The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1866-01-30 00:00:00

To ao Editor&

Your last week's impremion contains • somewhat
lengthy diatribe on this subject from the Bev. W.
Templer, of Burton Bredstook. It appsen that the
volume has recently bean introduced into Bud port
Church ; probably for the some reason that the
Government have ordered its adoptioe in the army
and navy, as being found on enquiry to be the most
extensively used of any existing collection. Hr.
Templer, however, it roan" is sot estiefled with
this amount of matters; and, as represeutusg the in-
willow°, of Barton Bradatook, feels himself celled
upon to protest accordingly.
It is true that it is not quite oonsonent with
usage, for • clergyman to publish reflections on whet
Wm place in so adjoining parish ; and eves Hr.
Templer seems t.have moans idea of the kind ; ash'
hit the pains to juntify his breech of courtesy on
the eround of his having formerly been • minister of
the Bedpan " oelegregalioe.°
Now, unquestiosably, Yr Templer's ministrations
Bridport are well remembered. One diseourse of
his in particular, in which he informed the
pariatiooen that be would now wooled* In the
Comforting and blessed words of Arebineedee. "To
ma to lint is Christ, and to the is gaui,"lllihily to
be somewhat losig•lned. 0! worse mee seen what
ocean& la the language of the Wesleyea sektool,
ko whiols Hr. Templer belongs, faith in • lever; mid
Archimedes had said something about moving the
world with • lever; and 81. Paul ea said • good
deal about faith. And thus the rev. gentdsones's
ideas having got, like 'Tony Lumina's, into " • ono-
intonation accordingly." he perorated as above.
In fact. however. Mr. Templer might have Sound
• mush better reason for his unerfoesse I grieve
to my it, host it is pate evident from his letter AM
the Popish 121104100611 who* he denounces is the
hymu•book, are hegtiinizieto operate very anion*
os
upon bientolt He —I do net quite wader-
stead why—to roe 'tour being designated In
small of she hymns VI the "Sc. of Wary.. Bee
his meet • tree believer to sosottaboot to tad Mom
Mr. Tempi*/ Monett, to We lotfor to you. moo the

, Popish apprillative, Saint Luke. Hem indeed is the
thin end of the wedge And still mom shocking is
the sentence with which um writer owoollites, o The
selection" he says "use objectionable, tajl marvel
any Christian Protestant should even dream of its
eitoptim" "Christian Protestant I" What •
phrase to have dropped from the pen of a gospel
professor! How painful the suggestion thus oonveyed
that there can be any Protestanta, who are not
Christian! True, the stoning unbeliever, or dis-
guised Papist may allege that such is now and than
the ode. Possibly each persons might ne disposed
to assign to • loner, or is.. perfectly davelowd
order, of the "OP,' the parishioner of Berton
Braddock, who hares in your last week's im
preriao, in • ciolomn immediately adjoining
cum of them occupied by his pastor, as baring
beep "very drunk and noisy is the parish ;" al-
though, " as your reporter adds, fortunately for him,
when lb* policemen desired him to "yo home, be
was civil!' But surely, surely, the champions of
Protestantism should not damage the cause by such
term.; sowing dimord in a united camp, and
sinking at the very root of the Protestant faith.
What can it signify whether • man be • Christian or
not, so long, aa he abuses the church of Rome ?

With the two painful exceptions above noticed, I
am happy to say that Mr. Templer's letter fir the
moist part entirely intimate Lb. requirements of
Puritan polemics. It is irreverent, and slightly
mendacious; assuming all the controvert. d points
(as for instance where Mr. Templer mys "lb. word
priest never nature in the Prayer-book in the sense
of literal secriticer," which is precisely the point at
issue); and either mis-stating the others, or translat-
ing pamense from the hymn book into his own
voimbulary and then denouncing them as Popish.
For example—the hymn book mys, "Before Him
bending this great sacrament revere." Mr. Templer
rye, " Tbe bread and wine are to be offered, and
revered, or worshipped, by the binding people
before ate altar ;" where the words in italic, are Mr.
Templer's own substitution for the originel, and, of
course, make the entire differentia. An equally
happy audacity is his amertion that "there is no
mystery whatever in commemorating the death of
Christ." As the prayer book in tie exhortation to
the Communion exeresely states that our "Lord"
instituted and *Maimed holy mysteries—" for a
°optional rsmanbetuace at His death ;" and then, in
• sebsequent prayer, speaks of the communicants as
"having received the.. holy ' mysteries' ;" Mr.
Templees denial of the foot is • bold and playful
line of treatment, popularly embodied in the phrase
which describes a men as engaged in demonstrating
that black is white.

The above specimens (for I meet not trespass un-
duly on your column.) will satisfy your Protestant
readers that Mr. Templer's letter has et any rate
the merit of unscrupulous advocacy; and as people
&MHOS that a man in "Lily Orders will not make in.
Motional mis-statements, it may very likely win
converts amoog those who know no better. At the
same Um*, I think the Protestant mind would have
preferred if it oould have been represented by • "male'
man who was a little more familiar with the meaning
of words, and then.. of the English tongue generally.
For instance, when Mr. Templer mye of the hymn-
book that there is an "scot. Popish accent in the
whole assortment." Although one can understand
that " amortineut " is only bad English for "collec-
tion," yet it is extremely difficult for pennies not
spiritually enlightened to find out what be means by
an mute PopiA accent, or whether the phrase ha.
my meaning at all; and we fear that such persons
may be disposed to sooff accordingly. Again, Mr.
Templer speaks of "the Popish character of the
type and printing of the volume." lam betraying
my ignorance, but really—what is "Popish type? "
Is there any of it in the Telegrams office (I trust
not)? Is it small pica, or long primer, or what jail?
The only explanation Mr. Templer gives on this
more is that the hymn-book has • great many
"capitals in Um middle of lines." Stiffish reeding,
no
doubt; but except in the light of a penance, or
leatea exercise, I hardly see how it can be
"Popish."
The fact is that the nocessiag denunciation of
Popery, however laudable in "Christian Protes-
tants,' has this drawback, that in its anxiety to
detect the cloven foot everywhere, it makes 000sa-
s'onsl mistakes. &KM very odd things get classed
as Popery. Not to mention the old lady who hid
away Adam's Roams A NS igwiliei for fear of its doing
harm to the servants, I regret to ay that men Ur.
Templer has given the enemy occasioa to blaspheme
in this Imo A few years since, he woe ill-advised
enough to print • sermon on this topic, in which he
wanted his readers against the Popish tendsocies of
"candles, crypt., and crosses." The mystery of the
second word seems yet to have been fathomed.
Candles and mom's, although now decided on
to be part of the English ere no IP.lnehe
stumbling-blocks to the Puritan brother; but what
have Popery and " crypts " to do with rack' other?
Might it not occur to • prejudiced mind that the
writer indulged in on alliteration of three "C.,"
without having much idea what the middle one
precisely meant ?
The truth is (for I must now conclude and write
seriously at the mine um., that the Rev. W.
rimpler would do better to confine himself to
Burton Braddock. He has some cleverness, but a
vest deal mor• ignorance; and as his estimate of
himself is equally in excess of the fact, he does not
always on these occasions show to advantage. His
present letter is the performance of a smart but
semi-educated schoolboy. Ai • dissection of Um
topic. to which it relates it is wholly worthless,
and would certainly have required no comment, had
it not been for the solecism on good manners in-
volved in such an interference in the ormosrm of an
adjoining parish. I think he would do well to put
this view of the oase rather plainly to himself.
There are many things which moiety pardons in a
aerostats. He may be ignorant, fanatical, and self-
conceited; the cat's-paw of alder men in competing
sect.; a dissenter in heart and teaching, without the
courage to avow himself such, or the honesty to
throw up the emoluments attached to his offioe in the
Glum* of England. We are all human; and, as I
have mid, such things do get overlooked, in some
people. But it is a wholly different matter, when
sum an Evangelical and' 'Christian Protestant" shows
symptoms, as Mr. Templer has dome on one or
two recant 000111110011, of becoming, in addition,
something more.
BEN EX.