people, their cattle and substance, all with them as a prey. He pursued them, and guided by an Egyptian who belonged to the party, but had fallen in the rear sick, he came on them and recaptured all they had taken, uninjured, besides so great a spoil, as enabled him to send presents to the elders of the chief towns of Judah, who had assisted him in his extremities. An Amalekite, hoping for a reward from David, brought him the first intelligence of the sad issue of the battle, and claimed the honour of dispatching Saul. Alas, how little he understood of the character of David, to imagine this would commend him to his favour! He was put to death, as guilty, on his own confession, of murder and treason: and David gave vent to his grief for Saul, whom he respected, and his sorrow for Jonathan whom he ardently loved, in one of the most beautiful and touching elegies ever written. With this elegy, slightly varied from our common translation, we will conclude the present paper. O beauteous antelope of Israel, Tell it not in Gath; We return now to behold the end of Saul. It was inglorious, but indicated the presence of much personal bravery. Alarmed at the hosts the Philistines brought against Israel, and not answered by the Lord who had rejected him, when he enquired, he had recourse to another and darker power. He went by night in disguise to a woman with a familiar spirit: a priestess of Ob, or a serpent, another form for devil worship. How have the mighty fallen! An appearance of Samuel was permitted to come to him, a circumstance which seems to have startled the woman herself, though some suppose an evil spirit personated the prophet; and it told him, that on the morrow he and his sons and his host would fall before the Philistines. This gloomy intelligence filled Saul with such sorrow and alarm that he sunk speechless and overwhelmed on the earth, and, after the priestess had given him a refreshment, though not a penitent, with dejected steps he retraced his path to the camp. The fatal day of battle arrived. Saul and his sons, like bold and valiant men, were in 'the high places of the field,' but they were overpowered by their foes. The army was routed; Jonathan slain; and Saul, to avoid being killed by a Philistine, fell on his own sword. The Philistines made a triumph with Saul's armour, and placed it with his head in the temple of Dagon. They dishonoured his body and those of his sons, by fastening them on the walls of Bethshan. The men of Jabesh-Gilead, mindful of their early obligations to Saul, boldly crossed the Jordan, and came in the night unto the city of the Philistines, and took away the bodies that they might receive a decent burial; and then fasted and mourned for him seven days. Such was the end of the first king of the Hebrews! He was brave, but impetuous; at times devout, but not of a right spirit for the important and peculiar position in which Providence placed him as king in Israel. Proclaim it not in the streets of Askelon; Ye mountains of Gilboa, Nor pastures sustaining offerings: The shield of the mighty, the shield of Saul, From the blood of warriors, Saul and Jonathan ! Mutual love united them in life, They were swifter than eagles! Pierced on thine own mountains, How are the mighty fallen! AMERICAN BAPTIST CHURCHES. (No. II.) AMONG American Baptists the pastoral office is merely nominal; the relation of a pastor to a church is not expected to continue long; the love of change and novelty prevails in churches as well as in the community generally. Many causes have been assigned for this state of things; it is usually admitted to be an evil. Much has been said and written to remove it, but to no purpose. From two to three years is the average duration of the pastoral charge, and in very many instances pastors remove yearly. I doubt whether, in the state of New York, ten Baptist ministers can be found who have occupied their present places ten years. The phrase "hire a minister," is as common as hire a man, or a horse, or a house, or any thing else that is to be had for money. I have discovered very little of that consciousness of divine guidance in directing a church to a suitable pastor, or a minister to a field of labour, which would tend to make the union of pastor and church permanent and sacred. Churches seem to regard ministers merely as servants of the churches, having no interest in them beyond what they are paid for. So long as a minister answers the purpose for which he was called, and no one is offended with him, so long is he a good minister; but should one or two take a dislike to him, either because he is too plain in speech, or too practical in his preaching, or too-anything else, from which offence may be taken, the movement begins which is to issue in his removal: a party is formed, and the work commences; if nothing can be found against his character, that will not make the antipathy less, they can starve him out, and should the persons be inquired of, why they refuse to assist in his support, the answer "He is not the man for us," or "I do not like him," or some such answer amounting to "I do not like thee, Doctor Fell; is all that can be obtained. The minister must go, rather than the church lose two or three who are able to subscribe ten dollars a year. 66 But This course is far too common. I fancy you are ruminating upon "the purpose for which he was called," and wondering what it means. It may mean many things. He may have been called because he was “a thorough going total abstinence man," and the leading members in the church wished to have a "total abstinence church," and make the teetotal pledge a test of membership. He may be a "red hot abolitionist," whose preaching is strongly spiced with invectives against slavery and the south. Or he may be great in the "moral reform cause," and often exhibit the abominable details of seduction and brothels; or any individual sin, against which the cry of the times is directed. When such objects are effected through his influence, or if he fail in accomplishing them, he must remove; the Church can meet and vote to dismiss him, and he must go. On the other hand, too many ministers seem to regard the churches with which they are connected merely as a stopping place, or point of observation, which they intend to occupy until something better presents itself; something better means a more popular, a more wealthy, or a more numerous church; in which case they are ready to remove, send in their resignations, and away they go to occupy another point of observation, and in a short time to move again. Such scenes as the above are of much too frequent occurrence, and they are the things which first arrest the attention, and by some are regarded as the exponent of the whole. I do not wish you to think so, though I present these irregularities, and call them iniquitous proceedings, upon which the Head of the church must frown. I suppose that the customs of the country have contributed not a little to this state of things. You know that the habits of a country influence even religious societies, and the aspect of the Christian Church. If, early in the history of Christianity, the church adopted the hierarchical notions of heathenism, and in the end became like it incorporated with the state, and obtained its Pontifex Maximus, need we wonder if in democratic states, where all officers are chosen either directly or indirectly by the people, and for very short periods, these habits should insinuate themselves into Christian churches, and especially into Baptist churches, which are confessedly democratic. I cannot but regard this as the primary cause, connected with such secondary ones as may be deduced from what I have before stated, of producing the practice of "living by the year,"-a practice, not universal indeed, but very common, and very prolific of evils alike to ministers and churches. Judging from appearances, I think we Baptists are fast hastening to the opposite extreme of popery papists regard the clergy as the church, we seem to be approaching the position that the clergy are no part. of the church; and as popery fleeced or flattered the people, who were merely the tail of the beast, according to its pleasure, so our democratic churches seem disposed to countenance or kick their ministers, as may best comport with the united wisdom of the incertum vulgus. One of the secondary causes, (some think it the primary one,) of the uncertain tenure of the pastoral office, is the labours of men who have obtained the name of Evangelists; these are sometimes called revival preachers, not a few of whom when they go to hold a series of meetings, a meeting of days, or a protracted meeting, (all these names are used,) steal away the affections of the people from their pastor, while they usurp his place for the time they labour, sometimes almost insult him in the presence of his church and congregation, and when they have collected and brought into the church many both good and bad, leave the poor pastor to regain the affections of the church if he can, and to perform all the drudgery of cleansing the Augean stable they have left behind; in doing which the pastor too often is met and frowned upon by those who have received from his lips the sincere milk of the word, and who are determined upon his removal. These Evangelists are supposed to do a great deal of good, but whether more of good than evil is a problem upon which many ininds are at work. I was credibly informed not long since of a pastor of high standing and influence, who had been twice prevailed upon to admit Evangelists; both times he did it reluctantly: at the close of the labours of the second revival preacher, the pastor said to him, "I gave you my affection, you have trampled upon it. I gave you my confidence, you have betrayed it. I gave you my pulpit, and you have disgraced it." If it were so, it was not a solitary instance :-but enough for the present. You may think this a gloomy picture: it is; I wish it were not a faithful one: the bright side has to come. I do not wish to extenuate, nor set down aught in malice; but to present what I have seen and heard from good men and true. ZENAS. REVIEW. THE SACRAMENTS. An inquiry into the symbolic institutions of the christian religion, usually called, The Sacraments. By ROBERT HALLEY, D. D. Part I. Baptism. 8vo. pp. 620. Price 14s. THE Congregational Lecture was established for the purpose of advancing the interests of religious truth in connection with the Independents; and though the committee of the Congregational Library, with whom rests the selection of lecturers, &c., in their prospectus, declare, that whatever responsibility may attach to the reasoning or opinions advanced in any course of lectures, belongs exclusively to the lecturer,' yet the fact, that the lecturers are selected for their 'literary attainments and ministerial reputation,' and that the arrangements of the committee secure the publication of each separate course,' VOL. 7.-N. S. H certainly invest the general doctrine of these lectures with a kind of denominational sanction. Ridiculous,' as Dr. Morison may affect to regard this idea, there is something in it which cannot be entirely explained away. If the lectures be controversial, the lecturer is put forth as a champion; and if he succeed according to the wishes of his adherents, great and glorious is the flourish of trumpets heard on the occasion. And, in the present instance, we should not have been so repeatedly told that the Cogregational Lectures do not occupy a kind of au. thoritative standing' amongst the brethren, if there was not something in Dr. Halley's lectures which greatly disturbed them. Our readers will misunderstand us, if this reference leads them to think that Dr. Halley is either a feeble or a contemptible polemic. He is neither. He comes to his engagement as well equipped for the conflict as can perhaps be desired. But he demolishes so completely some of the old established defences of infant baptism, under the full conviction that they are worthless and unsafe, that their adherents are filled with alarm for their position; and though they may bestow considerable laudation on some parts of his performance, they are not able to conceal their chagrin, that the sweep of their champion's weapon, comes more fearfully in contact with themselves than with their opponents. The lectures of Dr. Halley are therefore more likely to provoke a reply from polemics of his own party, than from ours. If he had no expectation' of being brought by the subject of these lectures into collision with the opinions of the Baptist denomination;' still less, we presume, did he anticipate that he should have to wage a conflict with those of his own. But we apprehend his fiercest assailants will be from the midst of his own camp. 6 We proceed to the brief examination of this volume, regretting that the lecturer has not completed his argument on baptism, and also that the price at which the volume is published, is such as to prevent the major part, both of Baptists and Pædobaptists, from purchasing it. It contains about half the matter of Dr. Carson's, and is near double the cost. It will be seen from the preface, that the object proposed to be attained by Dr. Halley, is not to demonstrate the absolute rightfulness of infant sprinkling, but to set up a passable defence for it. If I can succeed,' he remarks, 'in convincing our Baptist brethren, not that we are right, but that we have a case which honest men may honestly maintain without being chargeable with criminally resisting the truth, so that churches have no authority to prescribe any regulation upon the mode or subjects of baptism, my chief object in pursuing this controversy will be attained.' But this over careful and modest form of taking his ground, so widely different both in tone and temper, from other redoubtable champions of the cause, will un. avoidably be regarded as indicative of some misgivings as to the cause itself. Dr. Halley's first lecture is on the term 'sacrament,' and the several institutions to which it has been appropriated. This is an able, interesting, and instructive lecture, and with the lengthened notes in the appendix, is deserving the attention of the student of ecclesiastical antiquity and errors. We wish Dr. Halley had repudiated the use of the term altogether, in connection with the ordinances of christianity. It is heathenish in its origin, and is more adapted to be a covert to error, than an index of truth. The per. petuity and design of the sacraments,' is the 6 subject of the second lecture. Regarding baptism and the Lord's-supper as symbolical services, and of perpetual obligation in the christian church, the Doctor proceeds to refute the objections of the Quakers to these ordinances. Here, incidentally, he rejects, for six valid reasons, the rendering of the commission given by a distinguished writer in the Congregational Magazine, viz. Go forth, and make disciples of all nations, purifying them for the Father,' &c. Having disposed, very satisfactorily of the errors of the Friends, Dr. H. proceeds to the consideration of the design of these institutions. The conferring of grace in the sacraments, the opus operatum of the papists; the modifications of this error maintained in the church of England, and the Lutheran churches; and the doctrine of the Puritans, Scotch Presbyterians, and many foreign protestants of the Calvinistic churches,' that the sacraments are federal rites, ratifications of the evangelical cove. nant, made to those who profess to receive it, upon the supposition that their faith is sincere, and so insuring to them all the bless. ings which are promised to believers,' are rejected, as not agreeing with the symbolical character of religious rites, and as opposed to the great doctrine of justification by faith without works. Having in this general manner, disposed of preliminary matter, Doctor Halley proceeds more immediately to the business of the present volume. The order in which he takes up his subjects is the following:-Jewish baptism-John's baptism -baptismal regeneration-the mode of christian baptism- the subjects of christian baptism. In the lecture on Jewish proselyte baptisms, Dr. Halley inclines to the opinion, that they existed previous to the time of our Lord, and infers that the Jews were accustomed to baptize the infants of proselytes together with their parents, and therefore, that as christian baptism agrees in many particulars with the Jewish, assumes that there is some ground for the presumption that christians were accustomed to baptize the children of believers. But on inferences so remote, and deduced from premises so doubtful, it is scarcely necessary to offer any remark. If the premises were sustained by clear historical evidence, which Dr. Halley does not make apparent, or even firmly believe, it would still be a matter of grave discussion, whether any Jewish practice could be referred to as authoritatively binding us in the interpretation of a positive and clearly definable christian institute. On John's baptism, the main argument of Dr. Halley may be stated in the words of the late Daniel Isaac:- John baptized believers and unbelievers, and "a generation of vipers;" and we may do the same.' Dr. H., in support of the indiscriminate administra tion of John's baptism, relies mainly on the expressions, "There went out to him all the land of Judea, and they of Jerusalem, and were all baptized of him in the river of Jordan;' and he therefore seeks to explain away the force of the objection of John, 'When he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth, therefore, fruits meet for repentance,' &c. If words have meaning, surely these strong words constituted an objection to the baptism of these persons. Why should John refer to repentance, if there was no profession of it connected with the reception of his baptism? And why, in the case of these self-righteous men and sceptics, did he require more than ordinary proof of it? That John did baptize many who were not sincere penitents, there can be little doubt; but that he baptized any who did not 'confess their sins,' and thus make a profession of repentance, is contrary to the express tes. timony of the evangelical record. We are as distinctly told that they confessed their sins,* as we are informed that they were baptized; and the mode of argumentation adopted by Dr. Halley, in which he insists on the literal exactness of the former clause, and attempts to elide the latter, does not well comport with his professions of candour. The presence of the clause, 'confessing their sins,' is fatal to his case. The subsequent part of this lecture is devoted to the proof that John's baptism produced no moral or spiritual benefits on its recipients-a proposition, against which no serious objection can be advanced. The lecture on baptismal regeneration is a satisfactory and able refutation of the various forms of that absurd and pernicious dogma, and is highly deserving the attention, not only of the Tractarians, against whom it is mainly directed, but also of many others, not even excepting many Wesleyans and Congregationalists, whose theories and statements seem to imply that some moral benefit, or spiritual privilege, is conferred on infants who are submitted to it. With the argument of this excellent lecture every Baptist will be delighted. The longest and most elaborate lecture of the series, is that devoted to the mode of baptism. After stating his conviction, that the administrator of christian baptism is bound by the authority of the commission to mention the names of the triune Jehovah, the Dr. proceeds to the question:-' Is it indispensable, in the administration of this rite, to immerse the subject? We believe that immersion is not indispensable, that pouring or sprinkling is sufficient to constitute the christian rite, which is the emblem * Matt. iil. 6, and Mark i. 5. 1 of the cleansing of the heart by the truth and Spirit of Christ.' He then goes on to argue, that 'to immerse, unless we think it obliga. tory, for the sake of union, would be, as we conscientiously believe, to concede a principle of more importance than baptism itself." The principle, that, if a man believes sprinkling with water to be christian baptism,' it is so to him, and ought to be acknowledged to be so by others, the Doctor regards as being 'the very life of all obedience to positive institutions,' and as creating the only interest' he feels 'in the controversy respecting the mode of baptism.' This he illustrates and maintains by a reference to the fact, that different kinds of bread and wine may be used at the Lord's-table, and yet the ordinance of the Lord's-supper may be duly administered. But this principle, even with Dr. Halley, has its limitations; for he remarks, I have no hesitation in saying, I do not regard the sacrifice of the mass by a Romanist, as the commemoration of the death of Christ, because I do not believe that any christian man could, with due diligence, honestly arrive at such conclusion.' But, that there are Romanists who as firmly believe in the mass as Dr. Halley does in sprinkling, cannot, we apprehend, be disproved. We do not believe that any one sprinkled in his infancy, has been scripturally baptized; and the papist has as much right to modify the ordinance of the Lord's-supper as the pædobaptist has that of baptism. Besides, the whole of the reasoning is a fallacy. No Baptist wishes any one to submit to the sacred rite except on conviction. Do infants thus submit to this rite? Can they understand the very life of all obedience to positive institutions'? Do they honestly believe sprinkling with water to be christian baptism'? and attend to it in 'conscientious obedience to Christ'? If they do, half our objection to infant sprinkling is done away with. The whole of this argument has no bearing on its infant recipients. Nor is the sentiment given in connection with this reasoning, one which indicates a state of mind most likely to discover and follow simple truth. I do not believe,' says Dr. H., 'the apostle Paul, were he now living upon earth, would think it worth his while to decide the question between the immersionists and the sprinklers.' But our author ventures still further. He argues, that we have full liberty, according to the principles of interpretation stated in the New Testament, in construing the words which relate to a positive institution, to consider its nature and design, and, preserving the integrity of the emblem, to adopt, in exhibiting it, any mode which is in ac. cordance with its nature, and by which its design may be carried into effect.' The italics are ours. Where he obtains this full |