I have committed a great injustice to the Reviewer, who advanced his nine literary divines of the Scotch synod, and one poet, against the host of accomplished scholars and theologians in the English Church. I might well fear his huger

baton," for I have not only, hapless bard, come forward with my " small baton" in opposition to such knock-down authority, but, being animated by the subject, have overshot my mark by extending, inadvertently, the comparison into the present century.

Therefore, from my list I must take off five of the number specified, for I hope there will be no objection to those who wrote in the latter half of the last century, though still living; but the number produced by the Critic will be still greatly exceeded by one episcopal chapter in England in the prescribed period; and Benson, and Hoadly, and Sherlock, and Douglas, and Burgess, and Stebbing, and Daubeny, and Coxe, and Dodwell, and Gilpin, and Ridley, and Holmes, and John Clarke, and Blayney, Hebraist, and Archibald Allison, may compete, in high intellectual endowments, and in Christian spirit, with any champions of the faith throughout all Christendom.

Proudly do we acknowledge that the present race of the exemplary and excellent clergy in Scotland are, in their lives and writings, in learning and in charity, of a far different race from the "Scotch Rutherfords!" If we have our Bulteels and Tiptafts, they have their Irvings and his inspired prophetesses!- but all these sink to nothing in comparison with the principles proclaimed in a late Plan of Reform ! The question is this

Have they who bequeathed their property for purposes of public benefit a right to bequeath their property upon their own conditions? or has the public, benefited by such endowments, a paramount right at all times, regardless of the will, intent, title-deeds, or charters of the founders, to take possession of the property bequeathed, and make a new distribution and disposition of such devised lands and hereditaments-not (remark!) on account of any alleged abuses or wilful neglect, but from the sole plea of conducting such establishments more cheaply, and applying the funds to other purposes ?

He who fearlessly, and loudly, and publicly, proclaims these principles, calls on the august and sworn Defender of the Faith-calls on the Peers and Commons in Parliament assembled to second him. Turning the ear of picus abhorrence, like the " solemn league-and-covenant men," from “ungodly and unprofitable pipings upon organs"-at least shuddering at profane "duets and anthems" chaunted by urchins in idolatrous surplices, and shivering at the " pompous cеremonials" of a cathedral and a verger with a wand, he issues forth from the synod at Exeter Hall, like another "knight of the woeful countenance," in front of all our cathedrals, like so many windmills, and proclaims, rising on his hectic Rosinante" Reform the Church! Reform the cathedrals! Banish duets and anthems! Think of what the cathedrals cost! Take away their estates and land, held from the time of their foundation!

If

Put the proceeds into a bag! there are six canons residentiary, turn out four! Keep a dean, with a 'more godly name,' with two ministers, a latere!"

These principles appear to me equally absurd, illiberal, and unjust, as well as a most ungrateful return for the national benefit conferred by these establishments-conducted as they have been since the Reformation, and producing, even by Lord Henley's confession, such defenders, from age to age, of the assailed ark of our common Christianity.

I look at the august and beautiful piles, the sustaining buttresses, the battlements, and the spires, which have stood calm in the sunshine or the storm of so many centuries-and, not valuing so much as a bit of gravel in the walk that leads

to them, my own interest, pray to God for their inviolability, and that as their services have been of incalculable benefit to a Christian nation, the property that upheld them may not be diverted, without some delinquency proved against the present possessors, that from their hallowed arena, in other ages, other defenders of the faith may issue, as learned and pious as those who have gone before!

A certain Charles Tennyson, Member for Lambeth, tells his reflecting constituents, that "the whole property of the Church, which NOW BELONGED to useless DRONES, should be distributed among the WORKING PASTORS!"

Listen to his erudite and candid coadjutor, Mr. Hawes, a soap-boiler, who was of opinion-aye, marry was he-" that the DRONES and LOCUSTS" (such drones and locusts as Tillotson, Secker, &c.) " should be swept away, and that their gains should be distributed among the ministers of religion who WORKED!"

FINIS.

MR. BRITTON'S CATHEDRAL ANTIQUITIES.

On looking over the catalogue of those who hold the more eminent places in the Church Establishment, we shall, doubtless, find many who might seem from eminence in education, piety, or learning, to deserve that station; and many whom we should rejoice to see so placed, feeling regret that no hand has been put forth to raise them from their quiet village duties, and the "noiseless tenor of their way."

On this subject I would "suggest" humbly another reflection to your Lordship, which is, that if, abstractedly, the cathedral service might be thought somewhat removed from entire simplicity of worship, yet the venerable pile, the long pillared aisles, the lofty range of windows, the intercepted light, the solemn shrines, the monuments of the illustrious dead on every side, harmonize, most impressively, with the solemn sounds of devotional music, and these again with the plain, not pompous, dresses of those who take a part in these services, from the canon to the quoristers.

Let a person of common feelings look at the beautiful engravings which, under the auspices of Mr. Britton, have been published, and which set before us the effect of these hallowed buildings, devoted, for so many years, to national sacred worship.

The Author takes this opportunity, the first he has had, to express his sincere regret that, in his Life of Bishop Ken, he introduced a note, which might be thought disrespectful to this ill-rewarded but able illustrator of our Cathedral Antiquities.

The Knowledge of Tongues by Drs. Pocock, BLANEY, and GLOSTER RIDLEY, Hebraists, and Arabic and Syriac Scholars, of the Cathedral of Salisbury, compared with the learned and Rev. Mr. IRVING and his Prophetical Ladies.

WHEN, besides the knowledge of the Latin, and that language in which the gospel was written, common to all, more or less, of the clergy, we add, in this one cathedral chapter, the examples of those versed in the Hebrew and Syriac language, we well know how little we can can compete with one Scotch clergyman-the Rev. Mr. Irving.

We know that Montanus, the enthusiast of old, and the first methodist, had also his inspired ladies-Maximilla and Priscilla; and, therefore, though we have those versed in the Syriac and Hebrew languages, we feel how inferior, in this respect, the most finished scholar, according to human means, must be, compared with Mr. Irving and his ladies.

Besides they have advantage over the Apostles themselves, for the Apostles, not so deeply inspired, spoke known, not "unknown" tongues-tongues which were understood on the day of Pentecost by all the strangers who heard them, whether Cretes or Arabians!

Now who has ever heard of any Chinese, Caffres, or Esquimaux being the better or wiser for the language of this Pro