other, in the success of the first preachers of Christianity we have an experimental proof of the sufficiency of revealed religion, to those very ends in which natural religion failed. In their success we have experimental proof, that there is nothing in the great mystery of godliness, which the vulgar, more than the learned, want capacity to apprehend; since, upon the first preaching of the Gospel, the illiterate, the scorn of pharisaical pride, who knew not the law, and were therefore deemed accursed, were the first to understand and to embrace the Christian doctrine. An over-abundant zeal to check the frenzy of the Methodists, first introduced that unscriptural language which confounds religion and morality." Bishop Horsley well knew the grievous evils which had resulted from keeping back that essential "mystery of Godliness," the doctrine of justification by faith, in its inseparable connexion with “the expiation of sin by the Redeemer's sufferings and blood;" and his excellent writings had a powerful influence in encouraging that more evangelical strain of preaching which began to prevail, and the blessed effects of which are seen in that auspicious revival of piety, with all its fruits of zeal and love, which now gladdens our church; and we may trust, by the Divine blessing, will greatly increase, if not blighted by the recurrence of such pestilential doctrines as those which Horsley denounced. D. ORIGINAL POETRY. For the Christian Observer. THE POOL OF BETHESDA. THE busy throng was in the street, As Zion-ward their steps were bent; Had sent their distant tribes to worship Some shepherd band might here be seen, hold, Musing each wondrous sight between, On Him of whom the prophets told; And many a stranger guest had come And Spain, the guardian of the west; That turned once his sweetness into blood. All on one high design intent, To keep their ancient prophet's law, To Zion's hill their steps had bent, And musing much on what they saw, And what they heard of Mary's son, 'Twas now the Sabbath's holy rest, Nor sound from all the city rose, But whence upon the listening ear Comes there so oft the note of grief? 'Tis from Bethesda, house of woe, Yet house of heav'nly mercy more, dwell. ever Around a fountain dark and deep, Stretch'd on their beds the sufferers lie, And ever on its surface keep, In patient hope, their watchful eye; Waiting until the troubled wave Shall tell it is the hour to save, And God shall in his mercy give Power to one sufferer more to bathe and live. For may not all that fount around Must longer dwell in pain and woe; To reap the long expected gift of heaven. Full many a year an aged man Had lain beneath those arches drear; More than the half of life's short span Had passed away, yet left him there; The summer's sun had scorched his cheek, Yet patient still he lay, and meek; And often as the moon-beam play'd Upon the fountain's glassy stream, Each ripple that the night wind made Would wake him from his feverish dream; And he would start with ear intent, Yet still in vain the angel came, In vain the healing water moved; Troubled or calm, to him the same The water of that fountain proved; For crippled on his couch he lay Whilst others bore the gift away, Ere some kind hand could bring relief, And bear him to the fount to end his grief. But mercy came at last; for none May still in vain for mercy plead; Ever its prize hath patience won, Nor faith been robbed of promised But he who, on life's thorny road, There stood beside that aged man, One who his faith and patience knew; Who well his inmost heart could scan, For all was open to his view; CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 19. The word that ne'er did lip unfold, Nor only this; Himself had known Pain was the lot He came to bear; And now beside that fountain still He bent him o'er the cripple's bed, And prompt to do His Father's will, "Wilt thou be whole?" He gently said. Oh! I have none, the lame replied, Not such the slow result and long When Jesus spake; the weak was strong, The dead arose, the blind hath sight, As quick as darkness once he turned to light. Firm and erect the cripple rose, And, all undoubting, took his load, (Tho' on the Sabbath's strict repose), And went rejoicing on his road; For well he deemed that He whose word Creation wide obedient heard, Yet mindful of that law's demand, 3 H And there again by Jesus found, Oh! that that warning voice might reach To all whom Satan long hath bound; That Jesu's word at length might teach That sin's the cause of every wound; Then would they too by Him be sought, By Him from life to death be brought; By Him made whole, find peace and joy, And endless bliss at length without alloy. V. REVIEW OF NEW PUBLICATIONS. THE CONTINENTAL PROTESTANT CHURCHES. 1. JAMESON'S Notices of the Reformation in the South-West of France. -2. D'AUBIGNÉ's Voice from the Alps, by the Rev. E. BICkerSTETH.-3. D'AUBIGNE'S Confession of the Name of Christ.-4. The Faith and Patience of the Saints, exhibited in the sufferings and death of M. le Febvre. (Continued from p. 378.) IN our last Number we presented a few sketches of the early history of Protestantism in France. It is not our intention to draw up a condensed history of Protestantism in France, Switzerland, or Germany, which would be a mere meagre list of facts and dates; but to present a few individual illustrative features, with a view chiefly to excite our readers to increased interest and zeal in promoting, according to their opportunities, that blessed revival of pure religion which, through the mercy of God, has commenced in the Continental Protestant Churches. In pursuance of this plan, we gave some account of the events connected with the reign of that truly godly queen, Jane of Navarre; when French Protestantism was in all its early freshness. Then came the treacherous and sanguinary massacre of St. Bartholomew in the year 1572; one of the darkest spots of French or Romanist history; we should say the darkest, but that we cannot decide accurately the shades of such black atrocities. France had already had its Protestant martyrs during half a century; and vast numbers of the faithful had been burned at the stake for their testimony against the corruptions of Popery. Yet amidst these direful persecutions Protestantism still grew; and it had reached its highest point of prosperity-its churches exceeding two thousand, some of which contained ten thousand members-when the massacre of St. Bartholomew suddenly brought it to the very brink of extermination. Sixty thousand men, women, and children are reported to have perished in that dreadful slaughter; and that any escaped to be the seed of the Church in succeeding generations, was next to a miracle, considering the perfidious cunning, and unrelenting cruelty, of their oppressors. The persecutions continued till the year 1598; when Henry IV., though he had renounced Protestantism himself, yet had the humanity and wisdom to see, that the course which had been so long pursued was neither just nor politic; and he accordingly grant. ed his Protestant subjects the Edict of Nantes, under which they lived in comparative tranquillity, till its fatal repeal by Louis XIV. in the year 1685. By this edict they were allowed to worship God according to the dictates of their conscience, and to bring up their children in their own faith; and they were even permitted to fill public offices. But after the revocation of the edict, they were fiercely persecuted, and almost exterminated; and the persecution revived from time to time during the next century; till the Revolution,and afterwards the edicts of Bonaparte, placed them on a level with their fellow-countrymen. During the During the sway of the Bourbons, upon their return to power, the Protestants were treated with much severity as suspected persons; but since the second revolution, they have enjoyed full political privileges; and are rising to considerable importance as a large and wellordered body of citizens. It is more however to our purpose to add, that a revival of piety has commenced among them, which we rejoice to hail as the harbinger of a bright and glorious day. Before, however, we touch further upon their present condition, we shall revert to a few passages connected with their former history. From the period of the revocation of the edict of Nantes to the Revolution, they remained in a melancholy condition, not only as respected their diminished numbers, but also in regard to their doctrines and religious character. Their devout pastors and holy men and women had, for the most part, perished in the jails and galleys, or escaped to foreign lands; and in one or two generations there remained but the name of Protestantism, and its outward forms, to characterise a church once eminent for its purity, but which had silently relapsed, like that of Geneva, into the slumbers of spiritual death. Till very recently there was little to be heard from the pulpits of the French Protestant churches, but Pelagianism, Arianism, and Philoso phism; the pastors and the people having alike swerved from the evangelical standards of the days of Calvin, so glowingly described by Hooker, in the Preface to his Ecclesiastical Polity. "A founder it had [namely, the Calvinistic discipline] whom I think incomparably the wisest man the French church did enjoy. .... Though thousands were debtors to him, as touching divine knowledge, yet he to none, but only to God, the Author of that most blessed fountain, The Book of Life; and of the admirable dexterity of wit, together with the helps of other learning, which were his guides; till being occasioned to leave France, he fell at length upon Geneva." In the narrative of M. le Febvre, one of the sufferers upon the revocation of the edict of Nantes,we have an exemplification of the race of Christians which adorned the French church in its best days. If we wished strikingly to exhibit the faith and patience of the saints, we know not any period of the history of the church in which we could discover more appropriate illustrations, than in the sufferings of some of the French Protestant confessors and martyrs at this afflicting era. The sharp bloody work of the axe, and the fiery ordeal of the stake, soon terminate the scene of pain and trial; the daggers of St. Bartholomew opened a speedy path to heaven; but the long-protracted torture of the galleys, upon the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, was a lingering death which exhausted the sufferer both in body and mind, and left only the unsubdued energy of faith to uphold the frailty of nature under the severest pressure. We would not detract from the ample reverence which surrounds the me mory of that most illustrious victim of the St. Bartholomew massacre, the Christian champion Coligni; but as the venerable Admiral himself calmly remarked to one of his assassins, Young man, you ought to have respected my age and infirmity; but you will only shorten my life by a few days or hours; whereas in the case of M. le Febvre, or his companion in tribulation, M. de Marolles and many such instances there were-death in its most appalling forms flitted around them during many wearisome years, mocking their suffering, and shaking his dart over them, yet delaying to strike. The strength which is imparted to the Christian is indeed equal to his day; it is not adapted under one condition of things to another, but to its own peculiar circumstances; and it were, therefore, inconsequent to say, that the martyr under one form would not have been enabled to persist to martyrdom under every other; or that the faith which would incur the smallest worldly disadvantage for the testimony of Christ, would not be strengthened, if the exigence arose, to bathe in the flame, or drink the molten lead. But humanly speaking, many a man would hail the ordeal of Smithfield, or die stoutly upon the rack, whose constancy would have been worn out by the wasting tortures of the Lollards' tower, or the dungeons of the Inquisition, where, year after year, hope, or help, from man never approached to sustain the solitary victim in his mental contest with long-continued terror and cruelty. And then, as regards the unchangeable character of Popery, the relentless protraction of barbarity exercised towards such men as Marolles and Le Febvre, cannot be palliated by any plea of momentary excitement; it was cool cowardly persecution ; inflicted,be it remembered,by a nation priding itself on its graces and blandishments, and in its golden age of taste and literature; and falling, not upon men of lawless lives, or who had outraged society by their crimes, but upon men eminent for every social and amiable virtue-good subjects, honest and industrious citizens, and, like Daniel, blameless in all things except concerning the law of their God. We will now devote a few pages to the narrative of M. le Febvre; for a single portrait will aid the purpose of our rapid sketches, better than a meagre outline of general facts. It is not unworthy to be placed beside those of Marolles and Mignaud, and others of this band of Christian worthies, with which we have adorned some of our former volumes. We know not how to abridge the following portion of the narrative, and therefore give it entire. "Mons. Isaac Le Febvre was born in the year 1648, at Chatel-Chignon, in Nivernois. His parents belonged to a family of distinction, and were highly esteemed by all the Protestants in that part of the country. He speaks of them with great praise, in one of his letters from the prison of Marseilles. After relating the sufferings of his sister, who was at that time confined in a convent at Nevers, where she glorified God by her patience and courage, and afterwards died in the faith of Jesus Christ, he says, I admire what the Holy Spirit has wrought in her. The great God has remembered his promise to the children of them that fear him. Of such were my ancestors. My grandfather him in Christian simplicity, and endeaand grandmother having walked before voured to do his will in their day, both died in a good old age, in the communion of the true church. It pleased God to take my mother to himself betimes; but I know that her life was exemplary and edifying, and very remote from the vain amusements of the age. The probity, zeal, patience, and happy end, of my father are known to you, and though I cannot speak of him without emotion, his memory is too dear to me to pass it |