cannot do; and thus unites the most perfect security of the subject's liberty with the most absolute inviolability of the sacred person of the sovereign.

Such is the British constitution,-its basis, religion; its end, liberty; its principal means and safeguard of liberty, the majesty of the sovereign. In support of it the king is not more interested than the peasant.

It was a signal instance of God's mercy,-not imputing to the people of this land the atrocious deed of a desperate faction,-it was a signal instance of God's mercy, that the goodly fabric was not crushed in the middle of the last century, ere it had attained its finished perfection, by the phrensy of that fanatical banditti which took the life of the first Charles. In the madness and confusion which followed the shedding of that blood, our history holds forth an edifying example of the effects that are ever to be expected-in that example, it gives warning of the effects that ever are intended, by the dissemination of those infernal maxims, that kings are the servants of the people, punishable by their masters. The same lesson is confirmed by the horrible example which the present hour exhibits, in the unparelleled misery of a neighbouring nation, once great in learning, arts, and arms; now torn by contending factions-her government demolished-her alters overthrown-her first-born despoiled of their birth-right-her nobles degraded-her best citizens exiled-her riches, sacred and profane, given up to the pillage of sacrilege and rapine-atheists directing her councils-desperadoes conducting her armies-wars of unjust and chimerical ambition consuming her youth-her granaries exhausted -her fields uncultivated-famine threatening her multitudes her streets swarming with assassins, filled with violence, deluged with blood!

Is the picture frightful? Is the misery extreme-the guilt horrid? Alas! these things were but the prelude of the tragedy: public justice poisoned in its source,

profaned in the abuse of its most solemn forms to the foulest purposes-a monarch deliberately murdered-a monarch, whose only crime it was that he inherited a sceptre the thirty-second of his illustrious stock, butchered on a public scaffold, after the mockery of arraignment, trial, sentence-butchered without the merciful formalities of the vilest malefactor's execution-the sad privilege of a last farewell to the surrounding populace refused-not the pause of a moment allowed for devotion -honourable interment denied to the corpse-the royal widow's anguish imbittered by the rigour of a close imprisonment; with hope indeed at no great distance, of release, of such release as hath been given to her lord!

This foul murder, and these barbarities, have filled the measure of the guilt and infamy of France. O my country! read the horror of thy own deed in this recent heightened imitation! lament and weep that this black French treason should have found its example in the crime of thy unnatural sons! Our contrition for our guilt that stained our land-our gratitude to God, whose mercy so soon restored our church and monarchy-our contrition for our own crime, and our gratitude for God's unspeakable mercy, will be best expressed by us all, by setting the example of a dutiful submission to government in our own conduct, and by inculcating upon our children and dependants a loyal attachment to a king who hath ever sought his own glory in the virtue and prosperity of his people; and administers justice with an even, firm, and gentle hand,

a king who, in many public acts, hath testified his affection for the free constitution of this country,-a king, of whom, or of the princes issued from his loins and trained by his example, it were injurious to harbour a suspicion that they will ever be inclined to use their power to any other end than for the support of public liberty. Let us remember, that a conscientious submission to the sovereign powers is, no less than brotherly

love, a distinctive badge of Christ's disciples. Blessed be God, in the Church of England both those marks of genuine Christianity have ever been conspicuous. Perhaps in the exercise of brotherly love it is the amiable infirmity of Englishmen to be too easy to admit the claim of a spiritual kindred; the times compel me to remark that brotherly love embraces only brethren: the term of holy brotherhood is profaned by an indiscriminate application. We ought to mark those who cause divisions and offences. Nice scruples about external forms, and differences of opinion upon controvertible points, cannot but take place among the best Christians, and dissolve not the fraternal tie: none, indeed, at this season, are more entitled to our offices of, love, than those with whom the difference is wide, in points of doctrine, discipline, and external rites-those venerable exiles, the prelates and clergy of the fallen church of France, endeared to us by the edifying example they exhibit of patient suffering for conscience' sake: but if any enjoying the blessings of the British government, living under the protection of its free constitution and its equal laws, have dared to avow the wicked sentiment, that this day of national contrition, this rueful day of guilt and shame, "is a proud day for England, to be remembered as such by the latest posterity of freemen," with such persons it is meet that we abjure all brotherhood. Their spot is not the spot of our family; they have no claim upon our brotherly affection: upon our charity they have indeed a claim. Miserable men! "they are in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity:" it is our duty to pray God, if perhaps the thought of their heart may be forgiven them.

APPENDIX

TO THE

PRECEDING SERMON.

Ir is much less from any high opinion of the importance of Calvin's authority to confirm the assertions of the foregoing Discourse, that reference has been so frequently made in the notes at the bottom of the page to his "Theological Institutions," than from a desire of vindicating the character of Calvin himself from an imputation, which they who think it ill-founded will be concerned to find revived in a late work of great erudition, and for the ability of the execution, as well as for the intention, of great merit-the "Jura Anglorum" of the learned Mr. Francis Plowden. In a matter in which the sense of the Holy Scriptures is so plain as it certainly is upon the questions which are treated in the foregoing Discourse, the preacher esteems the additional weight of any human authority of little moment : but he cannot allow himself not to take advantage of an occasion spontaneously as it were arising from his subject, of rescuing the memory of a man, to whom the praise of conspicuous talents and extensive learning must be allowed by all, from unjust aspersions ;-the injustice of which lies not properly, however, at the door of the learned author of the "Jura."

Calvin was unquestionably in theory a republican: he freely declares his opinion, that the republican form, or an aristocracy reduced nearly to the level of a republic, was of all the best calculated in general to answer the ends of government. So wedded indeed was he to this notion, that, in disregard of an apostolic institution and the example of the primitive ages, he endeavoured to fashion the government of all the Protestant churches upon republican principles; and his persevering zeal in that attempt, though in this country through the mercy of God it failed, was followed upon the whole with a wide and mischievous success. But in civil politics, though a republican in theory, he was no leveller. That he was not, appears from the passages cited in the notes upon the foregoing Discourse; and will be still more evident to any who will take the trouble to peruse the whole of the last chapter of the last book of his "Institutions of the Christian Religion." In that chapter, he professedly treats the question of the consistency of civil government with the scheme of Christianity; which he maintains against the fanatics of his times. He shows that submission to the magistrate is under all forms of government a religious duty:† he declares his preference of a republican aristocracy to any other form:† but this declaration is prefaced with an express protest against the futility of the question, what form is absolutely and in itself the best:† he affirms, that the advantage of one government above another depends much upon circumstances;† that the circumstances of different countries require different forms; that government under every form is a divine ordinance; that the variety of governments in the different regions of the earth is no less conducive to the general benefit of mankind, and no less the work of Providence, than the variety of climates: and with respect to monarchy in particular (by * Institut. lib. iv. cap. xx. sect. 1-3. + Sect. 4. § Sect. 8.

+ Sect. 8.