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is followed by a hatred of civil coercion; and one of the most strongly marked symptoms of the times is a most unnatural sympathy with crime and criminals, to the setting aside of the truth of God's Word, and to the obstruction of the course of common justice. II. There is a general contempt for the authority of rulers and of parents. Men have learned to speak evil of dignities. Nor is this to be marvelled at, for the wicked walk on every side, when the vilest men are exalted. Now, they who have broken loose from the restraints of religion,' will soon show their contempt for magisterial, and judicial, and parental | authority. They who honour not God, cannot be expected to honour the king; and they who reverence not their Father in heaven, will not highly esteem their earthly parents. Much of the common contempt for rulers arises from their regardlessness of religion. They think themselves officially exempted from religious duties. They have been taught so. They believe it, they act upon it, and consequently they have little moral weight in society, whatever their civil power may be. In the same manner, many parents, falling away from attendance on religious ordinances, draw away their children after them. Or, if they attend irregularly, their families soon claim the same privilege, and thus the evil increases, and will increase, in a fearful ratio, if not counteracted by the benevolent and co-operative aggression of the evangelical Churches.

The loose and disorderly state of society is to be attributed also to the want of domestic religion, even among those who regularly attend divine ordinances. In how few houses do we find family worship! The pressure of extreme poverty, the sickening and sinking of the heart through hope deferred, the want of self-respect, the helplessness of continual dependence, the desperation of men losing sight of God, in the adversity of their circumstances, and growing hardened under the petrifying power of accumulating misery-all these, and many other causes, are rapidly breaking down our family altars, removing our household candlesticks, and turning many a Bethel into a den of practical atheists. If the Lord prevent not, what is to be the end?

Much moral evil also arises from young men and women being employed at too early a period of life. They soon learn to shift for themselves. They leave the parental roof, place themselves under the charge of strangers, who care for nothing but the little pittance of room rent received from these young deserters or outcasts from their fathers' houses. They shift, and come and go as they please—they are often corrupted, seduced, and ruined for life. Nay, more, many young persons of both sexes marry early, without forethought, or prudence, or provision of any kind, either domestic or personal; and the result of such premature alliances is an enormous increase of ignorance and vice.

III. The sources of corruption.-These are as various and as numerous as the pursuits, and occupations, and positions of the parties corrupted. The gathering together of great masses of young and old in our mills, our workshops, our factories, and warehouses, is a wholesale cause of ruin to thousands and tens of thousands. But it may be asked, "Where is the remedy for such an evil?" The remedy, to some extent, lies in the hands of employers. They can do much, but they do little. "What can we do!" say the proprietors of our vast establishments for laborious industry. Why, if ye will take

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in and employ the very refuse of society-if ye will patronize the intemperate, the improvident, the licentious, the vile, why do you not take care to classify your workmen? Why are the old and the young, the good and the bad, the sober and the drunken, the religious and the irreligious, the pious and the impious, all huddled together, and dealt with as if there were no difference between virtue and vice, between the man that fears God and the man who fears him not? At all events, why do you not put the young under the special care of a vigilant and virtuous guardianship? why are they to be corrupted and debauched by a premature intercourse with adult profligates, who glory in their shame, and who rejoice in the revelation of their carnal mysteries to the young, and lure them on to sin by fictitious and sometimes genuine narratives of a vulgar blackguardism that appears brave and romantic in the eyes of the inexperienced? Would you deal so with your own children? It may also be asked, Why do ye, who are obliged by law to provide a teacher for the young, defer the duties of the schoolmaster till the close of the day's labours, when the bodies of his pupils are worn out with fatigue, and the spirit, sympathetically crushed under the body's suffering, is incapable of any steady intellectual exercise. Let the schoolmaster meet his pupils in the morning, when their bodies are strong, and their minds clear and active, and their progress will be very different from what it is now, under the present system of evening tuition. Besides, if the teacher did his duty, he might so instruct, and exhort, and warn, and counsel his pupils, as to prepare their minds more thoroughly for the discharge of all their personal and relative duties during the day. The power to better the condition of the working classes is not wanting, if there were the will. Much might be done, and should be done; and if the compulsory interference of the Government do not teach employers their duty to the employed, the employed themselves may one day break out to the confusion and scattering of those who disregard and lose sight of the injunctions of common humanity.

IV. The low popular estimate of the ministerial character.-Some look upon ministers of the gospel, and honour them as ambassadors of Christ. Others have a respect for them, and treat them civilly. Others do not hesitate to question their motives, and speak lightly of their profession. While great multitudes speak with a virulence and a vehemence of the heralds of salvation, as if they were the enemies of their kind, the hinderers of all social and political regeneration. Why is all this?

Much of it may be traced to the indolence of the ministers of the Establishment. The people were as sheep having no shepherd. They were left, neglected-no man cared for them, and, by a natural reaction, they soon began to care for nobody; and even when these ministers were roused to a sense of duty, it was too late. Again, the Dissenting ministers had enough to do during the deadening Moderatism of the Establishment, to keep evangelical truth alive in a few places, and thus the great mass of the people escaped and ran off from the house and ordinances of God.

The ministers of the Establishment were caressed by the aristocracy, while the Dissenting ministers were the favourites of the common people. The one class supported the claims of Government, the other the claims of the multitude. The one were looked on by Dissenters as political

teousness. Co-operation would beget intimacy, and friendship, and affection; and thus the whole Christian body would move on with a steady step. Each under its own denominational banner, and keeping its own rank of independent but united aggression, would bear down with an irresistible pressure on the multitudinous confederacy of the enemies of Christ, and of his cause and kingdom. Would to God we saw such work going on, under the blessing of the Head of the Church! In order to carry forward this united enterprise, there should be,

tools, the other were regarded by the Establishment | and zealous interest in the cause of truth and righas political agitators. Religion suffered at the hands of both; and multitudes who went to the house of God to get the bread of life, received nothing but the stale bread of a heartless Moderatism, or bread fermented with the sour leaven of political Voluntaryism. Both had stepped down from their own platform, and put themselves on a level with worldly politicians; and their power, as well as many of their followers, forsook them, when they entered the arena of mere secular contention, and took up the weapons of mere carnal warfare; and hence the office and work of the Christian ministry came to be lightly esteemed.

The envy and jealousy of these antagonist parties greatly affected their character, and weakened their influence among the people. There was no fraternal feeling, no Christian union among them; nay, not so much as friendly co-operation, since the rise of the Voluntary controversy. In their mutual conflicts, the spirit of discord was engendered, and singular exchanges of principle and of party, on the side of professing Christians, showed a vast amount of latitudinarianism, that shifted and shuffled about with a thorough regardlessness alike to consistency, to authority, and discipline.

The character of ministers has also been much injured by narrow and congregational views of duty. They had a flock-from that they had their living. They looked not beyond the confines of their own little sheep-fold. They preached, they administered ordinances, and visited, and fell asleep, as if their task were done. If their congregations prospered, all was well-they cared for nothing beyond; and thus, instead of the broad character of a catholic, evangelical ministry, they have circumscribed themselves within the narrow range of a congregational partisanship, which lives for itself, does everything for itself, contributes a little for gospel enterprise abroad, but has done little or nothing for the rapidly increasing heathenism at home. Many Churches present the singularly anomalous character of a regard for the heathen of other lands, but live contended and regardless in the midst of great multiades who are perishing for lack of knowledge at ome, and who are growing from day to day more irreclaimable. What say ye to this, ye ambassadors of Christ ? What say ye to this, ye rulers in the house of the Lord! What say ye to this, ye members of Christ's mystical body!

V. Means of reclaiming the reclaimable.-The fundamental injunction, on which are based all missionary enterprises, both at home and abroad, is: "Go ye and preach the gospel unto every creature"-not to your little flock only, not to your congregation alone, bat to every creature; and if all the ministers of the gospel would join in this great home mission, the promise would, doubtless, be realized to them, " Lo, I am with you alway." Nor should our teaching be confined to churches or schools, but extended to that familiar, domiciliary instruction, which arrests the attention, engages the sympathies, and draws forth the affections of households, not only in regard to the messenger, but also in regard to Him who sends both the messenger and the message. The union of Christian ministers in this work would draw forth the active services of their respective officebearers, who would rejoice to aid their minister in his labours of love, and would rouse their several congregations to take a more lively, and prayerful,

1. A cordial co-operation of all evangelical ministers throughout the whole country, and more espe cially in our large and populous towns. Such a cooperation would leave every minister at perfect liberty to work according to his own measure of judgment and experience. Nothing more would be required of him than to work within a certain given time, within a certain locality-to do his best and his uttermost to overtake, and endeavour to reclaim, by the mild and persuasive spirit of the gospel, the great masses that are perishing. The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few. May the Lord send forth labourers into his harvest! From their labouring in the same field, from their meetings, their brotherly conferences and consultations, the spirit of congregational exclusiveness would give way to the enlarged and comprehensive spirit of a great national missionary movement. To accomplish this most desirable purpose,

2. A portion of every large town should be cut off as a field of missionary experience. There would be this advantage in taking a small section:-The labour to the ministers would be less burdensome; the fruits of their visitation would be sooner manifest; their experience would grow with their work, and would better qualify them for their subsequent labours; nay, more, the experience of the whole would be the experience of every one, when they met from time to time to compare notes together, and sum up their collective exertions. Of course, the extent of the section would depend upon the number of ministers who were to carry on the work from house to house. It would be necessary,

3. To divide the section into divisions-one for each minister. This would be the special field of his missionary exertion, and so small, as not seriously to encroach on his duties to his own congregation. A certain time should be set for visiting all the families; but the number of visits may perhaps be left to the convenience and discretion of each minister. The general purpose should be to stir up the people to a proper sense of their moral and spiritual condition, in the sight of God, and the gospel offer should be freely and fully expounded, and held out to all.

Now, having cut off a section of a town, say onefourth, or any other proportion, according to the number of labourers; and having divided that section into divisions containing a manageable number of families, so that each minister may easily visit each household in his district in the course of three months, the visitors may then meet, compare, arrange, and sum up the amount of their statistical information regarding the religious circumstances and condition of the whole section. This being accomplished, the ministers will proceed to the second section, and on to the third, fourth, &c., in order, in the same way. The labourers will work together; they

will cheer one another on; they will aid one another by counsel, by the communication of mutual experience; and by the continual exchange of civilities, and courtesies, and Christian kindness, they will show to the world the practical possibility of co-operation, without the compromise or sacrifice of any conscientious conviction whatever. Integrity of principle, and perfect freedom of action, will be secured to every evangelical labourer.

VI. Plan of operations.-It would be well if there were some uniformity of plan, though the details, as well as the practical working of them, must in some measure be left to the discretion of each minister. Whatever a system may be, every man will take his own way of carrying it out. It will be necessary to visit every family, and take a numerical census of them, specifying the names of the parents, the employment of the father, the names and ages of the children, and the occupation of such as are at work, as well as of those who attend school. The place of worship attended by the family should be mentioned. A list of the Sabbath-schools taught in the district, with the number and names of the scholars, and also of the teachers, along with the system of tuition, as well as of the books taught, would be valuable as a fund of statistical information. Nor should the dayschools be omitted among other memoranda. It inight be desirable, also, to state how many adults, married or unmarried, were unable to read, and how many children have not received the benefits of education.

2. The devotional exercises of ministers in families. These should be short and pertinent, and applicable, as far as possible, to the peculiar circumstances of the family. The reading a portion of the Word of God, if at all convenient, should not be omitted. The disease and the cure of souls might be briefly set forth in a few judiciously selected passages; and the closing prayer should bear impressively on the spiritual condition of the family; nor should mention of their temporal well-being be neglected, when the minister speaks to God on behalf of the household. The children, if present, should be addressed, and catechised with all patience and gentleness. Kindness to the children never fails to awaken grateful feelings in the heart of the parents. To advance the work,

3. A prayer-meeting should be held in one of the several districts once a-week, over which the minister should preside. It is very profitable to have the presence of the, elders and other office-bearers on these occasions, and to let them take part of the work, either in opening or closing the meeting with prayer. By being thus brought together, the officebearers and the people become acquainted, and the former are better fitted for duty by taking a share in the exercise. The elders who officiate are exalted in the estimation of the people; and settle down in the minds of the hearers as men having authority, to whom deference is due-as men who work, and who ought to be highly esteemed for their work's sakeas men of gifts and graces, of prayer and piety, whose moral and spiritual standing command esteem and reverence.

The district prayer-meetings have this advantage above stated meetings in a place of worship. In the latter you have always the same audience. They who least need instruction are most ready to attend; whereas, in the former, you have a new audience each time, and that audience often consists, not of

regular worshippers in any place of worship, but of numbers who never attend ordinances at all, or who have fallen awayf rom attendance, and are sinking down into the mire of a deeper and deeper degradation, because no man cares for their souls.

From the combined efforts of evangelical ministers, in endeavouring to bring the outcast population of our land under the shadow of gospel ordinances, many important benefits will follow to both ministers and people; such as,

1. Ministers will be following their Master's injunction to preach the gospel to every creature, and have reason to expect his presence and his blessing.

2. The co-operation of ministers will increase their influence and their usefulness in the community. 3. The sphere of their practical experience will be greatly enlarged by the collective experience of all. 4. The full extent and magnitude of the evils they have to meet will be seen, in the moral and spiritual statistics with which they will be furnished in the course of visitation.

5. The elders, by taking a share in the district prayer-meetings, will be gradually trained to the duties of their office.

6. The several congregations will be stirred up, also, to aid both ministers and office-bearers.

7. Passages will be opened up through the ranks of home heathenism for the spread of the gospel.

8. Popular prejudices, against ministers and religion, will be neutralized, or in some measure removed.

9. The Church will be in her proper position as a Church militant-her combined energy will be felt, and her power acknowledged.

Many collateral and consequent advantages might be enumerated as the probable result of this united evangelical movement. These topics we have not time to discuss, nor to enter on at all. One thing is certain, such a movement would furnish the Church with most valuable statistics for her future guidance. If even one single soul were awakened in this or that neighbourhood-if one or other were brought to Christ in this or that familythey would be so many lights shining in dark places, by which the dwellers in darkness might be shown the way of salvation; but, whatever might be the issue, the ministers of the everlasting gospel would have this consolation, that they were in the way of commanded duty, and that they did what they could. The Lord direct our minds into the love of God, and into the patient waiting for Christ, and stir us up to duty so effectually that no one, not even the poorest, the most despised, the most abandoned, can say, " No minister ever cared for me or mine-no messenger ever came to my door with glad tidings of salvation -no ambassador of Jesus ever warned, or instructed, or counselled me; but I have been left to live in ignorance, without God and without hope, as if there were no help for me in God." The Lord give us wisdom in all things!

A CURIOUS CHAPTER IN THE LIFE OF PRESIDENT EDWARDS.

WHO has not heard of the great and the good Jonathan Edwards, President of New Jersey College, in America, and author of so many theological workswhich will live as long as the English language? And who that has become acquainted with his history, does not reverence the memory of the man, the

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minister, and the divine! There is one part of his life, however, over which a veil of mystery hangs, and of which we have never seen a satisfactory explanation. We refer to his dismission from his church at Northampton. It is generally known that his people quarrelled with him on the question of communion, and that they never rested till they had forced him to resign his charge, and sent him adrift on the wide world. On many accounts, this conduct may be reckoned to have been as extraordinary as it was inexcusable. He had been long the idol of his flock, and he was regarded by many of them as their spiritual father. Under his ministry, several remarkable revivals had taken place, particularly in the years 1734 and 1740. Harmless and inoffensive in his manners, and recluse in his habits, he spent most of his time in his study, seldom visiting any of his people, and provoking no man. He was now in the very zenith of his popularity, his writings having spread his fame far and wide; he was consulted as an oracle; and so high did he stand in the estimation of his brethren, that, within a short time after his leaving Northampton, he was unanimously called to preside over the College where the New England pastors received their education. Nor was there anything in his views of communion that would seem, at first sight, calculated to excite prejudice in the minds of his people; the principal point on which he differed from them being that he held "visible saintship" to be the only true term of admission to Christian ordinances—a doctrine which we might suppose would have been anything but obnoxious to Independents, the descendants of the Puritans of Old England. And yet such was the man who was dismissed in the most summary, and, we might say, disgraceful way, by the almost unanimous vote of his people, and whom, after dismissing, they would hardly allow to enter the pulpit again, even when, in the child-like humility of his soul, he offered to supply it when occasionally vacant! And such is the only reason usually assigned for their conduct! Let us endeavour, however, to analyze a little more closely a denouement so remarkable. Such an exercise may be interesting even as an exhibition of kuman nature, and it is not without its moral.

There can be no doubt, in the first place, that Edwards, with all his meekness, was a strict, even stern, disciplinarian. His seventy rules for the regulation of his own daily conduct, are, in some points, stringent to a degree almost amounting to ascetism, for which an apology may be found in the weakness of his constitution. But he carried the same rigid standard of moral discipline into the management of his family. If, for example, they went abroad to visit their friends, they were never permitted to remain after nine o'clock in the evening, nor were they allowed to sit up long after that time with any visitors. One of his biographers has extolled another part of his domestic economy: "If any gentleman desired acquaintance with his daughters, after handsomely introducing himself by properly consulting the parents, he was allowed all proper opportunity for it, and a room and fire, if needed; but he must not intrude on the proper hours of rest and sleep, nor the religion and order of the family." All very proper, say we; but, alas, for the romance of courtship! The "gentleman," we opine, after passing through the freezing atmosphere of so many punctilios, must have been right glad of "the room and fire!" And yet Edwards had a delightful family. We can almost fancy

we see the mischievous smile of Esther Edwards (how we do love that name, for her sake and the sake of the noble Jewish maid that bore it!)-Esther, his lovely daughter, so good, and yet so lively and piquant, when asked "if the room and fire were needed?" To those, however, who may be disposed to smile at all this as needless preciseness, it may be proper to state that it may have been assumed by Edwards for the purpose of bearing more decided testimony against the looseness of manners prevailing in New England at that period. It appears, from several passages in his sermons, that customs obtained among his members, and among the best regulated families in the community, which, he says, persons might be inclined to laugh at hearing condemned," but which (such is the progress of society in what may be termed the decencies of life) would not now bear to be publicly mentioned. The New Englanders appear, moreover, to have been sadly addicted to all sorts of junketings and merry-makings things which, of all others, the solemn pastor of Northampton could never relish at any period of his life, and which, being in advance of his age in point of morality, he could not reconcile with the high standard of piety introduced with its revival.

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But the moral distance between the flock and their pastor was destined to be still more palpably brought out by an incident which occurred in 1744. In that year, having been informed that books of an improper character were in circulation among the young people in town, his zeal was immediately kindled; he procured a list of those suspected, and having convoked "the brethren of the Church," without any warning, he laid before them the startling intelligence, and proposed a thorough investigation. Taken by surprise, the "grey fathers consented; upon which, pulling out his list, he read the names of the defaulters, and summoned them, apud acta, as we Presbyterians would say, to compear before him at his house, and answer for their conduct. How much more efficiently might the matter have been managed by a judicious session, quietly dealing with the parties in private, and setting before them the sinfulness of their conduct: but to blurt it out before all "the brethren of the Church!" The whole proceeding, besides being formally irregular, indicates a much larger proportion of simplicity and good intention, than of prudence and knowledge of the world. The consequences were such as might have been expected. The old people, many of whose children were implicated, began to feel indignant at being taken in; and the young were grievously offended. So long as his rigid morality was confined to the pulpit or his own family, it gave no offence, because it excited no alarm; but this proposal of a domiciliary purgation enlisted against him at once all the pride of youth and the force of custom. In his praiseworthy anxiety to purify his flock-at that time nearly embracing the whole township-of the accursed leaven, he had thrust his hand, burning with zeal, into their very bosoms; and no wonder that, coming into contact with their cool temperat ture, it should have produced a painful and rapid revulsion.

Even this offence, however, might have been got over, had it not been followed, as it speedily was, by the promulgation of his views on communion. Mr. Stoddart, the grandfather and predecessor of Edwards, had unfortunately held views on this subjec directly opposite to those which his colleague and

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convert that into the subject of their profession which
was rather the object of their practice. All were
alike involved in the dreaded crisis. It was the
first time that the test of an eclectic system of com-
munion, calculated only for the meridian of a small
circle of double-sifted devotees, picked out of other
churches, was to be applied to a whole community of
professing Christians.

The consequences were such as might have been
anticipated. A general alarm was created, issuing in
a violent hysterical counter-movement, involuntary
and unreasoning, and kicking right and left at the
worthy man that had unconsciously excited it. In
vain did poor Edwards entreat to be heard in self-
defence; in vain did he offer to lecture on the sub-
ject, and demonstrate that they were all in the wrong
-that they must have misunderstood him. They were
well aware that they were no match for the contro-
versial powers of the author of "The Freedom of the
Human Will;" and they were determined to vindi-
cate on this occasion the freedom of their own. They
would enter into no controversy with him. His over-
tures were met by dogged resistance; the interference
of the "Council of the Church," called in upon the
emergency, only served to aggravate matters, by
threatening to establish the ecclesiastical inquisition
which they dreaded; and it issued in the sad separa-
tion, which none of them, we verily believe, at first
contemplated, and which most, if not all of them,
lived deeply to deplore. When the violence of the
spasmodic fit had spent itself, many expressed their
regret, mingled with wonder, at the part they had
acted. The letter of Joseph Hawley, Esq., addressed
to the Rev. Mr. Hall of Sutton, and published in the
newspapers, May 19, 1760, expressed no more than
what, it is probable, all Mr. Edwards' flock afterwards
felt the most undiminished respect for his person,
and sincere grief of heart at their treatment of one
who was only too good for them, and whose only error
lay in his expecting all others to be as good as him-
self.

grandson saw it his duty to adopt. The old man
held that unconverted persons, considered as such,
had a right, in the sight of God, to the sacrament of
the supper; that this was, in fact, an ordinance of
conversion as truly as the preaching of the gospel; and
that it was therefore the duty of sinners to come to
that ordinance, though conscious that they were
utter strangers to true holiness, and that they might
do so without incurring the charge of hypocrisy.
How far this very erroneous view of the institution
had taken hold of the minds of the Church at Nor-
thampton does not clearly appear; but Edwards,
gradually convinced of its unsoundness, appears to
have been led, partially, at least, into the opposite
extreme. He pled that, as the sacrament of the sup-
per was intended for the confirmation of saints, and
not the conversion of sinners, not only ought none
to come but those who were true saints, but none
ought to be admitted to that ordinance but those of
whose genuine conversion the office-bearers of the
Church were persuaded. It was not enough with
him to announce the doctrine, which we all admit to
be that of Scripture, that none can be "worthy re-
ceivers" of that feast, except those who are par-
takers of Christ;" and consequently to urge the duty
of self-examination as essential to its right participa-
tion. It was not enough with him to say,
"Let a
man examine himself, and so let him eat;" or,
"Examine yourselves whether ye be in the faith."
But, Let us, the brethren of the church, examine
you, to ascertain the same point, whether ye be in
faith. In other words, the "visible saintship,"
which he held an indispensable term of communion,
was not merely a Christian profession and practice,
which we generally understand by that phrase, but
the possession of genuine Christianity, or the existence
of Christian principle in the heart. Without can-
vassing, at present, the soundness or good sense of
this attempt to get at the knowledge of men's hearts,
let us attend to the effect which followed on his as-
sertion of these views. When it was found that he
intended exactly to reverse the theory and practice We have only a few words to offer on the question
of communion adopted by his worthy grandfather which led to this rupture. Edwards' idea of "visible
who had been much respected for his talents and saintship" differed, as we have seen, from that which
piety-that he threatened to apply a high spiritual we are accustomed to attach to the expression. In
test to every applicant for communion, rejecting all common with the Independents, he held it to mean
who could not satisfy him that they were
the genuine religion of the heart rendered visible in
saints"-this must have thoroughly roused the fears the life and character of the individual. Now, with-
which his previous procedure had awakened. It was out entering into this question at present, as we pro-
now no longer an isolated case of discipline, but a pose to take it up in connection with another subject,
systematic plan, according to which they were to be we merely observe, that it resolves itself ultimately
subjected individually, and many of them anew, to the into another question-namely, Whether the Church
cross-questioning of Mr. Edwards-a man, they knew, is entitled, in the admission of applicants, to sit in
deeply read in spiritual diagnostics, and prepared to judgment on the heart, or to pronounce on the spi-
apply his own rules, as to the "Religious Affections," ritual state and character of her members! We all
with the stern impartiality of a judge on the bench. grant that none but genuine saints should come to the
This ordeal awaited them all. It was not to be con- Lord's table; in other words, that all professing Chris-
fined to a small coterie-such as an Independent tians should be Christians indeed and in truth. And
pastor may gather around him in some corner of our in the doctrinal exhibition of the characters whom
crowded cities--but to be spread over the whole com- Christ invites to his feast, it is essentially needful to
munity of Northampton; embracing young and old point out, for the purpose of self-examination, the
the over-indulgent father, with the romping daughter, distinguishing features of the child of God and the
and the frolicsome youth of a son-manly fellows, child of the world. But the question is, What rule of
who disliked the inquisitorial look of the thing, as judgment is the Church to follow in the admission of her
well as modest Christians, who, though ready to pro- members? Is she either entitled to demand, or bound
fess their faith in Christ as their Saviour, and their to believe, that all whom she admits to her commu-
obedience to him as their Lord, were not prepared to nion are real saints? Or, is this the point which she
profess their full persuasion of the sincerity of their is bound at least to take means to ascertain? To these
faith or the goodness of their hearts-who, in short, questions we must answer in the negative. We main-
were too good saints to boast of their saintship, or totain, that, in the admission of Church members, man

"real

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