The Sun.
London, England, 1841-04-26 00:00:00

EATON HALL.-APRIL 23.

Lord Westminster thinks it right to say he has no con-
nection whatever with a Society called the " London and
Westminster Mutual Life Assurance Society," his name
having been put forth as Patron, without any authority
Vow%

THE WEATHER.—NooN, APRIL 24.
ROYAL GALLERY OF SCIENCE, ADELAIDE-STREET.
Barometer ....... ‘. ......... 29'72 In.
Thermometer... 56 Liiighest ......... 57 I Lowest 35
Wind S. W. —Freezing Point 32 Deg.

STRANGE SUICIDES.--During the past week
an unprecedented number of suicides have come under the
cognizance of Mr. Wakley, the Coroner for the western divi-
sion of Middlesex; it is stated as seven within two days. Some
of these eases were of a most extraordinary character. One
was on the body of a respectable tradesman, who hung himself
to the rail of his bedstead, because his wife kept him knocking
at the street-door too lung before she let him in, at a late hour
in the evening. Another was on the body of a drover, who
cut his throat in consequence of some of his companions re-
fusing to treat him to half a pint of beer. Another was on the
body of:a lady, who strangled herself with her nightcap strings
so tightly that the blood gushed trom her mouth and nostrils ;
she was of a most amiable disposition, but had been induced to
commit the crime of self-destruction in consequence, it is sup-
posed, of a delusion that she had an inclination to murder her
husband and child. The fourth was on the body of a man,
who hung himself to a tree in Hornsey-wood, because he had
failed in obtaining the situation of gamekeeper to a gentleman
in the country The fifth was on a lady, who ripped her throat
completely up with a pair of scissors; her reason for doing so
was not assigned, but it is singular to relate, that after she had
committed the act a woman was called in, to whom she gave a
loin of lamb that was lying on the table before her, inquiring
of the female if her husband would not like it for dinner; she
exPlred in two minutes after. Another was on the body of a
gentleman, who was alarmed by hearing the curtains of his
bed rattle, and, under a delusion that some one was going to
murder him, jumped out-of bed, ran to the window on the se-
cond floor, and leaped into the area. Many other cases quite
as singular have since been held by the same Coroner.
DESPERATE ATTEMPT AT SUICIDE ON
BLAcKFatAasißition E. —On Friday night,between seven and
eight a middle-aged f,male was ooserved by police-constable
371 to mount the parapet of the north-east side of Black-
fr:ars-bridge, and before he could reach her, she precipitated
herself from it into the Thames. Some men who were on the
pier instantly put off to her rescue, and succeeded in gaining
her apparently lifeless body, and oonveyed it to the Glaziers
Aries (receiving-house), Water-lane, where she was promptly
attended by Mr, Hutchinson, surgeon of Farringdon-street.
In the course of an hour she was so far recovered as to he
be enabled to state that her name was Ann Baines, and that
she resided at Cow-cross, Smithfield, but had no relatives or
friends in London.

" All the great and broad principles on which she may be
considered Babylon, may be retorted on us. Does the essence
of Antichrist lie in interposing m-dia between the soul and its
God? We interpose baptism. In imposing a creed? We have
articles for the clergy and creeds for ad men. In paying rever-
ence to things of time and place ? We honour the coosecrated
elements, take off our hats in churches, and oliaerve days and
seasons. In forms and ceremonies? We have a. service book,
We have bishops, priests, and deacons, In claiming an ins-
perium in imperio? Stith was the Convecation—such elec-
tive chapters. In the high state of prelacy ? Our bishops
have palaces, and sit amongst princes. In supporting religion
by temporal sanctions? We are established. In the mixture
of good and bad? We are national. In the discipline of the
body? We fast. England does not differ, then, from Rome
in principles, but in question of fact, of degree, of practice;
and whereas Antichrist differs from ( hrist, as darkness from
light, if one of the two churches is Antichrist, the other muse.
be also."—British Critic, No. lvi., p. 429.
" But further, it is a very impressive and touching fact, that
he hintself has told us that his Church shoul I have to bear the
same reproach with him, If they have called the master or
the house Beelzebub, how much snore shall they call them of
his household?"
" Antichrist, then, 'is almost foretold to ee the title which
its representatives and servants should bear. The imputatiota
of it may be almost called one of the notes of the Church.
We say deliberately Antichrist,' Babylon,' Mother of
Harlots,' Beast'—these titles given to the Church by the
world are as much a note of her being Christ's Church as her
real inward sanctity is. Rome must not monopolise these
titles ; liome has them not alone ; we share them with Rome;,
it is our privilege to share them i Anglo-Catholics inherit
them from the Roman family, from their common Lord and
Saviour. Rome must not appropriate them. The early
Church had them. We take it as a clear mark that- we are,
the Chursh, and Rome the Church, and both the swam
Church, because in these titles we are joint heirs of the
Church of St. Cornelius and St. Augustin. Heretics have
generally taken high ground, considered therwelies saints,
called the Church by foul and frightful names; it is their very
wont to speak, not against the Son of Alan, for he is away,
but against those who represent him during his axsenoe."_
British Critic, No. lvi., p. 418.
The British Critic claims for your Lordship, and for such
as your Lordship, a threefold privilege—first, of sitting among
the princes of this world—secondly, of interposing.
.yourselves
and your doctrines between the souls of men and the divine
Saviour—thirdly, of bearing reproach for the sake of Christ_
so that the deep indignation esspressed against your Lordships
by men who see that you ',refer what your apologist calls " gold
and frankincense," to scriptural truth—is to be esteemed a
badge of honour a.uti a mark of divine favour. 'To these three
privileges, your Lordship seems inclined to add a fourth—that
of favouring the Church of England with a form of your own
—your own composing or adopting—no matter which.
The Tract writers who so mee4ly lay down or take up their
pens at the veto or command of a Bishop,—those Clergymen
also w its according to your Lordship's testimony are to he
brought to subscribe and believe a' most anything at the requi-
sition of an Archdeacon mid a powerful pasty,—these and all
such tractable characters may devoutly believe that even self
contradiction in your Lordship must be right. But what do.
the writers in tins Record say to these things ? Truly they
scorn to be of tne same opinion. They make a great outcry
apiuit " Puseyism." They write tedious essays to prove
thM when Clergymen assert " This child is regenerate,"
those Clergymen do not mean what they say. They
combat the Oxford Tract Writers with every Weapon—
except the Bible. They make long quotations Irons
Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, Hooper, Phdput, Bradford, and
Rogers, from v hose testimony they derive boldness to assert
the, ideanity of the Pope with the Antichrist of the Scriptures.
hey denounce, in their magnanimous confessions, the Church
of Rome as a painted Jezebel, and a Church foredoomed to de-
struction. But as for those heresies which seek to dart their
poison into the very roots of their own establishment—they;
leave them as they find them. And the recent scene in White-
hall chapel, which, under a thin disguise, may serve to pave the
way for ninny a covert act of coalition with the Church of
Rome itself-Lseems, in their estimation and language, "a,
highly interesting service."
Millstones, my dear fellow-subjects, cannot be broken by a
feather. Crocodiles cannot be killed by a rotten stick. A
blazing fire cannot be quenched by a handful of straw. it be-
numbing frost cannot be counteracted by a farthing tandle.
And the cool, conceited, papalizing overtures of dr.: British
Critic and his Right Rev. supporters, cannot be checked by
arguments based upon the crude conjectures of Martyrs and
homilists concerning prophecies which they never understood.
Your Lordship's apologist, the British Critic, has sufficiently
evinced that the Bishop of Rome is not a greater hypocrite
than the Bishop of London ; and that consequently, those
Roman Catholic Clergymen, when they renounced with no
small pomp and parade, the jurisdiction of the Pope in order
to acknowledge that of your lordship—quarrelled with cue im-
pintos, in order to shake hands with another. Your lordship's
friend the critic has proved thus much. The critic is also
quite right in treating the notion that " Antichrist" means the
Prelate of Rome as a mere protestant blunder. He has, how-
ever, omitted to inform the public what Scripture really does
reveal concerning Antichrist, which is this—
If there be truth hi the Jewish Prophets, Antichrist will
prove to be a man, a king, another Pharoah, more stout, fierce,,
and powerful than his predecessori or prototypes (as being
more under the immediate inspiration of small) who shall ap-
pear on the earth at no very distant time, arid signalize himself
by influencing the nations of the earth to oppose the holy will
of the Almighty. 1 John, 2, 18. Js. 11, 4. 2'l Ness, 2, IL,
Dan. 8,23. Dan. 7, 11. Rev. xiii. 2, 18.
Possibly this individual, while yet unknown, and an infant,
may be brought to the font of the Church of England. Shall
we the Clergy do well in thanking the Almighty that. it bath
pleased him to regenerate this infant with his holy Spirit?
Will he also be bound to believe and to do all those things
which his godfathers and his godmothers may have undertaken
fur him ? Wilt thou play with him as with a bird ?
What I mean to say is this. The predictions concerning
Antichrist do not indeed confer upon us the privilege of curs-
ing the church of Rome, Nevertheless they warn us not to be
reckless in aseribing "regeneration" to we know not whom.
But to return to your Lordship's form of prayer. It is ob-
jectionable, my Lord, in every point of view. Sad solemn
grasulations accompanied by an invocation of the Eternal
Trinity, addressed to two or three Portuguese gentlemen,
merely because they take it into theiraeads to turn from one
church to another,—is contrary to tre twentieth chathpter of
Exok:us, in which it is written "Thou shalt not take
name
of the Lord thy God in vain."
But whether, your Lordship's form of
prayer be objectionable
or nut, your Lordship had no .right whatever to introduce it
into the Ohapel Royal at Uhitehall. In so doing, you have
made an innovation, my
Lord, in the Church'of England, which
is the less excusable, as your Lordship is a decided opponent
of those who wish to reform the rituals and modify the laws of
subscription,
severest terms which language can afford, andh threatenedt with
A Minister of a country parish is publicly censured in the
in Service.
On Bea otTsimsalosmeervu deprivation and excommunication,
scriptural and pernicious
of Baptismal
be pee'.
of his own
witted to foist upon the nation arubric
" hieillyinteresting service," considered in connection
This
On what principle of jusetx4eiresslissilolnas
with your lordship's unwillingness to correct the church rituals
abate the rigour of clerical subscription, signifies that.
h make a parade of being a Protestant bishop, than,
and to
you had tat er
do your duty as a Protestant bishop in ridding your own church
of serious error; that you prefer the penknife of Jehoiakim
to the hammer of Bezekiah,—unholy innovation to moderate
reform ; and that your Lordship's orthodoxy is evinced /Dort
by hostility to the t..hurch of Rome than by the love of truth,
It is true these Popish Priests have renounced some of the
grosser superstitions of their own Church. But whatever they
have renounced, it is far from clear that they have renounced
the
vital
h e
principles of Popery. In the official report of this.
transactionpublic is informed that these Roman Catholic:
Priests are " at the same time desirous not to be separated
t
from the Communion of the Catholic Church of Christ." The
decided ambiguity, my Lord, of this phrase (which forms a
position fit for advance or retreat), renders it extremely
ob-
jectionable in an official report of ecclesiastical transactions.
It has been used by the worst of men for the worst of purposes.
Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, caused John Rogers to be
burnt alive for the sake of " the Catholic Church of Christ."
It has been perverted by good men, who, like Peter, have not.
known what counsellor has influenced some of their opinions.
Under cover of " the Catholic Church of Christ," Tract-wri-
ters, Reviewers, Critics, and Clergymen, have taught doc-
trines which contain the essentials of Popery. The term
" the Catholic Church of Christ" conveys to the minds of mul-
titudes within 'the pale of the Church Establishment such no-
tions as the following—that Episcopal baptism only is valid—
that therefore the baptism of Roman Catholics is infinitely
preferable to that of Dissenters—that, therefore, on the
present occasion, baptism may be dispensed with—
and that baptism is a " medium interposed between the
soul and God." These concessions ( which are congenial as:
well to spiritual peers as to penitent priests) are implied in the
forms of prayer which, under the sanction of your Lordship,
has been denominated "A public recantation of the errors of
the Church of Rome." These concessions are not, it is true,
openly expressed in that form of prayer, but they are covertly
insinuated. They are overlaid by an invocation of the eternal
name, but they strike at the root of true religion.
I have the honour to be, my Lord,
Your Lordship's most obedient humble servant,
HENRY ERSKINE HEAD,
To the Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of London.

COMMODORE SIR CHARLES NAPIER, K.C.B.
—We are ir.formed, upon autho►ity, that this distinguished
r.nd Gallant Officer will ha present at the dinner of the
Shipwrecked Fishermen, and Mariners' Benevolent So-
ciety, to take place on Wednezday, May b, at the London
Tavern, Bisbopsgate-street.