but also to build school-houses for the young, and a parsonage-house for the clergyman. Two schools (boys' and girls'), in connection with the Church, have been in active operation for the last four years, but great inconvenience and expense are incurred by the necessity of renting accommodation.

FORFAR.-On Sunday, the 4th of September last, the Right Rev. the Bishop of Brechin, acting for the Bishop of St Andrew's, &c., held a Confirmation in St John's Church, Forfar, when twenty-two candidates were admitted to a participation of that sacred ordinance. The Bishop delivered a suitable and most impressive address, and notwithstanding the very unfavourable state of the weather, the attendance was numerous and respectable.

KIRRIEMUIR.-On the Sunday after Trinity, the Right Rev. the Bishop of Brechin, acting for the Bishop of St Andrews, &c., held a confirmation in the church of Kirriemuir, when twenty persons received the apostolic rite of laying on of hands.' The Bishop delivered a pathetic and very appropriate address to those who were thus admitted to the full enjoyment of their Christian privileges. The interest of this solemnity was greatly increased by the administration, at an earlier period of the service, of the sacrament of baptism to eight adults, and the reconciliation of six others who had, for some time previously, neglected the obligations of the Christian covenant. It is gratifying to find that this congregaiion flourishes under its present zealous pastor. But it is only one among many instances where the clergy of our Church have been enabled to show that there is no inherent antipathy, in the people of Scotland, to the principles and teaching of the Church of Scotland, where due pains are taken to inculcate and spread the truth. It is to be feared the various Presbyterian sects, from the Establishment downwards, flourish through the false principles and the apathy of too many of the nominal members of Christ's holy Catholic Church in Scotland. May we not hope that the day of indifference and pseudo-liberty is drawing to a close, and the time approaching when all shall be of one mind and one heart in extending the fellowship of the apostles, till every one of our countrymen is brought to the knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus?'

ST MICHAEL'S CHURCH, CRIEFF.-On the 17th Sunday after Trinity the services in this church were rendered peculiarly interesting by the reception of a whole family of seven persons into the communion of the Church. Six of them were baptized on this occasion, the father having been baptized in infancy. It having become known that such a solemnity was to take place, the church was crowded to excess, and nearly two hundred persons had to retire without obtaining admission.

Reviews.

An Address to the Congregation of St Mary's Chapel, Dumfries. By the Rev. ARCHIBALD M'EWEN, M.A., Incumbent. Edinburgh: R. Lendrum & Co. Dumfries: J. Sinclair. 1848.

It is, perhaps, one of the most disheartening occurrences which can happen to a zealous and faithful minister of the Altar, that, after he has been painfully and laboriously employed in the discharge of his duties, in rightly dividing the word of truth, building up the souls of his flock in the true faith of their Redeemer, and working for their spiritual good, as one to whom their souls are most precious,—after all this, it is, we repeat, most disheartening, to be singled out by some anonymous assailant with an accusation of treachery, of secret endeavour to pervert the truth of that most blessed message which he has been so earnestly delivering, to inculcate Romish error under the guise of Catholic verity, and prepare the way for the re-establishment of the long-exploded corruptions of that Church.

And the worst of this mode of attack is, that, up to a certain point, both the Reformed Catholic Church and the Church of Rome, as Apostolical Churches, necessarily march together in belief, both holding the same great essential truths; and it is very easy, by a little ambidextrous casuistry, a little wilful confusion and perversion of terms, to persuade weak brethren, who have a holy horror of the name of Rome, that the very doctrines of their own Church may be insensibly warped into a leaning towards the much-dreaded system.

We have only to sound the tocsin of Popery,' says a most unscrupulous Puritan,* and half the dangers of the Church are dissipated.' 'If you want,' says Mr Gresley, 'to throw popular odium on those who are endeavouring to restore the services of the Church to their decent order, and instruct her people in her genuine doctrines, you have but to sound the tocsin of Popery.' The artifice of the Puritans has been to magnify this danger, and to stigmatize with the odium of Popery some of the most undoubted doctrines of the English Church, as well as persons whose whole lives and energies have been spent in her service.'

Such seems to have been the species of attack made by (probably) some apostate from the flock against a zealous and faithful minister of Christ, whose name is appended to the publication at the head of these remarks. We have not seen the letter, and can only derive our notions of it from Mr M'Ewen's very satisfactory defence of his teaching; but, in all probability, it is one of a numerous class, published from various motives, by weak or malicious persons. These sounders of the tocsin of Popery' are, however, very unreasonable people. Not only do they expect that their arguments (!!) are to be refuted afresh every time they choose to bring them forward, but * Rev. Francis Close, of Cheltenham.

they give Churchmen the additional work of laying the of them.

very ghosts

To apply, with slight alteration, the words of Bishop Horne to the infidels : But how many times have these objections been considered and replied to? Have these persons the modesty to expect that we are to draw up a (new defence of the Church's doctrine and teaching), as often as any one of them shall think proper to ask a few old questions (or repeat a few oft-refuted mis-statements) over again?'

It is in the teaching of the Church that Mr M'Ewen is accused, and he has added another to the many refutations of these calumnies. In a very temperate and Christian address to his congregation, he distinctly proves from Scripture, and from the Scriptural Standards of the Church of England, the orthodoxy of every point of doctrine on which he was assailed.

It seems to have been objected to him that he taught,—

1. The doctrine of Remission of Sins, through the divinelyappointed channel of the priesthood.

2. The doctrine of Regeneration in Baptism.

3. The doctrine of the Communion of Christ's Body and Blood in the Holy Eucharist.

4. The duty of fasting.

5. That he assigned an undue place to the Virgin Mary in the thoughts and affections of Christians.

After effectually proving the Scriptural orthodoxy of these points, which are simply the doctrines of the Church of England, Mr M'Ewen proceeds to say :- Such are the subjects to which the writer of the "Letter to a Protestant Episcopal Clergyman" alludes, as objectionable points in my public teaching. I have endeavoured to show how firmly they are built upon the distinct and unerring Word of God, and conformable, in the strictest degree, to the doctrine and discipline of the Church in which I have been ordained. Feeling, as I do, conscientiously bound to adhere to the letter and spirit of the Liturgy, to which I and all my clerical brethren have declared our "unfeigned assent and consent," I can enter into the difficulties which many, imperfectly grounded in the faith, experience, in fully accepting the teaching of the Church on this or that doctrinal point; and am, as I trust you are well aware, ever ready and thankful to reason together with any of my flock, in all possible sympathy, affection, and regard. I despise the opinions of no man, when entertained with a conscientious desire for the glory of God, and advocated in a spirir of meekness and love. I am too sensible of my own need of wisdom from above, to look down with any air of superciliousness upon those who are seeking the truth in the love of it.'—Address, pp. 12, 13.

We can draw but one inference; not that Mr M'Ewen has departed from a faithful adherence to the teaching of the Church, or has any Romeward tendency whatever, but that his assailant is either ignorant of all Church principles and doctrines, or a wilful dissenter from them.

The Moon's Histories. London: Joseph Cundall, 12 Old Bond Street. Edinburgh R. Lendrum & Co.

THIS volume is elegantly got up, and cannot fail to bespeak attention to its exterior; but to those who wish to go a little farther, the contents will be found full of interest. It is written for children; and its object is to excite in them a thirst for knowledge, and to cultivate their taste. The idea of the work was suggested to the accomplished authoress by the works of Andersen, the Danish poet. 'In borrowing and attempting to follow out the felicitous and fanciful conception of a foreign genius, she has at once acknowledged her obligation, and expressed her appreciation of the tenderness and pathos of that graceful writer, by introducing translations from the original Danish of two of his sketches, The Moon's Peep into Rome,' and 'the Account of the Boy in the Tuilleries,' which are pointed out in the foot notes.' The rest of the work is original, varied, and full of interest. We should do injustice to the volume were we to give any quotations detached from the context. Suffice it to say, that its high moral tone, the interesting narratives which the moon' gives of some of the varied sights which she has seen, and the attractions of its exterior, cannot fail to recommend the book to the younger members of families, while it may be found equally acceptable to parents and tutors, as adapted for presents to children.

Miscellaneous.

CATHEDRAL DESECRATION.

Ir may seem a presumptuous as well as superfluous attempt, to reprove practices, which long use and habit have sanctioned, which individuals, both lay and clerical, in great numbers and of the greatest respectability, have patronised, and which, moreover, have been recommended to that patronage, and to general approbation, by the specious form which they assume of giving considerable aid to eminently charitable designs. Nevertheless, as what is intrinsically wrong cannot be made right, either by length of time, the support of high and influential names, or by the weight of numbers, or even by the charitable guise which it assumes, for in no circumstances do we admit the maxim, that the end sanctifies the means, we shall, with whatever risk, lift up our feeble voice against a desecrating practice still existing in the Church. We are now alluding to a performance, commonly denominated a musical festival,' which took place not long since in the Cathedral Church of Worcester. We are well aware that this celebration was only one of a series which for many years past have been held alternately in the Cathedrals of Worcester, Gloucester, and Hereford, thus by turns converting these magnificent temples, reared by ancient piety and munificence for the worship of

the Almighty, into mere theatres, places for a worldly amusement, which has been concocted for the purpose of eliciting charity, through self-gratification, from those who would never bestow it upon principle. There the band of money-takers (worse than the moneychangers expelled from the Jewish Temple of old) exercises its unhallowed vocations; the auditors take their places according to the rate which they have paid, and make the desecrated walls resound with applauses bestowed on hired musicians and vocalists, raked from the metropolitan and continental theatres.

The old plea, that nothing but what is termed sacred music is performed in Cathedrals, does not mend the matter, if it does not also add to the irreverence, for not only sacred places are profaned, but sacred subjects, and sacred names are lightly treated. The performers are hired; the audience pay; the consecrated building is disfigured with temporary accommodations, and for the time is as much a place of public amusement as the theatres of Covent Garden or Drury Lane. We may observe in passing, that we very much doubt the legal right of any parties to make such a use of the sacred buildings committed to their guardianship.

Surely there are town halls, and other large buildings in all these cities, which might be fitted up for such occasions: the same amount of amusement might be provided there; the same amount of money collected, while the houses of God might be kept free from such pollutions.

But besides the insult offered to the temple of the Most High, we cannot but shudder at the profane familiarity with which sacred names and subjects are handled. The sublimest ejaculations of piety and devotion become, like worldly phrases, so common in the mouths of the lovers of music, as a science, as well as of the more numerous class of pretenders thereto, that every thought of their meaning and solemnity seems utterly lost and forgotten; and they become mixed up with the most ordinary jargon of theatrical criticism.

We give a few quotations from an influential newspaper, out of a long series of the same kind :

'Worcester, Wednesday, Sept. 6.

The performance to-day has gone off most brilliantly. Fine weather helped the attraction of Elijah, and the Cathedral was filled in every part.

Elijah seems destined henceforth to surpass every oratorio, except the Messiah, in popularity, as it does in merit. Already it can be relied on as a sure source of profit at every important musical meeting, and the oftener it is heard the more completely does it take hold of the public mind.

In many respects we have seldom heard better chorus-singing. It is not necessary to cite particular instances where almost all was worthy of praise, but we cannot refrain from specializing the grand chorus in E flat, Thanks be to God,' and the beautiful chorus of angels in G, He watching over Israel:' these were