taken place in total silence, without the smallest opposition, without one single voice being heard, without a single line being written, in defence of the original apostolic divinely authorized practice. No: all that these worthy good-hearted true Christians, with the learned Christian Politician at their head, have to say for themselves is this, "We believe that there is no foundation for it." Although, however, this may be a very concise way of disposing of the question, it is possible that some speculative persons may not be altogether satisfied with this solution of the case. But happily our Christian Politician has, with great ingenuity, devised a hypothesis which, if admitted, completely relieves his pious and believing brethren, "the true Christiaus," out of all their difficulties. It is, indeed, perfectly original: none will dispute the honour of the invention: it could only occur to an adventurous and enterprising mind, perfectly free from the trammels of vulgar prejudice. It is this: "Had the tradition been well grounded, viz. that infant baptism was an institution of the apostles, and the universal practice of the primitive church, this could no more justify the practice than it would justify Peter's error, who was by Paul so justly condemned." Now it appears that the offence for which the apostle Peter was publicly and severely rebuked by the apostle Paul, was doing a thing which, at the time, he knew to be wrong. See Gal. ii. 11. And upon the Christian Politician's principles, by parity of reason, if the apostles instituted infant baptism, they knowingly contravened the explicit orders of their great Master; they promulgated a strange fancy of their own as an ordinance of Christ; they did what they at the time knew to be wrong, and instead of being approved and obeyed, as it appears they were by the universal primitive church, they ought to have been severely rebuked, and publicly censured, as Peter in a similar case had been condemned by Paul. This is an argument so novel and unexpected, that I frankly acknowledge that I am not prepared to answer it. I had always been accustomed to regard the apostles as authorized interpreters of their Master's will: and I had the simplicity to believe that whatever was taught by the apostles, and received unanimously by the primitive church, constituted a vital part of the Christian revelation. And having traced infant baptisin to this sacred source, I was content to leave it there: nor is it in my power to add any thing further to the argument. If, however, through weakness of judgment, I have unfortunately erred in assuming this principle, I have only to request, not in my own name only, but in that of many others, who would be "true Christians," if they could, that the Christian Politician will have the goodness to embrace an early opportunity of stating all those doctrines and institutions which, having been taught by the apostles and universally acknowledged by the primitive church, are now discovered to be "strange fancies," which endanger men's salvation, and "by which no true Christian can be led away:" and for the promulgation of which, in opposition to their better knowledge, the apostles deserve to be severely rebuked as Peter was by Paul. A communication of such importance cannot but be most gratefully received by multitudes, as well as by, Sir, SIR, Your Constant Reader, T. BELSHAM. Palgrave, Oct. 6, 1817. AM very happy to find, by a late Number of the Repository, [pp. 503, 504,] that the Unitarians of Kent and Sussex have petitioned Parliament to be permitted to marry among themselves, in conformity with their religious principles; in the same manner as Jews and Quakers have been for some time permitted to do. And I should hope, that if this boon be granted, and I can hardly see upon what grounds it can be refused, that our Unitarian divines will not introduce into their service any of the ludicrous and really indelicate observations which pollute the present established marriage ceremony, and are quite sufficient to suffuse with blushes the face of female modesty. But before the question is carried before Parliament, so far as to come to discussion, would it not be well to consider, how far it might be desirable to endeavour to remove the solemnization of the marriage contract alto gether out of the hands of those who minister in holy things, and place it, where, I confess, it appears to me it ought to be, in the hands of the magistrate. I am not going here to discuss what is marriage, or what the views with which it ought to be entered into, or with which it is entered into. But whatever may be determined on these points, if it should hereafter be necessary to discuss them, the manner in which the intention of the parties, intending to be man and wife, should be made public is a civil affair, and is designed for the preservation of harmony in society. Any grievances arising to married parties, as far as redress can be obtained, is sought for in our civil courts: the proceedings in the ecclesiastical courts scarcely can be said to form any exception to this remark. At all events, the moral guilt of parties offending, seems to be considered of trifling importance. Their punishment is visited in degree, according to the supposed magnitude of their civil offence. Besides, suppose a Unitarian should happen to marry a Trinitarian, the latter must be married (I use the term as it is generally used) according to the present law at church, because the mode adopted by Unitarians would not be binding on the Calvinistic lady. This is now done by Quakers, I believe, when they happen to marry out of their own community. It will be necessary that some clause should be introduced into the act, to obviate this inconvenience, provided the affair is still to be considered so far as a religious matter as to be left in the hands of ministers: but I wish to see from any of your correspondents, a substantial reason why it should not be rather ratified before the magistrate. J. F. Church, and, therefore, to adopt it would frustrate our efforts to obtain relief. Let us neither seek to "increase the scanty incomes of our own ministers," nor to "deprive the church of any pecuniary object," but to be eased of a burden which we ought not to bear. Let us respectfully petition Parliament, not for permission to solemnize our own marriages, but for relief from a ceremony which does violence to our consciences, leaving it to their wisdom how such relief shall be afforded. If a request so reasonable should be denied, nothing will then remain for us, but to " obey God rather than men." Let us be determined to do our duty, but let us do it in singleness of eye as unto God and not unto men, and with meekness and gentleness, and universal peace and love. F. K. Marriage Ceremony, as it respects Unitarians. This subject has attracted public attention. A better proof of this cannot be given than its being agitated in the Times Newspaper, a Journal, which is conducted, we believe, upon the mercantile principle, of provoking the discussion or of adopting the side which is most popular, that is, most profitable. From this paper we make the following extracts: No. I. consists of Remarks in the Times, Sept. 18; No. II. is a Letter from Mr. W. Smith on those Remarks; and No. III. contains the further Remarks of the Times upon the general subject and upou Mr. Smith's Letter. I No. I. Remarks in the Times, Sept. 18. T will be recollected, that towards the close of last session of parliament a notice was given by Mr. Smith, the member for Norwich, of some intention to move a bill, the object of which was to allow Unita cinians, as they are more generally called, to marry in their own chapels, and according, we presume, to a ritual of their own, either already compiled, or to be compiled hereafter. About the same time, we should suppose, a question relating to the same subject has been agitated with uncommon warmth in the British settlement of Newfoundland, where marriages have actually been solemnized by authorities deemed incompetent in this country, and the legitimacy of which was therefore doubted. The Methodist ministers, it appears, have performed this ceremony, arguing, that the marriage act of England did not extend to that colony; and that it was therefore competent to them, or even to laymen, to officiate. The matter being of great importance, application was made to the government of England, from which the following official communication has been received at the colony, and has thence found its way into the mother country : Provincial Secretary's Office, Halifax, Aug. 19, 1817. The following copy of a letter from Earl Bathurst to his Excellency the Lieutenant-Governor, is published by authority: “Downing-street, May 31, 1817. "MY LORD, Herewith I have the honour of enclosing to your Lordship an order of his Royal Highness the Prince Regent in Council, dated the 26th ult., disallowing an Act passed by the Legislature of the Province of Nova Scotia, in 1816, entitled, An Act to explain the Acts concerning Marriage and Divorce, passed in the thirty-second year of his late Majesty's reign, and the first year of his present Majesty's reign.' "I have the honour to be, &c. "BATHURST. "To Lieutenant-General the Earl of Dalhousie." Immediately after the date of this letter, a bill to the above effect was proposed to Parliament by Mr. Goulbourn, and on the 27th of June, received the Royal assent. From this act it appears, that the interpretation of the Methodist ministers, upon which an act of the Provincial Legislature of Nova Scotia had been founded, has been set aside, and that the British marriage act has been averred to extend to the colonies. The subject is so interesting to the morals of society, that we are disposed to say something more upon it than what merely results from the occasion. It appears to us, that in situations where regularly ordained or liceused ministers cannot be had, the ceremony should be performed in such practi cable way as may be best calculated to give it solemnity and publicity, and that such marriages should be held valid. In Scotland, if we recollect right, the declaration of the parties that they are married, added to the notoriety that they live together as in a conjugal state, is a conclusive proof that the ceremony has been performed. The Quakers, who have no priesthood, marry by a simple declaration of the parties, which is afterwards signed and attested in their meetings. But it may be asserted as a general rule, that in every Christian country marriage has been esteemed a religious solemnity and a civil contract united, and has been performed in the face of the Church by the Established Clergy, with consequences as to settlement, issue and relationship, prescribed and ordained by law. We confess that we shall be sorry to see any of these forms set aside, because we shall apprehend injurious effects to the purity and morals of our posterity. The Romish Church considers marriage as one of its seven sacraments; and when Christianity was interdicted in France, then, also, was the religious solemnization of marriage prohibited. Whatever respect, also, may be due to Dissenting ministers of various denominations and sects, whatever extraordinary purity we might, for argument's sake, be disposed to allow to their creed; yet they do not themselves, under the existing state of things, pretend to put their public acts upon a level as to general effect, as to the power of exciting attention, or making an impression, with those of the Established Clergy; and we are convinced that every thing of solemnity that can be added to that ceremony, from which all the relations of life spring, is necessary to sanction and enforce the due observance of its obligations. If it be asked, whether we would oppose the progress of Mr. Smith's bill through Parliament, we confess that we have such apprehension of raising the terrible howl of intolerance, that we should rather recommend it to the sound discretion of that gentleman to relinquish his intention; for if the Socinians are allowed to marry in their chapels, there is no reason why the same privilege should not be conceded to the other sects; some of whose ministers would be obliged to attest the performance of the ceremony with their marks instead of their names. There is no reason why the solemnization should not take place in every licensed house of worship; though these structures SO often change the purposes for which they are employed; and are one time dedicated to the worship of the Deity, at another to the consummation of those vices which he abhors. We trust that the Established Church will always be pre-eminent for the dignity and the solemnity of its ceremonies: but we should farther think, that the more respectable Dissenters will shudder at the introduction of a custom, through which they will certainly be disgraced by the practices of their ruder brethren. We think it, however, our duty to add, that the Marriage Act of George II. is a very confused production. business. Allow me, before I conclude, to embrace the opportunity of making one remark. You say that "in every Christian country marriage has been esteemed a religious ceremony and a civil contract united." Now, for the argument's sake, allowing this to be ever so accurately true, I would wish to ask, whether the most logical and legitimate, as well as the best practical inference from the premises, would not be, that while for the security of social order and of property, descendible or otherwise, the most effectual means should be adopted to render the civil contract firm, indissoluble and easy of judicial proof, the strength and permanence of the moral tie would not be best ensured by leaving the religious ceremony to be performed in the mode most congenial to the religious sentiments of the persons themselves; by which their most valuable feelings would inevitably be more deeply irterested in the transaction than they can be by the use of a form to which the parties may unfortunately bave annexed the ideas of inexpedience or impropriety? I am, Sir, Your obedient bumble servant, No. III. To the Editor of the Times. Remarks of the Times upon the general It seems that Mr. Smith, the member for Norwich, did not give notice of any motion for the purpose of altering the law of the land on the subject of marriage in favour of Socinian or Unitarian Dissenters; but, “acting as the organ of others," simply presented a petition from a number of that body who conceive themselves aggrieved by the existing law. In conformity with the request of that honourable gentleman, we hasten to correct our mistake, and have inserted his letter to us in another part of the journal. In that he asks, adopting our definition of marriage “as a religious ceremony and a civil contract united," whether "the most logical and legitimate, as well as the best practical inference would not be, that while for the security of social order and of property, descendible or other wise, the most effectual means should be adopted to render the civil contract firm, indissoluble and easy of judicial proof, the strength and permanence of the moral tie would not be best ensured by leaving the religious ceremony to be performed in the mode most congenial to the religious sentiments of the persons themselves?" To this question we cheerfully reply; first, that logically, Mr. Smith's supposition would make marriage not a religious ceremony and a civil contract united, but a religious ceremony and a civil contract separated, and therefore, not necessarily co-existent; and that the practical inference, would be, that the contracting parties would take as much of either as they liked. For example, the Socinians, we believe, exist in all conceivable gradations, from Christianity, or something near it, down to no Christians at all. There can be no reason why the latter should practise a religious ceremony enjoined by Christ, and recalled by him to primitive purity, by the restriction of single male to single female: with these, therefore, the marriage rite would lose all its solemnity, and become an affair of wax and parchment. On the contrary, the religionists of an opposite description, the enthusiasts, would make it wholly a pious rite or celebration, and limit its commencement and duration to the feeling or experience of passion; the internal motions of what they call godly love, directing them and giving them a right to the enjoyment of its object. With such the civil contract, affecting to bind those whom God had bound, would be superfluous, nay, even impious; and we are not speaking here by conjecture: this has been the language and the practice also of enthusiasts on the subject. Indeed we think it obvious, that if marriage were to be considered as a civil contract only, there can be no reason why it should not observe the character of all civil contracts, and be dissoluble at the will of the parties: but as a divine ordinance, it obtains a controul over the mind itself, and can only be • directed, as to form and circumstance, by human laws. At present the church service enjoys by prescription the right of so No. CCCXVI. Magnanimity of a King of Sweden at a Public Execution. The late King of Sweden had condemned a soldier to die; and stood at a little distance from the place of execution. The fellow, when he heard this, was in hopes of a pardon; but being assured he was mistaken, cried, his tongue was yet free, he would use it at his pleasure, which he did with great license, accusing the King most insolently, and as loud as he could speak, of barbarity and injustice, and appealing to God for revenge of his wronged innocence. The King, not hearing him distinctly, inquired of those about him, what the soldier had been saying; and was told, by a general officer, who was unwilling to . heighten his resentment against the miserable, that he had only repeated very often and loud, that God loves the merciful, and teaches the mighty to moderate their anger. The King was touched by the lesson, and sent his pardon to the criminal. But a courtier, of an opposite interest, took advantage of the occasion, and repeated to the King exactly the licentiousness of the fellow's railing; adding gravely when he had done, that men of quality and trust ought never, in his opinion, to misrepresent facts to their sovereign. The King for some time stood suspended in his thoughts; but turning at length toward the courtier, with a face of reproof; it is the first time, said he, that ever I have been betrayed for my advantage! But the LIE of your enemy pleased me better than your TRUTH does. Plain-Dealer, No. I, May 12, 1724. VOL. XIL. |