issued for such a purpose, the clergy showed themselves unwilling to comply with its demands, lest they should appear to acknowledge themselves amenable to civil authority in spiritual matters. The King therefore issued his writ to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who, in consequence, summoned the clergy of his province, in order to make a subsidy. In obedience to a spiritual superior, the clergy then met in convocation. The same expedient was resorted to in the province of York. Consequently there were two convocations, each summoned by their respective archbishops; and the inferior clergy, who had not before met together for purposes connected with the State, were constituted as a lower house of convocation. From that time to 1663 the clergy continued to be taxed for State purposes in convocation, as far as regarded their Church preferments and lands, which belonged to them in right of benefices and other similar tenures; the heaviness of the impost being sometimes but faintly concealed under the title of aides, and subsidies, and benevolences. During the reigns of twelve successive sovereigns, this grant needed no further confirmation, but that which was not likely to be refused, the Royal assent. From the days of Henry VIII. to those of Charles II., the authority of both Houses of Parliament was superadded, until this system of the clergy taxing themselves seemed in a singular manner suddenly to cease. The first public Act of any kind relative to this change of proceeding was passed in 1665, by which the clergy were in common with the laity charged with the tax then assigned, and were discharged from the payment of the subsidies which they had granted before in convocation. In this first Act of Parliament, however, there is an express saving of the right of the clergy to tax themselves in convocation if they think fit; this has never been attempted since, and the clergy have been constantly from that time charged with the laity in all public aids to the Crown by the House of Commons. This was reckoned by Bishop Gibson to be one of the greatest alterations in the constitution ever made without express law; it may be added, that since that time the clergy, as by a kind of compromise on either side, have without objection enjoyed the privilege of voting in elections of members of the House of Commons, by virtue of the ecclesiastical freeholds, which heretofore supplied the subsidies which the clergy granted.

The origin of our present houses of convocation, then, is connected with the financial exigencies of the State, and is to be traced with at least the strongest probability to a time when the various branches of the legislature were in a very different relative position to what they are at present, when, to speak briefly, the first object in summoning a Parliament, and the first object in instituting a kindred assembly on the part of the clergy, was in order to raise a subsidy. The con

vocation has ever since been summoned at the same time as the Parliament, and the ancient rule which was once observed in the Parliament is still continued in the convocation, that nothing be discussed except under the permission and direction of the sovereign. In order to avoid collision between the decisions of the houses of convocation in the respective provinces, the proceedings in Canterbury were allowed to have their weight and influence in the deliberations at York; and there are instances on record in which the convocations of the two provinces have on great emergencies acted as one, either by joint consent, or by the attendance of the deputies from the province of York at Canterbury. These convocations continued in full vigour until 1717. After that period they became insignificant, and no business beyond matters of form have been transacted since 1741.

THE GOOD OLD WAY-THE SAFE WAY.

THE good old way is Christ. The means by which we travel in this way is faith-faith only in opposition to the many inventions of the Church of Rome. We refuse to trust in any but Christ-we believe him to be the rock of our salvation; and that, consequently, as the Scripture says, "There is salvation in no other." We refuse to trust in the sacrifice of the mass offered by a priest, because we believe the one sacrifice of Christ on the cross is sufficiert. We refuse to call upon the blessed Virgin or departed saints for their intercession, for we know that Christ's intercession needs no help; and we believe his own declaration, that if we ask anything in his name we shall have it. As, therefore, we are sure of getting all we want by asking in his name, we feel that, even if it were not sinful, it would be useless and foolish to ask in any other name. We abhor the thought of inflicting sufferings upon ourselves with a view to make satisfaction for our sins, for we know that Christ's sufferings are infinitely meritorious. If the sufferings of the Eternal Son of God are not enough to take away sin, we are quite sure that no sufferings of ours can atone for them; but we believe that Christ is an all-sufficient sinoffering, and that there remains neither necessity nor room for any more sacrifice for sin. Through him we obtain full, free, and eternal remission of all our sins, through the tender mercy of God. In a word, we declare, with one of our glorious martyrs when burning at the stake, "None but Christ-none but Christ." This is the ground of our quarrel with the Church of Rome. She blames us for trusting in Christ only; she endeavours to frighten us from this trust by persecution, when she has the power; and by threats of damnation when

she has not. Christ will be the judge between us; for we must all, Protestants and Roman Catholics, stand before his judgment seat. We pray him, before that solemn day arrives, to open the eyes of our unfortunate Roman Catholic brethren, and lead them into the "Good Old Way ;" and we feel sure that he will never condemn us for thinking too honourably of his power and grace, and for placing too much trust in his ability and willingness to save us.

IMPORTANT HISTORICAL EVENTS.

(Concluded from page 375).

1570. Pope Pius V. issues a bull of excommunication against Elizabeth, absolving her subjects from their oaths of allegiance, and cursing them if they kept them.

1574. Died, Charles IX., King of France, who carried out the third canon of the fourth Lateran Council, by butchering about 40,000 Protestants. He died in great agony, weltering in his own blood, which oozed from every pore-an awful spectacle to those around him.

1587. John Foxe, the martyrologist, died, and was buried in the church of St. Giles', Cripplegate, London.

1598. Henry IV. of France published the edict of Nantes, in which he granted to Protestants the free exercise of their religion, and the rights of citizens.

1604. James I. expelled Jesuits from England.

Jesuits banished from England.

1605. Discovery of the Gunpowder Plot.

1606. The Jesuit Garnet, who was executed for high treason, declared a martyr and beatified by Pope Paul V.

Garnet came to England in 1585, with the authority of Provincial of the Jesuits, and lived in disguise under several feigned names.

1641. October 23. A day dedicated to Ignatius Loyola, founder of the Jesuits. The Papists in Ireland attempted to extirpate all the Protestants by a general massacre; thousands were murdered with the most horrid cruelty.

1652. Louis XIV. made a public declaration, at St. Germains, of his gratitude to the Protestants for their brave defence of his throne against the rebels. He confirmed the edict of Nantes when he came to the throne.

1685. Louis XIV. revoked the edict of Nantes; the murderous effects of this act are too well known to recite them here.

1688. The glorious revolution which placed William III. on the throne of these realms, which settled the Protestant constitution, and crushed the efforts of Popery to regain ascendancy.

1727. The Protestants of the Valley of Pragelato, Piedmont, deprived of all privileges, their public worship prohibited, and an order given that all their children should be baptized by the Popish priests, in defiance of the treaty of 1704 in their favour.

1732. Archbishop of Salzburgh expels all the Protestants out of his territories; they go to Prussia, where they are received by the king, who guarantees their safety in his dominions.

1759. Jesuits expelled Portugal.

1764. Jesuits expelled France.

1767. Jesuits expelled Spain and Sicily. 1768. Jesuits expelled Naples and Malta.

1773. Order abolished by bull of Clement XIV. They still continued, especially in Russia and Prussia, in spite of their vow of unlimited obedience and submission to the Pope.

1809. Buonaparte united the Roman states to the French empire. Pope Pius VII. was taken prisoner, and not restored to his dominions till the beginning of 1814.

1813. A joint stock company formed in Dublin, called “the Purgatorian Society," for the purpose of raising funds for masses to be said for the deceased relations and friends of the members. "No money no mass!"

1814. The order of Jesuits fully re-established by Pope Pius VII., in a bull dated August 17.

1815. Massacre of Protestants at Nismes, in France. No sooner was Louis XVIII. placed again on the throne, after an exile of several years, spent in Protestant England, than the Papists seized the opportunity to slay all the Protestants in the south of France; thousands were murdered in the most cruel manner.

1832. The Pope issues an encyclical letter, in which he declares "liberty of conscience" to be a pestilential error, and denounces (what he terms) "that worst, and never sufficiently to be execrated and detested" liberty of the press.

1837. Upwards of four hundred Protestants left Zillerthal, their native land, for Prussia, having been subjected to persecutions by their popish rulers in defiance of the article of the treaty of Vienna, in 1815. Another proof that " no faith is to be kept with heretics."

1840. The Vaudois commanded to sell the property they possessed beyond the valleys, and to retire within certain limits. By this unjust edict they suffer a great loss, especially as purchasers are Papists.

1841. The Pope issues a bull, dated May 22nd, against mixed marriages in Austria. He warns those who have contracted such, to use every effort to convert the Protestant, as the best means of obtaining pardon of God for their crime, and exhorts the priests to labour diligently for the education of their offspring in the Romish faith.

December 8th, the first bishop of the united Church of England and Ireland, in Jerusalem, left this country for the land of his fathers.

October 31st, the three hundreth anniversary of the festival of the Reformation was celebrated at Wirtemberg. 1842. January 21st, the Bishop of Jerusalem arrived at Jerusalem.

The General Assembly of the Church of Scotland passed an order requiring the Presbyteries to enjoin on the pastors the duty of preaching on the subject of Popery.

A popish bishop, on the continent, looking after some human bones, to make relics of-noble employment for one who is called a Christian bishop.

November. Formed at Geneva, a National Protestant Association, to resist the encroachments of Popery.

SABBATH MEDITATIONS.-No. IV.

66 WHO IS SUFFICIENT FOR THESE THINGS?"

As, in the early times of Christianity, when that zealous and highly-gifted apostle, St. Paul, after a course of long tried faithfulness, was constrained to exclaim in his second epistle to the Corinthians, "And who is sufficient for these things?" -so in these latter days is the minister of Christ, in the contemplation of the great and mighty work to which he has been called, the glorious perfection and holiness of Him who hath called him to it, and to whom he must give account, constantly reminded of his own weakness and utter insufficiency of himself, to think anything as of himself. And well is it for him that it is so: for he is thus brought to believe and to confess that his "sufficiency is of God." And although he has not the same open dangers and difficulties to contend with as had the first apostle to the Gentiles, yet, the faithful minister of the Gospel can answer, from his own experience, that even in the present day, in this professedly Christian nation, the offence of the cross is not ceased: that still must he lift up his voice like a trumpet, cry aloud and spare not and call upon the wicked to forsake his ways, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and turn unto the Lord, that he may have mercy upon him and abundantly pardon: and the lukewarm and the backslider, he must admonish to repentance and amendment -to watchfulness and prayer. He must "be instant in season and out of season," to reprove, to exhort, and to instruct. Above all, he must guard his own heart with all diligence, seeing that he is a man of like passions with his brethren;