REVIEW OF SIMEON ON THE LITURGY.*

MR SIMEON is well known as a pious, evangelical, and eloquent preacher, and as the author of different publications, intended as helps to students and young divines in the composition of Sermons. In the former line his popularity is great, and we believe that it is deservedly so. In the latter department, his labours have also met with approbation; and although we do not apprehend that a person will ever become an able or distinguished preacher, by practising upon skeletons prepared to his hand, and have ground to fear that, in many instances, they have proved hindrances instead of helps to composition; yet, we are very far from denying altogether the utility of the design, or wishing to detract from the merits of its execution. The selection of texts is judiciously made; the divisions, although too strongly marked with uniformity on subjects very different, are, in general, simple, natural, and just; and the topics suggested for illustration are scriptural, apposite, and frequently striking. We have no doubt that they have afforded important and

The Excellency of the Liturgy, in Four Discourses, preached before the University of Cambridge, in November 1811. To which is prefixed, An Answer to Dr Marsh's Inquiry respecting "the neglecting to give a Prayer-Book with the Bible." By the Rev. CHARLES SIMEON, M.A., Fellow of King's College, Cambridge. Pp. 111. Cambridge, 1812.

[From the Christian Instructor, Vol. VII., August 1813.]

useful hints to those who have looked into them solely with that view, and not for the purpose of servile adoption; and even when a very different use has been made of them, we have had the satisfaction to know that some congregations have had an opportunity of hearing good orthodox divinity, with which they never would have been edified, but for the Helps to Composition."

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In the present work, Mr Simeon appears before the public in a new character,-for we do not recollect that he has, on any former occasion, distinguished himself as a polemical writer. But though it be among his first essays in this line, it must be confessed that he does not display any symptoms of timidity, having, at the same time, entered the lists against the high church party, in the person of their redoubted champion, Dr Marsh, and against the whole host of Presbyterians, and Protestant Dissenters, in opposition to whom he engages to defend, not only the lawfulness and expediency, but also the excellency of the English Liturgy. This certainly required, on the part of the author, a competent portion of confidence in his own powers, in addition to a thorough conviction of the goodness of the cause in which he had embarked. Notwithstanding this, we entertain strong doubts as to Mr Simeon's being as well qualified for descending into the arena of controversy, as he is for ascending the pulpit. The truth is, that the preacher and the polemic, the orator and the controversialist, are two different characters; and the person who makes a respectable and even a distinguished figure in the former character, may make but a poor and awkward one in the latter. Tillotson could not have written the "Essay on Human Understanding," and Blair was not qualified for managing the controversy against Hume on Miracles. Mr Simeon will not, at least, be offended with our comparisons, especially when we add, that, as far as sentiment is concerned, we prefer his skeletons to the finished pieces of either of these celebrated preachers. The popular, the open, the declamatory style of composition to which public speakers are often habituated, however much it is suited to a promiscuous audience, and how useful soever it may be for ex

plaining and impressing upon their minds great and acknowledged truths, disqualifies them for close argumentation, and for unravelling the intricacies, and exposing the fallacy of sophistical reasoning. Tropes and interrogations, emphatic pauses and expostulations, especially when they are accompanied with the corresponding gesticulations and tones, have a powerful effect upon hearers; but they lose much of their force when committed to writing, and the sturdy disputant, who often has not a spark of imagination, esteems them no more than the leviathan does brass and iron. Mr Simeon is not unacquainted with the rules of controversial warfare, and he has made abundant use of its tactical terms. He takes his ground, he plants his foot, he challenges-dares—defies his adversary, he questions him, he drives him from every refuge. But amidst these oratorical flourishes (which he might have spared without weakening his argument), we suspect that he more than once throws himself open to an acute and vigilant antagonist. We speak at present of his controversy with Dr Marsh.

The principal object of the tract before us is to establish, "The Excellency of the Liturgy," i. e., the Prayer-book of the Church of England. Our author has chosen as the text of his discourses on this subject, Deut. v. 28, 29,-" They have well said all that they have spoken: O that there were such an heart in them!" Mr Simeon is aware, and he does not pretend to conceal, that these words have no manner of reference to the subject to which he has thought proper to apply them. He tells us, that after considering his text "in its true and proper sense," and after investigating "its hidden import, and spiritual or mystical application," he means to take it "in an improper and accommodated sense, and to notice it in reference to the requests which we from time to time make unto God, in the liturgy of our Established Church." We know that Mr Simeon can plead precedents for this, drawn from the practice of preachers of different ages, and of different communions. But this does not satisfy us as to the propriety or the decency of using a passage of Scripture as a mere motto, or set-off to a dis

course, and after paying our compliments to it, and coldly noticing it in the introduction, to dismiss it altogether in the remaining part of the sermon. Perhaps we are uncharitable, but we confess that when we have met with a text used in this way, and have found the preacher discovering his knowledge of the passage, by first giving its proper sense, and then handling it in a quite different mode, we have been forcibly tempted to suspect, either that he wished an opportunity of displaying his ingenuity, or that he could not find a passage in the Bible which suited his subject. We are not so rigid as to find fault with the occasional use of a phrase or passage of Scripture by way of accommodation, in a sermon, or in any serious discourse; we think this may be done with propriety, and with happy effect; but we must protest against the common use of texts of this kind, so long as a text is considered as the theme, argument, and ground-work of the discourse to which it is prefixed. Mr Simeon appeals to the example of the apostles, "who not unfrequently adopt the language of the Old Testament, to convey their own ideas, even when it has no necessary connection with their subject," p. 28. But we beg leave to remind Mr Simeon (for he cannot be altogether ignorant of it), that the apostles do this only in the way of occasional and transient illustration, and not when they are about to establish a controverted doctrine, or to demonstrate the excellency of any part of the Christian system.

We have reckoned it the more necessary to give this caveat, because the author is a teacher of others in the art of preaching; and as his authority stands high, there is danger of his example being followed in a departure from the line of good sense and propriety. We are happy, however, to have it to add, that he has given us an excellent sermon on the proper sense of his text. In the first discourse he considers the words as setting before us the sentiments and dispositions which God approves: the sentiments-"They have well said all that they have spoken:" the dispositions—“ O that there was in them such a heart." Having analysed the speech of the Israelites, which met with the divine approbation, he finds in it the following sentiments: "An acknow