had spoken to them, or they were directed to by the immediate guidance of the Spirit of God." In a letter written to a prelate by that tolerant papist, Maximilian II., emperor of Germany, in 1564, that potentate declares, that "there is no sin, no tyranny, more grievous than to affect dominion over men's consciences; and they who do so, go about to invade the tower of heaven." And the emperor Napoleon said, when at the height of his power: My dominion ends where that of conscience begins."

66

The Puritan view is well exhibited in a treatise published in 1647, by John Cook, a celebrated lawyer, and afterwards executed as a traitor for having acted as the prosecuting officer at the trial of Charles I., that notorious usurper of our Saviour's kingly power. "The question, truly stated," says Cook, "is but this: Whether the inventions of men ought any more to be mixed with the institutions of Christ in his Kingly office, than their good works in his Priestly office?" An Independent, he adds, "is content to be every man's servant, so as Christ may but reign over his conscience, which if he should not, we know not where he is to reign." "He depends not on any but Christ Jesus, the Head, in point of canon and command, for spiritual matters. Concerning the discipline of Christ's Church, he does no more depend upon man, than concerning the doctrine; and counts it the most glorious sight in the world, to see Jesus Christ walk as King, ruling by the sceptre of his Word, in the midst of his golden candlesticks." One more of the old Regicide's rousing words: "Christ's Kingdom is only there where His laws are in force; for that country is no part of a prince's dominion, which is not regulated by his laws."

The Puritan settlers of New England undertook their perilous and painful migration to these shores, for the express purpose of carrying out into thorough practice their grand principle, "that there is, under the New Testament, a sacred visible church-state, order, or polity, instituted and appointed by Jesus Christ, and him only; to the observation of which, believers are everywhere bound willingly to submit and subject themselves." The Massachusetts colonists all subscribed to the "Declaration of the Faith and Order owned and practised in the Congregational Churches in England," which is commonly called the "Savoy Confession," and was adopted in 1658. It is therein set forth, that "by the appointment of the Father, all power for the calling, instituting, order, or government of the Church, is invested, in a supreme

and sovereign manner, in the Lord Jesus Christ, as King and Head thereof." And the Congregational Union of England and Wales, in a similar declaration, adopted in 1833, announce, that "they acknowledge Christ as the only Head of the Church," and "their only appeal in all questions touching their religious faith and practice, is to the Sacred Scriptures."

The sentiments of our pilgrim fathers are well expressed by the celebrated Dr. John Owen: "They who hold communication with the Lord Jesus Christ, will admit nothing, practise nothing, in the worship of God, but what they have his warrant for. Unless coming in his name, they will not hear an angel from heaven. They know the apostles themselves were to teach the saints only what he commanded them. And you know how many in this very nation, in the days not long since passed, yea, how many thousands left their native soil, and went into a vast and howling wilderness in the uttermost parts of the world, to keep their souls undefiled and chaste unto their dear Lord Jesus, as to this matter of his worship and institutions."

Thomas Hooker, the founder of Hartford, in the preface to his once celebrated "Survey of Church Discipline," thus plainly states the case as to the object mainly sought by him and his brethren: "As the prophetical and priestly office of Christ was completely vindicated in the first times of reformation, so now the great cause and work of God's reforming people is, to clear the rights of Christ's kingly office, and in their practice to set up his kingdom." The name of Puritans was fixed upon them on account of their so strenuously insisting on the restoration of the Christian faith and institutions in their purity, according to the rules laid down by the adorable Founder of Christianity. Cost what it would, home, country, treasure, friends and life, they were bent on maintaining inviolate and entire, the supreme and undivided headship and sovereignty of Christ over all things pertaining to the church. They rejected all canons and customs which could not plead the recorded inspiration of the Bible in their favor. When they had thoroughly purged the Church of all legislation but Christ's, they found nothing left but simple Congregationalism; the only system of church policy which perfectly accords with the genius of Christianity, and is instinct with the free spirit of our religion. Jonathan Mitchell, the admired pastor of Cambridge, at whose death it was said, that "all New England shook

when that pillar fell," thus states the case: "It is our errand into the wilderness to study and practise true Scripture reformation and it will be our crown in the sight of God and man, if we find it, and hold it, without adulterating deviations."

The view which our fathers took of a pure and proper church is this;-It is an absolute monarchy democratically administered. It is an absolute monarchy; for Christ is its Head and King; his will is the highest law; he alone has the right to legislate; and his decrees registered in the Bible must alone be obeyed. And the affairs of this spiritual monarchy are democratically administered; for to the Church is given the free election of all its executive officers, and the members are all possessed of equal rights and privileges. What noble schools of liberty must be found in these self-governing societies, so willingly obedient to Christ, and so free from vassalage to man! The Church can do nothing but what Christ has authorised her to do. The power committed to the Church, is a power for administering the laws, not for making them. Christ put a stop to all further making of laws for his kingdom, when he closed the list of inspired writings. The famous John Cotton, the father of New England Congregationalism, in his comment on that clause in the apostle's commission,"teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you," - well remarks: "If even the apostles teach people to observe more than Christ has commanded, they go beyond their commission; and a larger commission than that given to the apostles, neither Elders, nor Synods, nor Churches, can challenge."

John Higginson, the worthy minister of Salem, affirms: "This was, and is, our cause, that Christ alone might be acknowledged by us, as the only head, Lord, and Lawgiver, in his Church; that his written word might be acknowledged as the only rule; that only his, and all his, institutions might be observed and enjoyed by us; and that with purity and liberty, with peace and power." "In matters divine, where we have a clear command, with Moses, we yield not an hoof to Pharaoh."

One of the oldest Puritans, who died on the scaffold, a faithful martyr to Jesus, once said to his brethren in the faith and patience of Christ: "Let us, for the appeasing and assurance of our consciences, give heed to the Word of God, and by that golden reed measure our temple, our altar, and our worshippers; even

by these rules, whereby the apostles, those excellent perfect workmen, founded and built the first churches." And one of the latest and ablest writers on this subject says: "The Word of God is our only rule, in the sense both of a law, and a standard; a rule sufficient, as opposed to all deficiency; exclusive, as relates to any other than the Divine authority from which it emanates; universal, as embracing all the principles of human actions; and ultimate, as admitting of no appeal from its decisions."

Nearly a century after the landing of the pilgrims, an assembly of Connecticut ministers, in setting forth their general assent to the Savoy Confession of Faith, made a preface to their solemn act and testimony, in the following admirable words: "We do not assume to ourselves that anything is to be taken on trust from us, but commend to our people the following counsels: 1. That you be immovably and unchangeably agreed in the only sufficient and invariable rule of religion, which is the HOLY SCRIPTURE, the fixed canon, incapable of addition or diminution. YOU OUGHT

TO ACCOUNT NOTHING ANCIENT THAT WILL NOT STAND BY THIS RULE; AND NOTHING NEW THAT WILL. 2. That you be determined. by this rule in the whole of religion. That your faith be right and divine, the Word of God must be the foundation of it, and the authority of the Word the reason of it." Thus have the Puritans and their legitimate offspring always adhered to the noble maxim of Peter Martyr, admitting" nothing without, nothing against, nothing beside, nothing beyond the divine Scriptures."

DR. MÜLLER'S LETTER ON THE GERMAN REVOLUTION.*

DEAR AND RESPECTED FRIEND.

You wish from me a letter written expressly for your " ChurchFriend," wherein I may impart my sentiments as to the recent revolutions in Germany, and particularly as to their actual and probable influence on the Church. I would readily respond to your wishes, could I do so without becoming an accuser of my

* Addressed to the Editor of "Der Deutsche Kirchenfreund," and translated from that work for December, 1848.

people before your present countrymen, which I have not the heart to do. You well know that I am not one of the pessimists; but I can look for nothing salutary from this whole commotion, so long as its existing tendencies are so deficient in religious and moral earnestness. The Frankfort Assembly was opened amid frivolous declarations, greeted with clamorous cheering, that the Germans had served God sufficiently, and must henceforth apply themselves to practical matters; and in the parliaments of Vienna and Berlin, this feeling was still more rampant. And this is that people whose standing epithet used to be," the religious!"

Our State, as you know from the journals, has formally thrown off its Christian character. Against this I have nothing to say, so long as this act only expresses the matter-of-fact which made the official Christianity of our State a mere untruth,—namely, that the great mass of our population is no longer pervaded by the spirit of Christianity. Moreover, all our political impulses produce in me an overpowering impression of rottenness and dissolution. The republic, or rather the anarchy, among us, is destitute of true energy and decision, or it would have gone much further. The revolution has not as yet thrown up men of character, able to inspire awe. And while anarchy has spread far enough in certain directions, yet our politics seem for the most part to move in a path leading to a precipice, that is to say, toward that kind of constitutional monarchy, which is, in fact, a democratic republic, only that it places a king at the head, who will have nothing to do at Frankfort except to nominate a prime minister, and to be looking out for a speedy successor to the person he has just nominated. I own, that nothing so disgusts me, as this sort of constitutional monarchy. I can commend the republic which honorably says what it is; and does not, like such a monarchy, lead the government into intrigue and corruption, in order to secure by secret arts an influence it could not openly claim.

As for the evangelical Church, one would suppose that this tumult would give it a strong impulse to rally in strength against the assaults of that radicalism, which thinks to use the abovementioned separation of the State from all nearer relation to the Church, as a weapon for cutting off from the latter all material resources, and all influence upon popular education. And it ought to collect its strength, not merely against radicalism, but also against the Romish Church, which will naturally derive very great