an infinitely wise, just and benevolent Creator. This axiom, Calvinism, if admitted, proves to be false.

The first and great commandment is, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart" this commandment Calvinism sets aside by rendering the observance of it impracticable. On the other hand, the command refutes the doctrine.

Calvinists with other Christians admit, on the evidence of scripture, that God is infinitely good; but Calvinism reduces this infinite goodness to mere theory which fact most woefully contradicts. And, strange to tell, the causes which prevent the exercise of this attribute are found in the Divine Nature itself!

Scripture assures us in various ways that mercy is what God delights to exercise; but Calvinism sets up in its stead an infinite indignation at a supposed infinite evil, which reigns in the divine dispensations, triumphs over wisdom, equity and goodness, and which nothing can satisfy but the eternal sufferings of myriads of creatures, whose grand crime (as they were born with a nature radically corrupt) has been, that they were destined to exist!!!

And now, Sir, as it is not proba

bly that I shall trouble you again on this subject, I should like to take my leave of it with saying a word on the tone in which my observations have been written. Conceiving Calvinism to be a most gross corruption of the best gift of God to man, I have exhibited its inconsistencies and its horrors as they have struck my own mind with unrestrained freedom, but without even an evanescent feeling of ill-will towards those from whom I differ thus widely. Strong as is my conviction of the absurdity and impiety of the system itself, I shall ever lose sight of the theoretical Calvinist when found in the person of the practical Christian.

furnish him with a confession of my faith. But as my life has been de voted to the instruction of young peo ple, I must not withhold the desired information on the present occasion. My religious opinions will be found detailed in my Twentieth Anniversary Sermon, preached at Worship Street, November, 1811. And should the inquirer wish to see the Middle Scheme perspicuously stated and ably defended, he is referred to Dr. Richard Price's Sermons on the Christian Doetrine; the attentive perusal of which may afford Young Scholars (if not too confident and opinionative) considerable improvement. As to my rever ed friend, the late Rev. Hugh Worthington, it is passing strange that any one individual of Salters' Hall congregation can have any doubt of his disbelief of the Trinity, since he is known to have delivered from the pulpit this memorable declaration- ! "I must first lose my understanding and likewise my sight before I can believe my Saviour equal to my God!" I am, Sir, Yours respectfully,

J. EVANS.

SIR, the suffering, persecuted HE promotion of a subscription

Protestants of France is truly honourable to the Dissenting Ministers of London. Besides relieving distress, it will hold out to the French an assurance of our hailing peace, in the spirit of peace. It will shew the government of that unhappy people that there is a tribunal to which even generalissimos, prime-ministers and kings are subject, the tribunal of public opinion, before which persecutors, oppressors and destroyers stand condemned.

Oliver Cromwell set on foot a general collection, in 1655, for the sufferers for conscience' sake in the valleys of Piedmont, heading the subscriptions with a donation of 20001. This might not be princely, but it was Christian, and the example was not without effect, the collections amounting to about 40,000l. Amongst the distributors of this bounty were mist divines.

Caryl and other nonconfor

AN OLIVERIAN.

Miscellaneous Notes intended to explain the Christian Eucharist.

THE

(See p. 571.)

HE commemorative acts, which were performed by Jesus Christ and his associated disciples and friends in the primitive rite of the Lord's Supper, seem very clearly and strongly, if not demonstratively, to forbid the belief that the sufferings, crucifixion and death of Christ were specially commemorated on that occasion; or indeed that they were ever intended to be made the special objects of commemoration in any subsequent observance of that rite. For suppose (what is far from being improbable), that Jesus Christ was a communicant at that time, and that he communicated in common, or on a footing perfectly level with his disciples, will it not necessarily follow, that the object or objects then commemorated, was or were precisely the same both to our blessed Lord and to all the associated guests? Now if the object commemorated at that time, both by Jesus and his apostles and friends was precisely the same; and if that object, according to common estimation, was the blood (i. e. the sufferings and death) of Jesus Christ, must we not infer-That, as the disciples drank some part of the Eucharistic cup, or wine, (expressly called the blood of Christ), so Jesus himself also drank some part of the same cup, or wine (i. e. his own blood) to commemorate his own death, even before his decease had actually taken place? It will perhaps be said that as the blood of Christ is men*tioned twice in this statement, it may be supposed to denote both the resemblance of Christ's blood, and also his real or true blood. But, allowing the propriety of this deduction from the present statement, doth it equally result from the words of Christ's institution, in which the term blood is mentioned but once? In expounding, or rather in administering the Lord's Supper, according to its prevalent signification, are not the expositors perpetually obliged to shift their ideas and consider this self-same, single term blood in a two-fold sense? That is to say (1) as the resemblance

of Christ's blood, meaning the Eucharistic wine; and (2ndly) as Christ's real blood, denoting his sufferings and death, or the commemorated object of the Eucharistic rite? What then can possibly be more arbitrary or more unscriptural, and consequently more injurious, than the insertion of the word resemblance in the expositions or administrations of the Lord's Supper; and employing it with manifest ambiguity? Even in imagination alone, can any one possibly believe, that the very same word, in one and the same place, hath more than one plain single meaning?

Considering the time and circumstances of the Eucharistic institution, and its immediate and intimate connexion with the Jewish passover ;would it not be far more rational and correct to ascertain the true intention and use of the Eucharistic body and blood (i. e. of the Eucharistic bread and wine) by retrospective, than by prospective means and principles ? In other words, may not the adoption, the use, and the true meaning of the Eucharistic bread and wine be more commodiously and satisfactory illustrated and justified, by simply deducing them from the ancient passover, than by any arbitrary or conjectural applications of them to the sufferings and death of Jesus Christ, which are neither warranted by the Eucharistic records nor by any other scriptures of the New Testament. Let this be exemplified only in one of our Christian symbols: at the end of the last Jewish passover, which Jesus ever attended, he transferred from the remains of that rite some wine, or a cup of wine, and called it his blood.

Doth this appear wonderful to us? Or was there really any thing mysterious in the action or expression? When Christ had appropriated the wine to the formation of his own new rite, might he not justly call it his wine, in opposition to that which had been previously used in the paschal rite? And as to the figurative term blood, which was given to that wine, may it not be fairly justified by considering that it was now substituted, as a commemo

fond; and they are generally supposed to have laid an inordinate stress on the meritorious virtue of their sacrificed animal victims; thinking them to be peculiarly acceptable to the God whom they worshiped, and to be sufficiently efficacious to compensate even for their immoral as well as for their ceremonial transgressions. Is it then any matter of wonder to find the mixed members of the infant church in Corinth entertaining some such persuasion? And under its influence, with their having heard that Jesus had sacrificed himself for the benefit of his followers, would they not be naturally and strongly induced to consult the founder of their society to ascertain whether, in their Christian worship, they were bound to respect the death of Christ as having (like their ancient sacrifices,) any sacrifical or fœderal influence and efficacy for gaining the future and final favour and acceptance of Almighty God? From a regard both to his own recent prejudices and engagements, and to those of the Corinthian converts, we should expect to find the apostle's reply to be exactly such as we now find it; that is to say, peculiarly cautious, mild and tender;—not enjoining on his correspondents any precise or specific duty, but simply informing them what would and ought to be the certain effects of their eucharistic devotions or Christian worship.

Commemorating and shewing the Lord's death, are doubtless two different acts or things; for such was evidently the apostle's distinction. The former (which was probably the notion entertained by the Corinthian worshipers,) seems to imply an estimate and recollection of the certainty and expiatory virtue, efficacy and benefits of Christ's death during its access, and home to its actual accomplishment. The latter, on the other hand, might only denote a declaration of the early result or issue of that death, together with its appointed, necessary and beneficial tendency to (what it actually and soon attained, namely) a resurrection from the dead. And hence St. Paul, without enjoining the stated commemoration of the

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death of Christ, seems to have been fully warranted in the implied distinction he made between " commemorating" and shewing the Lord's death;" and also in the ground and reason of the instruction, on this point, which he gave to his Corinthian correspondents:-" As oft as ye eat this bread and drink this cup ye do shew the Lord's death;” (i. e.) your eucharistic and devotional acts, or your Christian worship, plainly shew and declare the actual result and beneficial tendency of your Lord's death." This, it is presumed, is the true and accurate meaning of this apostolic reflection on the eucharistic rite; being fairly justified by the circumstances in which it was penned, and also by the true sense of the original words in which it was expressed : for Αχρις οὗ αν έλθη, connected, as it ought to be, with its subject, ávalos, and not Kucing, should have been rendered into the following English terms: "The Lord's death ye shew" [not" till he (Jesus Christ) come," but] " to what it went or tended." If the elliptic phrase, "Axpis av ou, be supplied and completed, as Mr. Wakefield did to the writer of this critique, it would assume this form, Αχρις ἂν προς οὐ HOT EX0, and might then be translated, in its reference to or connexion "to what issue, with 'O Javalos, object or termination it went or did go." For the verb EX, being the second Aorist, may be rendered by the preterimperfect tense as well as by the future. This 26th verse, which is subjoined to the apostle Paul's eucharistic record, is often cited to prove the perpetuity; but relative to the Corinthian Christians, this application of the words would have been quite irrelevant or incongruous; for the Corinthian worshipers were censured for the intemperate and indecent use of our Lord's rite, but not for its omission or infrequent observance. And the period prescribed for its duration is expressed in a term so extremely indefinite and ambiguous, that the most learned and pious divines are at a loss to ascertain its true extent and meaning.

P. K.