ally cleanfed his Augean Stable. It is faid that the amotion of a Vice Principal is a difficult undertaking, but the admiflion of Members is certainly difcretionary: and fo alfo is the retention of them when admitted. That quefiion has been fet at reft, both in the Court of Chancery and in the King's Bench. The Principal may alfo appoint another Tutor or Lecturer, and if any difpute arife, the Vice Chancellor, as Acting Visitor, can decide.' Let certain purchafers of advowfons provide for Mr. Crouch.

As the old Prefbyter's pamphlet may not be in the hands of many of your Readers, it may not be amifs to give a specimen of his candour, meeknefs, and charity, p. 9, of Plain Truths.

"If men are bred to the miniftry as a genteel profeffion, if their object be to obtain woridly advantages or diftinctions-if the value of the fouls of the people and their Redeemer's glory form no part in the confideration of thofe who confer or receive their preferment, if the one considers mere political intereft or family connexions, and the other eyes the fum of advantage or honour as the principal object of his purfuit, if in the bare traffic the fmallness of the duty or labour and the improveableness of the revenue are ftated as the eligible circumftances, it is evident fo far as men entering the Miniftry, are acting under fuch motives, it cannot be from the inward motion of the Holy Ghost, but from the influence of the God of this world. Is it then any wonder, nay, is it poffible it fhould be otherwife, that all these feek their own, not the things that are of Jefus Chrift: The worldly minded will mind earthly things; the indolent flumber over books or in their tall, the literary devote their talents to mathematics, metaphyfics, the claffics instead of the Bible, unlefs in the way of criticism, and the gay and volatile amuse themselves jufl like other men. I mean nothing perfonal, nothing invidious, I merely ftate facts glaringly obvious." Indeed, Sir! If you do not mean to be a railer, you are, to ufe Dr. Johnfon's expreffion on another occafion, the beft counterfeit I ever faw. I fhall not trouble the Reader with more of this abule, but fhall only repeat that fome of my most valuable friends are refiding upon purchased livings without the charge of fimoney in them or in their friends, and as confcientiously attentive to the clerical duties as any of the pretended fons of purity and perfection. Nor is it to be prefumed, that a great number of the clergy fquander their time in rural fports merely because a vender chufes to advertile that his living is in a fine fporting country. It is only excels in thofe diverfions which renders them criminal. The Prefbyters nugatory enquiry how far wealth and fplendor meliorate the progrefs of region deferves not a ferious anfwer? The examples of many Prelates, both living and dead, might convince him, if any thing would, that learning and piety united with dignity, become more extenfively beneficial. After giving proof of the old Prefbyter's candour, I fhall perhaps gratify your Readers with a fpecimen of his oratory, which may have drawn tears from dunces, and of which its brevity is its greatest beauty." Pride is the native inmate of every bofom; even martyrs may feel its workings. It is well for them as well as for us that there is one who bears the iniquity of our holy things. The blood of atonement must be sprinkled on the expiring corpfe of the martyr in flames, and but for that, he would perish, and they would be eternal," that is from earthly would be turned into hellish flames. Such is the drawcanfir who holds out terror and defiance to the Hoft of Anti-Calvinifis. His motto is,

Ruerem, agerem, zaperem, funderem, profternerem.

And

And while we are on the subject of mottos, I have one at hand for a brother champion in the fame caufe.

Nullum memorabile nomen

Fœmineâ in pœnâ eft, nec habet victoria laudem.

I have always found a habit in thefe enthufiafts of difparaging human learning, and for the beft of reasons, because they have few literary men amongst them. If Archbishop Leighton be a favourite author, why do they not follow his example? But it will interfere with their religious studies. Have they never feen difcourfes where the alliance of all ftudies in the fupport of revelation is fully ftated? The Oxford Act and the Cambridge Commencement, bring the interesting fubject into difcuffion every year. Yet, whatever may be faid, they are ready in perverting the Apoftle's language, and in faying that they are become fools for Chrift's fake.

If all mankind were judges of compofition, nothing could be a more effectual cure against fanaticism than to hear the tautology, flang, and goflip of their preachers. Indeed, how can found fenfe be expected from the extemporaneous effufions of men, fome of whom cannot write well, and others can neither write nor speak good English? But were they to ule notes, it would be going upon crutches, it would be quenching the spirit.-Of course, they have a gift which implies that they are infpired. How shocking is it, that the name of the blefed fpirit fhould be thus blafphemed ? What defperate examples does every year produce, fufficient to make an intelligent hearer cry out, Unde mihi lapidein? I need not go out of this place to point out ablurdities and nonfenfe. But one man's meat is another man's poison, and what some call perfumes others call tinks.

But we are to pray them down, preach them down, labour them down, and live them down. Suppofe this was faid to regular practitioners in mcdicine in reference to fuccefsful that is rich empiricks. Would they not pronounce the individual a proper candidate for Bedlam? In defiance of Mr. Overton's fneers, and the old Prefbyter's boated fulnels of Schifm fhops and Quaci Schism Shops, I trust that the English clergy, while they omit no part of the Chriftian fyftem, while the feveral feafons bring every fubject in fucceffion, will difdain to be what Bishop Warburton calls mobpreachers, and that they will endeavour to imitate the fimplicity as well as the fublimity of thofe writings, which are the ftandard of elegance as well as of truth, which abound with illustrations taken from the scenes and tranfactions of common life without ever producing a single idea or expreffion which is vulgar, coarfe, or conceited. What degree of aid will be given to the well meant endeavours of man cannot be known, but we may fafely affirm that the husbandman may fooner expect a plentiful harvest without cultivation and without feed, than an illiterate and weak man can become a good compofer. Enthutiafm either finds men foolish or makes them fo; it paralyfes every manly power of the mind, annihilates good fenfe in matters of religion, rendering it odious, difgufting, or contemptible, when it is avowedly not only the fource of happinefs, but the grand object of veneration and love.

Birmingham, Jan. 10, 1806.

I am, Sir, your obedient fervant,
G. CROFT.

P. S. In common with them, moft of the clergy refpect the names of Bishop Horne, and his biographer, Mr. Jones. Have they ever read the

LI 2

Sermon

1

Sermon on Juflification, by the former? Poor Bifhop Tomline, in common with the rest of us, is condemned as no true churchman. But let them all know that we have nothing to do with the latitudinarian notions, unhappily chargeable on fome otherwife refpectable perfons. I endeavoured twenty years ago to vindicate even the damnatory claufes in the Athanafian Creed, and to diveft them of all their terror. In this refpect, and in not admitting Elohim to imply a Trinity, I differ from many good men, and hope for their indulgence. As to Elohim, I always doubted; and Limborch made me a perfed convert. I feel a fatisfaction, at this diftance of time, that at no period of my life fince I began to ftudy the Scriptures at all, have I put any other construction upon the articles than the compilers intended, and I may be excufed for expreffing a fincere with that Dr. Lawrence would condense his matter into a smaller compafs, for the ufe of the people at large.

The old Presbyter's fcraps of Latin remind me of Partridge's quotations from Lilly's Grammar, and his non perfuadebis, ehamfi perfuaderis of a divine, who ordered (as he thought, under the authority of the Spectator) the following infcription upon his monument:

Qualis erat fupremus ille dies ostendebit.

Defence of the Essay on the English Elements, Accents, and Prosody, &c. reviewed in our 21st Volume, P. 416.

SIR,

TO THE EDITOR.

ESIDING in a remote part of His Majesty's dominions, it was not till 'month of Auguft, in which you have noticed an Essay on the English Elements, Accents, ond Profody. The author of this Effay, confcious of its numerous imperfections, has declared his motive to the publication to have been" the hope of inducing fome person of more leifure and ability to give every part of the fubject a thorough investigation." But this hope, he has reafon to fear, may in part at leaft, be already defeated; for, in the opinion of the Anti-Jacobin reviewers, which has long been highly and defervedly refpected, that part of his work, in which he has attempted to treat of tone, accent and emphafis, is delivered in language mysterious and unintelligible; and whoever takes this to be its true character, must be expected to pass it by, as unworthy of either difcuffion or enquiry. Of this formidable objection, he confelles that he had no anticipation. On the contrary, he had flattered himself that, however defective his work muft, in other respects, appear, his meaning was every where expreffed with precifion and perfpicuity. He therefore hopes you will not think him unreasonable in requesting a place in your Review for the following fhort extracts, from which your Readers may have an opportunity of judging for themselves, how far the book may, in this refpect, be intitled to a favorable reception.

Having defcribed the ancient accents, as inflexions of the voice, acute or grave, or both combined, he gives the following explanation, derived from ancient authorities" that an acute accent was an elevation, and a "grave accent a depreffion of the voice, but that, in this elevation and depreffion, the tone of the voice was varied, not, as in finging, by diftinct intervals, but by a continued motion, gliding up and down, in a kind

de of

«^of undulation, from a graver to a fharper, or from a fharper to a graver "tone." On this he observes that, in fuch a movement, whatever be **the interval from lone to tone, through which the voice may glide, it

can never dwell for an inftant on any tone whatever ;"--and here he points out that ambiguity of term, by which he fuppofes Commentators and others have been led to deny the exiftence of any thing like the ancient accents in modern languages, "The words fur and Bagurns, acutenefs and gravity, when applied to the accents of fpeech, denote indeed a change of tone, but a change of a peculiar kind. An acute accent, for instance, began in a certain tone (to be taken, ad hibituin, any where within the compass of the voice) and ended in a higher; the voice "paffing, always rapidly though not always with the fame velocity, from the one tone to the other, not perfaltum, but in one continued found, which might be compared to a waving line, commenfurate with the length of "the fyllable and generated by the flowing of a point. This motion of "the voice was accordingly defignated by a very expreffive term, pos as diftinguished from doua, the interval, by which fharper and graver founds, in mufic, are always separated, For, in finging, the voice "does not glide, but leaps from tone to tone.” To this he fubjoins Euclid's defnition κινήσεις δυο, ή μεν συνεχής και λογική ή δε διαστηματική μwdin-two kinds of motion, one continued and peculiar to fpeech, the other defultory and appropriate to fong,

το και

The object here in view, and which is afterwards purfued in difcuffing feveral authorities and opinions, ancient and modern, was to give an accurate idea of that difference between the tones of speech and musical tones, which has always been univerfally felt, but feems not yet to be well underfood. Among other explanatory remarks, it is ftated that" in the diaftematic "mufic, the intervals are paffed by a filent flight: that is, the found of "the voice or inftrument is heard only at those diftin&t points of tone, which

are the boundaries of these intervals. But in the mufic of fpeech, the "found of the voice is heard only in its paffage from one tone to another :"that the tone of every mufical found is immutable; for whenever it "becomes in the fmallest degree fharper or flatter, that is to fay, of a different tone, the found, as a musical element, is no longer the fame. "But the effence of a Greek accent confifted in a continual rapid variation of This variation took place on every fyllable; for otherwife the "two genera of fong and fpeech muft have been every inftant running the one into the other, and producing a difcordant mixture, univerfally difgufting. Every fyllable, therefore, must have been uttered either with an acute, a grave, or a circumflex accent."

. tone.

This explanation is also put to the teft of an experiment, first made by Mr. Steele, and acknowledged by Lord Monboddo to be conclufive, no only as making the ancient defcriptions of accent perfectly intelligi ble, but as a proof that we have now, in our own and other modern languages, a melody of speech, confifting of accents in all refpects of a fimilar kind.

68

"With a finger on the 4th string of a violoncello, and a corresponding motion of the bow, he (Mr. Steele) was able, by fliding the fingers rapidly up and down on the ftring, to imitate the tones of speech, in fuch "manner as not only to prove the fact, that we have accents, grave, acuce and circumflex, but also to afcertain their perfect agreement in every

66

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"particular,

particular, with the Greek definitions and descriptions above referred to. "This experiment may with eafe be repeated, in fuch manner as to re*move all doubt of the fact, that the tone of the voice, in speaking, is "varied by the rapid undulations here described: though to do this with "all the nice precifion neceffary for rendering the imitation perfect, would "require not only a quick and accurate ear, but the hand of a skilful per"former."

'This being then no longer a doubtful fpeculation, but a queftion of fact, confirmed by actual experiment, it will not be denied that the fubject is worthy of minute attention, and if this can be fo far excited as to give the melody of our fpeech a chance not only of being understood, but of receiving thofe practical improvements of which it may be fufceptible, the author's ambition will be fully gratified, in having contributed to bring the fubject into public notice and difcuffion.

He will now, Mr. Editor, prefume to trefpafs no further on your indulgence, than to inform you, that his book having been printed in his absence, fome corrections which had been tranfmitted in a letter to the Publisher, appear to have escaped his notice. In particular, the remarks which you have jultly cenfured-that " every fyllable in fuch pofition is fhort and emphatic," was noted among the delenda. It may perhaps be thought that the comparison of vocal found with a waving line ought alfo to have been fo noted and yet the ufual phrafes of vocal inflexion and flexi bility of voice do in fact imply fuch a comparison.

MR. EDITOR!

EXTEMPORE PREACHING.

ITHER the love of change, or the love of fubverfion has recently made lamentable havock in the moral, political and religious eftablifhments of fociety. Men affuming to themfelves the flattering title of philofopers; and, hungring and thirsting after the applaufe of the ignorant, and the fpoils of the rich, have endeavoured to perfuade us that our old and inftinctive habits of thinking concerning the duties of life are erroneous; that forms and establishments either of government or religion, are founded in prejudice and error, and ought therefore to be abolished. The experiment of reducing these mad theories to practice has been tried in our vicinage; and the refult is before us a nation without morals-without religion; alike contemners of the laws of man and of GOD! thefe calamities prefent to the difciples of innovation an awful and impreffive deffon of the neceffity of making a folemn paufe, when they are projecting the most trifling change even in the forms of government or religion. I have been led, Sir, to thefe reflectons, by obferving with much regret a moft daring innovation which has recently taken place in the practice of feverrl Clergymen of the Church of England. The innovation to which I allude is that of extempore preaching. It is a palpable defiance of authority; and which I feriously conceive is meant to be the precurfor of other changes of the moft awful nature.

It may not be unneceffary in this place fuccinaly to ftate the reafon by which the Church has been directed, in enjoiniug its fervants to preach from written difcourfes it was rightly prefumed to be the most effectual means of placing a bridle and curb on the unpremeditated effufions of igno

rant