however, the more willingly cite the passage for the sake of the concluding remarks, in order that he may do us the justice to believe, that, though our words were strong, our hearts were not unkind. Referring to one of his then recent publications we said:

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"Mr. M'Neile tells his countrymen, that he, like Jeremiah of old, has a special commission to them from God, and that it is a national sin that they refuse to hear his words. He even puts forth a declamation of his own, mixed up with the word of God, heading it, in italics, with Thus saith the Lord God of England;' and concluding it with Hear, ye men of Britain: be not proud, for the Lord hath spoken.' So that all who doubt the justice of Mr. McNeile's application and paraphrase of the inspired denunciations, are scoffers and infidels. The man who dares to speak the word of the Lord among you,' says Mr. McNeile, adverting to himself, receives no fair play.' No, you will not hear: but you shall hear, and God will make both your ears to tingle.' And again: Well, I will not threaten; I will not triumph over your deplorable infatuation; I will not forget who hath made me to differ,' &c.&c. And again: 'Then said I, Ah! Lord God, behold, the teachers of this people lead them astray....Is it not so, my fellowcountrymen? Your natural teachers have deceived you. Many of them are utterly careless, &c. &c.... These men have neglected you; you have no confidence in them; and when any of them attempt to influence you, they fail. But the teachers who have led you astray are men of a different stamp, men of activity, of zeal, of much profession, men who have talked about Christian experience, humility, piety, and brotherly love,' &c.: or, as they are described to the same effect in one of the passages we objected to in the Dialogues on Prophecy, the men who cant about Bibles, and tracts, and missions,' the Evangelicals, through whom, the English being a phleg

CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 351.

matic people, the devil has introduced infidelity under the mask of religious sanctimoniousness!' We will give but one passage more, leaving our readers to make their own comments on it. Mr. McNeile says: 'I am become an enemy to my people because I tell you the truth: yet, Holy Father, let me pray for them in secret with fervent affection; and warn them in public with persevering faithfulness, if yet Thy uplifted hand may be stayed in longer forbearance. But if not...O my God, at the last, when the word shall pass Thy lips in righteousness, sustain my trembling flesh, and give me strength above nature to rejoice in thy holy vengeance!' And we are to receive, upon pain of the charge of being 'infidels,' this strange declamation, because the writer professes to be an elucidator of unfulfilled prophecy! We write in sorrow, not in bitterness; for who that has witnessed Mr. McNeile's talents and eloquence, or been edified by his zeal and piety, but must lament that such endowments are deformed by the extravagancies which it has been our painful task to notice?"

Having quoted this passage, we shall only add, that, as our correspondent tells us expressly that he did not mean to represent himself as sent of God with a special denunciation against the people of England, we will not aggravate our offence by saying more than that if he had so meant, we see not how he could have used stronger language, or have more confidently exclaimed, "Thus saith the Lord."It is, however,far more consoling to us to learn that we unconsciously exaggerated the meaning of our Christian brother, than that he was guilty of that "preposterous arrogancy" which he so justly reprobates. It is enough for us to know

that a writer construes his own words in a modified manner; it is not for us to put a different interpretation upon them. It will not, however, be alien to the point to add, that it might be well for our correspondent in future to prevent the possibility of

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his meaning being mistaken, by couching it in a more guarded style. We would also respectfully recommend to himself, and to other "students of prophecy" in the present day, the following observations of the learned Ernesti, in his "Narratio Critica de Interpretatione Prophetiarum Messianarum in Ecclesia Christiana." Though the particular controversy to which they allude is not precisely the same as some which have been lately much discussed, they inculcate a lesson at all times equally important, and equally liable to be overlooked. "Omnino oportet in hoc genere NON ACERBUM ESSE. Vides tu, O bone, Christum in V. T. ubi alius aut omnino non, aut non ita clare videt, ut tu vel vides, vel videre te putas. Vide eum tibi, et gratias age Deo. Sed fac, ut eum in cor, cum ejus mansuetudine et lenitate, recipias, ne frustra videris. Ille vero alter eum alibi pariter videt, si non ubique in V. T. satis clare, ut dubitet, hæreat, per umbram modo, at in N. T. videt in clara luce refulgentem, et pro ejus claritatis beneficio gratias agit Deo. (Opuscula Theologica, edit. ii. p. 477.) We do not go to the extent of Ernesti's "Vide eum tibi:" far from it; for if the recent discoveries respecting the prophecies, the person of our Lord, miracles, or other points, be indeed, Scripture truth, they ought not to be withheld from the community of the faithful; rather ought they to be promulgated with a zeal corresponding to their importance: but the spirit of the passage deserves serious consideration; and particularly the exhortation to receive Christ in the meekness of Christ, and the excellent advice" in hoc genere non acerbum esse."

4. Our correspondent's next paragraph gives us real pain, because it appears that we have given him pain, and where we had not the slightest intention of doing so. He will see, by reference to the Christian-Observer pamphlet of the "Documents and Correspondence," that the quotation from his reported sermon was at

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page 4, and the passage, "What Christian can close the above discussion, &c." at page 77, seventythree pages after, and with no reference whatever to that sermon. In quoting that passage in our January Number, we have prefaced it, as Mr. McNeile justly states, with the reported quotation from his sermon: they are thus brought into juxta-position; and he thinks we meant to imply that he preferred miraculous gifts to Christian graces. But if he will believe us on our sincere decla. ration, we assure him that we meant nothing of the kind, we believed nothing of the kind, and we wished to insinuate nothing of the kind. has quoted sufficient from his sermon to shew that we could not believe it; and we trust he will do us the justice to be convinced that we did. not mean to assert what we could not believe. If he will refer to the passage, he will see that it was our wish to take leave of the discussion" with a few practical remarks, in which we believed all Christians would agree; and the tenor of the paragraph was intended to be to the effect, that whatever controversythere may be as to the question of miraculous gifts, there can be none as to the question of graces; and that if we could not concur with our friends in the former, they would doubtless agree with us in the latter. It never occurred to us that our words could be so construed as to imply just the contrary to what we meant; and our correspondent would see that they could not be intended to bear the meaning he assigns to them, if he would read only the next two or three lines to those which he has quoted; for thus runs the passage: "Were it not, then, wise to turn from such questionable gifts, to the solid practical realities of vital, saving, sanctifying truth? Oh, who would covet even a faith that could remove mountains, rather than charity, without which it profiteth nothing. Let, then, those who have attained to the more excellent way, as we are persuaded have those friends on whose

Observer: he virtually opposes the reasoning of Milner; and, to use his own words, "explains away the miracle exactly after the manner of the Neologians." The story of Zâl Khan is another proof, if another were needed, of the truth of our first and last position, that the only safe line, the only way to prevent the recoil of infidelity against the Sacred Narrative itself, is to vouch for no miracle since the age of the Apostles. Miracles there may have been; but they are not articles of belief; nor, with deference to Mr. Boys, are we Neologians, should we not credit them, any more than we are Neologians, because we donot believe in Joanna Southcote. Had Milner lived to read the case of Zal Khan, we believe, that, with his judicious mind, he would not have adhered to his opinion of the miracle of the sixth century; and we wish we could say that we indulged equal hopes of the present avouchers. Mr. Boys may please to ridicule science, and call it idiotic ; but we are quite sure, that had there been a little more of true science, or even of extended reading, and knowledge of the actual facts bearing upon the cases in question, we should not have heard of so many miracles.

But these things are not new; they have been in every age: they have their cycles; their periodical risings, fallings, and decays. While we write, our eye glances on the four volumes of Dr. Dwight's Travels, where, as we remember, occurs a monitory exemplification, in the history of the American "Shakers," of the worse than extravagancies which accompanied the pretence to those very prodigies which are now put forth in Scotland. The history is not only too long for our pages, but is a record of grossly vicious excesses and impurities with which we should not dare to stain them. But it is a fearful illustration of the results of fanaticism-and a fanaticism, be it observed, interwoven with those very notions which are recur

ring in their cycle of variation at the present moment. There were some of the same extravagant interpretations of prophecy, the alleged personal reign of Christ upon earth, the alleged revival or non-cessation of the gift of tongues and working of miracles and healing the sick in the name of Jesus; yet, connected with all this, there was such horrible licentiousness as may not be named among Christians. We will quote, though not the whole narrative, yet a few passages, in which not a little that Dr. Dwight describes of the extravagancies at New Lebanon in America might serve for a picture of certain recent scenes at Port-Glasgow in Scotland. We confine ourselves to the head of fanaticism; in justice excluding other matters, which do not apply to the modern instance; and we state this explicitly, that we may not seem, even by inadvertence, to insinuate a false accusation. On the contrary, we have not a shadow of reason to suppose otherwise than that the Port-Glasgow claimants to the gift of tongues and working of miracles are persons of honest and exemplary life, but whose imaginations have been heated by the new theories, which have turned aside some stronger minds. We may add also, that, were their life ever so bad, which we have no reason whatever to imagine, the abstract question would not thereby be affected; for, as Mr. McNeile most scripturally observes, miraculous gifts have never had any necessary connexion with piety or moral conduct. But still the history of the Shakers, and other extravagant sects, is monitory, because it shews, that, when once men give the rein to flights of fancy in religion, it is impossible to say, espe cially among uneducated and enthusiastic minds, where the mischief may end; and, in point of historical fact, the pretence of working miracles, both in the Protestant and the Papal church, has invariably, sooner or later, been accompanied by excesses which were little contemplated by those who originated the