66 established any geometrical proposition," that "the Trinitarian hypothesis, as it is stated in the Athanasian Creed, in the Liturgy and the Articles of the Church of England, has no foundation whatever in the Scriptures; and is not supported by a single trial." This last mentioned Creed is styled a jargon of nonsense" a "monstrous abortion of intolerance and paradox." The tenets which are maintained in the Liturgy of the Church," are said to be " “ utterly at variance with the tenets of all its ministers, who have any preteйsions to Biblical knowledge, or who are critically acquainted with the Christian Scriptures." The language of most of the Articles "of is called "ambiguous jargon or empty sound." Nay, they are expressly denominated, in the lump, THIRTY-NINE ABSURDITIES!" &c. &c. &c. (Vol. 11, p. 176; 12, 100, 324, 374, 444; 13, 26—32, 210; 14, 165-180.) 66 If any circumstance can add to or aggravate the shameless impudence of these assertions, it is supplied in the critic's boast that the Article in which several of the most outrageous of them are contained "has been generally approved both by the Clergy and the Laity !" (Vol. 14, P. 165) If any consideration can render this unprincipled calumny utterly incapable of being exceeded in atrocity, it is supplied in the general opinion, that this most indecent abuse of our Liturgy and Confessions of Faith proceeds from a Clergyman of our Church, who has himself publicly, solemnly, and repeatedly, declared, that from his heart he believes all and every thing contained in them to be agreeable, to God's Word !- Yet, with nearly the same breath, this gentleman boasts, that, whatever else it may want, his " that of morality* and truth!!”. Such then are "morality and truth," when divested of all orthodox mystery and absurdity, and exhibited in their native beauty and simplicity by Socinian re formers! cause is Such, however, is this critic's contemptuous description of that golden age of literature in which our great Elizabeth reigned; the age of Ridley and Jewell, of Hooker and Bacon. Such are his degrading allusions to the brightest luminaries of this age, to men in whom were united and concentrated all its stores both of wisdom and piety; to men, as the learned Professor Hey admits, “of the first ability, and to whom, he says, "as scholars, if we except a few, we are MERE CHILDREN.' (Nor. Lect. Vol. 2, p. 204.) Such is this modern philosophist's extravagant abuse of those forms of faith and worship, in the preparation of which, for a long period of time, nearly all the talents, all the learning, all the wisdom, and all the piety, of this age, and of these worthies, were vigorously exerted; and in defence of which our leading reformers cheerfully sacrificed the greatest earthly comforts, and submitted to the state. Such is this illuminated unitarian's account of a Liturgy which * Dereliction of principle is very generally attended by a correspondent laxity of morals. Perhaps the public will soon be favoured with a Body of a Morality," in which it will be demonstrated that the "marriage vow" is a mere political contract, &c.; but jam satis, &c. appears really to exhibit the maximum of elevated piety and scriptural simplicity; a Liturgy which for its prudent moderation, its general adaptation to the feelings of serious Christians, its holy intermixture of doctrines and duties, and its wise inculcation of every essential truth of the Christian system while it is employed in Christian worship, was extolled at the time of its formation by all the leading foreign reformers; a Liturgy which for two centuries and a half has been the admiration of Christendom; a Liturgy which the Critical Review itself has formerly characterised, as, amidst others that were admirable, "pre-eminently and peculiarly" distinguished for "piety," "moderation," "prudence," "charity," and "truly Evangelical principles !" Such is this Critical Review's charac ter of " Documents," from which, in conjunction with similar contemporary productions, it has before said, "we may learn to emulate and copy the truly evangelical principles of those great and holy men, who at the imminent peril, or who with the loss, of their fortunes and of life itself, preached, taught, and defended those weightier matters of the Gospel, which must ever be the life and ornament of the Christian Church." (See Burnet and Strype on the Reformation, and Letter 1, Antijac. Sep. 1808.) What then will not such a work calumniate? And what behaviour could render it, at once, more disgusting and more pestilential? If possible, however, something still worse is behind. But, that room may be afforded for more grateful subjects, this must be reserved for the next month. Till then, I am, Sir, Your's, DETECTOR. POLITICS. "betray'd To faithless parties, feminine assaults; WHILE thrones are tottering on every side; while ancient. dynasties are swept, as it were, from the face of the earth, like trees before the desolating whirlwind; while the rapid revolution of empires fills the mind with consternation and dismay; while England herself is engaged, or professes to be engaged, in the noble task of supporting the last efforts of expiring independence on the Continent; and while the fate of Europe hangs by a single thread, the attention of one of the great councils of the British realm has been engrossed, for the greater part of the last month, by an inquiry into the conduct of the commander-inchief, in the disposal of military commissions. Had this inquiry been instituted for the purpose of removing the many flagrant abuses which have been long known to prevail in the army; and had it been conducted in a manner suitable to the attainment of that great object, we should have thought that the House of Commons could not have been better employed. But as the inquiry has assumed a judicial character, as it has been conducted in much the same way, and with much the same spirit, as most of the judicial investigations of that popular assembly within our recóllection; we are far from sanguine in our expectations of deriving from it that public good, which in all human probability it would have produced, had the cause been submitted to a different tribunal. We have, on various occasions, expressed our decided opinion of the total unfitness of a popular assembly for the discharge of judicial duties. Every fresh attempt of the kind only tends to strengthen that opinion and to give additional force to our objections, which are founded on strong constitutional grounds. The jealousy which has lately been displayed respecting what is called the inquisitorial power of the House of Commons, appears to us puerile and silly; and we earnestly recommend to those who cherish the feeling, coolly to examine the source of that power, and impartially to ascertain its tendency and effects. We are aware that some apology is due to our readers for employing a mongrel expression unknown to our language; nor will it avail us, on the present occasion, to plead Lex et Consuetudo Parliamenti; for, although we be not disposed to question the right of Parliament to frame a kind of common law for itself, not to be found in our statute-book; yet are we not so obsequious as to admit their authority to alter the frame and structure of our mother-tongue, or to corrupt it by the introduction of words of spurious breed, and of ominous import. But we have been reduced to the necessity of using the term inquisitorial, by the desire to render ourselves intelligible to the gentlemen whom we more particularly wish to admonish. While, however, as faithful guardians of the literary character of our country, we censure the coinage of counterfeit words, we are compelled, in candour, to admit that no epithet which the English language can supply would be so strictly appropriate to the particular species of power intended to be described, as that which the gentlemen in question have thought proper to apply to it. For it is evidently derived from the substantive, inquisition; and it is very well known that the Inquisition fixes its own power, and suffers no other tribunal to define its nature, to deny its legality, to question its utility, or to limit its extent. It were needless to point out the analogy. One powerful objection to judicial proceedings before the House of Commons, is derived from its want of authority to administer an oath—a defect which, it is to be presumed, would never have been suffered to exist, had it been the intention of our ancestors to vest it with judicial powers. On this account it was that we witnessed, with regret, the rejection of Mr. Yorke's proposal for passing an act to appoint a special commission for trying the merits of the case: that commission would have been authorised, of course, to administer oaths. Now, will any unprejudiced man pretend to say, that, if the House of Commons could have examined witnesses upon oath, we should have seen any of that shameful prevarication, any of those disgraceful breaches of veracity, which have been remarked during this inquiry? Again, we will ask, if such a commission as Mr. Yorke suggested had been appointed, should we have witnessed those gross inconsistencies, those frequent deviations from the rules of evidence which the House chose to adopt on the present occasion, that marked the whole progress of the ex-. aminations at the bar? In an early part of the inquiry, the House, while they asserted their total exemption from all those rules of evidence which prevail in our courts of law (and which, it must never be forgotten, are the surest safeguards of innocence, though occasionally tending to favour the escape of guilt), resolved, in the case before them, to adopt and enforce them. When we recollect at what period, and under what circumstances of the examination, this resolution was entered into, and in how many, and in what instances, it was palpably and grossly violated, without an attempt to call the examining party to order, we find another strong ground of objection to judicial investigations before the House of Commons. We heard it objected to Mr. Yorke's proposal, that the public would not be satisfied with such a commission; and that nothing less than an examination at the bar of the House of Commons would satisfy them. What opportunity those who stated this curious objection enjoyed, which we do not enjoy ourselves, to ascertain the opinion of the public upon this point, we are totally at a loss to understand. We believe, on the contrary, that all the rational part of the public would have been much better satisfied with such a proceeding. With an examination before a select committee, indeed, we are confident nobody would have been satisfied. But who ever expressed dissatisfaction at a proceeding in any of our courts, as not being sufficiently public? And surely the inquiry, before the commission in question, would have been equally public and it would have been infinitely more solemn and authoritative, than when carried on by a popular assembly. A further objection which we entertain to the judicial power assumed and exercised by the Commons, is derived from the marked prevalence of that party-spirit which universally distinguishes almost every proceeding of a popular assembly; and which cannot prevail in a court of justice, without a manifest violation of every principle on which justice ought to be administered in a well-regulated state. The question-how far this spirit has been displayed in the conduct of the present inquiry?—it would not be safe for us to discuss. A great deal has been lately said about the freedom of the press. We are certainly amongst the most strenuous advocates for the strict preservation of that freedom, from a knowledge of the blessings which it may confer, and of the evils which it may avert; and therefore it is that we are decided enemies to its licentiousness; because its licentiousness has a necessary tendency to destroy its freedom. An essential part of this freedom consists in the power of every member of the community to discuss, fairly but freely, the public conduct of public men. Now, it will not be denied, that every member of the House of Commons, individually, is a public man; and, of course, that the whole House, in the aggregate, are public men. It will thence necessarily follow, that the established liberty of the British press confers a right on every Briton to animadvert, with freedom, on the conduct of any individual member, or on the proceedings of the whole House. But here, unfortunately, practice and theory are at variance; and the power, assumed by the House, of being judge as well as party, in every thing affecting themselves, operates as effectually as the most restrictive laws, in preventing the exercise of that freedom which constitutes at once the birthright and the boast of Englishmen! It is the existence, de facto, if not de jure, of this A |