neither fame for the former, nor spoil for the latter.

Cæsar could not have had the most distant hope of strengthening his party and cause by the invasion of Britain. The conquest of Britain was of no prac. tical use to the invader, in one way or other. It was not needed for the exercise and discipline of his army. Sometimes a general finds it necessary to seek em. ployment for his soldiers for the sole purpose of preserving them from riot and indolence. The preservation of the Roman authority among the warlike tribes of Gaul was sufficient for this purpose.

Cæsar had now a design upon the liberties of his country: his army was small; it was then a matter of great importance to him that it should not be diminished by any secondary enter. prise. The invasion of Britain was sure to cost Cæsar considerable loss in money, provisions, and soldiers: a loss which must have been the more severely felt as he had not the means of easily providing either. On the other hand, the accession of Britain to his province held out no prospective probable good to balance the present certain loss. It could not add to his strength; it could not furnish him with soldiers ; nor supply him with provisions or money.

All this is admitted by the subsequent conduct of Cæsar. When the time arrived in which it became necessary for him to throw off the cloak of patriotism, he abandoned the island, and with drew his troops, without having gained one solitary advantage to Vol. I. Nov. 1, 1831.

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balance the loss which the invasion necessarily cost. Had Cæsar been afraid of leaving an unsubdued nation behind him, while he was to be engaged in destroying the liberties of Rome, this might have helped to account for his invading Britain. But there is not one circumstance in the case that could have left room for the slightest fear. The subsequent conduct of Cæsar indisputably proves this; for he never attempted to make any use of his acquisition, nor to keep it in subjection while he was engaged in the civil wars.

When Cæsar stood on the banks of the Rubicon, and hesitated whether he should pass it, and immediately seize on the government of his country by force, he had a precise and definite object in view; he had before him something sufficiently powerful to move to action: he was then planning a game upon which was staked the empire of the world.

In the invasion of Britain no such motive was presented, nor could possibly exist : nor from the closest attention which can be given to the subject, does there appear to have been any thing satisfactory in the form of motive. And yet Cæsar must have had some motive to induce him to cross the straits of Dover, and land in hostile array on the British soil. Were it possible to ascertain the precise state of his mind at that time, and the views under which he acted, it would probably be a display of very extraordinary mental phenomena. Indeed, it is likely to have been of that kind that is utterly inexplicable to a second party, and perhaps not

On a review of the whole circumstances, there appears something for which ordinary principles do not account. But without attempting to unvail that which now must be forever hid from human eye, we keep ourselves within the limits of fact and certainty: this is sufficient for the present illustration.

First. Cæsar invaded Britain. Second. This brought Britain and the Roman empire into contact and connection with one another.

Third. This connection was the means of introducing the gospel into Britain.

The first of these propositions is an historical fact; the second was the necessary consequence of the former. The fact of the landing of a foreign army, and keeping it for some time in Britain, established a communication between Britain and Rome, and gave the natives an opportunity of being improved by the superior civilization of the Roman people. Subsequently, too, the communication was increased; for it is easy to understand why a government should be anxious to preserve an acquisition when made, although no adequate reason can be given for the first seizure of it once embarked in a cause, the principle of national honor accounts for prosecuting it. And the variety of succeeding emperors enlarged the communication they sent expeditions into Britain that the senate might decree them triumphal honors. Every new expedition cleared the way for the greater

country. The Romans, although now wicked and profligate, were still a civilized people. The civilization of the conquerors produced a change on the conquered, in proportion to their intimacy. The conquered Britons became gradually assimilated to their masters. Cowper, in an apostrophe to England, says of Cæsar,

He did more than civilize them; he became the means of introducing them to the knowledge of Christianity, by the communication which he opened between them and the Roman people. Difficulty exists as to the precise time in which Christianity was introduced into Britain: the opinions adopted are more the result of conjecture, than of historical record. Although there is no direct historical evidence, there is a strong probability that the gospel was carried into Britain immediately after its first promulgation.

About eighty years had elapsed from the invasion of Cæsar till the time when the apostles of Christ went forth from Jerusalem into all the world to preach the gospel. By this time the communication with Britain must have been considerable; and although there is no account in the history of the apostles of any of them visiting Britain, yet it is highly probable. It is certain that Paul traveled as far as Spain :* and that he or others of the apostles may have gone

Rom. xv. 24, 28.

into Gaul, and from that into Britain, is not improbable. These countries were as accessible as Spain. The invasion of Britain by Cæsar, afforded the apostles an opportunity of obeying the command of their heavenly Mas. ter; obedience to which was the great business of their apostolic calling.*

The means which forwarded the civilization of Britain, would as surely aid in evangelizing it. The superior manners and knowledge of the invaders were not more likely to be imitated and learned, than their religious rites and prac. tices. In a very early period in the history of the gospel, it found its way even into the household of Cæsar and some of the royal domestics made not only a profession of Christianity, but were indeed saints. Many years be. fore this, a church was planted in the city of Rome. And four years before it, Paul had written his epistle to the Romans.§ All this time, Christianity must have been much diffused in the Roman empire; and especially near the seat of government. Afterwards, in the third century, Justin Martyr, in his apology for the persecuted Christians, says, that the Roman armies, navies, and other public employments, were crowded with Christian converts. When these armies and navies came to Britain, the Christians, who were so numerous in them, brought of course along with them their religion. They would in fact be so many missionaries to preach the

gospel among the British heathens. And that they might do this, it was not necessary that any of them should be evangelists, so as formally and authoritively to preach the gospel, and organize churches. But they would bring with them some copies of the written word of God, and they would carry with them the knowledge of Christianity, which they had learned from the ministers of Jesus Christ in their own country. And with the zeal which almost always characterizes recent converts, they would employ their means and opportunities, in placing before the idolatrous Britons the way of salvation.

This is not to be viewed as a mere plausible speculation. The facts stated are incontrovertible; and the use to which they have been applied, and the conclusion which has been drawn from them, are perfectly legitimate.

It is morally impossible, that such numbers could be in the service of Rome without diffusing wherever they went, the doctrines, and holding up to imitation, the practices, of the Christian reli. gion.

Were the United States of America to send out an expedition to take possession of, and preserve under their jurisdiction, some of the vast number of heathen islands scattered in the southern ocean, is it possible that the Christian soldiers and sailors who might be employed in this armament, would not disseminate a knowledge of their religion during a residence of many years? And if these soldiers and sailors were relieved from their foreign service, and their places supplied by

fresh crews, would not this increase the means of still further propagating Christianity.?

This was exactly the case with the Romans; the reduction and retention of Britain became a popular measure with the emperors of Rome for four or five centuries.

LIFE

(To be continued.)

TISH REFORMER.

[Continued from page 192.]

"The righteous shall be in everlasting remembrance."-PSAL. cxii. 6.

In the month of July, 1560, a treaty (called the treaty of Leith) had been signed at Edinburgh, between the partizans of the late queen regent, and the officers of the French forces, for the Roman ists, upon the one part, and the lords of the congregations for the Protestants, upon the other. This treaty provided an amnesty to the Protestants for their opposition to the queen regent; it provided also for the calling of that parliament by which popery was abo. lished, and protestantism established. But Mary, queen of Scots, and her husband Francis, dauphin of France, refused their concurrence in the treaty. Foreseeing danger, Knox therefore exerted himself to procure, as speedily as possible, a complete settlement of the reformation, and a removal of every obstacle that might endanger its permanence. Accordingly, at a convention of estates in May, 1651, an act was passed, ordering every monument of idolatry, within the kingdom to

When

neral devastation. Still we believe it was to the state, and to the reformed religion in Scotland, what cutting off the right hand, and plucking out the right eye," are, to the Christian, a melancholy and a grievous duty; but absolutely necessary to the safety of the constitution. Knox considered the great ecclesiastical houses as the fortresses of popery and superstition; and the crowds of ecclesiastics, by which they were filled, he looked upon as the army by which error was defended, and truth endangered. asked his opinion about the demolition of these buildings, he there. fore quaintly replied, "Pull down the nests and the crows will fly away." To judge of his decision, we must place ourselves in his circumstances; we must consider that he and his copartners believed they were bound by the law of God, Deut. xii. 2, 3; 2 Chron. xxxi. 1. xxxiv. 3, 4; that they had not then learned the delicate distinction between idola. trous and idolatry; but were accustomed to call objects by their right names, without any of that puling, incincere, and affected sentimentality, which distin

guishes too many of the luke warm Protestants of the present day. To the eye of an antiquarian, or man of refined taste, the ruins of the spacious abbey or lofty cathedral, present objects of deep and imposing interest. To us they appear as monuments unassociated with harm; and we look back upon the days of their splendor, and grieve that their glory is departed. But to the eye of the reformers they appeared the receptacles of indolence, the nurseries of error, the theatres of superstition, the palaces of pride, or the courts of persecution. We are not therefore to wonder, if, under these mingled feelings, they regarded them and treated them as the people of Paris did the dungeons of the bastile, or the Spaniard, in his hour of liberty, the halls of the inquisition.

In August, 1561, Queen Mary landed in Scotland. She was received by her subjects with every demonstration and feeling of joy; and as the Protestants hoped that she would not only tolerate but patronize their religion, they were prepared to submit to her government with alacrity and affection. But Mary had been educated in a court strongly attached to popery, and had early imbibed the deepest aversion to protestantism, which she was determined as speedily as possible to extirpate from her kingdom. Out of regard to the numbers and power of the Protestants, she dissembled for a little; but, on the first sabbath after her arrival, ordered mass to be celebrated in the chapel of Hollyrood. The fears of the Protestants were excited; and a crowd was collected, who

vented their disapprobation in the most unequivocal terms. The wax tapers which the servants were carrying to the chapel, were broken; and other acts of outrage would have been committed but for the zealous exertions of the reformed leaders. Knox himself, in private conversation, employed all his influence to appease the multitude; but, at the same time, felt it his duty, on the succeeding sabbath, to testify his dread and abhorrence of popery, declaring, "that. a single mass was more fearful to him than ten thousand armed men landed for the purpose of crushing their religion.' Men wonder now, or at least affect to wonder, at such an expression from such a man. So they well may, under the mild and tolerant reign of protestant princes. But let them transport themselves back to the days of Knox; let them reflect upon the intolerant and sanguinary spirit of popery in those days, and they will learn to treat the fears and caution of the zealous reformer as neither imaginary nor unfounded. The celebration of mass so far from appearing as a mere religious rite, was neither more nor less than the signal of arbitrary power, and fiery persecu. tion.

The zeal of Knox in opposition to popery, and the language he had applied to the celebration of the mass, exposed him to the bitter resentment of Queen Mary. Not long after her arrival, he was sent for to the palace, and she entered into conversation with him, hoping to subdue or overawe the bold spirit of the reformer. When, amongst other charges,