miles distance from St. Paul's cathedral. These he divides intó two concentric circles, an exterior and an interior one. The more distant and exterior circle comprizės 38 parishes, and the interior one 55; none of them included in the general county average, and consequently not including the parishes in the City of London. He then proceeds to give in gross and in detail their entire population, together with the means of public worship under the Establishment possessed respectively by each. The 93 churches attached to these parishes he estimates roughly, and somewhat largely, as capable in the average of accommodating 2000 persons each. And finally, he assumes the number accommodated in the several regular chapels in and round the metropolis, at 30,000. From these principles he then draws the following" results, in numbers so enormous, in probable consequences so terrific, as perfectly to appal the imagination." 1. That in the exterior circle, containing 38 parishes and 181,882 inhabitants, only 59,000 persons are accommodated with the means of public worship: and in the interior circle, containing 55 parishes and 970,668 inhabitants, only 110,000 persons receive the same accommodation. 2. Consequently that in the former circle there remains a surplus of 122,882 persons, and, in the latter, the enormous one of 860,668 persons, wholly unac commodated with the means of public worship in regular parochial churches. Or, 3. That subtracting the 30,000 assumed to be.accommodated in the several epis copal chapels, there remain NINE HUNDRED AND FIFTY-THREE THOUSAND without the possibili ty of partaking the advantages of parochial worship, and consequent ly without that regard and attachment to the Church of England, which can only be formed by a sense of benefits conferred and received. To make this alarming statement still more terrific, Mr. Yates has recourse to his former County Averages; according to which he is enabled to state, that the whole number of persons unaccommodated may be considered as exceeding the entire population of NINE COUN TIES, which he names, containing 1652 parish churches. And the practical evil of such a deficiency, he points out as " equal not only to an infraction of the Residence Acts in other parts of the kingdom, by 1650 non-resident incumbents, but to the still greater evil of that num ber of parishes left totally without any pastors, either rector or cu rate, and by which several hundred thousand supposed members of the Church of England are left without parochial cominunion, without Di vine service, without any benefit from our admirable liturgy; with out any Gospel-instruction; with out auy sense of religion." "Such & mine of heathenism," Mr. Yates properly and forcibly exclaims, in p. 51, 66 and consequent profligacy and danger, under the very meri dian (as it is supposed) of Christian illumination, and accumulated around the very centre and heart of British prosperity, liberty, and civilization, cannot be contemplat ed without terror by any real and rational friend of our established government, in church and state: and is surely sufficient to awaken the anxious attention of every true patriot,every enlightened statesman, every sincere advocate of suffering humanity, and every intelligent and faithful Christian." Whether we take the parochial average at the stated number of 640 in the county calculation, or at an imaginary one of 2000 (the estimated contents of each parish church, in and round the metropolis), which last makes the deficit of parish churches on the whole, about 477 within the two circles: whether or not we deduct the quan tum of population supposed to quit the metropolis on the Sabbath day, which, however, seldom quits the limits of the exterior circle; or whether, finally, we speculate on the number invited and enabled to attend the several dissenting places of worship within the same districts; the result will still indicate the urgent necessity there is for the speedy consideration of this most enormous evil, and of the serious danger to the best interests of the Establishment, so long as it shall remain unattended to. - Space does not remain for us to interest the lovers of round num bers, by specifying some of the gigantic details contained in this work of Mr. Yates, and which speak of parishes containing up wards of 40,000*, and one 75,624+ inhabitants. Neither can we do more then allude to the hints given of similar deficiencies in the remoter parts of the kingdom, and which we knew in divers instances to be crying grievances. Much less can we now enter upon the various important discussions to which the consideration of remedies leads so inquiring and thoughtful a mind as that of Mr. Yates. We must satisfy ourselves with stating his strong 'censure of the law of the land, as it at present is supposed to stand, which throws every difficulty in the way of opening episcopal chapels, and affords every facility to dissenting establishments: together with the general basis of his remedial proposals, viz. a re-division of the several overgrown masses of population into practicable parishes, and a manly and effectual investigation in Parliament of the best means of raising funds for the erection of competent churches, and the endowment of a suitable regular ministry for their supply. This is accompanied with a minute detail of the proceedings which took place in the several reigns of Queen Ann, George I. and George II. relative to the well-known plan for building 50 new churches, in and about the metropolis; followed with some very judicious observations on the very large and lamentable failure in the execution of that plan.. We should not feel disposed, even if we had time, to develop more of Mr. Yates's valuable statements and proposals, from the strong desire we feel, that the work itself should be extensively possessed and most attentively considered by our readers themselves. The probable consequences upon society, and the best interests of our country, from letting things remain as they are, appear with a force in Mr. Yates's pages, which we could not otherwise convey than by transcrib ing his own words. Full of the real and terrific dangers accruing the largest computation cannot supply of the Church of England to more than the benefit of the liturgical instruction 3,000, leaving a surplus-population of 9,000 without parochial communion with the Church of England.—Such instances may more properly be termed exclusion rather than defection from the Established Church: they may account for the increase of Methodism and Dissent, but certainly cannot be assigned to the zeal or the activity of Sectaries. They arise solely from a disuse of the wise practice of our ancestors.-The continuance of such a system must indeed be highly injurious, and may be ultimately fatal, to the Established Church. It can only be 'remedied by the legislators of the Established Church itself." preserve the Church from the danger that impends over it through the ne glected ignorance, the unawed profigacy, the gross intemperance, and the habitual impiety of several hundred thousands, who are considered to be its to the Establishment, both in church and state, from the neces! sary influx and increase of every evil principle, where no means exist for the cultivation of good ones, Mr. Yates has neither time members, and ought to be its supporters nor inclination for the lesser war fare against the different modes of Christianity, which too many modern controversialists make the whole of their own mode of professing it. "It is not," he properly observes, r from the most discreet friends, and greatest ornaments of the Church of England-the wisest men and the best informed divines; that the reproachful epithets Methodist, Calvinist, Arminian, and Enthusiast, are so frequently heard. Let us rather repel întem perate and unfounded charges, by the superior excellence of our own principles, the superior candour and charity of our demeanour." p. 102, ? › And in comparing the present source of danger with certain others to which we have alluded in this article, we are particularly glad to quote the words of Mr. Yates, as those of one certainly not pre judiced in favour of the Institution to which our two first heads had respect, if not possessed of some degree of disesteem. for its sigual operations... The Associations formed of late years for the distribution of the Bible, have been described as a probable cause of injury and danger to the Esta blished Church. But surely the only injury likely to result to the Establish ment from the existence of these societies, and the controversy to which they have given rise, attaches equally to both sides of the question. The theoretical fears, and ideal phantoms of danger that appear to excite such serious alarm in one class of literary antagonists and the extravagant anticipations and exaggerated hopes of their zealous opponents, have equally tended to divert the public attention from the real source of danger, and of consequence have led to the proposal of palliative and insufficient assistances, instead of the only practical and efficient remedy. Repressing the exertions of these societies cannot possibly and protectors. So far otherwise, that sities of human nature are suffered to "Whatever danger may be supposed to threaten the Established Church from giving the Bible without the Prayer. book, that danger can only take its full effect from the neglect and disuse of the Prayer-book, consequent upon the neglect and disuse of the public service of the Church. Those cannot be expected to have much love and reverence for the Prayer-book, when given to them, who are denied the opportunity of using it, and learning its excellence, in public worship.” pp. 91-93. To conclude Whilst Mr. Yates's pages breathe in every line the zealous and unoffending spirit of a true Church-of-England activity; we can do no better than earnestly express our hope that such a spirit may become more diffusively felt and acted upon by the whole body of the English Clergy. Standing upon the high vantage ground of their own superior education, and the undoubted and unrivalled favour of public opinion wherever they conscientiously discharge their du ty: we have no fears whatever for the Church they represent, as it may be, in the midst of so many and great dangers," whilst, impressed with a becoming sense of the source whence these dangers arise, they "walk worthy of the We are bold to affirm, that no sound vocation wherewith they are called." apostolical church, like our own, can ever fall by any other means than by means of its own fault and set, the negligent or improper conduct kind; and displayed in enlightened of its appointed ministry. Every piety, sound learning, and active exclamation on its dangers, from benevolence.", p. 125. In exact whatever quarter, is, to our ears, proportion as this testimony shall but a satire on its own body; and be found, on extensive observation, with what consistency, therefore, substantially true, do we firmly in our view, its own ministers can believe the Church of England to reiterate that cry, let our readers stand on a rock that nothing can judge. Let only the Church ob- shake. There is nothing unstable tain the same legal facilities with in the revelation she unfolds: there the Dissenters, and we should not is nothing unsound, we honestly fear even the danger justly appre- believe, in her exposition of the hended by Mr. Yates, otherwise code. If her discipline be rethan from the inactivity of the laxed, or rather be scarcely perEstablished Clergy; persuaded, as ceived to breathe beneath the mass we are, that places would abun- of nominal profession which she dantly spring up for the exercise embraces, let it be remembered, of their ministry, wherever that that in a free country and a free ministry promised its proper fruits. religion, the mistake as to her The thronged congregations of some security might easily be on the side churches abundantly confirm the of too much, rather than of too maxim on one side; and would little external severity. The thunthat the situation of others did not ders of her pulpit are to our ears fatally prove the converse! at least as fearful as the ban of Presbyterian excommunication. It is in the pulpit and the cottage that her battle must be fought, and her cause either maintained or lost, by the personal character and conduct of her ministers. Let them know their own weight, "magnify their own office," feel their own responsibility, and exercise with a zeal directed by knowledge, the power entrusted to them by their God and their country, and we are persuaded neither they nor we have any thing to fear for the Church of England. Let them, in short, display only, no ostentatious indeed, but a real and sound regard to the souls of men and their everlasting interests, and we have no apprehension but their country will in return maintain their temporal interests and those of the church to which they belong. In fine, not to acknowledge the Church to be in danger, would be not to fall in with a very popular cry, or to lay ourselves open to the charge, perhaps, of sinister mo tives. On the other hand, as the investigation of that danger, if any, with its causes, must, even in our minds, ultimately bear hard upon the conduct of her ministers, even under existing disadvantages, it is plain we must feel ourselves standing upon tender ground. But, indeed, "we are persuaded better things, and things which accompany salvation." We would not be unrighteous to forget the work of faith and labour of love" which characterize so large a portion of the established ministry of this country, both within and beyond the limits of the metropolis. We believe, with the respectable Mr. Yates, that, guided by "a candid and liberal spirit of examination, we shall find no class of the community, equally numerous, to produce a more excellent standard and character than the Clergy of the Church of England; founded on a serious and conscientious regard to the honour of God and the best interests of man 46 CHRIST. OBServ. No. 167. "that shall stand." An appeal to the Bible has always proved itself a most powerful, if not irresistible weapon, whether of attack or defence: and if but, in idea, the ministers of our Church should turn over the free and unfettered use of that" sword of the Spirit" to their supposed opponents, we not only fear, but confidently foretel, the worst consequences to their own profession. The sword must neither be rashly mutilated, nor unskilfully encumbered, nor timidly wielded, that is effectually to maintain the cause of Christianity or of the true Church. The, discovery of fear in their cham pions will be fatal. Much more will a pretended zeal for the honour of God's word, used as a cloak to real indifference and averseness to its circulation, be at once discovered and condemned, "That which is spoken in the ear," let them be assured, "will be proclaimed on the house-top." No claims of the Established Church will be admitted to supersede the claims of that Book on which it is exclusively built. No purity in its liturgy, however unrivalled or unblemished, will be received as a substitute, much less a corrective and only as a subordinate help meet, for the Divine Instructor, whose voice it echoes. The rock will be admitted as neither more nor less stable for the building erected upon it. If they can be brought into mutual collision, it will easily be foreseen which must fall. Things human against things divine will prove, at best, a senseless struggle. "Whosoever shall stumble on that stone, shall be broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder." The Field of Waterloo; a Poem. By WALTER SCOTT, Esq. Edinburgh: Constable. London: Mur ray. 1815. 8vo. pp. 54. MR.Walter Scott is generally deemed among the foremost of those living writers who have rescued English poetry from its wrinkled and painted decrepitude, and have re-infused into it a portion of the native haleness and vigour of its maturity. The poems which have chiefly contributed to make him what he is, are of the days of Dryden at least, eveu where they are most modern; and, not seldom, they touch on the “olden time” of minstrels and troubadours, His muse, being thus but a new trans migration of a former existence, may be allowed to retain the manners, as well as to speak the lan guage and breathe the spirit, by which she was formerly distin guished. And, among other cha racteristic habits that mark her antiquity, she may be permitted to select themes for her song from the public, events, passing before her eyes;-to paint living scenes and celebrate contemporary heroism;a custom, frequent with our earlier bards, but which seems to have been frowned out of fashion by the discountenance of Pope. There is, indeed, no contemporary subject which a poet may undertake with so little hazard of debasing the dignity of song by moderu, and familiar associations, as a dreadful battle. The very idea of mighty and mortal encounter transports the fancy to other times. The extraordinary picture of material and mental sublimity which such an occasion may be conceived to exhibit,-the roar and tumult,the wild sky and blood-stained ground, the frightful forms of danger, and agony, and despair, and death,-the infinitely various and inexpressibly powerful attitudes of passion, the moral omnipotence of courage, and endu rance, and enterprize, the serene conflict of intellects in the very throat of sulphurous war,"-the tremendous revolutions of fortune, the desolating rage of man, and the predominant awfulness of mortality,-all these circumstances, united, make a compound of such - - |