distinctly point out the principles which have led to such melancholy results to the Church of England.

We must not however suppose these principles are in themselves new; they are as old as the earliest ages of Christianity.  The Galatian Converts were seduced from the simplicity of the Gospel by them; and coming down to the days of Charles the First, our own Church has great cause to lament the progress they made at that unhappy period.

I am the more solicitous that this should not be lost sight of, as Dr. Irons says his own views “were not obtained from the Oxford Tracts.”  This is very possible, but has nothing to do with the fact, that the Reverend Doctor holds substantially all the errors of the “Tractarians.”

That the principles of sound Protestanism still prevailing in this neighbourhood, combined with the faithful preaching of the gospel in many of our churches and chapels, may by God’s blessing be an effectual bulwark against the covert, as well as against the open, enemies of our time-honoured Church, is my earnest prayer.

A. E.

19, Alfred Place West, Brompton,
         11th December, 1854.

IS THE VICAR OF BROMPTON
A TRACTARIAN?

In a letter bearing the signature of the Reverend Dr. Irons, which appeared some time ago in the “Record,” there is a distinct denial on the part of the Reverend Doctor as to his being a “Tractarian.”

In making a few comments upon the letter alluded to, I feel that I am not overstepping my duty as a parishioner of Brompton, and much more my duty as a professed lover of Scriptural truth, in opposition to Romish and Romanizing error.

Dr. Irons says, in the letter alluded to, “I am not a Tractarian in any sense,” and adds, “that he has always differed from the teaching of some of the Oxford Tracts.”

If the English language is to be understood in its plain grammatical sense, some refers to a few, or the smaller portion, and, consequently, Doctor Irons does not differ from the teaching of the Tracts, generally.

I have never met a “Tractarian” who did not profess to be at issue with one or more of the ninety Tracts; and I have no doubt but Dr. Pusey himself would unhesitatingly affirm, that there was teaching in some of them from which even he dissented.

Could we have asked the reverend gentlemen who have lately apostatized to Rome from one of the churches at Stoke Newington, I can easily imagine that they too would have differed from the teaching of some of the Tracts, though their principles and practices, before they finally left the Church of England, were daily giving evidence how completely (as a whole) they were identified with the party.

It must be borne in mind that from the time this “Tractarian” blight came over our Church, it has been the practice of its clerical adherents to deny any affinity with Romish error, and to beguile their congregations with the assurance, that the holding of “Tractarian” principles was the best safeguard to the Church of England.

Not only did their most talented men write and preach in this strain, but the literary organs of the party still say so; and when, from time to time, the more honest among them secede to Rome, their friends attribute their apostacy to any cause but the right one, sometimes laying the blame upon the evangelical party for protesting against their unsound and unscriptural teaching.

Dr. Irons, in the letter referred to, defends himself from the charge of refusing to sign the Anti-Papal Petition in 1850:—the charge, however, is neither (as the Doctor calls it) “practically unjust, or untrue.”

Dr. Irons did refuse to sign the Petition, and the reason given at the time for this