see and hear; and what we see and hear may not always be exactly as we suppose them to be; but are we therefore to distrust our senses altogether? It would be madness. After all the blunders of our ears and eyes, we shall still trust them, if we are not fools; and though our feelings, or our sense of decency, and our sense of the difference between right and wrong, may sometimes, through our fault, deceive us, we shall still rely upon them, if we are not fools, as surely as we rely upon our ears and eyes. And as long as ever men have sense enough to trust either their outward or their inward senses, so long will they be able to see and feel the loathsomeness of Socialism without any examination of proofs whatever. Neverthe

less as far as any thing in the shape of proof has been brought forward, Christians have not refused to examine the subject. I know many Christians who have read almost every thing that has been written on the subject. I know Christians who have gone farther into the subject than ever the Socialist advocates appear to have done. They do not shrink from an examination, even when no examination is necessary for their own satisfaction.

But the truth is, if a man has an upright soul, if the eyes of his soul are not blinded by sin, and if his spiritual relishes are not destroyed or perverted by licentiousness, he can never be at a loss to ascertain the truth of religion, or the falsehood of infidelity. Infidelity is at war with every noble principle of our nature, and with every object in the universe; while to the well-disposed and serious mind, all things in heaven and earth, all things both within us and without us, lift up their voices in favour of religion. The infidel is at war with the whole universe; and the whole universe of truth is at war with him. carries the consciousness of his own guilt in himself, in his restless and agitated soul. While the Christian, cheered with the consciousness of rectitude, and resting on the firm foundations of eternal truth, enjoys a peace that passes understanding, and rejoices with a joy unspeakable and full of glory.

He

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EVANGELICAL REFORMER,

AND YOUNG MAN'S GUIDE.

BY JOSEPH

BARKER.

Published every Fortnight.-Price One Penny, or in Monthly Parts, price Two-pence.

No. 32. SATURDAY, MARCH 21, 1840. VOL. III.

THE PRESENT CONTROVERSY BETWEEN THE FRIENDS OF CHRISTIANITY AND THE ADVOCATES OF INFIDELITY.

I HAVE no fear as to the result of the struggle. I have no doubt but that Socialism, like every other form and scheme of infidelity, will pass away and take its place in oblivion amongst the things that are now no more. Christianity has experienced mightier attacks than this, and it still lives. Nay, more it gathers new strength, and increases the rapidity of its conquests continually. It spreads itself eastward and westward, and northward and southward; it crosses the seas with every wind that blows, it is visiting every land, it is running through the length and breadth of the earth, and its friends are solemnly preparing for a visit on her behalf to every dwelling of man, and an appeal to every heart. And it will continue to spread. It will derive fresh strength from every conflict. These struggles are only like those exercises by which we were accustomed to promote the health and activity of our youthful bodies. They are the discipline by which the Christian cause is gathering unwonted energies. In these battles Christians are learning the art of godlike warfare: they are training and arming for the spiritual conquest of the world. And even if it should happen that some of the advocates of Christianity should be beaten in their discussions with

infidels, Christianity will not be beaten. A thousand of her friends may be vanquished, but Christianity will still lift up her head notwithstanding, and dare the wrath and inalice of a world. Christianity is unconquerable: Christianity is invulnerable. The wit and analice of misguided man have not yet invented a weapon that can touch her. Do they plant against her the artillery of argument? There is not a shot can reach her. They might as well point their cannon against the stars. Do they throw at her the light weapons of ridicule and sneers? She stands with her countenance unmoved, the solemn but still the smiling benefactress of a world. The torrent that comes rolling from the tops of the hills will meet with some opposition from the rocks which it beats against, and the trees which it throws down in its course; but it would be madness to suppose that those loosened rocks and torn up trees should ever drive the torrent back to its source. There will be an apparent obstruction for the time, and a little noise and commotion in consequence; but the waters will neither go back nor stand still. While men are gazing on the obstruction, and listening to the noise of the torrent, the waters are rolling along, and covering with richness and beauty the fields of a hundred valleys. And so it is here. Christianity has broken another fragment from the rock, and the fragment lies in its way to obstruct its course. It causes a noise and a foaming in the waters, but is the stream stopped? Nay, blessed be God; the waters still roll on. The riches and blessings of the Gospel are rolling through more than a hundred lands, and carrying life and joy to the ends of the earth. And even this

piece of the broken rock shall not remain in the current long. It shall be heaved from its place; it shall be rolled headlong down; it shall be dashed from fall to fall; it shall be shattered and ground into dust, and carried along by the stream to the shores of the boundless deep.

I would, therefore, exhort the friends of Christianity not to be alarmed or anxious about this controversy, as if it were possible to come to harm. It cannot come to harm.

Truth will survive every conflict. Whatever else may perish, truth will be immortal; and the Gospel of Christ is truth. "All flesh is grass; and all the glory of man is as the flower of the grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth way; but the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the Gospel is preached unto you."-1 Pet. i. 24, 25.

The Gospel has had abler enemies than it has now; and that at a time when it had fewer and feebler friends. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries some of the most polished and popular authors of the age wrote against it. Men called noble by the world-men possessing all the influence of rank, and title, and place, and wealth, and power, stood forth against the religion of Christ, as in the case of Lord Herbert, Lord Bolingbroke, and Lord Shaftesbury. But did they prosper? Did they destroy Christianity? They did not even wound her. Christianity never looked lovelier; she never moved with a firmer step, she never worked with a mightier power, than since her struggle with those unhappy great ones.

And those who wrote against the truth in former times, had other advantages, besides the influence of their rank and learning, which infidel writers of the present day have not. Many of the objections they brought against Christianity were then new; their readers were also generally ignorant; people also were taken by surprise; they were not at all prepared for such attacks on religion; they had never heard of such objections before; and they had never heard or read of any answers to them. To many of those objections no answers had yet been given; Christians had not thought on the subject; they had never dreamed of such objections being made to their religion. Satisfied with the glorious character of Christianity, and blessed themselves by its happy influences, they hardly entertained a thought that fierce and open enemies to the truth would arise.

Besides, the age in which those earlier infidels wrote, was the age of blind belief: men had not examined the reasons of their faith; they were, therefore, the less prepared for the attacks of their enemies. And, in addi

tlon to this, the prevailing religion of those times was less pure; it was more encumbered and disfigured with the inventions of men. Many doctrines passed for truth that were not truth; and many doctrines that were true and of great importance, and necessary to the perfection of the Christian system, were little thought of, or forgotten. Men generally had received their notions of Christian truth and duty from men and from men's books, instead of receiving them immediately from the Scriptures themselves. Many parts of the prevailing creeds were therefore easily shown to be irrational and false; and many prevailing practices which had been mistakenly thought to be in accordance with the Gospel, were soon found to be unreasonable, and inimical to the interests of mankind.

When, therefore, the foes of Godliness began their warfare, they seemed to carry almost all before them. People were amazed. The good were alarmed, as if the Gospel had been declared to be a fable by a voice from heaven. There was a great and general panic among the friends of religion, and though they knew that the charges brought against religion were not true, yet they scarcely knew, in their confusion, what to answer, or what to do. Thousands upon thousands who were wedded to evil passions and criminal indulgences, and who were anxious for some excuse for throwing off the restraints of decency and virtue, embraced the infidel doctrine with joy. It was just the doctrine they wanted; it was just the scheme their guilty souls had longed and waited for. No sooner had they found à system so well suited to their unclean minds, than they began to recommend it to others. Every infidel convert became an infidel preacher. All of them wanted company; all of them wanted countenance; and they laboured to proselyte with a zeal that might have done honour to a better cause. The plague spread rapidly, it ran through the land, it infected more or less all ranks, and it took a fearful hold of the rising generation. Every one that had a vicious habit or a vicious inclination, found an advocate of infidelity in his own breast. Infidel jests, and infidel objections became the staple of polite conversation; religion was a bye-word; its doctrines and duties