charge of their public duty? Is not this protection ensured to them by the knowledge which others have, that compulsory means will be employed, if necessary, for rendering it effectual? These things cannot be denied; yet it has never been imagined that a worldly advantage thus secured to the cause of Christ, under the sanction of compulsory means, is incompatible with the spiritual nature of his kingdom.

The same account which I have given of those words of Christ, to which I have last adverted, will furnish a satisfactory answer to the argument which has been founded on the corresponding words of Paul,

"The weapons of our warfare are not carnal," or worldly, "but mighty through God."-To whose weapons or whose warfare are we to understand that the Apostle alludes under the appropriating term "our?" Most naturally to his own weapons and warfare, along with those of his fellow labourers in the ministry of the Gospel. But, supposing that he also refers to the weapons and the warfare of the Corinthians whom he addressed, still that number most probably included none who were invested with temporal authority; nor can the Apostle's declaration—for that reason—be regarded as applicable to the use which is made of such authority. Paul, indeed, and his fellow labourers were invested (as I have already said) with higher powers than those of any civil magistrate; and, to all the powers which they exercised, his description is strictly applicable; these powers were not carnal—

they were" mighty through God." But, while it is altogether inconsistent with any fair and natural interpretation of language, it would also require a fervid imagination indeed!-to suppose that, under the words in question, the Apostle referred to, and contemplated, the power which, at a future and distant period, civil magistrates either might or might not employ in aid of the visible church of Christ.

In short, from all that has been said under this head, I trust it is manifest that the spiritual nature of Christ's kingdom is not incompatible with the conclusion at which we formerly arrived-that it is both the privilege and the duty of kings and others in authority, to give that outward support to the church, which we have recognized as essential to an ecclesiastical establishment.

SECTION III.

ON THE OBJECTION AND ARGUMENT THAT THE CIVIL GOVERNMENT OF A COUNTRY IS NOT COMPETENT TO SPECIFY A RELIGIOUS CREED, WHICH OUGHT TO BE PREFERRED AND SANCTIONED, AND CANNOT THEREFORE BE SUPPOSED TO HAVE DIVINE AUTHORITY FOR THAT PUR

POSE.

THE question involved in this objection may seem to call our attention to the origin of civil government. But, whatever has been the origin of any particular government-whether it originated in circumstances of an incidental kind, or in what has been called the right of conquest, or in what is more to be respectedsome intelligible expression of the opinion and wish of the community, in whose behalf its functions were to be exercised, there can be no doubt that acquiescence on the part of the community may at length entitle it to their respect and obedience. To prevent, however, the possibility of any misapprehension of what I regard as constituting a government, competent and authorized to specify and determine the religious creed which ought to be preferred and sanctioned,-I desire to be understood as referring to such a government,

and such only, as is admitted to be competent and authorized for all other ordinary purposes.

Now, it is clear that the great general purposethe only reasonable one-for which any government can be either instituted or maintained, is the advantage of those who are subject to it; and, whether they have directly made choice of it, or have only acquiesced in what had been previously instituted, they must be understood as holding it adequate to all the ordinary functions of government.

Upon what ground, then, is it to be denied that the selection of a particular creed-a particular scheme or system of doctrine and worship-and, in conjunction with it, a particular form of ecclesiastical discipline, is one of the functions of government which men had contemplated, in either chusing the government under which they would live, or acquiescing in that under which they had been born? If this shall not be denied, it will follow that the general sense of mankind has been expressed on the competency of a civil government for the particular function to which we refer. I therefore repeat the question-upon what ground can it be denied that such has been the contemplation and understanding of men from the beginning? Has not the settlement of all that constitutes an ecclesiastical establishment been one of the customary functions of a civil government, in which a great majority at least of all concerned have obviously acquiesced? From the time when kings and others in authority first embraced the Christian faith, there have

been few exceptions from such procedure. I, therefore, hold myself entitled, in the commencement of this argument, to stand upon the 'vantage ground— that the general sense of mankind has already sustained the competency of a civil government for the duty in question. Indeed, this plea amounts to no more than what may be said in behalf of all that constitutes an ecclesiastical establishment; but, surely, this cannot weaken its application to the point now before us; it only strengthens all my preceding argument.

With this advantage, therefore, though it may not be found very essential to our object-let us now examine the objection before us, in all its bearings.

If there is to be a religious establishment under the sanction of the state, religion generally considered cannot well be the object. Human laws can effectually provide only for what is special and precise; consequently it is only a particular scheme or system of religion that can effectually receive the sanction of law; and it may perhaps be thought that the rulers of a state are not the best judges of this matter.

But it is altogether a mistake to suppose that the rulers of a state are to devise a scheme of either doctrine or worship. Before ecclesiastical establishments were constituted, the visible Church of Christ had been divided into a variety of sects, each of which had matured and digested for itself a scheme or system of all that concerns religion and its interests; and, in this respect, the Christian world has continued the same down to the present day. Consequently, the rulers