is capable, and whether he may not be entertaining errors in doctrine, for which it is no excuse for him that others entertain them. And let all religious teachers take heed to their teaching, and not think they have done. their duty by aiming at an apparent conformity of faith, to be maintained by church discipline, public opinion, and other external influences: let them remember that their hearers are to be made free in Christ, and not to have yokes laid upon them. They are bound to instruct them in the truth, but they cannot command their assent. The Reformation let in a flood of light, and set multitudes free from the bondage of error; their minds rioted in religious truth, and, as a necessary consequence, diversities of opinion arose, and diversities of conviction resulted in a variety of sects. This was unavoidable; not only so, but freedom of religious thought not merely begets this variety of sects,-it must produce an equal diversity of opinion in the bosom of each sect: nay more, in the mind of every active

Christian there is much diversity. And it must be so, because it is clearly a part of God's mode of dealing with men, that they must be continually struggling between good and evil; continually deciding between truth and falsehood, between right and wrong; continually exercising patience, practising selfdenial, resisting temptations, and undergoing an infinity of trials of greater or less magnitude, all which constitute the school in which souls take their form and character, which determine their capacity for everlasting happiness, or fix their destiny for unending misery. Men who by long and patient study acquire great knowledge, and by continual exercise strengthen their intellect, attain to a capacity for intellectual enjoyment not only great, but capable of indefinite enlargement. So those who exercise their religious affections, capacities, and graces, to their utmost power here, are the better fitted to enter upon the pure joys of the heavenly state, whenever called to a separation from the body. From this

preparation, in the infinity of these various exercises and experiences, operating on individual minds, there must necessarily be evolved an endless variety of thought, of character, and of opinions; a diversity as great as the number of individuals. As from these differences are constituted many sects, not agreeing in all things, but in many things which consist with harmony of action; it does not comport with God's government that these diversities of opinion should be obliterated or smoothed away. The cords which bind his disciples together should not be composed of opinions, nor doctrines, nor creeds: the cords provided for this unity are love to God and love to man; the ties of the affections are the real bonds of peace with God and man. If the bonds of love be made strong enough, and drawn close enough, differences in theology will be little remarked and sectarian asperity will find no soil in which to grow. The struggle among sects will then be not to injure each other, not to surpass in

numbers and power, but to surpass each other in efforts to promote the interests of the Redeemer's kingdom, by labouring for the best interests of men temporal and eternal.

THE MINISTRY AND TEACHING OF THE APOSTLES.

WHILST the words of Christ were yet sounding in the ears of his disciples, they commenced their ministry at Jerusalem. They followed their Master's example of preaching the gospel to the poor, of healing the sick, the lame, the blind, and deaf, and of raising the dead. "Silver and gold have I none,' said Peter to the man lame from his birth;

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but such as I have give I thee: in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk."* One of the earliest results of their ministry and teaching is thus recorded: "And all that believed were together, and

*Acts iii. 6.

had all things common: and sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need."* "And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that aught of the things which he possessed was his own, but they had all things common.' "Neither was there any among them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold, and laid them down at the apostles' feet, and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need."† The distribution of the proceeds of these benefactions among the needy soon absorbed so much of the time and attention of the apostles, as to draw them unduly from their peculiar duties of preaching the gospel, and made it necessary to select and appoint men to this special business. Frequent mention is made, throughout the Acts of the Apos

*Acts ii. 44, 45. † Acts iv. 32, 34, 35.

Acts vi. 1-3.