If the peculiarities of the author's religious thinking be inquired after :-he is a member and friend of the Church of England, he hopes for her durability; but not, if, unlike all other national institutions, she be immutable. He wishes that, like the constitution of his country, she may last for ever; but he wishes that, like the same constitution, she may grow with the growth of the people to whom she belongs.

If pressed further on the articles of his creed, he will say nothing. Too much mischief has already been done in the world by dogmatizing. Were he to embody a single article in terms, he would be immediately, either with the supporters or opponents of the Church, embarked in what he declines, polemics.

Finally, his only aim is to raise the rough ore of the word of God in such a manner, that the genuine metal may be obvious, leaving every man to deduce and refine for himself.

It now only remains to add a word as to the machinery of the book. Every verse

illustrated is set down at the top of the page, and the line, in which every verse commences to be illustrated, is successively marked by a pair of dots.. in the right margin. As it is often difficult to determine to which verse the additional illustrative matter should exclusively belong, and indeed impossible, for such additional illustrative matter is frequently shared by more than one contiguous verse or passage, the position of the dots will perhaps be occasionally thought incorrect. The first pair of dots in the right margin answers with the second verse named at the top of the page, except where the last verse of the preceding page happened to conclude that page.

There will be some trouble where two or more verses, which is not unfrequently the case, are mixed up together in the illustra, tion, they are all set down at the top of the page, the same as if they were separately illustrated, and the pair of dots marking the commencement of such combinations is the same as those marking the commencement of single verses; so that the reader will not, from

any thing immediately before him, be able to distinguish such combined verses.

At the end of the book therefore there is a list of all the combinations.

It will be observed that the last verse set down at the top of a page, unless it is finished in the page, is always repeated at the top of the next page, and that, where that verse is combined with one or more verses, the whole combination, unless finished in the page in which it commences, is repeated at the top of the next page.

The following passage from "Paley's Horæ Paulina," will be much more acceptable to the reader than any thing contained in this preface, and will be equally introductory to the ensuing work:

"St. Paul's letters furnish evidence (and what better evidence than a man's own letters can be desired?) of the soundness and sobriety of his judgment. His caution in distinguishing between the occasional suggestions of inspiration, and the ordinary exercise of his natural understanding, is without ex

His

ample in the history of human enthusiasm. His morality is every where calm, pure, and rational; adapted to the condition, the activity, and the business of social life, and of its various relations; free from the over-scrupulousness and austerities of superstition, and from, what was more perhaps to be apprehended, the abstractions of quietism, and the soarings and extravagances of fanaticism. judgment concerning a hesitating conscience; his opinion of the moral indifferency of many actions, yet of the prudence and even the duty of compliance, where non-compliance would produce evil effects upon the minds of the persons who observed it, is as correct and just as the most liberal and enlightened moralist could form at this day. The accuracy of modern ethics has found nothing to amend in these determinations."

SPROUGHTON,
SUFFOLK.

I ROMANS, CHAP. I. V. 1, 2, 3, 4.

PAUL, a servant of Jesus Christ, chosen for an apostle by special appointment, singled out for the office of proclaiming God's blessed message, writes to the disciples at Rome.

God had before promised this message through.. his prophets in holy writings, that related to his Son Jesus Christ. The holy writings alluded to, among many others, were such as the following-"Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee," again " I will give to thee the sure mercies of David," and again, "Thou shalt not suffer thy holy one to see corruption."

Jesus Christ, in conformity with these.. writings as inheritor of the sure mercies of David derived his carnal existence from a natural birth in the lineage of David, being son of David according to natural extraction, or according to a legal tie connecting him to David his earthly progenitor. In conformity also..

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