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with them the whole is a question of words and theories, which they have taken up as the popular teaching, without ever realizing them; that they seek to be "justified without works," rather than by faith;" that they shrink from the thought of the indwelling SPIRIT, because they have not in themselves "the fruits of the SPIRIT;" because the thought of that Holy Being as actually indwelling, would require greater strictness and watchfulness over their actions, and a more awful care of, and reverence for, themselves, as being His temples. "Justification by faith" is to them an easy profession; it leaves them free, unconstrained; it makes all right; the indwelling of the SPIRIT is a law within (Rom. viii.), taking place of the law without (Rom. vii.), but It is equally "a law," equally requires obedience; only that It will supply what It requires. The obedience to the law is not repealed; but the power to perform it given. Christians are not under a law, but have the law within them; yet so must they be the more actuated by the law, controlled by the law; more than before, only from within, as well as from without in Holy Scripture. This some like not. It does away with the supposed liberty of the Gospel. It leaves them as much in constraint as before; nay, they must needs be more watchful, more timid of doing wrong, more jealous over themselves, more careful of details; as one would tread reverently and lowlily in GOD's House, and touch with respectful care vessels sanctified by

3

use in His service, so does the Christian's body and soul acquire an awful character, if the whole man be indeed" an habitation of God through the Spirit" (Eph. ii. 22). The "vessel" of our bodies must indeed be "possessed in honour" if it be consecrated with such a Presence; "God" must indeed be "glorified in "our" spirits and our bodies," if they are in such sense "God's." This constraint some misliking, condemn, as mysticism, the doctrine which condemns themselves and their unheedful ways. One would not even in thought imagine who these may be; individually, one would hope of all, one by one, that they were not such; but in an age of so much profession, and so little practice, which speaks so much of faith, and practises, so little, good works, and "vaunts itself" so much, it is much to be feared that there must be many, who at present lie under the sentence of such as say, Lord, Lord, but do not the things which I say." And this is said not to disparage any opinions or views within or without the Church, but if by any means it may tend to dispel the self-deceit of any; and GOD may give them repentance, to recover them out of the snare of the devil, whatever that snare be, or however hidden from them.

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Other points dwelt upon in the Letter, it is, from different causes, little necessary to do more than name. The doctrine of "reserve in communicating

religious knowledge," in other words, "carefulness in not obtruding religious truth upon minds unfitted to receive it," had given rise to little controversy when the Letter was first written; it relates also to an

0os, a moral principle, a natural instinct, Christian wisdom and discretion, rather than to the class of subjects upon which this Letter was employed; and now, all necessity of explaining or defending it, is superseded by the further developement of the subject by the thoughtful writer himself'. If they, who seem perhaps most to need it, will not be benefited by it, at least it may be hoped that it will be useful to such, as having come to the knowledge of neglected truths, might be disposed to advocate them in a spirit of excitement, or without reference to times and seasons.

On another subject, the distinction of "deadly sin," which has been remarked upon, was used in no other sense, than in that in which it is employed in our Articles (Art. XVI 2.) and Litany; and while it is, of course, felt that every sin needs to be washed away by repentance, and effaced by the Blood of CHRIST, and the greatest saints have been ever ready to confess themselves, in true humility, the "chief of sinners," and it was observed (Letter, p. 86) that Rome had erred in the "refined distinctions which she made in carrying out her divisions of mortal and venial

1 Tract No. 87.

2 Referred to in the Letter itself, p. 83.

sins," yet it would be introducing Stoicism into the Gospel, to contend that all sins were equal; nor would any one who never did repent, repent alike deeply of all his sins, or think that all were alike to be repented of. Conscience, when not bound down by a system, would reject the notion that adultery and some slight excess in eating were equal sins, although, under a system, there have been who have maintained it. Rather, while they who have been saved from greater sins, acknowledge that it is of GOD's mercy that they have been so preserved, by which same mercy others have been led to repentance of them; let each repent of the sins into which he has fallen, according to their magnitude and their aggravations in himself; listening to conscience, and not to human theories, which will not avail in the day of judgment; that so humbling himself he may be exalted.

Thus much having been said on the topics of the Letter, there are two points as to the Letter itself, upon which I would wish to explain myself.

The first relates to the extent to which I claimed the benefit of the acquittal of the Bishop of Oxford for the writers of the Tracts (Letter, p. 8, 9). I desired, certainly, most scrupulously to adhere to the very letter of his Lordship's words, altering them no further than was necessary for the change of person, in quoting to his Lordship his own words. The Bishop of Oxford had been called upon by publica

tions little inclined to recognize Episcopal authority, and anonymously, to pass censure upon the Tracts; he did pronounce "The authors of the Tracts in question have laid no such painful necessity [that of "interfering"] upon me, nor have I to fear that they ever will do so." I was myself addressing him as one of those "authors;" and it certainly never occurred to me that in mentioning this acquittal of his Lordship, I should be understood to claim it, further than on the subjects upon which he had been appealed to, upon which he had pronounced, and on which I was writing, the charges made upon the writers of the Tracts, for what they had therein expressed. One individual has, it seems, given my words another meaning, as though I meant to claim the protection of the Bishop's name for the various other publications of the writers of the Tracts; I therefore would take this opportunity of saying, that I meant to adhere rigidly to his Lordship's words, and had no thought of any thing except those Tracts.

2. I have understood that parts of my Letter have given pain to some good men, as though their views were unfairly represented in it. This would be a subject of much regret in any case; but especially where one chief object was to conciliate and promote peace, I should be the more sorry to give pain to those with whom (in common with such whose views of doctrine and practice I more closely share,) I