objects, which excites and elicits its exercises and expressions. This is its peculiarity. It is this which distinguishes it from affection of every other description. With what misconception, perversion, delusion, and multifarious counterfeits has the great subject of love to the brethren been encompassed! Is it not possible by the application of the test now in our hands, to clear this duty of the extraneous and darkening matter with which it is surrounded? It is already done for us. "Who also declared unto us your love in the Spirit." "If a man say I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar; for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, that he that loveth God, love his brother also. Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ, is born of God; and every one that loveth him that begat, loveth him also that is begotten of him. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and keep his commandments." Such is the scripture doctrine respecting the ground of that complacency which we are required to feel and to cherish towards true christians. Their resemblance to God is to win and attach our hearts to them. We are to love God in them. Every glow of this affection towards believers is a tribute of love paid to him whose image they bear. This is to give an expansion to our christian charity to direct it to "the children of God scattered throughout the earth," and to make it breathe forth in ardent wishes and sincere prayers, "grace

* Col. i. 8.

+ John iv. 20, 21. v. 1, 2.

be with all them that love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity."*

But Christians are to be the objects not of complacency only, but of special mutual beneficence, which is to be exercised with a view to the will and example of God, as well as the relation in which they stand to him. In numerous instances is this " loving not in word, but in deed," urged upon these high considerations. "Put on therefore as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long-suffering; Forbearing one another and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any; even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye." + "Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoso hath this world's good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him? Whatever we do therefore

in the form of Christian kindness should be done to the glory of God; and is so done when performed from regard to the pleasure of God in the case, from affection to the image of God in our fellow Christians, and in filial, devout, and lowly imitation of our Father who is in heaven. It should be therefore on spiritual and divine considerations-on grounds far above those which are merely secular-from motives far removed from those which are supplied by natural affection, earthly friendship, constitutional ami

* Eph. vi. 24.

† Col. iii. 12, 13.

1 John iii. 16, 17.

ableness, party zeal, or the mere mental endowments

of the objects of our regard.

We are to love them

How refined How far raised

It becomes iden

for that ، divine nature ” implanted in them, and to do them good" for the Lord's sake." and elevated is affection like this! above the elements of this world! tified with the highest excellence. It is measured by our holiness and our spiritual proficiency. It is unaffected by the causes which impair and dissipate mere earthly attachments, and break up worldly confederacies. Unlike them, it is not the victim of caprice, the sport of change, the fit of passion, or the prey of selfishness. So far as it is christian and godly, it is indestructible and immortal. there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away. But charity never faileth." How suitable a training then, are its exercises, for the pure and glorious fellowship of the skies, where every creature will be loved in proportion to his resemblance to God, and where every act of kindness to the holy and blessed inhabitants will be an act of devotion and love to the Lord of all.

'Whether

- The great and safe rule of doing all to God's glory, should conduct us in all the doubtful and disputable matters which exist among christians. Let this principle predominate, and it will prove an effectual guide. It will dispose christians to agreement, as far as that may be practicable. "Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be likeminded one toward another according to Christ Jesus: That ye may with one mind and one mouth GLORIFY GOD, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Where

fore receive ye one another, as Christ also received. us TO THE GLORY OF GOD." This aim will also lead us to closer and progressive agreement. "I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Let us therefore as many as be perfect, be thus minded; and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you. Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing."* The management of all that lies beyond the present attainable points of agreement may be safely committed to the operation of the simple but efficacious principle of due and sincere deference to the divine glory. To this should be submitted, all minor differences. This was the rule laid down for the early christians in relation to their disagreements upon less essential points. This has to adjust the difficulties created by the less considerable discordancies of sentiment. This it is which neutralizes, or at least mitigates, the evils of error in subordinate matters, whilst it forms the basis of fellowship, of mutual forbearance, confidence and affection in the disagreeing parties. Appealing to this great principle, there is found no necessity for reciprocal rejection, reproach, or disturbance. Him that is weak in the faith receive ye, but not to doubtful disputations. For one believeth that he may eat all things, another who is weak eateth herbs. Let not him that eateth, despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth for God hath received him. Who art thou

66

Phil. iii. 14-16.

that judgest another man's servant?

To his own

master he standeth or falleth. Yea he shall be holden up: for God is able to make him stand. One man esteemeth one day above another; another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord; and he that regardeth not the day, to the Lord he doth not regard it. He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, for he giveth God thanks; and he that eateth not, to the Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks. FOR NONE OF

US LIVETH TO HIMSELF, AND NO MAN DIETH TO HIMSELF. FOR WHETHER WE LIVE, WE LIVE UNTO THE LORD; AND WHETHER WE DIE, WE DIE UNTO THE LORD. WHETHER WE LIVE THEREFORE OR DIE, WE ARE THE LORD'S." *

If the question arises, shall we admit the claims of a particular class of men to our christian esteem, affection and fellowship; it surely may quickly be determined by the all-deciding requirement of doing all to the divine glory. We have not to ask, do these men in all things agree with us are they not incommoded with some superstitions-disfigured by some singularities-obscured by some errors-damaged by some prejudices and weaknesses; but do we find in them the grounds of that affection which is urged upon us in the scriptures. Can we glorify God in loving them? Are there those traits of godliness upon which the Christian eye can fall complacently? Is God in them? Has he received them? Do they reflect his image? Has his Spirit changed

• Rom. xiv. 1-8.

M