any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maranatha." And again: "We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death."* And this last declaration would bring us at once to the fullest conviction of the importance of Christian union and love, -the object to which our attention is now so particularly directed. Now while, on the one hand, it is of the very first importance to ascertain what are those points,-whether doctrinal or practical,— which the Scripture thus declares to be indispensable; and, having ascertained them, to give them that prominence and peculiar glory which belong to them, both in preaching and writing: so, on the other hand, if we desire to promote union and love among all the disciples of Christ, we must be very careful not to insist upon anything as indispensable, which the Scripture itself does not plainly declare to Doctrines may be true, and very important in their place,worthy to be maintained and contended for in due season,-which yet are not essential. And we should sin against God, and against the whole brethren; we should make sad those whom God hath not made sad, and wound and stumble those whom we ought, with all Christian wisdom and love, to comfort and encourage, if we insisted on them as essential; or (what comes almost to the same thing) should treat those who yet hold them not, or who ignorantly oppose them, as if they were the enemies of truth and righteousness. It is a sad and fearful thing to smite an erring brother as if he were un enemy; when the Scripture plainly teaches us that we should rather admonish him as a brother, and therefore in a brotherly spirit. The apostle says: "Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye who are spiritual restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted."+ And the spirit of this exhortation will apply to doctrinal faults as well as to practical. On those points which the Scripture states as essential, it is evident that the children of God must be agreed. But, on all other points, they may and do differ, more or less. Some are yet ignorant; some are prejudiced; some are (alas that so it should be!) stubbornly maintaining that which is erroneous and false; and, therefore, losing the practical benefit and blessing of the truth which they deny, and expe riencing the evil effects of the error which they hold. If our brethren are thus suffering,-if those who are fellow-members of the same body are thus losing a blessing, and bringing evil upon themselves,-our feeling surely ought to be, not anger, but compassion: ‡ and if we consider them, notwithstanding, as brethren indeed, we should treat them with brotherly tenderness. And, that we may be enabled to do this, let us not magnify their errors beyond their real importance; let * 1 Cor. xvi. 22. 1 John iii. 14. † Gal. vi. 1; comp. 2 Thess. iii. 14, and 2 Tim. ii. 24, 26. 1 Cor. xii. 26. us not magnify the points of difference; but consider them soberly, and speak of them as the Scriptures teach us to speak. Can anything tend more to keep us asunder, and to increase and perpetuate divisions among us, than an undue magnifying of the points of difference? which, from the very constitution of the human mind, in this imperfect state, it is not possible to do, without, at the same time, in some measure at least, undervaluing and disparaging those great, essential, and glorious truths in which we are agreed. If an error be a soul-destroying error, fatal to him that holds it, I cannot be too strong or earnest in denouncing it. I am not for mincing matters: I make no scruple about calling it a monstrous evil and an abomination. But if (though I may clearly see it to be an error) it is yet an error maintained by Christian brethren of far higher attainments in holiness than I can pretend to,-by men at whose feet, in regard to almost all other points, I should consider it my privilege to sit, then I do not imagine that it is consistent (I will not say with modesty, but) with truth and Scripture, to denounce it in such unmeasured terms. If the error itself does not break the bond of brotherhood, let us not denounce and contend against it in such manner and terms as we do. For example: I am myself an Episcopalian; I hold the principle of an establishment; I am, moreover, a Calvinist. My own views, on all these points, are strong, and very decided: and I hold all my views, as one who is ready, whenever I see fit season and occasion, to contend for every particle of Divine truth. But if I were to come away from such a meeting as it was our privilege to attend at Liverpool a fortnight ago, a meeting in which I gladly recognised many Presbyterians, Congregationalists, Voluntaries, and Arminians, as my Christian brethren, and was refreshed and edified by their addresses and their prayers; --and on leaving it should come forward, in the most public manner, to denounce all those points, on which those brethren respectively differ from me, as monstrous evils and abominations; and should devote myself to the forming or working of a society, whose professed object was to put them all down, and root them out, as such,—I think my brethren would feel (and most justly) that such conduct was by no means consistent with the principles of brotherly love and union which were avowed at that meeting: they would have good reason to turn round upon me, and to say, Is this the voice, or the conduct, of a brother? If these remarks are acceptable in your pages, I shall beg leave to follow them with some others, on a future occasion. In the mean time, I remain, yours faithfully in the Lord, Cumming-Street, Pentonville, Oct. 18, 1845. THE PRAYER OF A PENITENT. O GRACIOUS Spirit! yet once more, once more And a fresh armour lend for that which erst In sin's false-shining stream, which bore me down, And a voice crieth in its wilderness, Into thy temple, Lord, and if thou wilt Make it to rock with earthquakes, but take thence Of wicked-worshipping thoughts. Alas! a press Of many terrors would fain still my cries, Shall my heart cry. O Wisdom, make me wise! My guilty soul less hideous. Give, at last, Some place in heaven, yea, but the least, the farthest, R. A. V. "JESUS CHRIST, THE SAME YESTERDAY, TO-DAY, AND FOR EVER!" THE firmest friends may change, Where is the love undying? The friend who never fails? Behold the Lamb! who beareth For such He ever careth And now, as yesterday! Bernard Barton's Household Verses. REVIEWS. A Voice from the Sanctuary on the Missionary Enterprise: being a Series of Discourses delivered in America, before the Protestant Episcopal Board of Foreign Missions, the American Board of Foreign Missions, &c. By the most Eminent Divines of that Country, belonging to Various Denominations. With an Introduction, by James Montgomery, Esq. London: Hamilton and Co. Sketches of Sermons on Christian Missions, Original and Selected. By the Author of "Four Hundred Sketches and Skeletons of Sermons,” "Pulpit Cyclopædia," &c. BENEVOLENCE is itself a blessing. Wherever it exists, there the approving smile of the Eternal rests, as on so much territory rescued from the selfishness which sin has introduced. Its manifestation and activities may be simply directed to the removal of some peculiar form of misery, or to the bestowment of some single good. But it cannot move without more widely diffusing its benefits than it originally designed. The agents it employs, it most abundantly blesses; it raises them from the ordinary selfish pursuits of men, and honours them while it invests them with the commission and dignity of angels, messengers of mercy. It scatters its benefits where they are not much recognised and less acknowledged. Like the sun which wakes and cheers the birds of song, he also warms the birds of night, which shun the brightness of his beams. The benevolence which glowed in the heart of God from eternity, designed the salvation of immortal souls; and in carrying out this design, millions have received the ultimate blessing contemplated, and millions more have largely participated in the incidental good that mercy dropped in the pathway to her great work. The form in which Divine benevolence first appeared in our world, was in the person of Jesus Christ, when he came on the mission of redemption. God is love, and God clothes himself in flesh, dwells among men, shows himself love incarnate. And though ever so intent on the great work which he came to accomplish, that neither the temptations of the wilderness, nor the flattering offers of sovereignty, could divert his attention from the one great object of his advent; yet his dwelling among men was to our world a new morning, bearing on its wings a dewy influence, which refreshed the drooping, and vitalised the dead. The blind received their sight-the sick were restored the lame were healed-and the dead were raised; but all these were the mere overflowings, and not the fulness of benevolence,— the mere imprints of its track, and not the goal of its course. And in the present day the amenities of society and the equity of jurisprudence, though these fall infinitely short of that salvation on which the heart of Christ was set, yet are they to be traced to the doctrines he taught, the code of morals he gave, and the motives he recognised and excited, We think that the church never puts a higher honour on her Lord, than when, in humble imitation of his example, and in obedience to his command, she manifests that heaven-born benevolence, that fain would rescue immortal souls from the horrors of rude heathen darkness, or from the entanglements of a refined paganism. "Compassion to the soul, is the soul of compassion," said the venerable Baxter; and that saying may well become the appropriate motto of the missionary enterprise. The salvation of souls by the regenerating power of the Holy Spirit and justifying righteousness of Jesus, would comprehend the design, the great object contemplated by all the Protestant missionary institutions in this and in other countries. Their contributions, their prayers, their energies, and their efforts, have been directed exclusively to the accomplishment of this, as their ultimate object. And though the salvation of souls has been their simple aim, yet they have scattered innumerable blessings, and in directions they did not contemplate. We should very much exceed the space we intend to devote to this article, were we to attempt to enumerate the indirect and collateral advantages conferred on the world by the missionary enterprise. It has been the great peace-maker of the tribes and nations of the earth, and has already accomplished so much towards the achievement of universal peace, as to justify the expectation that, under its auspices, the nations shall be taught to turn their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning-hooks, and renounce war for ever. It bas been the means not only of hushing the outbursts of hostile feeling, but of fraternising the nations over whom it has had any influence. The saving of two British vessels by one "missionary box,”* was an example upon a diminutive scale, of the pacific influence of the spirit and work of Christian missions. It was the sacred mark which awed and subdued the warrior, and turned him into a friend and brother. And the very genius of Christian missions secures the long-anticipated result, when "peace on earth and good-will" to man shall be the rule of every heart, and the law which regulates every national compact. Science has largely enriched her stores by means of the missionary operations,-man is better known to man in all the essential oneness of * Missionary anecdote: Evangelical Magazine, 1815. |