of Protestants were compelled to fly to the continent, where they found refuge at Frankfort-on-the-Maine, at Emden, at Wessel, at Basle, at Marburg, at Strasburg, and at Geneva. At all these places they were received with open arms by their Protestant brethren; and at all, they found a much simpler ritual and worship than that to which they had been accustomed in England. In the last named place, in particular, they found "a Church without a Bishop, and a State without a king." It was in that same city of Geneva, that John Knox discovered the "pattern" of that Church which he and other worthy co-workers erected in Scotland, and which has endured to this day.

Under these circumstances, it is not wonderful that the friends and advocates of further reform in the Established Church of England returned, upon the death of Mary, from the continent, after a sojourn there of five years, more fully confirmed than ever in the opinions which they had previously held. The consequence was that the struggle between formalism, prelacy, and monarchy, on the one hand, and a purer faith, a simpler worship, and a constitutional government, on the other, was renewed with more vigor than ever-a struggle in which the throne and the altar were both, for a while, prostrated, somewhat less than a century later.

Long before that event occurred, however, there began to be formed in England a small but growing band of those who were resolved to come out of the Established Church, in which they despaired of seeing a further reformation. Finding no longer any protection in the land of their birth, several hundreds of them emigrated from the eastern counties of England to the opposite shores of Holland. Not finding such a home there as they desired, and preferring to live under the dominion, as they said, of their "natural prince," they removed to this continent, and settled amid the wilderness which then covered its shores. They planted at "New Plymouth," a Church without a bishop, and a commonwealth without a monarchy, save an almost nominal allegiance to one which was three thousand miles distant. Here was the cradle of American institutions and American liberty.

Genus unde Latinum,

Albanique patrês, atque altæ mania Romæ.

For small as this colony was, never did another exert so great an influence. Those which followed, and settled in 1628 at Salem, and in 1630 at Boston, though both when they left England were composed of those who still rejoice to be called members of the Established Church, had scarcely touched the American shores before they threw off the Episcopal form of government, and became Independents, or Congregationalists,-both because they were pleased with the "pattern" which

they found at Plymouth, and because by so doing they created an impassable gulf between themselves and the Bishops of England, an escape from whose domination was one of the chief motives for seeking a home in the New World. England threatened to attempt to bring back these fleeing Israelites under the ecclesiastical tyranny from which they had escaped. The colonists prepared to resist. At this moment, the dispute between the government and the friends of reform in Church and State at home, took such a turn as to prevent the conflict between the mother country and her infant daughter. The first essay, therefore, on the part of the colonies in resisting the authority of England, was made in behalf of religious freedom.

Not only did the Puritans settle in New England, but men of like spirit, and actuated by similar motives, emigrated at a later day, from Scotland, from the north of Ireland, from Wales, from Germany, from Poland, from Bohemia, from France, and from the Valleys of Piedmont, to these shores, and spread themselves, with few exceptions, over what are now our middle and southern States. Of all the Protestants who emigrated to this country in the 17th and 18th centuries, and laid the foundation of this nation's greatness, by far the largest and best portion were driven hither by religious persecution, as well as by political oppres

sion.

But, is the question still asked, who were the Puritans? Let me answer in the language of Britain's most eloquent modern essayist :

"The Puritans were men whose minds had derived a peculiar character from the daily contemplation of superior beings and eternal interests. Not content with acknowledging, in general terms, an overruling Providence, they habitually ascribed every event to the will of the Great Being, for whose power nothing is too vast, for whose inspection nothing is too minute. To know Him, to serve Him, to enjoy Him, was with them the great end of existence. They rejected with contempt the ceremonious homage which other sects substituted for the pure worship of the soul. Instead of catching occasional glimpses of the Deity through an obscuring veil, they aspired to gaze full on the intolerable brightness, and commune with Him face to face. Hence originated their contempt of earthly distinctions. The difference between the greatest and meanest of mankind seemed to vanish. when compared with the boundless interval which separated the whole race from Him on whom their own eyes were constantly fixed. They recognised no title to superiority but His favor; and confident of that, they despised all the accomplishments, and all the dignities of the world. If their names were not found in the registers of heralds, they felt assured that they were recorded in the Book of Life. If their steps were not accompanied by a

splendid train of menials, legions of ministering angels had charge over them. Their palaces were houses not made with hands; their diadems crowns of glory, which should never fade away. On the rich and the eloquent, on nobles and priests, they looked down with contempt; for they esteemed themselves rich in a more precious treasure, and eloquent in a more sublime language; nobles, by the right of an earlier creation, and priests by the imposition of a mightier hand. The very meanest of them was a being to whose fate a mysterious and terrible importance belonged; on whose slightest action the spirits of light and darkness looked with anxious interest; who had been destined before the heavens and earth were created, to enjoy a felicity which should continue when heaven and earth should have passed away. Events, which short-sighted politicians ascribed to earthly causes, had been ordained on his account. For his sake empires had risen, and flourished, and decayed. For his sake the Almighty revealed His will by the pen of the Evangelist, and the harp of the Prophet. He had been rescued by no common deliverer, from the grasp of no common foe. He had been ransomed by the sweat of no common agony, by the blood of no earthly sacrifice. It was for him that the sun had been darkened, that the rocks had been rent, that the dead had arisen, that all nature had shuddered at the sufferings of her expiring God."

Wonderful men! By what visions cheered! By what hopes and motives conducted! The Duke of Wellington once asserted on the floor of the British House of Lords, that such was the perfection of discipline, such the esprit du corps of the army which he commanded in the Peninsula, that he believed it could have marched anywhere! In this respect, it was like the army of Hannibal, which for fourteen years bade defiance to all the attacks of the Romans, and during the latter part of that period, did not meet an enemy that had the courage to oppose it. In like manner it may be asserted, that men possessing the spirit and character, the exalted aims, the soul-sustaining hopes, the faith that fixes her eye on eternal things, which the Puritans had, are capable of doing anything that is great and glorious. And verily they did things that were both great and glorious. Those of them who remained in their father-land nobly contended for the rights of mankind, political and religious. They fought the battles of liberty over and over again, until through their exertions, and through the triumph of their principles, the British Constitution became firmly established. "The precious spark of liberty had been kindled and was preserved by the Puritans alone," says the great English historian to whom we have already referred-a historian who has been justly charged with lying in wait, through the whole course of his history for an opportunity of throwing

discredit upon the cause of both religion and liberty, and who bore a special dislike to the Puritans.

As to the Puritans who emigrated to this country, they carried out, to their legitimate extent, the great principles of civil and religious liberty which they had learned in England, in the school of oppression and fierce discussion. They went on gradually improving the forms of popular government which they had originally adopted, in the face of all the efforts of the Crown of England to destroy them. And although never were subjects more loyal to a Crown, or a people more sincerely attached to their father-land, they were at last compelled, as they believed, by the unkind and unnatural course pursued by that father-land, to sever the bonds that had bound them to it, and establish an independent government of their own, in which religious, as well as political liberty should be carried to its proper boundaries.

And what has been the effect of our example upon the world? Let the history of France, Belgium, Spain, Portugal and Greece, in the Old World, and of the entire of South America, together with Mexico, Guatamala, and St. Domingo, in the New, answer that question. Let its answer be also read in the throes of poor Poland and of benighted Italy.

It is indeed but too true, that the revolutions which have occurred in the world within the last fifty years, have led to no results comparable to those which their great prototype and forerunner in our own country has produced. Nor is it difficult to discover the reason. They have not been the fruit of the pure Gospel; they have not been sustained by an evangelical faith; they have not occurred in nations which had been penetrated by a true Christianity; they have not taken place where the Bible is in the hands of almost every one, and its sanctions felt in millions of hearts. Therefore it is, that the governments which they have given rise to have been unstable and very imperfect.

But let us have hope. These revolutions have been necessary to break down the despotism of the prince and of the priestwhich like Castor and Pollux, or to use a less classical comparison, like the Siamese Twins, are inseparable, and neither can be destroyed without sooner or later occasioning the death of the other. These revolutions are opening the way for the diffusion of the pure gospel. And the countries in which they have occurred will one day experience its renovating influence. Then, and not till then, will they be enabled to obtain and maintain those free governments which they desire, but for which they are at present so greatly unprepared.

ARTICLE II.

REVIEW OF FINNEY'S THEOLOGY.

By Rev. GEO. DUFFIELD, D. D., Fastor of First Presbyterian Church of Detroit, Mich.

Lectures on Systematic Theology, embracing Lectures on Moral Government, together with Atonement, Moral and Physical Depravity, Regeneration, Philosophical Theories, and Evidences of Regeneration. By REV. C. G. FINNEY, Professor of Theology in the Oberlin Collegiate Institute.

THE work, whose title we have placed before the reader, as the subject of this article, is given to the world by its author, as a "text-book where (in ?) many points and questions are discussed of great practical importance, but which have not to (his) knowledge been discussed in any system of theological instruction extant." The present volume is to be followed by others, and will form the second of the series; because it embraces, as the author says, "subjects so distinct from what will appear in the first" and because it seemed especially called for just now, to meet a demand of the church." The church in general, no doubt is meant, and by its "demand," the author's judgment of what it needs. The volume, therefore, lays high claims to general consideration.

The well established and extensive reputation of the author for piety, his success as a popular preacher, in the conversion of men, and the estimation in which his name and fame have been held in the churches, render any remarks from us unnecessary in the way of awarding the "honor to whom honor is due." For ourselves, however, we must be permitted to say, that we have always affectionately regarded him as one whose ministry the Lord delighted to bless; and although occasionally sentiments of an erratic character had been attributed to him by others, and quoted in isolated remarks from his writings, as we have seen, yet have we been wont to refer them rather to neglect in properly qualifying his expressions, than to any serious or radical departure from the orthodox faith. It is a matter of regret, that we have been constrained to apprehend there was more reason for censure than we had suspected. We still cherish the kindest feelings, notwithstanding we have yielded to what appears to us to be an imperious demand, to counteract the dangerous tendency of a philosoph' Preface, p. iii.