Popery on every Coin of the Realm.—The Rev. E. H. Titcombe in the Irish Evangelical (Belfast) has a timely critical article on Tract 61 of the Catholic Truth Society in which a claim is made that Popery is on every coin of the Realm. The reference is to the title—Fidei Defensor, Defender of the Faith—conferred on Henry VIII. by Pope Leo X. as a reward for Henry’s attack on Luther. The above Society asserts that England should return to her Mother, the Church of Rome, which she forsook at the Reformation. On the same lines of argument Mr. Titcombe maintains that Romanism should return to Paganism as she has on her medals the title Pontifex Maximus. The legend on our coinage, papal in origin though it be, was annexed Act 35 Hen. c. 3 to the Crown. It would be better that the title coming from such an unworthy source as Leo X. had been allowed to pass into well deserved oblivion both on account of the giver and the recipient.
A True Assessment of the Veracity of Certain who posed as Prophets.—In his Memoir and Remains of Rev. D. Macdonald, Shieldaig, the late Rev. D. Macfarlane has some pertinent remarks against certain prophetic utterances made in 1893 when our Church came into existence. “Some men thought, said, and wished, that our Church would not grow larger than its first small beginning. Dr. W. C. Smith, speaking from the Moderator’s Chair in the [Free Church] General Assembly, compared our movement in defence of God’s truth and cause to the steam issuing from a small teapot that would soon exhaust itself by the process of evaporation. But he was disappointed. Dr. Walker, the Editor of the Free Church Monthly, publicly predicted that our Church would, in the course of three or four years, become extinct, and the reason he gave was that our funds would by that time be exhausted! The wish was father to the thought. But so far as this prophecy of that rev. gentleman is concerned, all that he has for it is that he bears the mark of a false prophet (Jer. xxviii. 9). His prediction did not come to pass. Our movement was not of man, but of God, and so long as we, as a Church, faithfully adhere to, and display the banner we have been enabled to lift up for the sake of this truth in our land in a backsliding age, no weapon formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against us in judgment we shall condemn. “This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their righteousness is of me saith the Lord.” This was written in 1903; this is now 1943; and notwithstanding the various predictions of the greater and minor prophets of that discredited school we are still in existence. Dr. Smith and Dr. Walker made the mistake of their lives in singling out the future of the Free Presbyterian Church as ‘a subject on which to exercise their assumed prophetic gifts, for in doing so they exposed themselves to the deserved ridicule of all men of good will who value veracity more than unfulfilled assertions and sober statement rather than reckless words. We refrain from saying anything meantime in reference to the minor and later prophets of the same bad school except that they, like their predecessors, make it quite plain that the gift they pride themselves in is the very one in which they prove to be glaringly lacking.
NOTE.—The review of the General Assemblies and other articles are held over until next issue. Owing to the Glasgow Fair Holidays this issue may be later in reaching our readers. May we remind our readers that owing to war conditions, shortage of staff, etc., the issue of the Magazine involves many more difficulties than in pre-war days to all concerned with its issue. We are sure, when thus reminded, our readers will make allowance for delays in receiving their copies and for other short comings incident to the disturbance caused by war conditions.