THE CHURCH MISSIONARY SOCIETY.

NONE of our readers can be ignorant that there exists at present a Society under this name, one avowed object of which is the dissemination of the doctrines and principles of the Church of England amongst the heathen. For this purpose clergymen are appointed and fitted out to labour in the uncultivated places of the spiritual vineyard, and to give periodical reports of their several successes. Of the excellence of such a principle no doubt can be entertained by any member of the Church; and the fitness and necessity of such an institution long ago commended itself to the sense of the Church, when the celebrated Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts was constituted. But since the constitution of this Society, and its universal support on the part of all that is authoritative in the Church, it must appear extraordinary that another Society, professing exactly the same objects, should arise. The Bible Society has asserted its distinction from the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, by professing to advocate a more Catholic principle, and to combine in one irresistible phalanx the whole host of Christian believers; but the Church Missionary Society does no such thing; it professes to teach the doctrines of the Church through the agency of the ministers of the Church; its objects, as avowed by its officers, are neither preparatory, nor collateral, nor auxiliary to those of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel; but they are in strictness IDENTICAL with them.

We mean not here to impeach the sincerity of those who avow these objects and these motives; but we cannot lend our approbation to their judgment. The course which they have taken is most extraordinary when compared with their profession. They seem to have quite forgotten the oft-told tale of the bundle of sticks. Did the numbers of the Church Missionary Society accede to the lists of the old and authorised Society, their aid would be powerful and effective. But acting by themselves, they weaken the hands of that Society by subtracting from its contributors, while they decline that strength which they might otherwise possess from the influence and authority which marshals the operations of the old Society.

That this is not only the necessary tendency of such an institution, but that these have been its actual consequences, facts will demonstrate. The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel is very inadequately supported, as its own reports evince;-reports, which, however calumniated by men unfavourable to all religion, are yet sanctioned by such authority as permits not any honourable man to call their financial correctness in question. Now it is but fair to presume that all such persons as were willing to contribute money to the objects of that Society, would have contributed it to the Society itself, had no other channel existed; and, therefore, it might have been expected that all the money which the Church Missionary Society has collected since its establishment, would have passed through the hands of the original Society: inasmuch as it is impossible to conceive that those whose

objects were the spiritual interests of the Church, would have placed less confidence in the high official names, which give their strength to that Society, than the respectable, but far less authoritative, conductors of the other. And that such money must, from the very circumstances, have achieved a greater good than it could have done in the hands of a less powerful and less authorised body, however zealous, must be apparent to all who reflect on the subject, and whose object is the dissemination of the pure Christianity inculcated by the Church of England.

The Church Missionary Society, in proof of the sincerity of their views, often appeal to the scholarships founded by them in Bishop's College, Calcutta, and to the support which they received from the learned, orthodox, and zealous Bishop Heber. But their sincerity is not the point contested; it is the policy of their institution which we impugn. That College, and the Christian world in general, will not be slow to acknowledge the obligation conferred by the Church Missionary Society, in the endowment of those scholarships. Nor will the patronage of the judicious Bishop Heber be any proof of the soundness of their policy. The situation which he held is one of such extraordinary difficulty and delicacy, that it can never be drawn into precedent to justify a similar course of action in positions essentially different. If Bishop Heber could have attained the object nearest his heart, no doubt he would have brought the whole of our Eastern Empire to the doctrine and discipline of the Church of England. But where all could not be obtained, the Bishop did not refuse to obtain a part. The great point was the conversion of the native population to the faith of Christ. On the attainment of this point, the missionaries of various sects were employed: even the Romanists were not inactive. The Bishop, therefore, had the winds and tides of sectarianism to contend with; and while he still kept in view the haven where he would be, he was obliged to make it by oblique approaches; and by using that portion of existing force which would act in the direction he contemplated, causes which he could not suppress he endeavoured to regulate. Nothing could be more essential to the attainment of the point desired, than to throw into the back-ground all the differences which existed among the various sects who strove to gain footing in India. With this view Bishop Heber countenanced all, and encouraged all. Had all preached the doctrines, and promoted the discipline of the Church, no doubt that great man would have been far better satisfied with the fruits of his labours. But though all did not preach the Church, all did preach Christ, and it was better that He should be preached imperfectly, or (in non-essentials) incorrectly, than that this vast peninsula should lie totally in heathen darkness. This the Bishop felt, and with this view he acted. Beside which, any cause which had operated to introduce distrust of Christianity among the natives, even in its least perfect forms, must have had its proportionate action on the labours of the Indian Church. Bishop Heber found the Church Missionary Society at work in India, and he gave them his support, as he supported the sectarians; and the Church Missionary Society enjoyed his patronage on the same principle which the sectarians did, and on no other.

The whole subject, however, assumes an entirely different complexion, when these circumstances are removed. Differences of religious opinion in this country are too notorious to be concealed, while their nature is such as not to bring doubts on the object of difference to any well-informed mind. There is no reason why our Bishops should give their countenance or patronage to any private or schismatical views of Christianity. Believing "the faith once delivered to the saints" to have been faithfully preserved in the bosom of the English Church, they judge harshly of no man, but they wisely and piously bestow their benevolence on those institutions, in which that faith is preserved and communicated. In aiding the religious proficiency of their brethren at home, they avail themselves of the channel of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. They have a society for the same purpose abroad. And why should more than one such society exist? Upon what principle of advantage to religion, or to the Church, can the friends of another society, for exactly the same purposes, take their ground? Surely unity of purpose requires unity of agency, and unity of instruments; any other means must necessarily impair the general strength, for it will look like dissent, and it certainly will be disunion. Bishop Heber, we know, countenanced all sects, not that he held their opinions alike, or indifferent, but because he had to contend with an evil to which all minor ones were incomparable. But no churchman, who does not stand in that peculiar situation, that it is his duty to afford assistance to the preaching of dissenters, can be bound to support the Church Missionary Society, who, though no dissenters from the doctrine and discipline of the Church, yet are so far hostile to the interests of the old incorporated Church Society, that they reduce its numbers and weaken its resources, without substituting an equivalent in permanency and authority with the country.

That the Church Missionary Society is regarded by the Dissenters not as an auxiliary, but an impediment to the interests of the Church of England, may be fairly inferred from the following report of a speech made by the Rev. Charles Simeon, at the meeting of the Cambridge Church Missionary Association. The Report is extracted from the local paper, the Cambridge Chronicle; and there is no reason to suppose it incorrect.

"There was one consideration which the Secretary of the Parent Society had left unnoticed: he alluded to the support which the Society might Now receive from Dissenters. This was CALLED the Church Missionary Society: but there were no Test Acts here. The Test Acts were now repealed, and the co-OPERATION OF DISSENTERS would show that as we were ONE IN FAITH (!!!) so we were also one in heart and in love."

This speech we consider most important. "The support which the Society might now receive from Dissenters!" Why now, or at any other time? So far as the Rev. Gentleman's meaning may be conjectured, because the Test Act is repealed. A most extraordinary sequitur. The Test Act imposed civil disabilities on Dissenters, but never restricted them from contributing to the interests of the Church, from which, we supposed, they were withheld by conscience alone, which would still continue to operate the same effects. Will the repeal of the Test Act produce one dissenting subscriber to the Incorporated

Society, reduced as its finances are? or to the Society for Building Churches, the last shilling of whose funds is exhausted? We are certain it will not. The Dissenters understand their game too well. But the reason of the distinction is plain. This Society is called the Church Missionary Society. This the Dissenters know; they know that, whatever its advocates may intend, it is, in effect, only called so; that its real tendency is to weaken the Church, and with this view they may conscientiously support it, without leave from the Test Act. Surely, however, Mr. Simeon exceeded the sanctions of his brethren, when he argued that they and the Dissenters were ONE IN FAITH. The conscientious Dissenter we respect; but if he be one in faith with us, then is he no Dissenter at all, and the term is a misnomer. If the co-operation of Dissenters would show that they are one in faith with the Church Missionary Society, it would prove either that the Dissenters assume this name without understanding its meaning, or that the Society asserts an appellation to which it is in no respect entitled.

In the provincial and auxiliary branches of this Society, much is said and done, which, however it might please Mr. Simeon, must, we suppose, be unpalatable to a Society thus constituted. We have known an instance where a Dissenter volunteered to move a resolution at one of their subordinate periodical exhibitions, and where a large majority of the Committee were in favour of intrusting it to his care. But we never heard a single instance of interference on the part of the dissenting interest in the affairs of the Incorporated Society; although that Society is not called a CHURCH Missionary Society, and does not so prominently advance the precise character of its tenets. Such facts are strong presumptions that the Dissenters regard the Church Missionary Society as only "called" so, and being essentially, though unintentionally, a very different thing.

We are antiquated enough to be, and bold enough to profess ourselves, FRIENDS OF CONSISTENCY. We cannot bring ourselves to believe so ill of our National Church as to suppose that we may not be consistent in her communion, and yet not infringe "the bond of peace" with the Dissenters; and if we cannot also embrace "the unity of the spirit," that is no fault of ours. Men are allowed to dissent from our doctrines and discipline, and enjoy their own, so far as is consistent with the political rights of all. We may live in perfect Christian harmony with the Dissenters; but that we should advocate their doctrines, and advance the interests of dissent at the expense of the Church, is really too much to expect, even in this liberal age. Either their cause is better than ours, or it is worse. If we think it better, let us give up our own, and join it. If we consider it worse, let us have the consistency" to refuse the evil, and choose the good."

Doubtless unity of object and feeling in a religious cause is a most - commendable thing; and the Scriptures are earnest in the inculcation of it. But when we read this duty in the Scriptures, let us be careful to read the whole duty. If the Dissenters are so very "liberal" as to encourage our missions, when they have missions of their own, let them make one step more, and it will give them the credit of consistency as well as that of liberality; let them return at once into the bosom of the