters, and requiring to be defended by learning, art, and subtility. Instead of being considered as an affair of the heart, it is treated first, and chiefly, as an affair of the head. Instead of being within the capacity of a Hottentot, or Laplander, it is supposed to require deep study, intellectual effort, and subtility, on the part of its converts. The continual droppings of learned officiousness have worn away the plain and simple features of the original, and covered its emaciated form with such a load of glosses, explanations, queries, distinctions, doubts, and difficulties, as to put at defiance all pretence of harmony or consistency, and render it a matter of wonder, that any two persons should exactly agree, or be perfectly content to differ, on any one point. It is to a greater or less extent in every community supposed to be, with respect to its claims, its authority, and its bearing on the future destinies of men, on a level with other religions. It is judged of, not by any reference to its author, nor by its own pure light, but by its elevation or depression in the scale of human reason, the learning and prowess of its defenders, and the state of pending controversies.

The truth is, discouraging and humiliating as it may be, the great mass of the people in Protestant Christendom know little or nothing of the Gospel; and perhaps as large a proportion of those who are instructed, and even learned, in other matters, have no idea of the spiritual nature and design of Christianity, as of those who are most ignorant of all other things. And there is but too much reason to apprehend, that the religion of Protestants in this country is in danger of a similar eclipse to that which long since obscured its light in Germany.

The people are not taught. The system is such, that it

requires an educated Protestant minister, alas, in how many instances! six whole days of study and rest, to prepare himself to deliver two lectures, essays, or sermons, of thirty or forty minutes each, on the Lord's day, to such persons as may please to come to hear him. These generally must be carefully written, in learned and set terms, so as to be unintelligible to many of the auditory, lest in the infinite confusion of ideas in which the subject is involved, and the labyrinth of definitions, distinctions, doubts, and perplexities which crowd upon the question on every side, he should make some mistake, use some wrong words, cross somebody's track, or in some way get out of the traces. This habit on their part disqualifies them in every respect for that simple, familiar, colloquial teaching, by which alone the young, the uneducated, the common mind, can ever be instructed. Ministers are too often a class by themselves— a learned, recluse body, as far removed from the associations, capacities, and sympathies of the people generally, as were the priests of Egypt, and the philosophers of Greece, or as are the Babel tongues of their libraries. Is it any wonder that the most diligent of their hearers, when for the time they ought to be teachers themselves, have need that one teach them again and again, which be the first principles of the oracles of God? Is it any wonder that the pure, demonstrative, resistless light of the Gospel, cannot be seen through such a confused mass of artificial net-work, such a compound of bewildering technicalities, abstractions, and mysteries!

This system seems unavoidably to require, what is so commonly, and with so much surprise observed, that the glow of love in the newly renovated heart, should be chilled, restrained, and compelled to give precedence to the theories, notions, and abstractions of the head. No sooner does a convert discern, with grateful and admiring transport, the divine beauty, loveliness, and glory of the objects which the Gospel presents to his new-born affections, than he is directly, or by just inference from the course of instruction, made to feel in danger if he yields to the power of that vision, to the absorbing emotions of the heart, to that transforming spiritual influence, the mode, or philosophy of which is one of the thousand things in controversy; and he is painfully driven to turn his eye, and yield his attention, to the cold, cheerless, barren subjects of speculative theology, sectarian

distinctions, and the category of religious tactics. He is to obtain through these mediums whatever light he enjoys or reflects. His heart is confined and smothered, by the very instruments which are intended to excite its action; it is, as it were, incased in the thick folds of theory, speculation, technicality, mode and form, as the Chinese glaze over their earthen images with an unyielding and durable compound. And now that the well-springs of life and action are sealed; now that those powerful emotions and supreme affections of the heart, from which obedience in the outward conduct proceeds, are checked and repressed; now that the native spiritual influence of Christianity, instead of being permitted to become the law of the mind, superceding all other influences, and ruling all the sources of action, is subjected to an artificial system of theory and speculation, is it any wonder, that the practical exhibitions of this religion, of its pure spirit, its humility, its benevolence, its forbearance, its amiableness, its universal and surpassing loveliness, should not be such as to put an end to all doubt of its genuineness and efficacy, all question of its reality and blessedness, all difficulty of distinguishing its radiance from false lights, and all pretence for depending for its support or defence on any thing but its own simple truths and the co-operation of the Holy Spirit?

Under this system, when the church is by its leaders thought to be in danger, not from vice and immorality, but from errour in speculation, errour touching the construction of something in the symbol of doctrine or the principles of ecclesiastical government, one of the first things to be done iswhat? To repent and do the first works, and return to the fountain and source of light? Quite otherwise. It is to draw all possible attention to the written symbol or standard, as though a speculative conformity with that, as the respective parties construe it, were the main thing, and all variance of opinion, even respecting the latest and most subtle distinctions, were the highest offence, demanded an exclusion from all confidence, and merited condign punishment. Pride, selfishness and passion now have scope for their indulgence, under the cloak, and in the abused and insulted name of religion. Piety stands abashed. Love, humility, meekness, gentleness, forbearance, compassion, kindness, joy and peace disappear, while their place is occupied by the seven spirits of contention.

On the scheme of maintaining Christianity by intellectual efforts on the fields of ecclesiastical, philosophical and doctrinal controversy, the door of dissention is alway kept wide open, and the same pride, ambition and other passions are appealed to, and there is the same tendency to division and strife, as in politics and false systems of religion. Books, therefore, on all sides of every question which the wit of man has been able to suggest, have been and still are constantly increasing. At the same time it is apparent that the learned terms, and incredible masses of lumber which this method has accumulated, have no hold on the common mind, and neither directly nor indirectly exert any more influence on the mass of mankind, than the rolls of Pompeii, or the hieroglyphics of Egypt: and hence the facility and success with which infidelity, fanaticism and delusion have so long roamed over the vast field of human ignorance and depravity.

How on this scheme can it be accounted for, that Christianity has always flourished and triumphed most, when so administered and so circumstanced, as to appear contemptible to the learning, philosophy, wisdom and power of the world? and when utterly bereft of all hope of favour from them, subjected to their frowns, and driven to depend exclusively on God? Did the faith of miracles at the beginning stand in place of our shield of polemics and controversy? Did the resistless sword of Nero excuse the church from an intellectual war? Was the Apostolic church in the valleys of Piedmont preserved by miracle, or by the same humble instrumentality, and the same divine influence and protection, as in the primitive age?

Let the reader, with a full view of the nature of Christianity, its divinity, its proper sphere, and its complete adaptation to its object, refer to the history of events in the theological and ecclesiastical world of Protestantism; examine a list of what are called theological books, or such as are deemed desirable and necessary in a theological library; consider the systems of theological education especially in Europe, and the nature of ministerial labour; and to avoid uncharitable censures, let all the exceptions which any one may find reason to make, and all the good which has been done, be allowed, and the most ample folds of all charity be thrown over all those individuals who with honest hearts have wasted their lives in building up and defending the

mere scaffolding of their systems; and let him candidly inquire what have been the results of this method of propagating and maintaining Christianity; what is the actual state of religion and of the churches, in those countries where the experiment was commenced, and where it has been most fully tried? What in short under this system is the type of a minister? With respect to those countries at least, may it not be said, that a Protestant minister is a man specially educated and trained to defend the ecclesiastical and theological system of his sect, first against all other Protestant denominations, and then against all the errours of the rest of the world?

Such a minister suggests the idea of a man who should undertake to construct a building for religious meetings, and in order to prepare himself for the work, should study the civil law, the theory of architecture, and the method of selfdefence; and as a practical mechanic should learn to use only the rule and the smoothing plane, and know nothing of the axe, the saw, the chisel, the hammer, or any other implement. He would thus be qualified to sketch a plan of the proposed building, and to explain and defend his theory and all his rights; and supposing the necessary timber to be brought to the proper locality, he might in course of time make some impression on it with his smoothing plane, and probably fit some pieces for their place in his edifice; but most of his materials would perish before he would effect his object. Should several different persons, similarly qualified, undertake to co-operate in constructing the same building, and should they disagree as to the architectural plan, and employ themselves in controversy, first about their own, and then with the world at large touching the plan of all other buildings, the illustration would perhaps be more complete.

There has been a shifting of scenes, a change of tactics, from time to time, but the great evils which have been assailed by this array of effort have not been subverted.— Would that it might be seen, that the means employed had no tendency to work success, and never even in appearance had any success,except as death cleared the field of particular enemies, and perseverance worried out others, or the taste and fashion of the times demanded new subjects, and new modes of contention. This partizan warfare and single combat of intellectual and moral gladiators may, with respect to the