that we cannot lose one of these without losing the other also; a choice between the two will never have to be made; we shall preserve, or we shall lose both at once.

This discussion is not an idle one. The attack and defence, it is true, pass from the one side to the other without meeting one another each party advancing that which the other does not reject, and repudiating that which the other does not care to defend. But this discussion, which could not have arisen at any other period, marks a tendency or disposition of men's minds, which it is incumbent upon us to observe, and, moreover, it may help us to determine with more accuracy our position in the church and in society.

This disposition of men's minds is a very singular one; it includes a contradiction. They do everything in their power that we may become a caste, and they do it from a fear that we shall become one. They do not see that it is in the nature of a body to make to itself an empire of its exile, and that its members will not see even equals in those in whom they are not permitted to see their fellows. They create, or at least strengthen, the esprit du corps by this very fear of the esprit du corps.1

The clergy itself is undecided between the recollection of its ancient authority and the feeling of its actual position.

That interest in religious questions, which has been revived, not yet, indeed, among the masses, but among a certain number of individuals, tends to confer importance upon the clergy; that same interest also invests the laity with some of the functions of the clergy, and more or less effaces the limits which divide them.

This position of things should only teach us one thing-to remain or to return within the limits prescribed by the gospel, and which we have already described.

In every church, therefore, which is organised according to the word and according to the spirit of Jesus Christ, there will

1 This passage is very obscure. I have therefore thought proper to render it as literally as possible. Perhaps the author has in view the state of matters in the Pays de Vaud, where the evangelical clergy were thrust out of their livings, and perhaps deprived of the full privileges of citizens (exiled), because they refused to become mere state functionaries. -TR.

be ministers, forming or not forming a distinct body, but never a caste; that is to say, belonging, in everything that does not exclusively affect their distinctive official duties, to the category of other Christians and other citizens, and having no inalienable attributes except such as belong to and are limited by the interest of the order.

Sv.-EXCELLENCE OF THE MINISTRY.

The ministry, as being necessary to Christianity, and sharing the necessity of Christianity, and which, moreover, was instituted or intended by Jesus Christ, cannot but be, according to the expression of St. Paul, "a good work," 1 Tim. iii. 1.

Let us, however, study it in itself, and indicate the principal characteristics which may exalt it in our estimation.

At the first glance, and in a mere worldly point of view, the art par excellence is that of ruling minds (ars est artium regimen animarum):-and although others besides the preacher may pretend to and succeed in this, yet certainly, when he succeeds, he does so in a more definite and profound way, because of the nature of the motives which he employs. He excites and fortifies in man all those thoughts which ought to determine and regulate his entire life.

Looking from a still higher point of view, we perceive that it is a great prerogative, or a great mission, which is conferred upon the preacher, to maintain in the souls of men, who are always in danger of being absorbed in the things of earth, a faith in things invisible, in the spiritual world, and to be, among men, the man of the soul and of eternity.

Those who devote their attention to social interests, regard the minister as the chief instrument of civilization, inasmuch as he is the chief agent in forming the morals of society. As he asserts and propagates, so far as he can, the maxims of good living, as he is the magistrate for consciences, the counsellor of benevolence and peace, he represents the highest element of social existence. As he is the religious instructor of the people, he cannot remain indifferent to intellectual culture; he is its promoter; he is everywhere at the head of the popular school,

So it is also in

as well as of the church: and here again, in this relation, the minister of the gospel is the minister of civilization.—The prophet and priest of the middle ages, and the missionary among savage tribes of the present day, have been ostensibly and openly the chiefs of society. All society has been more or less theocratic at its birth. The birth-time of society is the time when men have less perception of second causes, and when, in every case, they ascend directly to the first cause. Afterwards they do not take the trouble to ascend so high. the governance of society. Religion now governs and directs civil order only indirectly, and according to the measure of its influence; and the minister is placed in a corresponding position. Society does not recognise him as its chief. But it must necessarily happen that the most grave and solemn moments in individual and public life will belong to religion, and consequently to him,-that a number of weighty interests will of necessity be entrusted to him,-that the lowest deeps of the human spirit will be opened up to him by the religious consciousness which is the strongest of all. Always does his hour return [and, with him, religion penetrates into the midst of those interests which are abandoned to him. Wherever religious institutions are feeble, where the church is no longer a reality, there remains only the pastor: it is to him that we look. It is with the pastor as with the Sabbath. Happy is he for whom every day is a Sabbath, and happy will be those times in which the individual importance of the minister shall decrease because all Christians will be ministers.]

His every-day life, instead of being trivial, as the life of men in general is, is solemn. His duties belong to the very foundations and roots of human life. By his ministry he is brought

1 [All this applies specially to the Christian minister; for, apart from Christianity, the minister is often, and especially in these days, the representative of the anti-social and anarchical element,-the minister of darkness. But, even in false religions, he is not such if we look at their starting-point. Whatever illusions may have mixed up with religious traditions, the truth has always found its place, and civilization has had the advantage of it. The want of a religion is a noble want; everywhere has it been the cradle of society.]

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into contact with whatever is serious and important in life. Those great pauses or resting places-those great momentsbelong to him-birth, marriage, and death.

His life is a life of devotedness; without this it has no meaning whatever. [His career is a perpetual sacrifice into which he draws all that belongs to him. His family is consecrated; it belongs to the ministry, and shares in its privations. As Jesus came into the world not to be ministered unto, but to minister, so it is with the minister, and this is his glory. "To serve God is to reign with him." He seeks the glory of God directly, yet does he seek it as the servant of man, for to serve men from love to God, is to serve God. The minister is a man of benevolence and compassion. And no one is deceived in him : every one, even the natural man, requires charity in the minister; every one will reproach him if he displays hardness, avarice, coldness, unkindness. All this is peculiar to Christianity. nations which are not Christian, even among the Jews, the priest has not at all this character; and sometimes he is regarded as a formidable and malignant being. But now the greatest unbeliever yet believes Christianity to be the religion of kindness.] A minister is a man to whom God has said, "Comfort ye, comfort ye my people." He is, among men, the representative of a thought of mercy, and he represents it by transferring it into his own life. To succour is his ministry

-is his life.

In

Lastly, the ministry, at least in the Protestant church, [and among the Presbyterians,] can be at most the goal of ambition, never its starting-point. A more convenient post, a more agreeable locality, are the only advantages which distinguish one minister from another. It is a noble sight to witness his ambition determinately arrested, his desires imperatively limited. Man is only too much harassed by his desires; he is a fevered patient who knows not which way to turn himself; in order to calm him, the floodgate of his desires must be closed.—The minister is no more shut up in his ministry than any other man is in his profession, and he may satisfy that striving after development which is one of the characteristics and prerogatives

of our nature. But the feature by which he is distinguished is, that, once a minister, he is all that externally he can be; his place is taken, and he may never leave it.]

Let us now rise to the point of view supplied by Christian faith. The dignity and excellency of the ministry follows:

1. From the excellency of the doctrine which he preaches. · It is a "wisdom among them that are perfect," 1 Cor. ii. 6,that is to say, a wisdom which renders men as perfect as they can be; not a show or a fragment of truth, but the truth itself and the whole truth. [Nothing is more grand than this mission. Whoever should infallibly possess the truth, on any subject whatever, would be already a most important person. Jesus Christ, before Pontius Pilate, associates royalty with bearing witness to the truth. This witness respects the truth, -the supreme truth, that which explains and rules the life,the everlasting truth, the truth regarding man's relations with God. What work then can be more exalted than that of preaching it? And that is the mission of the pastor.]

2. From the fact that this doctrine is a revelation from God. The divine oracles have been entrusted to him. They are things which " eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man and which God hath prepared for them that love him," 1 Cor. ii. 9. The minister then is the immediate messenger of God himself; "He that receiveth you receiveth me, and he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me," Matt. x. 40.

3. From the fact that the minister is a co-worker with God, 1 Cor. iii. 9. God himself sharing his responsibility, becoming surety for him, promising to work for him and by him.

If

4. From the fact that he announces and offers salvation. this ministry were one of condemnation, if the pastor preached, in the name of God, only the law, he would fulfil his duty with anguish and terror, and his duty would still be excellent. But as God has shown his glory chiefly in pardoning, so he has put glory on the ministry of pardon. Accordingly, St. Paul, speaking not only of the two economies, but of the two ministries,