steadiness to overcome, the danger. For a weak and indecisive mind, a history of rival sects is likely to be an injurious book; since, without aiding the judgment, it weakens the faith, presenting a sort of patterncard of religions, each vying with the other, and from all which a choice is to be made. To the skeptic, it furnishes an argument of which he is glad to avail himself, in order to discountenapee what be cannot refute; and to men of the world, in general, it affords a sort of excuse for their supineness in not searching into the things which belong to their eternal peace. It is consoling, however, to remember, amidst all the jarrings of the ologians, that if any man will do the will of God, he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God;" whereas, without humility and faith, the intellect of an archangel would be of no avail.

These reflections ought, perhaps, in due critical regularity, to have followed, rather than preceded, our remarks upon the present volumes: but, to say the truth, we were really anxious, both for our own sake and that of our readers, to approach the subject with those practical feelings which it ought to inspire, rather than under the influence of merely literary or religious curiosity.

The author of the work before us, the well-known Abbe Gregoire, has been distinguished for many years as the zealous and persevering friend of the African race. In the political life of this gentleman, there are some passages which it would be impossible to justify, and which, on the contrary, we should feel ourselves unreservedly compelled to condemn. But the constancy with which he has adhered to the cause of the oppressed Africans, though deserted by his early associates, assailed by the unceasing obloquy and merciless hostility of the WestIndia party in France, and discouraged by the frowns of the Consular, Imperial, and Royal govern

ments, which succeeded each other; and the intrepidity with which he stood up, in an assembly of ferocious atheists, on the behalf of outraged Christianity, entitle him to no small share of honour, and we willingly embrace the opportunity of recording his claims. As a writer, for M. Gregoire has published various works, he deserves praise principally for the philanthropy which breathes through them. He is a rash, superficial, and inconclusive reasoner. His materials are,

for the most part, crude and undigested. His facts often are assumed on very inadequate authority, and prove, therefore, exceedingly incorrect; and the general texture of his productions is loose and flimsy. He is a stanch Roman Catholic, but an avowed and determined enemy to all persecution. So far does he carry this laudable feeling, that he obstinately persists in branding the disabilities of the Irish Catholics as cruel persecution; just as some zealous Protestants among ourselves choose, notwithstanding the clearest evidence to the contrary, to dignify with the same name the party feuds, and the atrocities consequent upon them, which bave of late disgraced Nismes and its vicinity. M. Gregoire is even so unreasonably vehement on this subject, as to place the Catholics of Ireland on the same level, as to oppression and civil degradation, with the negro slaves in the West-Indies.

Such is our author, who, in the work before us, exhibits nearly the same characters, both of mind and style, which we have ventured to attribute to his former productions. He states his object to be, a review of the eccentricities of the human mind, in matters connected with religion, from the commencement of the last century to the present time. He has, therefore, in the prosecution of his plan, passed over, in a cursory manner, the sects which arose at periods antecedent to the eighteenth cen

tury, in order to display, with more minuteness, those which come most immediately within his province. The number of religious denominations which he has thought fit to notice, is about seventy; all of which he includes in three classes. 1. Those which have no separate assemblies for religious worship; 2. Those which have, but, nevertheless, continue in the communion of the parent sect; 3. Those which have a particular and separate mode of worship, entirely disconnected with any other denomination.

We need scarcely remark, that this division is quite arbitrary, and by no means calculated for a lucid display of the varieties of religious persuasions; but, even imperfect as it is, it is not adhered to in the body of the work, so that every sect is suffered to occupy, at random, the spot on which it chances to fall. In fact, the whole arrangement, if arrangement it can be called, is illogical and unsatisfactory the author plunges at once in medias res, beginning his work with the Glassites, the Methodists, &c. and proceeding to the conclusion, without any visible method, through a variety of insulated sects, the species of which he describes without informing us of the genera to which they belong.

The Abbe Gregoire certainly evinces considerable research respecting religious sects; but he is frequently betrayed into the puerile fault of making sects of what are no sects, and which, therefore, ought to have had no place in the present collection. Who, for example, would have thought of placing among religious sects Les Mammillaires, or even the Freemasons? Respecting the latter of these, he, however, informs us, that "England seems to be the only place where this institution partakes of a religious character!" In looking over the pages before us, we often find mere slang or cant names gravely taken up as real

appellations; and the reveries of individual madmen, and fanatics of every species, detailed as legitimate characteristics of a religious sect. Many of the denominations described have never had any existence as sects, and, in general, the forgotten filth and lumber of ages are heaped together, as in every work of this kind is more or less necessary and unavoidable, in order to point out the multiplied aberrations of the human mind. Our author has certainly not been sparing in detailing absurdities; and, in fact, the more absurdities he could collect, the better would his purpose be answered; since one principal moral, intended to be enforced throughout the work, is the necessity of a Catholic infallible church, which church he, of course, assumes to be the Church of Rome. His constant complaint against Protestants is, that "their rule of faith is the Bible, which each person interprets at his pleasure;" thus inferring, that if all men had been members of the Romish Church, the whole mischief of sects would have been avoided; a proposition, either untrue, or true only in the same manner as if he bad said, that would men but consent to forego the advantages of culinary fire, we should not so often hear of houses being consumed. He might, however, have recollected, with a view to soften the asperity of his remarks against Protestantism, that some of the most ridiculous and fanatical sects, which he himself has recorded, have been nourished in the bosom of the Romish Church, to which they exclusively belong. We do not wish to taint our pages with examples and illustrations: but if our author will but turn to his own volumes; for instance, to the "Society of Victims,” of which he professes to have given "a very exact description;" he will see specimens of such eccentricities and blasphemies as could scarcely have arisen elsewhere than in the mys. ticism of Romish theology.

To follow the Abbe through the various chapters of his work is neither practicable nor necessary: we shall therefore chiefly confine ourselves to a few cursory remarks on some of the most prominently exceptionable parts.

The second, and longest, article in the first volume is devoted to a review of the society of Methodists. After stating the origin of the sect, he proceeds to the following definition: "The Methodists are distinguished from Infidels and Jews, by their admission of the Divine inspiration both of the New and the Old Testament; from Catholics, by their adopting no rule of faith but the Bible; from the Socinians, by their recognising the Divinity of Jesus Christ." Nothing, surely, can be more incomplete than such definitions or distinctions. He might quite as correctly have defined a horse as an animal differing from an elephant, in baving no trunk; from an ostrich, in having no feathers; from a dog, in having a mane and hoofs, &c.

For the distinction to have possessed any logical propriety, Jews, Infidels, Roman Catholics, and Socinians, ought to have comprised all the possibilities of religions in the world; and the differences ought to have been specific, which they are not, since many other sects possess all those marks which he applies, as if exclusively, to the Methodists. Churchmen, Indėpendents, Baptists, &c. &c. are as much included in his description as the followers of Mr. Whitfield or Mr. Wesley. This fault is discoverable in other parts of the work. Thus, in speaking of a sect called "Tunkers," he observes, that "they deny, in common with the General Baptists, the eternity of future punishments, and the imputation of Adam's sin to his posterity." Our author ought to have known, that many of the General Baptists do not adopt these opinions; and that many persons, CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 184.

on the other hand, adopt them who are not Baptists at all.

The general remarks upon the history, the doctrines, and the discipline of the Methodists, in the former part of the present chapter, are doubtless intended to be im

partial; but they are extremely loose and inaccurate, as well as meagre, and possess no claim either to novelty or research. Indeed, there is on this, as on all other occasions, too great a tendency in our author to retail not merely a second-rate sort of information, but anonymous, or even hostile, authority. Many of the writers whom he quotes have been utterly discredited in England; and in general he seems to derive his materials, and even bis remarks, even when they are correct, from little popular abridgments, instead of consulting the original and authoritative writers of each denomination. Our readers will smile to find him gravely referring, in matters of theology, to the Monthly, Critical, and Edinburgh Reviews, the Lives of Public Characters, Le Docteur Evans's Sketch, &c.; nay, even to Lackington's Confessions, from which he ventures upon what he calls "a curious article," of about twenty pages, though without undertaking to approve of all his ideas, or the burlesque manner of promulging them." It is not a little remarkable, that, while there are several authentic lives of Mr. Wesley, comprising clear and succinct histories of the progress of Methodism, and full details of its doctrines and discipline, (namely, by Hampson, Whitfield, and Coke,) he should have entirely overlooked these genuine authorities, as well as the Journals of Mr. Wesley himself, and have drawn much of his materials, for describing the sect, from the hostile pages of Nightingale, or the ribaldry of Lackington; which Lackington himself indeed, to his honour, afterwards retracted. After such authorities, we cannot much wonder to find him 21

describing the Wesleyan Methodists as inclining to Pelagianism, and Whitfield as undervaluing good works; or classing under the head of Methodists, Messrs. Toplady and Romaine, "the poet Sir Richard Hill," and his brother Rowland, of whom he proceeds, with profound gravity, to remark-" On assure que dans ses sermons il intercale des histoires facétieuses, de ces traits que n'a pas dictes le bons sens, et que les Anglais appellent exentriques: mais sa charité, sans bornes pour les malheureux, fait pardonner la bizzarrerie de son éloquence." Vol. i. p. 11.

re

He soon after stumbles upon the Bishop of Lincoln, of whom he remarks; (after mentioning various other persons' mistatements specting the Methodists ;) "Prettyman, Bishop of Lincoln, is equally unjust in describing the Methodists as fanatics who, amidst their aspirations after extraordinary sanctity, are all the while licentious in their moral conduct. L'opinion pub lique a fait justice de cette calomnie." Vol. i. p. 32.

So imperfectly informed is our author on the whole of this subject, on which he has undertaken to illuminate the people of France, that he has confounded the correct and accredited sense of the word Methodist with that vague and unmeaning use of it which has been sometimes employed, by party violence, to discountenance and vilify true religion, under whatever appearance it may be found. If a proof were needed of this remark, we need go no farther, in order to show our author's ignorance, than simply to state, that he has actually ventured to represent (vol. i. p. 32.) the revered author of the “" Practical View of Christianity" as "one of the disciples of Methodism." Surely, before he thought himself competent to write on the state of religion in England, he ought to have known, that the distinguished senator to whom he alludes, and to whose character he is not otherwise

deficient in doing justice, is amongst the brightest and most consistent advocates of the Established Church of these realms. In reply to the remark, that "his example has not made many converts to Methodism, of men in office, or men of letters," we can only say, that it would have been strange, indeed, if the example and writings of a zealous and conscientious churchman should have conduced to such a purpose. But if, as we suspect, the remark is to assume a wider latitude, we can very confidently inform our author, in return, that his conjecture is quite incorrect, and that no one single volume has done so much towards the revival of genuine and rational devotion, amongst the middle and higher classes of the English community, as that to which he affects to attach so little importance.

In proceeding with the various remaining articles, in the history before us, which have any reference to this country, we have detected palpable errors in almost every instance, as well as many trivial or improbable circumstances, wholly unbecoming a bishop's pen to record. We are ready to allow that, in a work like the present, `errors and misconceptions were, to a certain degree, almost unavoidable. At the same time, our author, in most cases, has so strangely neglected the proper sources of correct information, and followed such incompetent or fallacious guides, that, as a view of Protestant sects, his work is worse than useless: it cannot fail to mislead the reader. Our limits render it impossible to produce many particulars of evidence in support of this statement. Our readers must, therefore, be content with a few incidental remarks, till we arrive at the important chapter on Protestantism, which will deserve a somewhat longer notice.

The assertion (vol. i. p. 60.) respecting the intolerance of the English Church, is not worth refu

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tation. We certainly never expected to hear it coolly asserted, in an historical volume, that "in no country of Europe is persecution more legally established than in the British Isles." We are by no means insensible to the sufferings of the Irish Catholics in times that are past but it is the very extravagance of party feeling to speak of them as still suffering martyrdom" for their attachment to the Catholic faith. The great mass of the Irish Catholics stand on the same footing with their Protestant brethren, as to the common civil and political rights; and all they have now to complain of is, their exclusion from seats in Parliament, and from a few of the highest offices, civil, naval, and military. It is impossible for any sect to enjoy, in a more unrestricted manner, the exercise of their religion than it is enjoyed by the Catholics of Ireland: the toleration is plenary.

To proceed: our author's animadversions on the sect of Universalists, are in general orthodox, and his arguments for the eternal duration of future punishments scriptural and correct; but having proved the impropriety of using the word d'vos in two different senses, according as it is applied to recompense or suffering, he cannot refrain from the following antiProtestant illustration.

"Here we may very justly apply the same mode of reasoning by which we

refute those who deny the real presence. Let us suppose for a moment, says the Catholic, that I were a Calvinist: with you I declare that these words of our Saviour, This is my body, this is my blood, mean only this is the symbol. But if instead of the symbol, Jesus Christ had wished to have declared the real presence, could he have explained his meaning in other or clearer terms? In the same manner we say to the Universalist, if by the word avios, eternal, the Almighty wished to indicate infinite duration, could he have employed language more decisive?" Vol. i. p. 72.

Who does not immediately per

ceive the fallacy of this comparison? In the one case, an expression is used, which may be either literal or metaphorical. The literal sensé introduces various absurdities and impossibilities, while the metaphorical is natural, easy, instructive, and consistent with the analogy of Scripture and the faith. We, therefore, adopt the latter. In the other case, the same word is construed, in the same sentence and under the same collocation, in two different and incompatible significations; a mode of writing the most improbable and incorrect. What analogy, then, can there possibly be in the two cases? In order for the parallel to have been any way applicable, our author ought to have shown that the Protestants fell into the same error as the Universalists, by using the same word in two different meanings. But this is not the fact: we do not, for example, say, that this is my body is to be understood literally, and this is my blood figuratively; but having affixed a certain sense to the one, we apply it also to the other. Had the Universalists made the bliss of the Christian only agelasting, as well as the punishment of the sinner, their argument, though incorrect and unscriptural, would not have been open to the charge of verbal and grammatical inconsistency. There is, then, no just reason for our author's farfetched comparison; and we regret that, with all his professed liberality, a virtue in which he is not always deficient, he should in this instance have thought it necessary to go out of his way for the sake of a side-blow at the Protestant faith. It is not, of course, necessary, on the present occasion, to proceed to a refutation of the doctrine of transubstantiation; but we may just remark, in passing, by way of argumentum ad hominem, that if the terms this is my body, &c. must necessarily be used in a literal sense, the Roman Catholics are as heterodox as ourselves, in