May I recline Beneath thy shrine, I turn my eye From vanity, And gaze on scenes of bliss supreme, which never die. True friendship's genial power Survives the transient day: Its memory ne'er is obsoleteStill it is sweet, 'tis passing sweet→→→ 'T is never gone away. Nor does the shade In memory fade, When in the tomb on earth, the form belov'd is laid. This world is empty, vain, And round my joyful brow thy peaceful Where never rust nor moth destroys, emblem twine. My fancy flies away Before thy sacred tread; My meditation, from this cell, Hears unappall'd the solemn knell, And soars above the dead. And though a tear By chance appear, Yet I can smile, and say, my hopes do not end here. Come, Expectation, come! With humble hope of sin forgiven, 1 raise my dying eyes to heavenI look beyond this world; Where we again shall meet. Borne on faith's wing, I rise, and sing Grave! where's thy victory now? Death! where's thy sting? Come, Expectation, come! How sweet thou art to me! Blest herald! now I own thy sway, When time is done, Life's but begun Then may I joyful say, My God, "Thy will be done." Feb. 13, 1811. B. W. BRIEF MEMOIR OF THE RIGHT REV. DR. GEORGE CARLETON, BISHOP OF CHICHESTER. THIS eminently pious and able prelate was born A. D. 1559, at Norham, in Northumberland, of which castle his father was at that time governor. He received his grammatical learning under the care of the celebrated Mr. Bernard Gilpin; whose faithful, judicious, and affectionate attention to his young pupil was so remarkably owned of God, that the excellent tutor had the satisfaction of seeing him rise, at once, into a scholar and a saint. When Mr. Carleton became sufficiently qualified for the university, he was sent to St. Edmund Hall, in Oxford, where he was liberally supported by the munificence of his old master Mr. Gilpin, who loved him as his son, and who seems to have foreseen the eminence and usefulness for which the great Head of the Church had designed him. While at Oxford, our future Bishop was a pattern to the rest of his fellow-students, in piety, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity. Persons who are happily called to the knowledge and experience of the grace of God in truth, in early life, are sometimes prone to negCHRIST. GUARD. VOL. IV. lect, if not to despise, that literary cultivation of the understanding, of which, at a more advanced age, they know the value when too late. Mr. Carleton was blessed with a measure of wisdom, to discern and avoid this mistake. Next to the care of his immortal soul, and the maintenance of communion with God, his grand business was to furnish his mind with as much important knowledge as he could grasp. Hence the solid and swift advances, which Providence enabled him to make, in the various walks of useful and ornamental science. In February 1580 he took his bachelor's degree, with a pre-eminence of applause, which did him honour as long as he lived, and laid the first visible foundation of his subsequent promotions. In the course of the last-mentioned year, he was elected Probationer Fellow of Merton College, and proceeded Doctor in Divinity, A. D. 1613. From his long and constant residence at Oxford, he appears to have been extremely fond of an academic life: nor, probably, would any thing but the royal command, have drawn him out of a sphere so suited to his regular and philosophic turn of mind. On the 12th of July 1618, he was consecrated to the see of Lan 3 Q daff: to which elevation he was raised, and entitled, not only by his amazing genius, learning, and virtues, but, chiefly, on account of his masterly and resolute opposition to Arminianism, which had by that time found its way into England from the Dutch provinces, and with which several of the clergy of the Established Church were then beginning to be infected. Dr. Carleton, in his Sermons and University Disputations, had shown himself so watchful against the encroachments of this newlyimported poison, and was so accomplished a master of the whole controversy, that King James I. (who hated the Arminians with a perfect hatred, till he thought fit, some years afterwards, to make use of them for political purposes) first appointed him to the above bishopric, and then sent him, as his religious plenipotentiary, and as one of the four representatives of the Church of England, to the famous Synod of Dort: where his Lordship assisted that most venerable assembly, in their candid trial and just condemnation of the Arminian heresies. So faithfully as a Minister of God, and so ably as a man of talents, did this excellent Prelate acquit himself at Dort, that, on his return to England, the States of Holland wrote King James a letter of thanks for sending them a person whom they not extrávagantly styled," Imago atque expressa virtutis effigies:" i. e. a living image and counterpart of all virtue. His Majesty, likewise, was so thoroughly satisfied with the whole of his conduct, that he translated him to the see of Chichester, in September 1619. What must endear his name to posterity, while sound religion breathes in England, are the valuable works, which his pious and learned pen has bequeathed to the Church of God. Among these, --velut inter ignes shines his famous "Examination" * Fuller, book ii. p. 119. Warner, Before the civil and ecclesiastical troubles, in the seventeenth century, arrived at their height, the great and glorious Head of the Church was pleased to remove the worthy Bishop to another and a better world. He fell asleep in Jesus, on the 20th of May 1628, in the 69th year of his pilgrimage in this vale of tears, full of faith and of the Holy Ghost, and richly laden with good works. He was buried the. 27th of the same month, in the choir of Chichester cathe dral, near the altar. The compilers of "Biographia Britannica," who have supplied me with several of the above particulars, are so just to the memory of this profound and steadfast Or thodox Prelate, as to observe, that "He was a person of solid judgment, and of various reading; well versed in the fathers and schoolmen; wanting nothing that could render him a complete divine."-Echard, in his "History of England," volume ii. page 72, characterizes him in terms of distinguished honour; as does the indefatigable Dr. Fuller, whose words are, "About this time, George Carleton, that grave and godly Bishop of Chichester, ended his pious life. He was bred and brought up under Mr. Bernard Gilpin, that apostolical man, whose life he (i. e. Bishop Carleton) wrote, in gratitude to his memory. He retained his youthful and poetical studies fresh in his old age The testimony of the great Mr. Camden shall close the present sketch of this admirable Prelate's life and character. The learned antiquary, in his account of Norham and its Castle, writes as follows: "This, and other matters, were taught me (for I shall always own my instructors) by GEORGE CARLETON, born at this place: whom, for his excellent proficiency in divinity (whereof he is professor), and the other polite parts of learning, I love, and am loved by him. And I were unworthy of that love, if I should not acknow ledge his friendship +." Mr. Camden wrote this in 1607, some years before Dr. Carleton's elevation to a bishopric. May the great Head of the Church furnish many, very many, like eminent witnesses for God, in this our day, who shall not be ashamed of the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; but, daring to be sin. gular for his cause, boldly go without the camp bearing his reproach, and in simplicity and godly sin cerity lift up the standard of the Gospel against the floods of un godliness! Arise, O God, and plead thine own cause, AN *Church History, book xi. page 131. See also Dr. Fuller's Worthies of England, part ii. page 304. + Camden's Britannia, vol. ii, cpl. 1099, edit. 1722. SIR, RELIGIOUS COMMUNICATIONS. To the Editor, THE following is an abstract of Vitringa's interpretation of the Apocalypse, a specimen of which I lately communicated to you, as thinking it might interest your readers. Ch. ii, 1-7. Ephesus, a type of the Apostolical Church, as it was at the time of vision, A. D. 96, and as it was to continue to the persecution under Decius, in the middle of the third century. Ver, 8-11, Smyrna, a type of the Church under persecution in the third and fourth centuries. Ver. 12-17. Pergamos, the Church contending with the Ariaus and other heretics, until the eighth century. Ver. 18-29. Thyatira, the Church from the time of Charlemagne to the appearance of the Waldenses. Ch. iii. 1-6. Sardis, the Church in the time of the Waldenses, until the Reformation. Ver. 7-13. Philadelphia, the reformed Church, which should persevere in the same state until the age of religious indifference, which should gradually paralyze the churches, and be followed by a severe and universal tribulation, which awaits the Protestant churches, ver. 10; after which God himself, at last, will stand forth, the Deliverer of his Church, and the Avenger of its enemies. The address to Philadelphia is particularly applicable to the close of the sixteenth century. Ver. 14-22. The Protestant Church languishing in spiritual life immediately before the last judgments, above mentioned. This state already commenced (A. D. 1719), and religion now absorbed in speculation; whereas, in the kingdom of Christ, nothing availeth but a new creature. Ch. vi. 12-17. The sixth seal, the changes following the Reformation in Europe. Ch. vii. The day of judgment, before which the elect are exempted from the last tribulation falling on the enemies of the Church. Ch. viii. Rest and tranquillity after the victory of God over all his enemies. Ver. 2. The trumpets constitute another vision; and in the fire cast down to the earth, there may be a reference to the day of Pentecost. The first trumpet, the times from Trajan to Gallienus. The second, the invasion of the empire by the Scythians and Goths. The third, Arius hæresiarcha. The fourth, the fall of the western empire, in the times of Honorius and Valentinian the Third, in the latter part of the fifth century; at which time the Roman empire and the Church underwent a remarkable eclipse. This is a notable epoch both to historians of the Roman empire and to ecclesiastical writers, who have spoken of these times almost in the words which we have used in interpreting this prediction, though they had nothing less in their minds than the explanation of prophecy: e. g." Squalidos solis exortus hebetabant matutinos diei candores." Ammianus, lib. 31, § 1. Compare Zosimus, lib. 4, cap. 31. Ch. ix. The fifth trumpet, the Goths under Alaric and Ataulphus. -The sixth trumpet, the Saracens, Turcomani, Tartars, and Turks. The number four remarkably applied by Launeus to those pow. ers. Ch. x. St. John, the representative of the Church at the time here described. This supposition, the very key of this part of the Apocalypse. By eating the little book, is meant the study of the Apocalypse. The bitterness which followed, sig nifies the sufferings of its interpreters. The kings here spoken of, the same, among whom Europe should be divided at the time referred to. Ch. xi. 1, 2. The temple, the Christian people as constituting a Church.-The holy city, the same as under the government of magistrates. The measuring of the temple, the separation of true Christians from apostates.--The altar, the terms of communion with Christ ascertained by Scripture.— The outer court cast without, the apostates excommunicated by the reformers. Ver. 3. The 1260 days signify so many years, commencing A. D. 606. The two witnesses, the Waldenses and Bohemians. |