now propagated among candidates for the ministry, and throughout the country, by the Tracts for the Times,' now in course of publication at Oxford. The increased exertion, in circulating the opinions maintained in these Tracts, has arisen at a period when earth and hell seem to be leagued together for the destruction of that Church, which has been, and is, the main pillar of the Reformed religion. Popery, to which the dogma of Baptismal regeneration, in the character which it has assumed, is too nearly allied, is bringing into renewed action all its artifices and energies for the overthrow of "the faith once delivered to the saints," as it was recovered and restored at the time of the blessed Reformation. The sentiments imbibed by those who are annually going forth from our Universities, to become the accredited Ministers of our venerated Church, are inseparably and awfully connected with its safety as an establishment; and also with the spiritual and eternal welfare of their hearers throughout the length and breadth of our beloved country.

The following pamphlet has been now remodelled in its form, and curtailed in its length, with a hope of increasing its circulation. To the first publication an appendix was subjoined, containing numerous extracts from the body of Protestant Confessions of faith; from the writings of our eminent Martyrs and Reformers, and other

Divines who flourished about the time of the Reformation. To these were added quotations from nearly thirty Archbishops and Bishops of our church, from Jewel to Horsley; and from twenty-three other Divines who had not attained to the episcopal rank. This appendix contained also extracts from forty-seven of the tracts, which have been published by "the Society for promoting Christian Knowledge."

All these extracts, some of which were extensive, appeared to contravene the doctrine that "the inward and spiritual grace," represented in baptism, is connected, exclusively and inclusively, with the outward and visible form of the baptismal ordinance. A few of them have been incorporated in the following pages.

The Author is convinced, that, were the doctrines of the Articles, Homilies, and Liturgy of our Church, clearly, fully, and affectionately enforced from all her pulpits, she might look with pity, unmixed with fear, on the efforts which are making for her destruction by the combined forces of confederated foes; and his hope of her deliverance from the perils, which surround her on every side, rests on the widely increased promulgation of those doctrines which her creed contains, and the effects of those doctrines as revived during the past century. These, blessed be God, are still diffusing their animating influence more extensively through her ten thousand pulpits. He admires and cherishes

her external form; but his hope of her preservation is built, under God, on the growing vitality of her ministrations and worship. Let the true spirit of the gospel be found in these, and she may adopt the encouraging words of Athanasius, uttered at a time of similar difficulty, danger, and distress, Hæc nubecula cito præteribit. The Author entertains a strong persuasion that the Church in which he was educated, and in which he has ministered for more than half a century, will come out of the furnace of present affliction, like gold seven times purified in the fire.

To one who has attained the seventy-fourth year of his age, and has been just restored from an illness, which had placed him on the very verge of an eternal world, the censure or praise of man must be supposed to be of very little consequence. To himself to that adorable Being, to whom approve all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid,' and before whom he is shortly to appear; and to promote, so far as his means of doing it extend, the spiritual benefit of his fellow-sinners, has been, he hopes, the single motive which has influenced him in the republication of the following pages, for which a period of confinement from parochial duties has furnished the needful leisure. If it should prove the means of exciting a spirit of prayerful investigation on the momentous subject to which it relates-the surest

moments.

way of attaining to a safe decision-his time will not have been misemployed. If proof should be given that he has been in error, and if that error should be demonstrated to him before his now approaching dismission from the church militant here on earth, the discovery will be a subject for deep humiliation and pungent sorrow in his dying But he believes, after long and deep consideration, that the view which he has taken is correct, and that the opinions which he opposes are not only erroneous in themselves, but possess also a dangerous tendency-a tendency, hostile to the true interests of the national Church in this alarming crisis of her history. That nothing presumptuously dogmatical, and nothing savouring, in the least degree, of an unkind or uncharitable spirit, might be found to deface the following pages, with respect to his brethren from whom he is obliged by the dictates of conscience to differ, and to whom he gives full credit for sincerity in the course which they pursue, has been his earnest and constant aim while engaged in the discussion which he presents to public notice.