and faith, very few honest men will pay them any regard. When the gentlemen of your order took the trouble to collect the canonical books of Scripture, did not the civil powers pay them for their pains? Counciis seldom assembled but at a great expence to the public; and Bishops were never such fools as to travel at their own expence, unless when they could not help it. I would desire your friend Sarpedon to tell us no more of the succession of a church, with power to establish articles, unless he takes in the whole community of believers into the idea; and even all they have a right to do is to make the best they can of the articles which Christ and his apostles have already formed to their hands. If it were necessary to pursue Sarpedon very close, he might be required to prove from the nature of Christ's kingdom, and the account which revelation gives of a church, that any number of clergymen can be a church, he will not find such an idea in the whole New Testament. The apostles themselves did not assume that title when they were assembled, but considered themselves as only members of the church where they were. Suppose that all the Cardinals and Bishops of the church of Rome were assembled, with the Pope at their head, they could not with any propriety be called the Church of Rome; they could only be an ecclesia of clergy: a Christian church has a far more extensive idea. The two houses of convocation of England are not the Church of England, nor even the representatives of that church; they only represent some of the clergy. I am not sure if the poor curates have any representation; but I am sure that the people have none in either of these houses. It argues great officiousness, my Lords, in you and your brethren, to pretend to do men's business without their consent; and great ambition to pretend to be their masters, without any just right or authority. It is a burden grievous to be borne," for men to be obliged to commit their spiritual concerns to persons they cannot trust nor confide in; who, instead of seeking to save their souls, prey upon their substance, and riot in their possessions.

One grievous burden you lay upon our shoulders is yourselves; the majority of the nation reckon you a heavy burden, and long to be freed from you. Your extravagant incomes might do much good; your Lordships devour more in a year than all the clergy of Scotland. And yet the people there are as nice and intelligent, and know more of religion, than the greatest part of the people in any of your dioceses; even the poor Dissenters within your own bounds will compare with any of your people, who are immediately under your very noses. Is it not, Most Reverend and Right Reverend Fathers in, a burden grievous to be borne, to see a man, who never preaches above once a year, devour twelve or fifteen thousand pounds per annum, and one who drudges from day to day not have as much as will keep his family from rags, nor himself from beggary? You say that it is

the

the constitution: may Heaven soon dissolve it; for God never made it. You know this, gentlemen, as well as I; your consciences have told it you a thousand times; but honour, power, and luxury, have rendered you callous to all conviction.

It is a burden grievous to be borne, and which you never touch with one of your fingers, though you lay it on, I mean your Spiritual Courts. In these you reign like lions in their dens, and tear to pieces all who have the misfortune to fall under your power. Your courts resemble the fabled castles of the giants, where nothing is to be seen but the spoils of victims devoured by your merciless hands. Woe to the man who enters within your spiritual dominions! for though his soul can never be the better by any thing you can do, his body, his interest, and substance, shall be considerably worse. Ye culprits, who have ever been within the walls of these inquisitions, say, What help, what aid, did you receive from the fingers of the Bishops? was not his little finger heavier than the loins of your Saviour, who is all mercy and goodness? What do you think of his Chancellor, Proctors, and Apparitors? Saw you any mercy in their visage, or clemency in their looks? Nay, nay; every one would look for his gain from his quarter, as long as you had a farthing. His Lordship's finger would not ease your burden, nor mitigate your ne, however grievous to be borne.

The Articles, Liturgy, and Athanasian Creed, are heavy burdens, and grievous to be endured, which you zealously bind on other men's shoulders, though you give them nothing for bearing them. You do not add twenty pounds a year to the living of a poor Curate for subscribing and reading these badges of superstition. If a man is so obliging as to sell you his conscience, you ought undoubtedly to keep his teeth going. Many of your underlings would never read nor subscribe a single article of those fopperies, were it not for a little temporary enjoyment,-and far too small, my Lords, for so much obedience. If they would cleave to the Lord Jesus Christ, he would reward. them better for their service. You ought to consider them: many of them are dutiful creatures, and obey your mandates with great punctuality; but it is hard to perform such disagreeable business for such puny rewards. A little help would be of some service; a hundred instead of forty pounds a year would make the Athanasian Creed go better down: you can easily afford it out of so many thousands. I wonder much, considering the temper of the times, that there are any creeds read at all; for it is seldom that some churches have any sermons.

The damnation of your Creed is grievous to be borne; who can rehearse it without saying, Miserere, Domine! I wonder you are not ashamed to deal so often in unreasonable damnation. Shall all men be damned who do not believe the Athanasian Creed? then all the apostles are in a miserable situation. Your Lordships, I am afraid, will stand a poor chance. Ask your con

sciences

science if you believe it. Horresco referens, est horribile dictu. If all who do not believe this unscriptural creed shall perish eternally, who then can be saved? for never a son of Adam was able to believe it. Jesus Christ himself could not believe it; for it is not true, and he could not believe a falsehood. It is a burden, my Lords, it is a grievous burden; and it is unreasonable for you to bind it upon any persons. I would not wish the devil to have such a burden. I wish it had only been nonsense; for then we might have laughed at it: but it is fit to spoil any man's mirth to hear the clergy curse so heartily, and all the people say Amen." Bless, and curse not," is the true maxim; it is a glorious maxim, a God-like maxim. The other is devilish-like, wicked, and abominable. Pray remove this burden altogether; touching it with your finger will not do; it will burn you, it will set all your lawn sleeves in a flame, if you come near it. Noli me tangere is its motto. Read, and take warning before it is too late, Test what came upon the Jewish priests come upon you; which God of his infinite mercy prevent. Amen.

SERMON II,

MATTHEW, Xxiii. 4.

For they bind heavy burdens, and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.

ONE

NE of their fingers would be insufficient to move them; the whole strength of their bodies would not be able to move the burdens they have laid upon others. I heartily wish, and so will every honest man, that the race of the Pharisees had never survived the destruction of Jerusalem, but had been consumed in the temple, when the Roman soldiers set it on fire. The world had been well cleared of a race of vermin, which since have not only devoured widows' houses, but have preyed on every house and cottage in the world, wherever they have had power. They have infested the world almost in all quarters, and have changed themselves into every shape. They have assumed the shape of Bishops, Patriarchs, Metropolitans, Cardinals, and Popes, and will turn any thing, to serve their own ends and purposes. The Almighty seems to have sent them as a scourge to punish all nations who have not valued those liberties and privileges which he hath bestowed upon them.

The persons spoken of here were an amphibious kind of creatures, partly laymen and partly clergymen; they were something

something like what you would call a Rector or Vicar made Justice of the Peace, or a Bishop made a Baron; they belonged to both states, that they might devour the profits of both. They had a sort of double authority: as priests, they could shut men out of the kingdom of heaven; and as lawyers and civil officers, they could banish them from this world. It was dangerous to disoblige them: for if any one happened to offend them, and fell under their curses, they had no privilege in things civil; they were like men excommunicated in the Bishops' courts, who cannot sue for their civil rights till their Lordships loose their sentence. They had the whole credenda of the nation under their controul, and no man durst pretend to believe a single sentence without their good licence. They had the sole power of all the synagogues in the kingdom; and could likewise licence gin-shops. They were a strange sort of beings, they were exceedingly like to English Bishops.

In the first place, Because they were the creatures of the King, or the civil power. In the days of our Saviour, the Romans made any one high-priest whom they pleased. The Tetrarch had a power to do it; and Josephus tells us, that Herod transferred the priesthood from Jonathan to his brother Theophilus; and Agrippa took away the priest-hood from Jesus the son of Gamaliel, and gave it to Matthias the son of Theophilus. This shews that the high-priests among the Jews were not now of divine institution, but creatures of human policy. While they continued upon the plan of their original institution, none of the kings of Judah could remove them; but after they turned Pharisees, they became mere creatures of the state. This, an't please your Reverences, shews, that when the clergy join with the kingdoms of this world, the Lord Jesus Christ will have no more to do with them. I have seen in some of the printed sermons of the Bishops and clergy some hard sayings against the Scribes and Pharisees: but these preachers did not consider that they were abusing their betters, and their fathers too. There never were in the world, believe me, my dear Doctors, a set of men more zealous for church authority, for tithes,-for the rights of the clergy, for keeping the common people in subjection,-for persecuting Dissenters,for an established church, and the Lord knows what. They were zealous, like you, for human Articles also.

I observed that the ancient Jewish priests, the Pharisees, were creatures; and what could they be else? But the Lord never made them; they were exactly like our English Bishops, creatures of civil authority. No man need to wonder that they were dutiful to the powers of this earth; for it is some way natural for creatures to worship their Creator. This very morning all the birds in this wild aviary are expressing the feelings of gratitude to Him that made them. I do not mean, my Lords, that they do it so politely as Lords Spiritual, nor use so much

ceremony

ceremony as a Bishop does, when he is admitted into the Royal presence, to shew his gratitude for his preferment; but they do it in a way which is far better-they do it from the heart. The rooks on the old trees before my window, the blackbird in the garden-hedge, the thrush and linnet on the spray, with all the rural concert of feathered songsters, would do one's heart good to hear how gladsome they are to praise their Creator for the pleasing enlivening beams of the morning-sun. The ewes and lambkins on the banks of the rivulet, the cattle on yonder. meadow, all seem pleased, and, according to their different manners, praise the Lord that made them. No signs of ambition, except to please, appear among them. The fox, who just now issued forth from among the brakes and whins, and devoured the tender lamb, and put the flocks in fear, suggested to my mind the idea of a Bishop,-a Priest,-a Pharisee! How slily did he make his approach, as if upon some friendly visit, till he was within reach of his unhappy victim, which he devoured without mercy, as the Pharisees did widows' houses, or as Commissaries or Proctors devour the substance of poor culprits in the spiritual courts. This was paying devotion to the belly, like those who make it their god, and who mind earthly things. It is a disgraceful thing to live on the vitals of others, like foxes, wolves, and kites. It is their nature, to be sure, to live on the ruins of other creatures; but it is not the nature of man, God made man upright. All similitude between man and ravenous animals is a perversion of their nature.

When I observe that there is an exact agreement between Bishops and the ancient Jewish Priests, I would not be understood as if I meant those under the theocracy while the Lord was among the people; there does not appear to be the least resemblance between those officers of God's appointment and our Clergy. Those sons of Levi were called and appointed by God himself, and were priests by a divine ordinance. Both they and the Kings of Israel were appointed by the authority of heaven, and made each a part of the theocracy. When they continued in this channel, and fulfilled the laws of the theocracy, the Lord acknowledged them, and shewed them favour; but after they obstinately transgressed the laws which God, as their King, had given them, and walked according to their own vain imaginations, he forsook them, and no more acknowledged them for his people; yet they did not give up their claims, when God gave them up, but endeavoured to support their claim to God as their God, and to the distinguishing privileges which, as a nation, they had formerly enjoyed. But, alas! they had lost their right, which rendered their claim absurd and ridiculous. When the Messiah, who was the end of their law, was come, it was wicked and impious to support their hierarchy. All dominion in matters of conscience now centered in Jesus; the dominion of the priesthood, as well as the royal authority,

rested