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2. The setting apart a certain portion of time during which the children of the poor may have an opportunity of receiving religious instruction by competent persons possessing the confidence of their parents, and that we would not choose, in the present divided state of religious sentiment, that ordinary schoolmasters should be entrusted with the religious instruction of children, in the strict and proper sense of that phrase; deeming it inexpedient that a Calvinist, or an Armenian; Roman Catholic or Episcopalian; Churchman, or Dissenter of any denomination, should be at liberty to inculcate his peculiar dogmas on the infant minds of the children entrusted to his care by parents conscientiously opposed to his particular views.

3. The formation of a Board of Commissioners, consisting of persons of different denominations, and composed of clergy and laity, because it furnishes a safeguard against undue interference with the religious principles of the children, contrary to the consent and wishes of their parents, and because it provides against the unjust appropriation of the public money by any particular party; because we would decidedly resist any system of general and combined national education, proposed to be placed exclusively in the hands and under the control of the Established, Roman Catholic, Presbyterian, or any other clergy; and because we would look upon it as a fruitful source of corruption and intrigue, to commit the disposal of the public money separately to the clergy or laity of the different sects, for the purpose of distinct and separate education.

4. We approve of making the Board accountable to Parliament, and consequently to the country, because it furnishes a check against abuses, and the means of introducing such improvements and alterations, from time to time, as wisdom and experience may dictate-an advantage which other systems do not possess. And we further approve of the idea of putting forward the proposed system as an experiment that it may receive the deliberate jndgment of the country, instead of imposing it at once by legislative enactment, as an arbitrary measure admitting of no further examination or improvement.

5. That provided extracts from the Bible be fairly made, and provided they be not substituted for the whole Bible, we see no reasonable objection to the use of a book of extracts as a school-book during the time of combined education-declaring, at the same time, that by extracts we understand selections, in opposition to an abridgment; and that such extracts are not viewed by us as implying, on the part of those who make them, the guilt of expurgating or mutilating the Word of God. That, at the same time, we distinctly understand and declare, that on the seasons set apart for religious instruction, facilities are offered not only for the reading, but for the study of the sacred Scriptures.

6. That acquiescing in the new system, so far as it proceeds on the principle of condemning all compulsory measures in religion, all invasion of the rights of conscience, and the denial of all education, even of a literary kind, to the Roman Catholics, should they refuse to employ the Protestant or any other version of the Scriptures-yet if they will not consent to receive the Bible at our hands, we are still willing to assist in giving them an education good in itself, to the extent we can persuade them to receive it.

This is the first series of the resolutions adopted by the Presbyterythe second is as follows:

II.-Resolved, 1. That, in proceeding to specify the improvements we

are anxious for the Government to introduce into the new system, we express our satisfaction to learn, from Mr. Stanley's letter to our Moderator, that the regulation requiring the master of each school to keep a register of the attendance of the children on public worship "has been rescinded;" and also to learn, from an extract of a letter by Mr. Stanley in the newspapers, that "the reading of a chapter in the Bible each day would be allowed to Protestants, but should not be made compulsory on Roman Catholics."

2. That while we condemn all compulsion in religion, and all invasion of the rights of conscience, and while we are persuaded that the Bible, as a whole, shall be used on the season set apart for separate religious instruction, yet we would earnestly recommend to the Government to allow no authoritative exclusion of the Bible, where its admission is desired, even on the days of ordinary and combined education; thus neither forcing the Bible on Roman Catholics, nor forbidding it to Protestant children,

3. That with respect to the communication of religious instruction by the Pastors of the different denominations, we recommend that, in order to meet the objections of conscientious persons, the Government shall merely afford the opportunity of giving that instruction which each denomination shall consider appropriate;-thus avoiding the evil of sanctioning what the sects may respectively believe to be erroneous, and, at the same time, exercising passive toleration to its fullest extent.

4. That we confidently hope that the Government will attend to these suggestions, which do not interfere with the fundamental principles of their plan; and that we express our decided satisfaction with the general conduct of Government, so far as they have proved their willingness to remove the grievances, advance the welfare, and listen to the reasonable wishes of the people. [The foregoing resolutions were consigned to a committee authorized to embody them in a petition to Parliament ]

1. Our first remark upon this extraordinary document is its date.Mr. Stanley's letter was dated, if we well remember, in October, and was fully before the public not long after November; and the Belfast Secession Presbytery come forward on the subject in May!! Heavy bodies, we are told, move slow. So, why should not the Belfast Presbytery take time for deliberation. Perhaps, during this period, they were consulting their favoured correspondent, Mr. Wyse, the Roman Catholic, to discover the best time to libel their Presbyterian brethren-or, were they tempted to angle in the fishing season, which, we suppose, in Irish estimate, was fast coming in? These are questions we are unable to solve-but which, we suppose, can be answered by the parties themselves.

2. Choosing to call every thing by its right name, we pronounce their first resolution-a most false and calumnious libel, so far as the Synod of Ulster is concerned. True, there is a back door of jesuitism in it by which they may attempt to escape, alledging that they do not accuse of falschood, &c. every opponent of the Government system-but speak of them in the abstract; but while they make no exceptions in favour of any, every opponent must feel himself charged. They stand openly therefore, before they public, as accusers of their Brethren," who thus dragged before such a tribunal, have no alternative but openly to deny the charge-a charge which we pronounce ungenerous, because it comes from professing Presbyterians; calumnious, because it is an assault upon the character of men, at least, as reputable as themselves; libellous, because calculated to injure usefulness and provoke hostility; and false,

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so far as the Synod of Ulster is concerned, who have ever avoided political partizanship, whilst they have remained, through all their history, the open and consistent friends of the genuine civil and religious liberty of their country.

3. We lament this gratuitous assault of a Secession Presbytery upon the Synod of Ulster,-for the Synod must, by implication and intention, come in for a chief share of the charge.—We lament this assault, because, we confess, we had hoped that a little time, under the blessing of Providence, might have reunited the different portions of the Ulster Presbyterian Churches. Such an ungenerous and unnecessary assault wi the breach, cools the friends, and arms the enemies of this reur.on; and compels us to feel and say we are thankful our honour is not so united. 4. We lament this attack the less because we do not believe it can be the opinion of the majority of Secession Presbyteries; and we believe it is not the opinion of the Secession People. We believe were the Rev. Messrs. Wilson, Coulter, &c., to try a petition in their congregations in favour of the Government plan, all the sophistry of their resolutions and we confess it is considerable would not produce an extensive signature. We may be deceived, but we think we know the firmness and consistency of the people, though we have misunderstood some of their Ministers.

5. We must remark the cunning jesuitism with which the resolutions not merely slur over, but absolutely omit, the most objectionable part of the whole scheme we mean the part that would convert Mr. Carlisle into a Prelate, clothed with "complete control" over all books of religious instruction. This point is never touched; it does not even appear in the list of improvements. It is a fatal omission in the honest discussion of the question..

6. In closing our brief remarks, to which we have been most reluetantly dragged, we feel pleasure in stating our opinion, that in spite of all the aid of the Belfast Secession Presbytery-the Government scheme of education will yet be finally abandoned-is, this moment, abandoned ! We state this as our opinion, not as a matter of certainty; and we subjoin our authority in the following extract of a letter from a friend, whose information may be considered as pretty authentic:

"I was this day informed that very important changes have been made by the Education Board, with the full consent of Government. They are as follows:-The Patrons of schools to determine the time to be allotted for separate religious instruction-No control over the books used-A list of books, with the extracts to be provided by the Board-Patrons may reject such as they disapprove for literary instruction-Registers not to be kept-The Bible to be a daily class-book to those who choose it. During the separate religious instruction, I am informed that a difference exists, whether the parent's or the clergy's order is to be received in forbidding attendance."

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If all this be so, and we see little reason to doubt it, we can congratu❤ late our Protestant brethren upon a victory achieved. Our opposition to the Government scheme has been neither factious nor political; and the moment it is reduced to a Protestant standard, that moment we are ready to lend it our best assistance. Meantime, though much is gained, let us not pile our arms, nor sleep on our posts. Let us stand fast by the "whole Bible," the religion of Protestants; and as long as we stand by our principles, we may calculate on success; and should we be foiled in our labours by the violence of enemies or the desertion of friends, of two things still we are certain-the approbation of God and of our own consciences.-EDIT.

ORTHODOX PRESBYTERIAN.

No. XXXIII. JUNE, 1832.

VOL. III.

CHOLERA-THE PESTILENCE.

WITH three "sore judgments" does the Lord threaten disobedient nations and lukewarm churches, Ezek. vi. 11; Rev. iii. 19; yet because he is "merciful," he warns; and because he is "long-suffering," he waits; and because he is "slow to wrath," he smites gently with one rod, if so be that any will repent before he apply the scourge of another. To these nations God has now commissioned one rod, of whose slow but sure approach he has been warning us for the space of fourteen years. The warning, indeed, has reached us, not through the voice of direct revelation, but as a deduction and prognostication of human experience; yet the warning has been as much from God, as if it had come through any other channel. By men who look no higher than visible causes, it will be treated as a fortuitous event, arising from the operation and progress of merely natural causes; but to those who look "through nature up to nature's God," or who rather look through Scripture up to the God of providence, it will appear a "judgment" upon national sins, and a call to national repentance.

At a time when this scourge continues to extend its ravages, we judge it a duty again to call the attention of our readers to the subject. And in doing so, we shall first treat it as a religious, and secondly as a medical subject. In the first we shall extract some observations from the Rev. P. Macindoe, (whose work on the subject we earnestly recommend ;) and on the second, after a few remarks of our own, we shall subjoin extracts from some of the excellent documents published by the medical members of the Boards of Health.

PESTILENCE CONSIDERED AS A RELIGIOUS SUBJECT. Thou shalt not be afraid for the pestilence that walketh in darkness.— Ps. xci. 5, 6.

"That pestilence, of whose ravages we daily hear accounts, is, it must be confessed, one of the most dreadful dis

orders that has been permitted to visit this country for many years past. Wherever it comes, it produces the sudden prostration of the vital powers, subjects to excruciating pains, interrupts the healthful circulation of the blood, and in many cases, hurries its wretched victims, in an average of twelve to thirty hours, into a premature grave. Already has it, on its march from Hindostan over various provinces of Asia and the northern kingdoms of Europe, left dead about fifty millions; and though its virulence in this climate is not what it must have been in regions that lie almost under a vertical sun, yet is it committing ravages sufficient to mock the anxious efforts of the most experienced physicians, and to awaken a salutary alarm in the breasts of thoughtful survivors.

"Nor can this alarm be accounted groundless. No doubt, if, in any case, it has risen to a height disproportionate to the severity of the calamity, or productive of murmurs against the equity of Providence, or paralysing to the energies which should be employed in carrying into effect the requisite precautions, all will admit that it is blameable. But surely, that insensibility which treats this visitation with indifference, ridicules the precautions used with such laudable activity as unnecessary, and pursues the same career of luxurious indulgencies that was common before this judgment touched our shores, is no less blameable. This indicates minds either incapable of surveying with a steady eye passing events, or unsusceptible of those salutary feelings which the prospect of danger should awaken. We envy not the hearts of those who can hear of its dreadful ravages, without sympathy, who can contemplate the probability of these visiting our own vilages ere many months have passed, without solemn seriousness, and who can plunge into all the scenes of irrational merriment, that come within their reach, without an enlightened concern for the security of themselves against the dreaded infection, or that of their fellow-men in their immediate vicinity. 'Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame them. And the harp and the viol, the tabret and pipe, and wine, are in their feasts but they regard not the work of the Lord, neither consider the operations of his hands.'--Isa. v. 11, 12. Let us now consider the moral causes, and moral objects of Pestilence.

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