The whole work closes with some important observations upon the nature of evidence, among which the following is deserving of peculiar regard. "There has been a golden rule,” says this veteran in letters, "which I of old laid down, and to which I have always conformed myself-never to suffer, what I do not know, to militate against what I do." p. 250*. We view the present work to a disadvantage when we consider it as the production of the author of the Analysis of Antient Mythology. The posthumous observations, however, now presented to the public, will be found to exhibit a degree of learning and ingenuity sufficient to confer a considerable portion of reputation upon ordinary writers. To the intention of the author we offer the tribute of our commendation; in the execution of his design some things occur, against which we have stated our objections; but we should not do justice to this eminent scholar did we not declare that, generally speaking, we think highly of the remainder. The christian world is much indebted to Mr. Bryant for having uniformly devoted his great talents to the defence of the religion upon which all their future hopes are founded; and which never required more able defenders than at a period when it has been, and we fear, still is, (though in a declining degree,) attacked by an organised confederacy of the most unprincipled and malignant adversariest. decisive, that Ketos means, not merely a great sea fish, but also a great sea vessel, float, raft, &c?" Frag. No. cxlv. p. 103. We are at a loss to know how such a tes timony can be extracted from Hesychius. He does indeed explain Krog of a great sca fish, and adds, (but nothing more,) δηλοί δε και απορίαν. Under the word Κητηνή, however, we have the following explanaείου, πλοίον μέγα ὡς κήτος. But this is very little to the purpose. *We were sorry to observe so many errors of the press, besides those which are noticed in this work. The last map, too, on the eastern side of the Lake Asphaltites, is strangely incorrect. +We wish our countrymen, in general, never to forget that Barruel and Robison have written; we wish them never to forget in what manner they have been answered.-See Monthly Review. CXXXVIII. The Sentiments proper for the present Crisis; a Sermon preached at Bridge-street, Bristol, October 19, 1803, being the Day appointed for a General Fast. By ROBERT HALL, A. M. Second Edition with Corrections and Additions. London, Button. 1804. Price 2s. pp. 78. THE name of Mr. Hall is well known to the public. He has already gained considerable celebrity by his successful efforts in the cause of religion and social order; but the work before us rises even above the level of his former productions, and considerably exceeds the expectations which our knowledge of his superior talents had led us to form. It is no less distinguished by the general elevation and occasional sublimity of its style, than by the originality as well as excellence of its sentiments. It combines enlarged and comprehensive views of moral and religious subjects with a depth of thought, an acuteness of reasoning, a force of eloquence, and a soundness of principle, which are rarely found united in the same composition. The text is Jerem. viii. 6.-" 1 hearkened and heard, but they spake not aright; no man repented him of his wickedness, saying, what have I done? Every one turned to his course as the horse rusheth into the battle." Mr. Hall's first object is to point out the errors both in judgment and practice, into which the existing circumstances of the country will be apt to betray us. Those err, he remarks, "who content themselves with tracing national judgments to their natural causes," forgetting that there is a being who can move and arrange them at his pleasure, and in whose hands they never fail to accomplish the purposes of his unerring counsel." (p. 5.) Those also err "who, instead of placing their reliance on God for safety, repose only on an arm of flesh," and indulge in "that language of extravagant boast, that proud confidence in our national force," which nothing can justify; and "which, however fashionable it may be, is as remote from the dictates of true courage as of true piety." Those also are to be blamed who "indulge in wanton and indiscriminate censure of the measures of our rulers," forgetful of the respect which, independant of personal character, is due to civil governors on account of their office; a respect" which we are not permitted to violate even when we are under the necessity of blaming their measures." (p. 10.)* They likewise are shewn to entertain mistaken sentiments, who rely "for success on our supposed superiority in virtue to our enemies;" for admitting the fact, judgment often begins at the house of God. But before we can decide on the comparative guilt of nations, "it is not enough barely to inspect the manners of each:"we must "estimate the complicated influences to which they are exposed, the tendency of all their institutions, their respective degrees of information, and the comparative advantages and disadvantages under which they are placed;" a survey to which the supreme judge alone is equal. The religion which prevailed in France, it is further remarked, retained scarcely any trace of the truth as it is in Jesus, whilst we have long enjoyed the clear light of christianity; and is it not " melancholy truth, that many of us have continued in the midst of all this light unchanged and impenitent; that if our enemies, with frantic impiety, renounced the forms of religion, we remain destitute of its power; and that if they abandoned the christian name, the name is nearly the whole of christianity to which we can pretend?" It will, therefore, he adds, "be our wisdom to relinquish this plea, and instead of boasting our superior virtues to lie low in humiliation and repentance." (p. 19.) a Mr. Hall then proceeds to shew, with his accustomed force, that general acknowledgments of national corruption are very inadequate to the demands of the present season. The sentiments which they excite are too vague and indistinct to make a lasting impression. "He who has been thus employed, may have been merely acting a part; uttering confessions in which he never meant to take a personal share. He would be mortally offended, perhaps, to have it suspected, that he himself had been guilty any one of the sins he has been deploring." Such an one Mr. Hall justly regards as under a dangerous delusion, and reminds him that his of Mr. Hall's views on the subject of civil government are just and scriptural. chief concern is at home. National sins are the aggregate of the sins of individuals. The displeasure of the Almighty "is a fire supplied from innumerable sources, to which every crime contributes its quota, and which every portion of guilt, wherever it is found, causes to burn with augmented violence." (p. 26.) The preacher having thus traced the errors into which we are prone to fall, proceeds to point out the peculiar duties to which we are called at the present moment. To a devout acknowledgment of the general administration of Divine Providence, we are bound to add an affecting conviction and humble confession, that the evils which overtake nations are the just judgments of the Almighty. In enumerating the various symptoms of national degeneracy, which may be fairly regarded as contributing to our national distress, he gives the first place to a gradual departure from the peculiar truths, maxims, and spirit of christianity. "The truths and mysteries which distinguished the christian from all other religious," observes our able author, "have been little attended to by some, totally denied by others; and while infinite efforts have been made, by the utmost subtlety of argumentation, to establish the truth and authenticity of revelation, few have been exerted in comparison to shew what fall and of redemption, which are the twe it really contains. The doctrines of the grand points on which the christian dispeusation hinges, have been too much neglected. Though it has not yet become the fashion (God forbid it ever should) to deny them, we have been too much accustomed to confine the mention of them to oblique hints and distant allusions. They are too often reluctantly conceded rather than warmly inculcated, as though they were christianity, from which we were in haste the weaker or less honourable parts of reality these very truths which have, in to turn away our eyes, although it is in every age, inspired the devotion of the church, and the rapture of the redeemed. This alienation from the distinguishing truths of our holy religion accounts for a portentous peculiarity among christians, their being ashamed of a book which they profess to receive as the word of God." and mysteries of revelation, have led, by "Indifference and inattention to the truths of the book which contains them, so that, an casy transition, to a dislike and neglect in a christian country, nothing is thought so vulgar as a serious appeal to the scriptures; and the candidate for fashionable distinction would rather betray a familiar expresses with uncommon strength and precision, views which we ourselves have long entertained, would do honour to the pen, even of a Burke. acquaintance with the most impure writers, than with the words of Christ and his Apostles. Yet we complain of the growth of infidelity, when nothing less could be expected than that some should declare themselves infidels, where so many had completely forgot they were chris"The consequence has been such as might be expected-an increase of profaneness, immorality, and irreligion." (p. $2-34.) tians." "The traces of piety have been wearing out more and more, from our conversations, from our manners, from our popular publications, from the current literature of the age. In proportion as the maxims and spirit of christianity have declined, infidelity has prevailed in their room." A lax theology is the natural parent of a lax morality. The peculiar motives, accordingly, by which the inspired writers enforce their moral lessons, the love of God and the Redeemer, concern for the honour of religion, and gratitude for the inestimable benefits of the christian redemption, have no place in the fashionable systems of moral instruction*. The motives almost exclusively urged are such as take their rise from the present state, founded on reputation, on honour, on health, or on the tendency of the things recommended to promote, under some form or other, the acquisition of worldly advantages. Thus even morality itseif, by dissociating it from religion, is made to cherish the love of the world, and to bar the heart more effectually against the approaches of piety." (p. 34, 55.) Mr. Hall here enters at great length on the consideration of that fashionable but mischievous system of expediency, by which " religion is degraded from its pre-eminence into the mere hand-maid of social morality; social morality into an instrument of advancing the welfare of society; and the world is all in all." We regret that our limits will not permit us to transcribe the whole of what Mr. Hall has said on this interesting subject; but we trust that the sermon it. self will meet the eye of many who require to be guarded against the pernicious influence of the system in question. The following passage with which the discussion on the subject of expediency closes, and in which Mr. Hall "If the reader wishes for a further statement and illustration of these melancholy facts, he may find it in Mr. Wilberforce's celebrated book on religion, an inestimable work, which has, perhaps, done more than any other to rouse the insensibility and augment the piety of the age." "As this fashion of reducing every moral question to a calculation of expedience is a most important innovation, it would be strange if it had not produced a change in the manners of society. In fact, it has produced an entirely new cast of character, equally remote from the licentious gaiety of high life, and the low profligacy which falls under the lash of the law: a race of men distinguished by a calm and terrible ferocity, resembling Cæsar in this only, that as it was said of him they have come with sobriety to the ruin of their country. The greatest crimes no longer issue from the strongest passions, but from the coolest head. Vice and impiety have 'made a new conquest, and have added the regions of speculation to their dominion. The patrons of impurity and licentiousness have put on the cloak of the philosopher: maxims the most licentious have found their way into books of pretended morality, and have been inculcated with the airs of a moral sage+.” “A callous indifference to all moral distinctions is an almost inseparable effect of the familiar applica tion of this theory." "Crimes and virtues are equally candidates for approbation, nor must the heart betray the least preference which would be to prejudge the cause; but must maintain a sacred neutrality, till expedience, whose hand never trembles in the midst of the greatest horrors, has weighed in her impartial balance their consequences and effects. In the mean time they are equally candidates, we repeat it again, for our approbation, and equally entitled to it, provided the passions can be deceived into an opinion, and this is not difficult, that they will come to the same thing at the foot of the account. Hence that intrepidity in guilt, which has cased the hearts of the greatest adepts in this system as with triple brass. Its seeds were sown by some of these, with an un-♦ sparing hand, in France, a congenial soil, where they produced a quick vegetation. The consequences were soon felt. The fabric of society tottered to its base: the earth shook under their feet; the heavens were involved in darkness, and a voice more audible than thunder called upon them to desist. But, unmoved amidst the uproar of elements, undismayed by that voice which astonishes nature and appals the guilty, these men continued absorbed in their calculations. Instead of revering the judgments, or confessing the finger of God, they only made more haste (still on the principle of expediency) to desolate his works, and destroy his image, as if The unholy speculations of Mr. Godwin were founded entirely on this basis. they were apprehensive the shades of a premature night might fall and cover their victims! "But it is time to conclude this discussion, which has, perhaps, already fatigued by its length. I cannot help expressing. my apprehension, that this desecration of virtue, this incessant domination of physical over moral ideas, of ideas of expedience over those of right, having already dethroned religion, and displaced virtue from her ancient basis, will, if it is suffered to proceed, ere long shake the foundation of states, and endanger the existence of the civilized world. Should it ever become popular, should it ever descend from speculation into common life, and become the practical morality of the age, we may apply to such a period the awful words of Balaam; Who shall live when God doth this? No imagination can pourtray, no mind can grasp its horrors*." "If the apparent simplicity of this system be alledged in its favour, I would say, it is the simplicity of meanness, a simplicity which is its shame; a daylight which reveals its beggary. If an air of obscurity, on the contrary, is objected against that of better times, let it be remembered that every science has its ultimate questions, boundaries which cannot be passed, and that if these occur earlier in morals than in any other inquiries, it is the natural result of the immensity of the subject, which, touching human nature in every point, and surrounding it on all sides, renders it difficult, or rather impossible, to trace it in all its relations, and view it in all its extent. Meanwhile the shades which envelope, and will, perhaps, always envelope it in some measure, are not without their use, since they teach the two most important lessons we can learn, the vanity of our reason, and the grandeur of our destiny. "It is not improbable that some may be offended at the warmth and freedom of these remarks: my apology, however, rests on the infinite importance of the subject, my extreme solicitude to impress what appear to me right sentiments respecting it, together with the consideration, that the confidence which ill becomes the innovators of yesterday, however able, may be pardoned in the defenders, however weak, of a system which has stood the test and sustained the virtue of two thousand years. Let us return, then, to the safe and sober paths of our ancestors; adhering, in all moral questions, to the dictates of conscience, regulated and informed by the divine word; happy to enjoy, instead of sparks of our own kindling, the benefit of those luminaries which, placed in the morai firmament by a potent hand, have guided the church from the beginning in her mysterious sojourn to eternity. Stand in the way, and see, and ask for the old path which is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. "Instead of demolishing the temple of christian virtue, from a presumptuous curiosity to inspect its foundations, let us rejoice they are laid too deep for our scrutiny. Let us worship in it; and along with the nations of them that are saved, walk in its light." (p. 42—51.) Mr. Hall notices, as another symptom of degeneracy, the innovation which has taken place in the use of moral terms. Pride, for example, though marked in scripture with the severest denunciations of divine vengeance, is now seldom used except in a favourable sense; while humility, the leading feature in the character of our Saviour, rarely enters into the estimate of human excellence. He likewise adverts to the growing disregard of religious observances, manifested more especially by the highest and lowest classes of society, and points out with becoming censure the fatal effects to be apprehended from the assignation of the Sunday by the legislature to the purposes of military exercises. We agree with Mr. Hall in thinking it remarkable that this first instance of a legalized breach of the sabbath should occur at a time when we are engaged with an enemy, whose very name conveys a warning against impiety." (p. 55.) Surely ministers act unwisely in persevering in this measure. May not a doubt of its propriety be fairly excited in their minds, even by the single circumstance of the pointed censure which such a writer as Mr. Hall, in such a sermon, has felt it his duty to bestow upon it? To these proofs of national corruption, Mr. Hall adds, *This passage, indeed the whole of the preceding discussion, is well worthy of the that almost universal profaneness attentive consideration of all who, in their which taints our daily intercourse, and landable efforts to check the progress of which has risen to such a height as to vice, may have been led to countenance have become a melancholy charactethe dangerous principle of general expediency, a principle "which, pretending to enter into the designs of the Almighty, makes his laws of secondary authority and supersedes the force of the most sacred in injunctions." See the Christian Observer, Vol. II. p. 301. CHRIST. OBSERY. No. 26. ristic of our country." The enormity of the slave trade is in the last place briefly, but feelingly noticed-" Its enormity no words can express." (p. 58.) We wish we could have concurred with the author, in acquitting the nation at large of a share in the guilt of this traffic. It is too notorious that a shameful and criminal indifference to the important interests involved in the question of abolition has prevailed in this country; and if a proof of the fact were wanting, we might refer to the circumstance, that, during the two last general elections, it does not appear that any one body of electors in the kingdom have been led to consider, whether the men of their choice were friendly or hostile to this trade, and to the system which it feeds. Mr. Hall next proceeds to point out, that the only safe expedient which, under the pressure of our complicated guilt," remains to be adopted, is an immediate return to God:" a speedy return to the spirit and practice of the Gospel." "Let it be remembered," he adds, "that repentance is a personal concern. Instead of losing ourselves in a crowd, and resting in general confessions, we ought, each one to examine his own ways and turn from his own iniquity." This duty is urged upon the reader by various powerful and affecting considerations, which our limits will not allow us to particularise. The important truths, however, contained in the following extract entitle it to distinguished no tice. "We shall ill consult the true interests of revelation by disguising its peculiarities, in hope of conciliating the approbation of infidels, and of adapting it more to their taste a mistaken and dangerous policy, by which we run imminent risque of catching their contagion, without imparting the benefit of its truths. Let us not for a moment blench from its mysteries: they are mysteries of godliness; and however much they may surpass human reason, bear the distinct impress of a divine hand. We rejoice that they are mysteries, so far from being ashamed of them on that account; since the principal reason why they are, and must ever continue such, is derived from their elevation, from their unsearchable riches, and undefinable grandeur. In fine, let us draw our religion and morality entirely from the word of God, without seeking any deeper foundation for our duties than the will of the Supreme Being, an implicit and perfect acquiescence in which, is the highest virtue a creature can attain." (p. 63, 64.) Some remarks of a consolatory nature are then subjoined. "We may hope," observes the author, (that) infidelity has run its length. In truth, its sophistry, in the eyes of men of sense, has been much discredited by the absurdity of its tenets; and if any have been in danger of being seduced by the talents of its advocates, they have commonly found a sufficient antidote in their lives. We have learned to prize revclation more than ever, since we have seen the ludicrous mistakes, as well as serious disasters, of those mystics of impiety, who chose rather to walk by an internal light than enjoy the benefit of its illumination. They have edified us much without intending it; they have had the effect which the great critic of antiquity assigns as the purpose of the tragic muse, that of purifying the heart by pity and terTheir zeal has excited an equal de ror. gree of ardour in a better cause, and their efforts to extirpate religion have been opposed by contrary efforts, to diffuse its inAuence at home and abroad, to a degree unexampled in modern times. A growing unanimity has prevailed among the good m different parties, who finding a centre of union in the great truths of revelation, and in a solicitude for its interests, are willing to merge their smaller differences in a common cause. sincerely pious, we trust, is increasing aabatement from the confidence of infidelimong us, whose zeal, so far from suffering ty, has glowed with a purer and more steady fame than ever. These are pleasing indications that the presence of the Holy One of Israel is still in the midst of us." (p. 64, 65.) The number of the The concluding address is admirably calculated to excite and cherish in the breasts of our countrymen, all those energies which the present state of public affairs peculiarly requires to be called into action. We shall not make any extracts from it in this place, as we intend to insert the greatest part of it at the head of our political department. Besides the ornament it will be to our work, we conceive that we shall be doing a real service to the great cause in which our country is embarked, by giving as extensive currency as possible to the senti ments it contains. Having laid before our readers a view, though we confess a very inadequate view, of the contents of this sermon, it remains that we notice its blemishes. These, however, are few and unimportant, and chiefly respect slight inaccuracies of style. Some passages also are, perhaps, too tumid, and to be perfectly correct, would require to be a little qualified; as when England is represented as the Thermopylae of the universe; (p. 74,) or when it is said that the people of this country are to decide whe ther freedom shall yet survive or be |