of the people-guarding the fountain heads of learning, and opening new springs; promoting thus the good of allhonoured and respected by all, not because all can fully comprehend the meaning and value of their pursuits, but because all see them honoured by the State.

Would that we could hope for some support of a like kind for the intellectual interests of our country. But what has government ever done to cherish these interests? Next to nothing in comparison with their importance and its own means. It has occasionally ordered a picture or a statue; it has subscribed for a few books. Oh, if a portion of those superfluous millions, whose distribution has created so keen an excitement, could have been devoted to founding and cherishing a great and noble institution for the cultivation of lofty science and letters, what occasion of joy to every lover of the cause, and to every enlightened lover of our country! Little, however, can at present be expected from government. The action of our government is but the reflection of the popular will; it has but little power to form and direct the public mind. It will be yet a long time before the country at large is adequately awake to the importance even of primary education. It is pleasant to perceive a growing sense of this; but the importance of a generous provision for the cultivation of the higher departments of science and letters is scarcely at all

So far, indeed, is the mutual connexion and harmony of the two from being discerned, that there is a disposition on the part of the friends of popular education---even among those who ought to know better-to dislike and oppose the claims of high science and letters. A great change must be wrought in public feeling, before the ample resources of the country will be applied to this great object.

What then remains? Shall the lovers of good letters despair of this cause? Oh no! Let them stir themselves up to a loftier zeal in proportion to the adverse influences that press upon them. Let them mutually quicken in each other those genial impulses which the chill cold atmosphere of the country so tends to repress. Let them brighten the golden chain that unites them. Let a livelier sympathy pervade and animate the whole brotherhood of those who love and honour the cause of Truth, Beauty, and Letters. Let them combine their exertions, and direct them to supVOL. III. 76

plying the fostering influences which the Public and the State withhold.

It is greatly to be regretted that there is not a more intimate connexion among our men of letters; that they meet no more frequently as a class-have no more free communication and make themselves no more felt as a distinct body and a positive element in the social system. Perhaps in part it is owing to the want of some such point of common attraction as the capitals of Europe supply; but more to the fact that those among us who are in any degree devoted to the cultivation of letters, give to its pursuits only the intervals of leisure snatched from the duties and cares of other professions, upon which they are dependent not only for subsistence, but for their social position and consequence. They are thus scattered abroad over the land-— isolated, amidst the ungenial influences that surround them, with but little leisure or opportunity to indulge in the sympathies of brotherly communion, and to combine and strengthen their influence for the promotion of high letters.

Would, however, that the love of these great interests, and a sense of their value to the country, might lead to more vigorous and combined exertions to promote them. If I might suggest, in broken hints, the outline of a scheme that I should desire to see embodied—I would say: Let a great association be formed, embracing all who cultivate, and all who appreciate the value of good Learning, lofty Science, and Art. The objects of such a union should be by mutual sympathy, to quicken in each other the love of Truth, Beauty, and Letters, and excite to genial production;-to supply, as far as possible, the requisite material conditions-the means and appliances-that may give free scope to the impulses of genius; and to act upon the intellectual spirit of the nation, exalting its tone, developing the power and exciting the disposition to appreciate and cherish the productions of high letters. În imitation of the German Society of Naturalists, let there be an annual Congress of the disciples of letters, held in different places on successive years;—and let not the influence of these meetings die away with the speeches that are made. Let suggestions concerning all the most important desiderata in the highest departments of Philosophy, Art, and Letters, be received, carefully weighed by appropriate committees, and discussed in the most Catholic spirit;-let prizes be pro

posed, and works of pre-eminent merit be crowned. But above all, let the most strenuous and unwearied exertions be directed to securing those material provisions which are requisite to create a learned order to call a portion of the highest talent and genius of the country into the field of science to sustain a body of high and original cultivators of Truth and Beauty. Here would be included the foundation of libraries containing the most perfect apparatus for the thorough cultivation of every department of letters, and complete collections in Nature and Art;-and last, but most essential, ENDOWMENTs for the dignified and honourable support of Genius-where, free from life's cares, it may follow the impulses of its nature. Here let all those whom God hath formed for great Poets, great Artists, and great Philosophers, find every condition and every influence to quicken, unfold, and perfect in themselves the rare and excellent gifts of God. Here "in the quiet and still air of delightful studies," let the sense of Duty unite with the inward promptings of their nature, leading them to work, each in his high vocation, for the glory of God and the honour and instruction of their country and mankind.

If this be but an idea that can never be realized, surely it is an idea beautiful to the imagination, and attractive to the wishes of every lover of Truth and Letters. Even if it cannot be fully realized, something may be done. A beginning may be made by the union and combined influence of the disciples of letters; and they may at length so act upon the intellectual spirit of the country as to secure the fostering influence of the State. At all events, the duty of uniting in the promotion of this great end, rests upon all who love the cause of Truth and Letters. It rests upon all whom history and reflection have taught to dread for our country the debasing and deadly tendencies of a too intense and absorbing devotion to the mere physical interests of life. It rests upon all who would elevate the intellectual tone of the nation-develope its true humanityand raise it to the true freedom of virtuous energy. It rests upon all who would secure to our beloved country the permanent possession of its true dignity and proper well-being. There is no alternative. We must be rich and great. We cannot-like the mountain dwellers of Switzerland and the Alps, the pastoral tribes of Lapland, or the poor inhabitants of Iceland-find in our poverty,

and in the influences of religion, those safeguards of our virtue and our welfare, which render the conservative influence of high and pure Letters comparatively unimportant. We must be rich and great; and our riches and greatness will inevitably prove our ruin-spite of all that Religion will effect-unless the intellectual spirit of the nation be elevated by the pervading influence of pure Letters, and a Spiritual Philosophy.

ART. VI. UNITED BRETHREN'S SOCIETY.

By the EDITOR.

[For many of the statements which here follow, some of which relate to particulars in the history and constitution of this society not heretofore published, the writer is indebted to communications made to him, at his request, by a much esteemed member of the Brethren's Church, whose long connexion with it, and official standing in it, entitle his statements to the highest confidence. ED.]

IN presenting the following sketch of the Church of the Moravian Brethren, we have chiefly in view the practical illustration it affords of those principles of Christian Union, to which the attention of our readers has been so frequently called. In the constitution of this society, better than any where else, are these principles carried out and embodied. To the cordial adoption and wise application of them, does this Society owe, under God, its origin, usefulness, and permanence. In the formation of the Brethren's Unity, we behold the animating spectacle of Christians of different denominations, forgetting their minor peculiarities, and flocking together, like a band of brothers, to the standard of the Redeemer's Cross, and there organizing themselves, after the primitive model, on the broad basis of their common faith, into a visible Church of Christ!

It is perhaps not generally known, that the Unitas Fratrum, or the Church of the United Brethren, commonly called Moravians,* is (unless the Waldenses are excepted) the most ancient of all the denominations, which

* This name is a geographical designation, which the Society of the Brethren have never themselves adopted, though they do not object to it.

may be styled Protestant. The name of Protestant is not, indeed, generally applied to those who contended against the corruptions of the Romish Church, before the reformation. Still it properly designates all who, in any age, have witnessed for the truth in opposition to Romanism. It is justly remarked by Twestan,* that a protestantism, substantially agreeing with that of the German Reformers, had always existed in the Catholic Church from the time it became corrupt.

Another fact respecting this Society deserving mention, is, that of all the Protestant communities, it is the only one whose ancestry may be traced back to the Eastern Church, as it was through the instrumentality of two Greek Bishops, Cyrillus and Methodius, that the Gospel was introduced into Moravia and Bohemia, in the ninth century.

It was in those countries that the ancient Church of the United Brethren took its rise, in the year 1457, from among the genuine followers of John Huss, who, on the 6th of July, 1415, had sealed his testimony to the truth by the death of martyrdom. This little Church of Martyrs and Confessors, adopting the word of God as its only standard, organized itself upon the model of the primitive Apostolic Church In adopting the name of Unitas Fratrum, it plainly indicated the principle on which it was founded, and its obedient regard to the Redeemer's prayer for his followers, that they all might be one. That the United Brethren, at that early period, not only maintained this principle among themselves, but sought to carry it out in efforts to form a union with all whom they could regard as true followers of Christ, will appear from the facts here subjoined.

They first endeavoured to enter into a closer connexion with the Waldenses in their neighbourhood, and were prevented only by a persecution which broke out at the very moment when the union was to have been consummated. Again, in 1474, they sent out delegates to various countries of Europe, Asia, and Africa, to search for such Christian congregations as lived according to the rule of Christ and his Apostles, proposing to unite with them: but their search proved fruitless. In 1486 they attempted a second time to

* Dogmatik, p. 100.