grateful allegiance to our venerable SOVEREIGN, who ever revered the sanctity of his CORONATION-OATH, yet survive in any Protestant heart; if attachment to the REGENT, who has made a glorious stand against the partizans of the Roman Catholic Claims, and the apologists for modern Popery (as if it were possible for Popery to change its nature), glow in any bosom; if a love of the laws and immunitics of England, the envy of the world, can yet prompt any one to maintain their established safeguard, the Protestant Religion, and a Protestant Succession to the Crown, we call upon all such to second our efforts, and to aid us in this great controversy, provoked by the Papists themselves. We know that the Protestant cause numbers many such friends as those to whom we make our appeal; and proud shall we be of the office of presenting their literary productions to the world at large. If our summons be regarded, and we are confident that our sincerity must give importance to our Address, and add a proportionable momentum to our arguments; -we shall presently silence a few wordy Irish barristers and their abettors, on either side of St. George's Channel-we shall soon baffle the attempts of the Popish faction.

The Papists never yet could stand before the Protestant Advocates.Ridley, Latimer, Cranmer!" our hearts burn within us," when we look back upon the overwhelming ability with which you discomfited your antagonists, in the plenitude of their oppressive power; and the Christian fortitude with which you laid down your lives for "the truth as it is in JESUS."-Whilst Jewel's "Apology," and the "Defence of his Apology," remain, we know whither to resort for sound divinity, in venti lating this great question. With Chillingworth's "Religion of Protestants a safe Way to Salvation" in our hands, we have nothing to fear. So much, and far more, for doctrinal Protestant information; as for politico-theological arguments against Popery, which more immediately apply to the present state of things, let us only advert to the great names that appeared in the reign of James II. the last Popish Sovereign of England;-Stillingfleet, Tillotson, Sherlock, Sharpe (then Rector* of St. Giles's), Wake, South, &c,

* See Burnet's History of his own Times, year 1686.

these eminent scholars long ago determined the point (now more daringly mooted) concerning the ancient independence of Britain on the assumed power of Rome; and have fully vindicated the King's supremacy. We doubt not but many of the clergy of the present day will draw their pens on the Roman Catholic Question, and will gladly avail themselves of the channel afforded by the PROTESTANT ADVOCATE, to communicate their papers to the public. The efforts of the clergy, in the year 1686, whilst Popery was contending for the mastery with Protestantism, were followed with the happiest consequences. "Many of the clergy set themselves to study the points of controversy and upon that," says Barnet,* "there followed a great variety of small books, that were easily purchased, and soon read. They examined all the points of Popery with a solidity of judg ment, a clearness of arguing, a depth of learning, and a vivacity of writing, far beyond any thing that had before that time. appeared in our language." The clergy, at present, may save themselves the labour of printing and dispersing the tracts which they think proper to compose. Our work will afford an easy vehicle for giving them publicity.

. Having mentioned the conduct of the clergy, generally, on the eve of the Revolution, we must be indulged the gratification of stating, particularly, that of the bishops. Seven of our prelates petitioned James II. against the dispensing power which he claimed of releasing the Papists from the operation of the penal laws and the test; and told him, respecting his "Declaration for Liberty of Conscience," (liberty of conscience, granted by a Papist!) that they could not + "in prudence, honour, or conscience, so far make themselves parties to it, as the distribution of it all over the nation, and the solemn publication of it once and again, even in God's house, and in the time of his divine service, must amount to, in common and reasonable construction." Here let us

inscribe their names: WILLIAM SANCROFT, Archbishop of Canterbury; THOMAS KENN, Bishop of Bath and Wells; JOHN LAKE, Bishop of Chichester; THOMAS WHITE, Bishop of Peterborough; FRANCIS TURNER, Bishop of Ely; WILLIAM LLOYD,

Bishop of St. Asaph; and JONATHAN TRELAWNY, Bishop of Bristol. These were conscientious men, indeed; for although they made this glorious stand against Popery, the first-named five conceived themselves so bound by having sworn allegiance to James, that they suffered themselves to be deprived of their sees, rather than take the oath to William. Bis martyrizati; they endured persecution for the sake of the King's supremacy, even when it was surrendered by the King himself; and afterwards gave up their bishopricks, out of a religious regard for allegiance.-Poor Sancroft, endued with passive fortitude, was deficient in active courage. Where that good man once sat, in the metropolitan church of Canterbury, we are happy to see a SUTTON now seated. Educated in the same college with his predecessor, he possesses an equal veneration for the Religion and Constitution of his country; and is blessed with a firmer system of nerves. Having drunk of the water of life at the same fountain with himself, long have we known him; and ever have we respected him. He is a man of high birth, and most affable demeanour. His learning and his talents are unquestionable; and both derive value from his admirable moderation; but he has often shewn himself to be no temporizer; and whenever the real interests of the state, or the church, have been placed in circumstances of hazard, he has never shrunk from standing forward in their defence.

In the days of James, a timid creature was Bishop of Durham -Crewe;-weak as a rush, he was swayed by every wind which swept the face of the country at that stormy period. But where Crewe's vacillating imbecility disgraced the character of a Protestant Bishop, a BARRINGTON now wears the mitre; who has ever been a fast friend to the Church of England, and a powerful champion in the Protestant cause. But we exceed our limits. We will not further particularize. The charges of several of our prelates, touching the Roman Catholic Question, noticed in this first number of the PROTESTANT ADVOCATE, prove that they have not been slumbering in their episcopal chairs; but that, alert in the discharge of their high duties, they have sounded an alarm to their clergy, and have put the laity on their guard. This publication shall ever be ready, with fervent gratitude, to acknowledge their services to the Protestant interest.

Sermons, Charges, and Tracts, now first collected into a Volume ;by Shute, Bishop of Durham.-Cadell and Davics, 1811.

We have read this book with great attention; it has confirmed us in several opinions which we had previously entertained; and it has afforded us instruction on many important points. In the Bishop of Durham we have a steady supporter of the Protestant Religion. He is deeply read, and well studied in the great Question which has been so long agitated; and his work affords many proofs of extensive knowledge of the subject, and furnishes many instances of uncommon acuteness of reasoning.

We can only notice such parts of the publication as relate to the Roman Catholics, whose lamentable errors were, some time ago, pointed out by this Prelate, as one cause of the contempt of religion on the Continent, and a source of that inundation of infidelity which overspread, in our days, the fairest portion of Christendom; and produced, amongst other deplorable effects, the conspiracy against thrones and altars, the French Revolution, and all the moral and political evils which continue to molest the world. In a Sermon, preached before the House of Lords, on the general fast-day, in the year 1799,

Can it be necessary (said his lordship) to remind any one person who hears me, that tremendous warnings have been given, and continue to be given, to a careless age. A devouring fire is kindled upon the earth. All endeavours, I will not say to check, but to subdue its fury, have hitherto failed. In what direction its flames may next be carried, human foresight is not able to predict. They who are spared have cause to tremble. That sacred voice ought to be still sounding in their ears, "except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish." With deep thankfulness indeed for the mercy by which we have hitherto been protected, and for the opportunity and space for reflection and amendment which have already been vouchsafed to them, still they ought to see their danger as it is they ought to see, that, acting as reasonable men, they can neither dismiss their fears, remit their penitence, nor forget their vows.

A louder call, a more than ordinary alarm was wanting, nay, seems to have hardly been sufficient, to rouse the consciences of a generation brought by a long train of causes to something worse than a neglect, to a declared contempt of religion, and a fixed insensibility to its concerns. What these causes are, it might not be difficult, if it were necessary,

to explain. A form of Christianity exceedingly corrupt, and by its corruptions liable to the objections of thinking men, and still more exposed to the sneers and shafts of infidelity, had obtained an establishment in many of the most powerful nations of Europe. The establishment of the Popish creed, however at first acquired, has been for many years continued on the part of the governments which have adopted it, and of the higher classes of men of the communities in which it prevailed, not from any opinion of its evidence and truth, but from an utter indifference to all religious truth whatever. This appears for some time to have been the disposition of Roman Catholic countries with respect to the religion professed among them. Its effects upon those who conducted public affairs, or who ruled the public manners, were habitual insincerity in themselves, and a neglect of that attention, and of those provisions which are necessary to inculcate the principles of any religion, or to preserve its influence upon the people. I am persuaded that Christianity can exist under no form whatever, in which it will not contain a great deal of what is good. Its lines are so strongly, so plainly, and so deeply inscribed on the tablet, that no injury can entirely efface them. But the want of belief in the truth of the public religion, considered as a system, produced a coldness and aversion towards every part of it; and not only so, but towards the name and thoughts of revealed religion itself. The consequence was, a general omission, or negligent application of those means by which what was good, and true, and of the greatest importance, might, though mixed, it is probable, with erroneous and unauthorized opinions, have been upheld in the minds and hearts of the people. Every thing, in the countries alluded to, operated against Religion. The lower orders observed in their superiors an ill concealed, indeed, a hardly dissembled contempt of the religion of the Country; and no care that had been taken, no education that was given them, supplied principles which might resist the influence of these observations. This state of things can in no country last long; and besides the termination to which it leads, as it affects public institutions, it is sure to induce and leave upon the minds of men a spiritual deadness, a religious torpor, an unconcernedness, which it is extremely difficult to remove; and which it requires perhaps nothing less than some violent shock to remove at all. It is true, that Protestant countries are not in the same situation; but it is far from being true that they have not felt the influence of the same causes; for that rejection of Christianity which. found, not a just, but a natural excuse, in the multiplied additions by which the religion was disguised and deformed, diffused itself by dint of example amongst others, who neither had, nor could have the same grounds of objection. There are no persons in the world, who are more