has since proved itself the friend of good morals; and has in the larger towns kept from the wildest disorder, and induced frequently to a restitution of stolen goods and a reparation of injury an emigrant population, who without their priests and confessionals would have been an intolerable nuisance. And the Catholics have accordingly been admitted to equal privileges and immunities with the several denominations of Protestants. But the Catholics in this country are connected with Europe, whence they receive their priests, and draw most of their funds; and in the course of political events a crisis may perhaps arrive, when it would be expedient to make efforts to suppress the denomination, not on account of their tenets, but of their intimate connexion with foreign powers. And in such a crisis the government may be called upon to exercise the right with which the Constitution entrusts it, of requiring every man to contribute to the support of Protestant worship.

This Article does not invest the legislature with the right of requiring all men under all circumstances to attend public worship; but only, "if there be any public religious teachers, whose instructions they can conveniently and conscientiously attend." That government has a right to demand the personal service or attendance of citizens, is a principle recognised in our militia system. Inconvenience and conscientious scruples are the only excuses allowed in this case. The former exempts the absent and sick; the latter, the Quakers. And in the grant of a right to require men to attend church, both of these excuses are recognised. Thus this Article can never empower the legislature to drive to church the sick or the feeble, the halt or the blind, the wind-bound or the storm-bound, the Deist or the Atheist, or those Christians, who, like Cowper, conscientiously refuse to join in public worship. I do not indeed think it by any means important that this provision should be retained in the Article. Let this, let the provision which limits legislative patronage to Protestant religious societies, be expunged, and all that I regard as essential to the Article remains. I have barely attempted to show that, since this article is a declaration of certain rights, - not a statute, there is no necessity of expunging these provisions from it, because not recognised in practice.

2. Those who favor the repeal of this article assert, that

in the States where similar legal provisions have been repealed, no harm has been done by the repeal. That in several of those States, towns which a few years ago enjoyed the regular ministrations of settled clergymen, are now destitute, is an undeniable fact. But it would be equally impossible to show that they have, or that they have not, become destitute in consequence of the repeal of legislative provisions previously existing. We will allow, then, that the religious societies in those States were not esentially injured by that repeal. It does not follow that the societies in our own State will be left unharmed by a similar measure. The repeal took place in those States before the mutual alienation of religious parties had arrived at its crisis. And perhaps it may have been of service in healing dissensions and preventing an entire rupture in many small parishes; for at such a time the sincere friends of religion would naturally consent to wave unessential differences, in order to preserve unimpaired the institutions from which the government had withdrawn its patronage. But among us the the division is already entire; the alienation utterly irreconcilable.

Again, when we compare the States where religious institutions were formerly supported by law with those where they never were so, we shall perceive that the former owe much of their religious prosperity to the laws now repealed. In the States where no such laws ever existed, well-educated and permanently settled clergymen are maintained in the cities and larger towns; but the pulpits in the less populous portions, are, in general, indebted for a precarious supply to itinerant preachers (many of them supported by charitable funds), and, in some large districts, to men devoted and zealous indeed, but hardly superior in education or refinement to the humblest of their charge. In our own State, and in States where religion has till recently been supported by law, the cities and large towns are the very places where religious societies are the least numerous in proportion to the population; and yet they are much more numerous than in the cities and large towns of other States.

3. Some object to the support of public worship by a tax upon all the citizens, on the ground that all, or that they themselves, cannot or do not attend church. Let us test this ground by supposing one or two parallel cases. A man goes to the town assessors and says: "I have no children to send

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to the public schools; and must therefore beg you to abate that portion of my tax which is appropriated to their support." The assessors might justly say to such a man: "You derive numberless blessings from living in an intelligent community. If the people are well-educated, they will use discreetly the right of suffrage; if they are ignorant, they will impose upon you worthless rulers, or will involve themselves or you in the horrors of anarchy. We tax you, then, for the support of a system, which secures to the people, - to you, the permanence of social order and prosperity. Expect therefore no abatement." Another man sends a message to the assessors in terms like these: "I have been prevented by bodily infirmity from riding or walking out for the last two or three years; and probably shall never go out again. I must therefore request you to excuse me from paying my high-way tax." The assessors might fairly reply: "The community of which you are a member, which defends you, which protects you, could not subsist unless the members of it had convenient means of passage to each other's dwellings. We tax you, then, for what is essential to the existence of the body politic,

essential to your own comfort and prosperity. We therefore must request or compel you to pay your high-way tax." And in like manner we might say to him who is unwilling to contribute to the support of public worship, because he never attends it: "Though you never go to church, you derive innumerable benefits from living in a community where the Sabbath is observed, and its public services regularly performed and well attended. Your property, your life, your character is rendered more secure by the sense of religious obligation, which the institution of public worship has diffused throughout the community. Your other taxes are also made lighter by the pauperism and crime which that institution prevents. We therefore hold you liable to be taxed for the support of an institution thus eminently beneficial to the public and to you."

4. But another yet more plausible objection is sometimes urged against the support of public worship by a tax indiscriminately laid. There are those, who profess that they cannot conscientiously contribute to the support of Christian institutions, as they are not believers in the Christian religion. Let us answer their objection also by the supposition of a similar case. The Quakers, as is well known, have conscientious objections to engaging in military operations. Suppose a Quaker delegation should make application to the proper State and national authorities after this manner: "We cannot conscientiously pay a tax for the military expenses of the state. We beg you therefore to deduct from our State tax the proportion of it which is appropriated to that department. And, as nearly one third of the national expenditure goes to the support of the army and navy, we shall expect that, whenever a member of our fraternity imports any article chargeable with duty, he be required to pay but two thirds of the duty demanded of other citizens." Those to whom such an address was made, might of course, with perfect justice, reply: "We have consulted your conscience in not requiring you to bear arms. But you are so unfortunate as to belong to a nation, the majority of which think a well-organized militia, an army, and a navy, essential to its security and well-being. You enjoy all the privileges of a citizen, and we only tax you for your proportion of what those privileges cost. If conscience will not let you pay the tax, the world is before you. Go and find, if you can, and, if you cannot find, establish a community, where there shall be neither fort nor arsenal, army nor navy; and when you are tired of leading a life of constant anxiety, alarm, and danger, we will cheerfully welcome you back to your full share of our privileges and our liabilities." And in like manner might our legislature say to those whom a tender conscience forbids to pay for the support of public worship: "We have consulted your conscience, in not requiring you to attend public worship unless you can do so conscientiously. But you live in a State, the majority of the inhabitants of which believe its maintenance essential to their welfare as citizens, to the preservation of their social rights and the security of their property. As long as you remain a citizen of this commonwealth, you are therefore liable, as a citizen, not as a Christian, to be taxed for the support of public worship. If you cannot conscientiously pay this tax, the world is before you, -go, as the wise and good of former times have gone, go into exile for conscience' sake. Go where the gospel has never been preached, where the Sabbath is unknown. And, when sad experience has convinced you, that, whether our religion be true or false, it is politically useful, we will gladly receive you back to the immunities and obligations of a State which the genius of Christianity protects."

ART. VIII. - 1. Plan of the Founder of Christianity, by F. V. REINHARD, S. T. D., Court Preacher at Dresden. Translated from the Fifth German Edition, by OLIVER A. TAYLOR, A. M., Resident Licentiate, Theological Seminary, Andover. New York. G. & C. & H. Carvill, 1831. 12mo. pp. 359.

2. Memoirs and Confessions of Francis Volkmar Reinhard, S. T. D. &c. From the German. By OLIVER A. TAYLOR. Boston. Peirce & Parker, 1832. 12mo. pp. 164.

We welcome with satisfaction whatever has a tendency to promote a commerce of mind among the nations, on the great topics of theological investigation. An acquaintance with the habits of thought, and the results obtained on these subjects, in different parts of the world, is of no slight importance to the Christian, and to the student of religion. It is neither salutary nor philosophical to shut up the mind within the bounds of our country, any more than within those of our sect. We should look abroad, and observe the opinions and forms of inquiry which men adopt, under institutions and influences quite diverse from our own, on the deeply interesting questions relating to the character and evidences of revelation, or the nature and bearings of divine truth. Christianity is indeed the mother tongue of all the nations who receive it; but it is well to be acquainted with the different forms in which it is spoken, and the different meanings which it is understood to convey. On this account, translations of valuable theological works, though generally deemed - but not always justly - a humbler kind of labor than original composition, should be thankfully received.

No one can doubt, we think, that the claims of Germany, on the theological inquirer, are of an interesting and important character. These claims have been sometimes, perhaps, exaggerated on the one hand, and depreciated on the other; but we believe, that both in this country and in England, a better acquaintance is producing a fairer estimate. German theology has been praised or condemned in the mass. Nothing can be more vague, than such general strictures or commendations. This manner of speaking of the religious investigations among any people is, for the most part, quite unsatisfactory, because it overlooks the varieties produced