verything else of peculiar sacredness within the edifice.
The holinesses of Westminster cost thrice as much, but were a good
bargain notwithstanding. Would English Churchmen permit, far less
originate and insist in doggedly maintaining, so palpable a
profanation, did they really believe their cathedrals to be holy? The
debased Jewish priesthood of the times of our Saviour suffered the
money-changers to traffic unchallenged within the temple; but they
did not convert the temple itself into a twopenny show: they did not
make halfpence by exhibiting the table of shew-bread, the altar of
incense, and the golden candlestick, nor lift up corners of the veil
at the rate of a penny a peep. It is worse than nonsense to hold that a
belief in the sacredness of ecclesiastical buildings can co-exist with
clerical practices of the kind we describe: the thing is a too palpable
improbability; the text quoted by the Englishman is conclusive on
the point. Would any man in his senses now hold that the old Jewish
priests really believed their temple to be holy, had they done, what
they had decency enough not to do--converted it into a raree-show? And
are we not justified in applying to English Churchmen the rule which
would be at once applied to Jewish priests? The Presbyterians of
Scotland do not deem their ecclesiastical edifices holy, but there
are certain natural associations that throw a degree of solemnity
over places in which men assemble to worship God; and in order that
these may not be outraged, they never convert their churches into
twopenny show-boxes. Practically, at least, the Scotch respect for
decency goes a vast deal further than the English regard for what they
profess, very insincerely it would seem, to hold sacred.

We have said there is quite as little New Testament authority for
consecrating a place of worship as for baptizing a bell; and if in
the wrong, can of course be easily set right. If the authority
exists, it can be no difficult matter to produce it. We would fain
ask the reader to remark the striking difference which obtains
between the Mosaic and the New Testament dispensations in all that
regards the materialisms of their respective places of worship. We
find in the Pentateuch chapter after chapter occupied with the
mechanism of the tabernacle. The pattern given in the mount is as
minutely described as any portion of the ceremonial law, and for
exactly the same reason: the one as certainly as the other was