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know that they would vindicate our old claim to candor and charity. There has been no authority assumed in the case, no invasion proposed or desired of another's freedom; nothing but respect for another's right of opinion; nothing but tenderness of conscience seeking to know what is right. Nothing in language or manner or spirit has resembled that assumption, common in religious bodies, of being undoubtedly right, and having nothing to do but to reclaim an erring brother. More large, more liberal, more modest and kindly has been the thought that has prevailed among us. And I confess for myself, that there is a picture of charity and forbearance, that strongly inclines and almost wins me to a judgment different from that to which I have come. We are all erring creatures. When the cloud of life shall be lifted up and shall open the vision of eternity, we may all find that we have contended for things unnecessary. "Why shall we not, then, bear with one for a while, and mingle together in the offices of religious instruction, no matter what our differences be about Christ and Christianity?" I wish with all my heart that I could take this view of the case.

But there is something higher than mere kindly feeling, by which we must be guided. And I would beseech the most aggrieved person in the case, to tell us what with our views we can do to satisfy him. Controversialists seldom look at a subject from each other's point of view. Let this justice be done to our position, and we ask what other we can take? We preach an authoritative and miracle-sanctioned Christianity. How can we unite in teaching with him who abjures all this, razes the very ground on which we stand, and preaches only Natural Religion? Suppose a lectureship were established for the explanation and defence of the American Constitution; could two men. give alternate lectures there, the one of whom regarded it as a binding instrument, and the other, discarding that view, proposed to speak only of the primary and absolute idea of Government? How could such dissentients with regard to the Christian bond, meet together to enforce it? What would become of Christian congregations, when taught such distracting theories? What would be their chance of edification and establishment? Why, upon these theories we cannot even read the Scriptures in each

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other's churches. If I were to read the New Testament in a meeting of the disciples of Strauss, must they not look upon me as a weak brother, smile at my credulity, and wonder that I should gravely read such things to them? And if their teacher should read that book in my pulpit, would not the people look upon him with surprise and feel as if it were scarcely proper or honest to do this? Can we then preach the Gospel together, who cannot even read it together in our congregations?

Those among us who advocate ministerial intercourse with a denier of Christ's authority and miracles, still hold the same views as their brethren of the denial in question. They hold it to be a complete departure from the substantial ground of Christianity as a system of religion. They regard it as theoretical Infidelity. But they say that the denier does not so regard it. But by whose judgment of the matter are they to be governed? By theirs, or by his? By whose judgment ought he to ask them to be governed? On what ground, I say, shall they stand? On the ground of their opinion, or of his opinion? If he looked upon his disbelief as they do, I think he would not ask for participation in the teaching of Christianity. And can they consistently do what he could not consistently ask? I will make nothing of mere numbers in the case. I will suppose myself, and not my brother, to stand alone. And I say, if I and others had agreed upon a certain text-book as the basis of our teaching, and then if one or all of them had rejected that book, I could not unite with them in teaching; or if all of them held it as of authority and I did not, I could not unite with them. There could be no union obtained but by sacrificing the book, or by holding it to be of little importance, or by merging it in some more general teaching. And in truth this is the question before us. Shall we merge Christianity in Natural Religion? This is what ministerial exchanges in the case would say; this would be the public significance of the act, on the part of those who believe in the Christian records; that, although believing in them, they hold them to be of little comparative importance, and are willing to merge the whole of what they consider to be the Christian peculiarity in the general sentiments of religion.

Besides, can it it well be expected of me, that I should

welcome into my pulpit a person who holds in something very like contempt so much that I revere? For it is vain to deny that this is the tendency, and must be the result of the late anti-supernatural speculations. Fable is never very respectable; but fable when raised to the character of solemn faith becomes, by necessary contrast of ideas, absurd and ridiculous. There is another respect in which my reverence is yet more deeply wounded. There are differences of which I can think lightly. But he who lifts his finger to the great and venerable ideal before which I bow down, and speaks of the divine and anointed Christ as a remarkable genius, an extraordinary Jewish youth, who yet erred sometimes in doctrine and practice, who is subject to criticism and censure, who was tinged with Jewish prejudices - thought himself the Messiah perhaps, or was willing to assume the character, (a fault venial in a young man;) can he be welcome to take part with me in the holy ministrations of the pulpit? If I were wrong and he were right, yet I do not see how it is possible for us to stand together. If a man but assailed the good name of my dearest friend, I should deeply feel it; and at any rate too deeply, to be willing to take part with him in a eulogy over that friend's grave.

Alas! here is a difference that the opponent will not see, and perhaps cannot appreciate. He has passed into another hemisphere of thought and feeling with regard to Christianity, and he does not know what is thought and felt in ours. But the difference is immense. And it is no new thought of to-day that makes it so; at least with me. I have long meditated in former days the question that is now propounded among us; it was the meditation and the painful struggle of years; and at length I came to the conviction - from the largest views I could take, from the lowliest prayers and the deepest searchings of which I was capable that God, who speaks through the realm of nature and humanity, hath yet more especially, hath miraculously "spoken to the world by his Son." From that hour, next to a belief in God and in his goodness, this has been the most precious conviction of my life.

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Can any one fail to perceive how momentous this conviction must be to him who holds it? We lift our eyes to the universe of worlds. Eternal laws penetrate through the

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infinite realm. Wisdom, goodness, beauty, grandeur are around us; but as it all exists to us in the mind's conception, so its interest to us all centres in the soul's hope. Shall we live hereafter to behold this glory? Or are we to be swept down to silence and death, only to give place to other successions of being? for that is the visible course of things. From the infinite order, from the infinite silence, hath God in mercy spoken to us? This terrible bond of fate may we believe that it is broken by an articulate voice? This awful sovereignty-may we believe that it condescends to our weakness and listens to our cry? May we believe, not merely that God hath sent all elements and powers upon eternal, say rather inexorable errands, but that as a Father he presides and is present in all worlds, and graciously interposes in the moral fortunes of each one according to its needs? And is Christianity such an interposition? Is Christ the anointed and blessed messenger to this world? Is he only some imperfect, ordinary Jewish Socrates? Or is he, in some far higher sense, our Saviour? Is he this, or is he not?

Nor is this question momentous to individual minds only, but to the moral interests of all mankind. Opinion lies at the bottom of the world. All action is its result. The world is but the bodying forth of opinion. All history, empire, literature, society, life, is but the incarnation of it. But of all opinions I know of none more important than those which relate to Christ and Christianity, And most especially important are they in the present crisis of human progress. The world is about entering upon a new career. The bold speculations, the struggling passions of men are about to be let loose in a new and fearful manner. What is to control them? If Christianity is to be merged in that Natural Religion whose defects it came to remedy; if it is the mere scaffolding to the temple of truth, now to be taken away and to disappear; then the world must go on without that guidance that has been necessary to keep it in less perilous times. Science too is presenting aspects and tendencies that increase the need of this guidance, this instruction from on high. Under the name of order, it is bringing back a fate into the universe. It is threatening men with a new orphanage; it is bereaving them of the Father in heaven. It is not true, I conceive, that Christ

ianity was only or especially needed in an earlier and ruder age. It is needed now, and never more than now. The world, in some quarters, in some departments of thought at least; in the young especially, in the young America, the young England, the young Germany-for this is the sort of phrase that is used to describe a phasis in modern humanity; the world, I say, is growing skeptical, infidel, pantheistic, bold, indocile, rebellious to authority and estranged from trust. And the word Father Father in heaven — that which was so familiar on the lips of Jesus - that is the great word that needs to be uttered now!

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In fine, let opinions fairly unfurl their banners, and not fold them into cloaking veils about the momentous points of difference. Reformers as they consider themselves— must somewhat sturdily take their ground. They must not wonder at resistance nor rejection. They must let other people think too, and say what they think. They must expect opposition and learn calmly to meet it. They must not construe opposition into unkindness. Let there be no unkindness. Let the trial of this great question come; and let it be sustained patiently, gently, charitably: and may God, the Infinite Wisdom, the Solemn Judge, graciously guide his creatures right!

ART. VII. CHURCH MUSIC.

EVERY person who, convinced of the duty and conscious of the happiness of cultivating religious affections, keeps in mind the design of public worship in its various departments to aid in this holy work, is disposed to inquire, What can be done to render the services of the temple more conducive to their high object? This inquiry has often been made, and the subject discussed by the ministers of religion, and others who sympathise with them in the work in which they are engaged; and the general reply is, "Let those who lead in public prayer be more devout than they usually are, more appropriate and more earnest; and in their preaching, let them address themselves, not less to the understanding, but more to the hearts and consciences of

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