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ing the offenders, to pillage the district. Some of the houses were gutted, others stripped of their valuables; the live stock was killed; and the inhabitants either taken prisoners or obliged to fly. The houses of two English merchants, Messrs. Burnett and Ellicott, were filled with women, flying from the violence of the soldiery. It was not till the pillage had continued three days, that these gentlemen obtained, by their ur gent remonstrance, an order to restrain the soldiers. Twenty-two prisoners were brought round in a frigate, and lodged in Funchal goal. The illegal signature of the warrant would have justified any resistance, while the circumstance that no blows were struck clearly proves how trifling it actually was. The pillage was witnessed by several English gentlemen who visited the spot, and its effects are still visible to all who go to the Sierra. Ten of the prisoners belong to the family of Maria Joaquina, who is still in prison under sentence of death. Times, Oct. 24, 1844.

Great Protestant Meeting.-On Monday Evening, November 4, at six o'clock, a Meeting of the members and friends of the Metropolitan Tradesmen and Operatives' Protestant Associations, will be held (D.V.) in the Large Hall, Exeter Hall. The Rev. HUGH STOWELL has kindly promised to take part in the proceedings.-Tickets to be had at the Office, 11, Exeter Hall, or at Hatchards'; Nisbet's, Seeleys', Rivington's, Baisler's, Dalton's; and of the Secretaries of the Metropolitan Associations, Messrs. Allen, 120, Bunhill-row; Binden, 19, Brandstreet, Broadley-terrace, Blandford-square; Sykes, 3, Adam's-place, High-street, Southwark; Rigley, Chapel-street, Stockwell; Goad, 41, Great Queen-street, Long-acre; Spicer, 2, King's-road-terrace, King's-road, Chelsea; Woodcock, 27, Brunswick-street, Hackney-road; Smith, 1 Upper John-st. Commercial-road East; and Colson, St. Mark's Infant School House, Whitechapel. A SERMON will be preached on the Evening of November 5th, 1844, in Fitzroy Episcopal Chapel, London Street, Fitzroy Square, by the Rev. R. W. Dibdin, M.A., Minister of West Street Episcopal Chapel, St. Giles's. Divine Service to commence at Seven o'clock.

Meeting of the Members and Friends of this Association, on the Evening of November 5th. It has been postponed to another month, in consequence of the "Great Meeting" on the 4th.

Tower Hamlets-Puseyism and other causes have prevented the delivery of the Two Courses of Lectures, which it was expected would have been now going on, in connection with this Association. The proposed Lectures have not, however, been lost sight of. As soon as other rooms have been obtained, they will be duly announced. The Rev. Henry Cappel, Minister of the German Lutheran Church, has promised this Association a Lecture on Luther and the Reformation.

Finsbury.-The Lectures announced in the last "Operative," in connection with this Association at Clerkenwell, have been exceedingly well attended hitherto. As soon as they have terminated, a Meeting will be held; after which there will be another Course of Lectures.

North Tower Hamlets, (late Shoreditch and Hackney.)—The Rev. Mr. Aveling has promised to give a lecture to the members and friends of this Association in Kingsland Chapel, Kingsland-road (of which he is Minister); the Rev. H. Fish in the Wesleyan Chapel, Hackney-road; and the Rev. J. Stamp in any suitable room or chapel that can be obtained for him within the district assigned to the Association. These may be expected to take place during the present month.

CHELSEA.-The first Meeting of the Chelsea, the National School Room, Christ Church, Chelsea, Brompton, and Pimlico Association was held in on Tuesday Evening, October 11th. The Rev. W. Howard, Incumbent of Christ Church, was in the Incumbent of St. Jude's, Pimlico, the meeting was chair. After prayer by the Rev. Mr. Patteson, addressed by the Chairman, the Rev. Messrs. Thelwall, Barber, Stokes (Chaplain of the new English Church at Rouen), and Nicolay, James Lord, Esq. and Mr. Binden. The meeting was well attended, and there appears every prospect of a or have been added since the Meeting, and the good Association being established. Many MemCommittee are making arrangements for a Course of Lectures to be delivered shortly.

Our Friends are informed that the "PROTESTANT ALMANACK," for 1845, is now ready, both in the form of a Sheet and Book, price 2d. with much valuable and interesting information, relanumerous embellishments, a new chronology, and ting to the Popish Controversy. No. I. of the Second Volume of the Child's Book of Martyrs, is also ready, price 1d. The First Volume may be

Southwark. It was intended to hold a had, neatly bound, price ls. 8d.

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"If they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them."-Isaiah viii. 20.

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SPEECH OF THE REV. HUGH STOWELL, M.A. We have much pleasure in presenting our readers with the following Speech of the Rev. Hugh STOWELL, M.A., at a public meeting of the Members and Friends of the Metropolitan Tradesmen and Operatives' Protestant Associations, held in Exeter Hall, on Monday Evening, November 4th, 1844. The Chair was taken by G. J. P. SMITH, Esq. and the meeting was opened with prayer. The Rev. Hugh Stowell, in seconding the second Resolution, spoke as follows:

MR. CHAIRMAN, and my Christian friends: -In seconding the resolution which has been so simply and so efficiently moved, I cannot but feel cheered and inspirited by the animating assemblage that I witness filling this vast place of meeting, even to its extremities; filling it, too, at a season of the year when, comparatively speaking, a lull and a hush pervade the public mind; when there are not the excitements that usually tell on the Christian public in the wellknown month of May, and when no special attraction of any kind is held out, save the attraction that a Protestant meeting still has for thousands of sound-hearted Protestant Englishmen. It was worth hastening from Manchester and hastening back again, as it is my lot to do, in order to witness so

VOL. V.

encouraging and enheartening a spectacle ; because we in the country naturally look to the metropolis of our land to set us the standard, and to diffuse throughout the length and the breadth of the country, of which she sits in some sort the queen, right principles and right opinions. The metropolis may be regarded as the mighty heart of the community; and if we find, that the lifeblood is flowing healthfully and vigorously from the heart, we may trust that it will flow healthfully and vigorously through the mem. bers, even to the least and lowest extremity.

The spectacle is the more animating, because we must frankly confess, that over our Protestant machinery there has come a good deal of impediment and embarrassment, and I may perhaps add, languor and inactivity. I regret that we have to say it, but is is well that we should look the fact in the face, and that we should ascertain why it is thus, and consider how we are to counteract what we trust is but a temporary suspension, and not a neutralisation of our spirit and of our efforts.

In the fore-front of the occasions of the present stagnation, and the present dispiritment amongst many of our formerly most valued supporters, and most ardent friends, I conceive to be the fact, that there was too much leaning on an arm of flesh; that there

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was too much trusting to political party, and too little trusting to the Omnipotent arm, and the imperishable, immutable principles of Christian truth. The ranks of the Protestant Association were swelled with recruits from party politicians; and those party politicians have proved what the soundest and soberest of Christian Protestant advoeates foresaw and foretold that they would prove, a bruised reed" in the hour of our necessity. They would use Protestant Associations, or any other associations, to subserve the purpose of helping into power the party to which they were devoted; but no sooner is that party intrenched, as they think, in impregnable security, than the platforms of the Protestant Association witness them no more, and the ranks of Protestant assemblies number them no more amongst them. And it cannot be denied, that many of the firm and ardent friends of Protestant Associations have felt themselves sorely discouraged and dispirited by such desertions; and therefore they have been ready to conclude, that the movement was but momentary, and that it must subside and come to an end. Far from it. We have got rid of political partisans, but we retain Christian men, whose watchword is-not party, but principle-not men, but measures-not the changing opinions of political expediency, but the unchangeable principles of "the truth as it is in Jesus." I am perfectly persuaded, my Christian friends, that what we have lost in numbers and in rank, we have gained in soundness, coherence, and consistency. I have ever myself held, that our Protestant Associations were essentially Christian institutions; that their aspect upon politics was but, as it were, the necessary bearing of Christianity on the social condition, but that their members and their movers were to act, not with an eye to the things of time, but of eternity; not with an eye to one party in the state, or another party in the state, but with an eye to the defence of those great religious principles which were planted by Christ and His apostles-which were revived and sealed with their blood by our own martyrs at the Reformation, and which have come down to us in their purity and in their integrity, but are in imminent danger both from political expediency and from Romish and Tractarian combination, and which therefore we marshal round to protect them. And whoever may be in power or in place, whoever may adhere to us or desert us, I trust we are pledged to stand by those principles, faithful amid the faithless, and firm amid the wavering.

Another source of disheartenment to many of our Protestant supporters arises out of

the way in which, as they conceive, their petitions, and their appeals, and their remonstrances have been treated by men, whom in some degree, indirectly at least, they helped to attain that place which they now hold in our country. I am not going to diverge into party politics; but this I will say, that the unpolitical and sober-minded clergy of the Church of England, and the right-minded too, amongst the laity, the men of thought, and of piety, and of prayer, have had their confidence, whatever it was, in the present administration, sorely shaken and diminished by the light way, with which that administration has treated questions involving, as we conceive, the vital principles of our Protestant Church. We cannot forget how the clamour of antagonists has been hearkened to, and the mild, firm remonstrances of friends have been set at nought. We cannot forget how the Educational Bill, whatever were its merits or demerits, was swamped in compliance with the voice of antagonists, whilst the Dissenters' Chapels' Bill was carried in the face of the remonstrances of the right-minded. We cannot forget that we fondly hoped that when our friends came into power, the grant to Maynooth would he, if not at once cut off, at least made the subject of a sifting investigation, as to how it was applied, and whether or not there was truth in the allegations brought against the education at Maynooth, that it is an education in the face of sound morality-in the face of the interests of her Majesty's subjects in Ireland, whether they be Romish or Protestant-in the face of the well-being of the British nation-and in the face of the security of the British constitution-for such are the grave and oft reiterated allegations which a M'Ghee and an O'Sullivan have proved to demonstration on the platform and through the press, and ought to have the power of proving in the Senate of England, before a Committee of the House of Commons: whereas, instead of our friends, when in power, either altogether amputating, or even scrutinizing the application of that grant, we now hear whispers and rumours of the grant being, not retrenched, but redoubled, and of concessions being made to the Romish agitators in Ireland, such as I know have inspired deep apprehensions in the breasts of the best and the truest of the clergy of Ireland. As one of them said to me lately-" God seems to be blessing us, for Romanists and Romish priests are flocking back to the Church; but man seems to be deserting us, and the more God does for us, the less man seems to care for us." And is it not true, that our Protestant petitions, have, for the most part,

been received with ill-disguised impatience, or half-concealed scorn?-and it has been said by some of our friends, "What avails it to go on petitioning, and petitioning, when our petitions are but so much waste paper, to load the table of the House of Commons?" What is the good of it! There is this good -we have acquitted our consciences; and let the responsibility rest where it ought. What is the good of it! There is this good at least-if we cannot stop the wheels, we shall act as a drag upon the wheels, in the downward course which is now running. What is the good of it! It at least serves, we trust, to bind together a band of faithful men in our country, who perhaps, when legislative concession has gone so far, that legislation can do nothing to save our country, may rise up, firm, and determined, and cool, and say, "Popery shall never reign over us. Be it, that our petitions have been slighted; be it, that the rule is, to sacrifice friends to conciliate foes; be it, that the principle is, to govern by concession, and not by maintaining fixed, unchangeable principles; be it so:-are our petitions disregarded at the throne of grace? Has God looked down with displeasure on the simple protest, borne by His faithful people, through the medium of such associations as these? Surely, if anything can avert the judgments which we are provoking, and arrest the downward course of our Protestant liberties and Protestant truths, it will be the firm, faithful protest, and the earnest, believing, untiring prayers of those faithful men within our Church and without our Church, who love the truth for its own simple sake, and are prepared to labour for it, to suffer for it, and, if need were, to bleed for it.

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But another ground of disheartenment to many, and especially to the clergy that have espoused this cause, is that want of fellowship and sympathy on the part of a great proportion, even of their more serious reverend brethren, which it has been the misfortune of the Protestant Association to encounter. The charge, brought no doubt by covert Jesuits, against this Society when it rose, that it was a mere political engine-the charge brought against it, that we were wild enthusiasts and incendiaries, stirring up and inflaming the people-the charge brought against it, that we were producing more of schism and division, than we were of unity, and concord, and peace :--these charges, too readily received by many of the clergy, and too willingly, I fear, circulated, did much to keep aloof from the Protestant Association the great bulk even of the serious clergy. I deeply deplore this; but I am not dis

heartened by it. They were few among the clergy that began the Reformation; and yet ultimately the Reformation carried the whole of the Bench of Bishops and the clergy along with it. What would have been the fate of the Reformation in Germany, if Luther had said, "Because I can get few of my brethren to go along with me, I will not dare to undertake the wondrous enterprise?" No; he had "not so learned Christ." With his Bible in his hand, and his Saviour before him, he walked forth alone, to encounter the embattled world; and he conquered, because he did it in the name of the Lord of hosts. With all deference and respect for my reverend brethren, I cannot help saying, if you cannot join us, at least wish us God speed; and if you think we are a little too enthusiastic, come amongst us, and serve as the regulator and thermometer, the safety-valve if you will, lest we make the engine explode. But, my Christian friends, we are not disheartened even because many of the clergy hold aloof.

Let me, then, seeing that there are such causes of discouragement, insomuch that we must concede that some few of our Protestant Associations have dissolved altogether, while others, I fear, are almost stranded, and others are much dispirited-let me, in the face of all these things, consider what reasons and grounds there are why, instead of disbanding, we should the more combine; and instead of becoming disassociated, we should more rally round the standard that God has enabled us to set up.

We should do this, my Christian friends, because, as my resolution remarks, of the struggles and the throes of Popery in this land. I believe, that since Popery was beaten down by our martyred Reformers, there never was a day when she had so concentrated all her powers to take Old England as at the present juncture. She is putting every engine to work, and every means into requisition. Aware that England's Church is the Thermopyla of Protestantism in the world, that there the battle must be fought, and that there is much to be lost or wonher attention seems concentred upon England and England's Church. For that carried, what, under God, is to withstand her? Look at the mighty efforts she is making in building chapels, multiplying nunneries, putting forward her masquerade and her mummery boldly in the face of Protestant England. I am not, however, going to concede that the 600 chapels in England, which called forth the cheers of some of our Romish friends when they were mentioned a few minutes ago, are any very great thing,

in comparison with what the Church of England has done and is still doing. But I reserve that for a more fitting part of my address to you; I will merely remark here, that these external evidences of her convulsive efforts present surely a sufficient reason why Protestants, instead of being lukewarm, and disconnected, and discordant, should be all the more fervid, and the more united, and the more as one man, with one hand, and with one mouth, and with one heart, to withstand the encroachments of their great antagonist.

But, my Christian friends, Romanism not only calls for our renewed efforts and endeavours, on account of the struggles which she is making; but as I have just hinted, on account of the bold, daring aspect, that she is assuming in our land. Time was, when a Romish procession, with crosses, with pictures, with all the insignia of idolatry, would not have dared to show itself in a town of Old England. The Protestant spirit and feeling would not have abused the Papists-they leave that weapon to the Papists-but they would have scouted them and laughed at them, till they would have been ashamed to play their foolish antics before the face of heaven. But it is otherwise now: so jesuitically has Rome gradually crept in upon the people of England under a mask; so has she tampered and trifled with the high Protestant edge of the English mind; so has she wrought, by a variety of appliances, and, above all, by her masterly use of her Tractarian recruits-that little band which has done her so much service, though they are continually pretending that they do not intend to serve her, but it is strange that with all their declarations they are sending her over members, I may say, week by week at the present juncture. My Christian friends, I may say, that she now parades everywhere her fooleries and her fopperies. So we saw in Manchester, not long ago; there was an immense procession, pouring its long train through our streets, headed by banners and led on with music, sweeping all before it, so that a Protestant could not pass along the pathway. And there were lambs, and crosses, and pictures, and all the absurd paraphernalia of idolatry; and this, in the broad eye of heaven, and amidst the Protestant population of our great manufacturing metropolis! And then, to crown the whole, they placed upon the ground where the chapel is to be built, a great seven feet high cross-the emblem of their idolatary. For, however we may love the cross, as a remembrancer of the sacrifice that was made upon it, when the

cross comes to be put instead of the sacrifice, and the emblem instead of the great antitype, then we are disposed to regard the holy symbol with horror; and, like Hezekiah, with that which was the type of the cross, the brazen serpent, who, when it came to be worshipped, brake it in pieces, and branded it as Nehushtan-that thing of brass; so would we call the mere material cross that thing of wood, if it is to come between the sinner and the atonement, that was offered upon it on Calvary. And some of our honest Protestant operatives-I have no doubt it was their work-went and wrote upon their cross in large characters, Nehushtan; and there it appeared in the morning with its proper name upon it.

But the Romanists are exhibiting their boldness and effrontery, still further, in the way in which they dare to treat Protestants even in England. Why, when the Protestants at Bradford had a procession, with no obnoxious pictures, no crucifixes, but with simple music, what was the consequence? A number of Romanists set upon the poor musicians, broke their instruments, and murdered one poor man upon the spot. And this in England! free-born England! Ah! my friends, the Irish Papists will by and by, if you do not look well to it, Englishmen, be like the cuckoo that lays its eggs in the sparrow's nest, and thrusts out the poor confiding sparrow in the end. Ay, and the combinations of Ireland are spreading throughout England. We have our Ribbon conspiracy; we have our Hibernian Brothers, in London and in Manchester, and throughout the country, ready to cooperate with the Irish Papists, if ever the occasion serves, when Chartism, and anarchy and Popery may make common cause, to break in upon the liberties and the constitution of England.

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I will give you a scene, that occurred in the largest chapel in Manchester not long ago-a scene that is worthy to be known, as showing that we are bringing no railing accusation" against Rome. It is not long since, that an announcement was made, that in the principal mass-house in Manchester, there would be high mass celebrated for O'Connell on the ensuing Sunday; that there would be prayer offered up to God on his behalf. This was all very right, on their own principles; I am not blaming them for that; but I leave you to judge what those principles are, which lead men to think it right so to do. It was announced also, that an address would be given, on the state of Ireland, by the principal priest. A considerable detachment of one of our regiments, to

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