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go forth-"Let there be light." And Light will come again, leading in its train Charity and Love; and another Sabbath shall yet descend, with its rest, and peace, and holiness, and men shall truly worship God!

PROPOSED TESTIMONIAL TO THE REV. J. H. SMITHSON, On his retirement from the Editorship of the Repository.

To the Editor.

Mr. SMITHSON having completed his work, and ceased to have control over this Magazine, it may not be out of place to refer to the length of time he has so ably conducted it. I, as an old member of the Church, was much disappointed that the late Conference was allowed to separate with nothing more than the record upon its Minutes of a vote of thanks for his past services. I am one of those who think that 25 years spent in uses so eminent and duties so arduous, requiring so large an amount of knowledge, learning, and talent, ought to be rewarded in a more substantial manner. Without further comment, I respectfully suggest for the consideration of the members of the Church at large, the propriety of entering into a subscription, for the purpose of presenting him with some substantial and lasting testimonial for the good work he has so ably performed during the long period referred to.

GEORGE PIXTON.

Since the above was written, a Committee has been forming in this town, and a subscription commenced, notice of which will be forwarded to the secretary of every society; and we trust the appeal will be responded to in a manner commensurate with the services rendered by the late Editor to the Church at large.

All subscriptions will be acknowledged through the medium of the Repository.

Liverpool, December, 1861.

GEORGE PIXTON, Treasurer pro tem.,

1, Duke-street, Edge Hill. JOSEPH SKEAF, Secretary pro tem. Adelphi Shades.

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BROTHERLY LOVE.

THE Lord's church is a brotherhood, the members of which derive their relationship to each other from their common relationship to Him. As a natural brotherhood derives its origin from natural birth, and is held together by the ties of natural affection, so a spiritual brotherhood originates in spiritual love, and is maintained by the bonds of spiritual love. In the Christian church mutual love can be purer, and the bond of brotherhood stronger, than under previous dispensations, for man can now become truly a new creature, formed in the image and likeness of Him who became man, and made His humanity the pattern and the power of a perfect regeneration. On this account the Lord said to His disciples—“ A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another." The commandment was new because the love and the brotherhood were new, as the effects of a new manifestation, higher than any that had preceded it, of the Lord's love for the human race. His love to us is the principle as well as the law of Christian brotherhood. Our love to each other has its origin in, and is to be measured by, the Lord's love to us. And how did He love us? By giving Himself for us. He lived for us and died for us. So must we live and die for the brethren. His love in us will lead us to do both. We live for each other when, like our Lord, we do good to others from love. It is the nature of love to pour itself forth through every channel of usefulness, like the life-stream that gushes warm from the heart, carrying vitality and nourishment to every organ and member of the body. When we act from love, even those actions which have immediate reference to ourselves are not selfish. They are not done with a view to recompense as an end. They do not proceed from self-love, although they may be directed to self-support. To labour that we may live is one thing,—to labour that we may live for ourselves is quite another. The law of self-love is, all for one; that of mutual love is, one for all. Christian love prompts every one to regard himself as a member of the Lord's body, whose unity and harmony it is alike his duty and his interest to promote. This object demands the exercise of meekness, kindness, benevolence, and every other spiritual excellence in which love clothes itself, in its desire to do good and to communicate.

But as the Lord died as well as lived for us, so must we die as well as live for each other. And what is that death which we must diethat life which we must lay down? The Lord died daily in his temp[Enl. Series.-No. 97, vol. ix.]

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tations; His death upon the cross only finished what He had been undergoing during His whole life. We die for the brethren, when we resist evil in ourselves, that we may not do evil to others. Every act of self-denial-of forbearance and forgiveness, is a laying down of our life for our friends. In every such act, we crucify some evil temper, some disposition to retaliate, some desire to gratify our self-love. O that we

may strive constantly to subdue the demon within us that works so industriously, and often so insidiously, to divide, that he may destroy! If our whole duty can be expressed in any one precept, it is in that which says " "Cease to do evil." To do this precept, we must not only cease to be openly wicked, but to be irritable, petulent, self-willed, and self opinioned, much more cease to be overbearing and unforgiving. If, in brief, the members of the Lord's church would live together in unity, they must love, not in word only, but in deed.

DEATH OF THE PRINCE CONSORT.

THE death of Prince Albert-an event which has come upon us so unexpectedly that no suspicion of its near approach existed at the time. we went to press-has produced a feeling of real and deep sorrow in the hearts of the people of this country, and will be mourned over by all classes of Her Majesty's subjects in every part of her dominions. The estimable qualities of the Prince, his highly-gifted mind, his comprehensive views and practical aims, his nearness to the throne, and his beneficial influence on the Court and on the councils of the State, endeared him to the nation, and give poignancy to the grief which his removal has produced. But we require to reflect on the peculiar circumstances in which the Prince was placed, fully to see and appreciate the real excellence of his character. The head of the woman and the subject of the queen, his was a most critical and delicate position, and it required no small share of high intelligence and practical wisdom to act consistently with his twofold character; yet he has the great merit of having uniformly acted in a manner that has secured the confidence and affection of a people proud of their institutions and jealous of their liberty.

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But those qualities in the Prince which endeared him to the people, and now intensify their grief for his loss, deepen our sympathy for the Queen and her family in their sorrowful bereavement. How deeply afflictive and solemnly impressive is the case of the widowed Sovereign! She who occupies the highest throne among the kingdoms of the earth,

has been humbled to the dust by a stroke that falls alike, and with equal severity, on her and on the lowliest handmaid that lives under her sceptred rule. How strikingly does it tell us that no condition of life is exempt from suffering and sorrow, and that our Father in Heaven, who has the same beneficent end for all his children, prepares them for it by the same common discipline! May peace and blessing from on High descend upon the Royal Sufferer, and, while they soothe her troubled spirit, sanctify her deep affliction! But have they not descended? Whence could come that resignation which rose amidst the scene of death superior to the ordinary feelings of such an occasion? Pious resignation is manifested in making the inclination to indulge in the luxury of grief yield to the call of sacred duty. How touchingly beautiful is that exhibition of resignation in the Queen, when, after the first paroxysm of grief had passed, she called her weeping children around her, and exhorted them to be worthy of the father who had been taken from them, and help to support her in discharging the arduous duties of a parent and a sovereign, which she was now left alone to perform!

From none of her subjects will her Majesty receive truer or deeper sympathy than from the members of the New Church, with whom loyalty is not only a national sentiment, but a religious principle. Yet, profoundly believing in an overruling Providence, who does or permits all things, even to the minutest particulars, in the affairs of nations and individuals, for the wisest and most beneficent ends, it is at the same time our duty to bow beneath the stroke that has removed from our head one so honoured and esteemed, and to turn to the Source whence cometh our help, who alone can make the present dispensation, to our experience, one of mercy and goodness.

As the pulpits of our places of worship will make the present sad occasion an opportunity to express sympathy for the Queen, and inculcate resignation to the Divine will, we shall no doubt have some interesting reports of these addresses in our next.

MISCELLANEOUS.

THE MONTH.

The Church of England, like the New Church, and indeed the Papacy itself, is obviously commencing a new era. Our readers are aware that a prosecution has been commenced against one of the authors of the Essays and Reviews; but this work has been almost thrown

into the shade by another, which has just been edited by the Rev. Bristow Wilson, vicar of Great Staughton, Bampton Lecturer for 1851, and author of one of the articles in the Essays. In the Introduction by Mr. Wilson (the work itself being the production of a layman), the reader is not left to infer

ences, but is furnished with very clear statements; while in the work itself it is maintained, that as to his Divinity our Lord was infallible; but as to his Humanity, fallible like other men: and that as such he fell into the popular error of supposing the 110th Psalm to be written by David. (p. 17.) It is further maintained (p. 87) that the Gospels are irreconcilably discordant; and in many cases (p. 114) that the reasoning of the Apostolic Epistles is illogical and inconclusive. As to the Old Testament, it will be necessary for our readers to peruse Mr. Wilson's Introduction, in order to obtain anything like an adequate idea of the extent to which it is discredited; but it seems to us as if he had not left one stone upon another which he has not thrown down. The work itself is entitled "A Brief Examination of Prevalent Opinions on the Inspiration of the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments; by a Lay Member of the Church of England." One object of the work is to enlist the laymembers of the church against the cleri

cal; and it remains to be seen what will be the effect produced. Mr. Wilson clearly challenges the authorities of the church to the combat. He distinctly declares that his own theological school will not suffer themselves to be silenced, that they will retain their offices in the church, and will renew their attacks whenever they please: this they call ministerial liberty.

In the meantime another very remarkable contest is taking place among the orthodox themselves. Our readers have heard of Mr. Mansel's Bampton Lectures they have now found another and most formidable opponent in Pro. fessor Goldwyn Smith, of Oxford. In his work on Rational Religion, recently published, the professor observes-"As Mr. Mansel's case stands at present, I maintain that there is no precept nor example so foully licentious, or so abominably inhuman, that, if it is embodied in a religion professing to be attested by miracles, we can affirm on grounds of morality that it is not from God." (p. 34.) It is remarkable that in these cases it is not doctrine that is the subject of controversy, but the very sources from which doctrine is derived, viz., the Bible itself, as the Word of God, and the true method of interpretation. It remains to be seen whether

the Church of England has really any innate strength to enable it to come out of these controversies purified and better prepared to fulfil its duties as a National Church; but it is a fearful thing for any one to say, as the professor does in p. 10-"I do not wonder that materialists should have received these lectures with approbation, as well as bishops. It is to blank materialism and empiricism that such reasonings inevitably lead. Morality, truth, God, are swept away." This statement is not made in the heat of debate, but calmly and deliberately; and moreover, it is a sign of the times to hear this or any University professor say,-" The only cry in which I am ready to join is a cry for freedom of religious thought, and the entire abolition of all State interference with the conscience of man in matters of religion. I think the time for raising this cry, loudly and resolutely, has arrived, if the faith of the people is to be preserved." (p. 144.)

And

It was with great pain, and not without a shudder, that, after the performance of the imposing ritual at St. Paul's Church, Brighton, on the Second Sunday in Advent, some friends who were present heard the following words from the pulpit, on the subject of the Last Judgment:-" Then shall the wicked be brought up before the tribunal of judgment, to receive their final sentence to eternal punishment; and then shall they say Nay, Lord, but we have been burning for centuries already.' then shall the Judge say unto themThis is but the beginning of that which shall be; for inasmuch as ye have broken my laws, my hatred against you shall endure for ever, and I will take upon you my everlasting revenge. Depart, ye cursed, into everlasting fire."" It is curious to observe how extremes meet; and thus how Mr. Spurgeon, Dr. Cumming, and Mr. Arthur Wagner are quite at one in this sort of theology. Notwithstanding all their efforts, however, we predict that it is not the theology by which "the faith of the people is to be preserved." Oh, that members of the Lord's New Church may be solemnly, nay, awfully, impressed with the momentous duties to which they are called!

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