from the era of Hildebrand; (1079,) got possession of the Latin Church in Europe, and have been the cause of corruption of morals, and perversion of doctrine to the European nations, and then of internal strife, desolation, slaughter, massacre, and finally, of iron-hoofed, irremovable despotism; these principles, in the shape of Ultramontane Romanism, are to get the universal control of this country, with the same results, or else we, the American Catholic Church, are to lift ourselves up to the grandeur of our Mission, and to know, that being the Church of God, while Romanism, here as everywhere, is a schism and a corruption, we are to cast away all sect feeling, all of this little, paltry meanness, which sees ourselves as merely the greatest of the Protestant denominations; and to see, that we are to expand and be the Church, One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic, over this great land; if we can only open our eyes to see, our hearts and hands to pursue the course which God has placed open before us.

The practical conclusion, then, of this paper, for the Bishops, the Clergy, the Laity of the Church, is this. Here are two Churches, each with an Apostolic Ministry, in competition for this Nation. The one, corrupt in doctrine, in practice, in discipline; the other, pure in all these, with the Bible in her hand and the Truth, as it is Jesus Christ, clearly preached. We, the last, acknowledge the Orders, and the Sacraments of the first. Now, through thoughtlessness or carelessness, we have placed our true descended and valid Episcopacy, in a situation which impedes our progress, causes trouble and confusion, is an obstacle in the way of all, Bishops, Clergy, and Laity, hindering our action and the development of our work in this land. The advantage of the See Bishoprick we have seen in all these ways. Now, for those that love the Church and desire its progress and further growth, until the vine taken out of Egypt, and planted here, cover the whole land; for those, too, that see the evils of the Roman system, the great matter to be considered is this.-Of all these advantages we have deprived ourselves. All of them are we content that the Roman Catholic Church should possess, until, by long possession, by use, by habit, by custom, by that easy acquiescence in estab

lished facts, which belong to the human Constitution, the Roman Catholic Church, with its Bishops in every City of the land, small and great, using skilfully and persistently all these advantages, which we could so easily enjoy and do so slackly surrender, shall be accounted, and finally come to be the Church in this land? To that result, unquestionably, our position, as having Bishops Territorial, and their position as having 'See Bishopricks,' tends, and must, in the course of time, if unchanged, arrive.

Whereas, the restoration of the See Bishoprick places us at once in our true position in reference to this land; and to that false Church here existing schismatically, it says, 'the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church' is not the Roman. We, with the Creeds, the Bible, the Sacraments, the Doctrines of the Primitive Church, we are the Church of Christ. In this city,' it says, the Bishop, who is Roman, the Church, which is Roman, is not the Catholic Bishop and Church, but the Bishop, the Clergy and the Laity, who are American at once and Catholic.

There is no doubt, to our mind, that the 'See' position of our Bishops is the only one which can give fair play and a distinct status to our Church, as the sole efficient antagonist of Rome in this land. The only position it is, which can bring before the minds of the masses, practically and clearly, the question of the Church, as it is, between the pure Church and the corrupt one. We have fought in behalf of the idea, and the fact of the Episcopate and the Apostolic Succession, now for seventy-five years against inorganized dissent. Now comes the greater struggle against a Church having both these, and yet corrupt, in all things wherein the true gold can be debased with alloy. We see no way whereby to all the people of this land the differences may be shown, except that in every City of our land, wherein the alien Bishop has intruded, and the alien Church, with its mediæval corruptions of faith and practice and tradition, the American Bishop should stand up himself, his Clergy and his Laity, showing to the eyes of all men the pure gold where the others display only a metal debased and alloyed.

We have now brought this subject to a conclusion. We do not say we have said all upon it that could be said, but we do say that when the subject, as we have discussed it, from our own knowledge of the Church in this land and of Primitive Antiquity, has been brought before the minds of the Bishops, the Clergy and the Laity of the Church, then, from their own experience, each and all must and will say, "the arrangement by which our Bishops took their titles from States was a mistake, that impedes the work of us all, and the progress of the Church, and that which entitles the Bishop from the City and places him therein as his 'See,' is the universal, the Primitive way; that, which being once established, opens the way to peace, to healthy growth, and to world-wide progress.' And we believe, that this, being manifested as easily attainable, as we have shown it in this second Article to be, there will be no difficulty in establishing the 'See Bishoprick,' even in the minds of the feeblest, and most timorous, and apprehensive. For a change beneficial to all,-Bishops, Clergy and Laity,-injurious to none, infringing on no rights, but bringing all to constitutional perfection, completely agreeing with our principles, and furnishing the universal prevalence of our system, this cannot but be brought about, ultimately, by the agreement of us all.

ART. II.-HYMNS FROM COMPILERS' HANDS.

Hymns for Church and Home, compiled by Members of the Protestant Episcopal Church, as a contribution to any additions that may be made to the Hymns now attached to the Prayer Book. Philadelphia: 1861. 18mo. pp. 376.

ALL verse ought to be poetry, (or very nearly,) or else it ought to lose its ornamental distinctions of a marshalled front and commanding capitals and music in its rear: it ought to be disbanded and discharged into promiscuous prose, or dispersed to the dictionaries. This is strict wisdom. Yet, in safe times, when literature is in no danger of being overrun, we do not deal so strictly; and there is many a set of verses read and read again, printed and re-printed, which, though it has never got the unhappy stigma of popularity in some American schoolseries, yet, to the eye of practised criticism, or, still better, to the quick, fine taste, is very poor stuff; and there are producers of such stuff, who avail themselves, deliberately, of the deliberate sea and snow and liberty, which Homer, Hesiod, Horace, and some others, used to better purpose, and who are indulged in thus wasting time and words. Nay, there are prosy pieces by true poets, of which their writers never thought anything better, than that they would make a sort of packing for their better things, and be passed over by the worthiest readers with a short, indulgent comment, which presently are set in the chief places in some literary journals, with the certificate of the editor, that none but one author could have written them. Pegasus has his four legs, as well as his two wings, and when, half-fed and not inclined to fly, he wanders, munching, in a doze, or is pitted in a scrub-race, he, at least, gives many an honest fellow a chance to feel of him and pat him, that would never make him out if he were always in the upper air.

In common times, then, let it be so.

Now Hymns are verse, and ought to be poetry. Indeed they ought to be the highest poetry that men have, for reasons that

we need not give; and yet there is a settled feeling, that they are such poor things, that we must take down all our bars of criticism when they are standing there, and help them through. False rhymes, false quantity, false grammar, false figures, and false taste of every sort, we are to pass, as surely as certain false things about the persons of our women. In the schoolseries before mentioned, and in the literary journals, and there only, almost, will you find such gatherings-together of verses as in the Hymn-books. Anything seems to be thought good enough by the compilers, if it have, once before, got bound between two leathern covers. It is most wonderful, for the compilers have, for the most part, been committee-men, appointed for their supposed poetic taste and known education; and though the supposed poetic taste is not to be much accounted of, yet the known education was a reasonable guarantee, before trial. The wonder is to be explained only by our established axiom, that before Hymns all bars are taken down,

It is the fact also, that, unless this is done, there is but a thin book; and the compilers have but come to the melancholy resource of lecturers and other audience-wanting people, against their better pride, in giving out free tickets, freely. The outermost fact we will not count a greater wonder than the fact, that men not only bravely trifle with the time of fellow-men, and with their language, but choose to send up to the ear of the Great Author of all might and thought and harmony, such Hymns as have been printed, sung, and set to music. Perhaps the wonder, here, is not so great: indeed, we will allow that it is not; because a poetic sense is rare, and only not so rare as the true fire and power of poetry. Still, while we bring ourselves to pardon the misdoings and mistakes of writers, which would be harmless, if not taken up by others, we cannot think that the compilers should be let off easily. They earn a place of influence over the taste and devotion of multitudes,-perhaps of generations, at a very cheap rate, always, and quite too cheaply, when they have not used taste and judgment and conscience-inborn or learned or borrowed, and the best that could be had-in their opportunity. Allowances may be made for them, in fairness,-all men must make allowances for all other