light, is believed, confided in, and adored, -how invaluable the presence and possession of a standard of truth, unquestionably divine in its origin, immutable in its nature, and supreme in its authority, like that contained in THE Word of God :—a canon and rule of truth, at once infallible and changeless; and a test of error så searching and complete, that in its conscientious use, the believer may ever detect its illusions,-may strip the destroyer of his disguise, and distinguish in time, the machinations of hell, from the counsels and requirements of heaven.

The portion of scripture which forms our text for this morning, invites us to the examination of a subject at all times interesting to the christian church, but which has lately assumed a local importance (a) that not only warrants, but demands the closest attention we can give it.

When your implicit credence is summoned, on the pain of the forfeiture of your salvation, to doctrines of which till lately you never heard, and your submission, absolute and entire, is required to an hierarchy of eclesiastical government professedly invested with the literal and awful authority of the Christ-commissioned founders of the church, it surely becomes you to pause before you make the surrender-to estimate the credentials of the self proclaimed (a) See Notes.

messengers of heaven, and asserting the privilege which the New Testament bestows upon the believer, to "prove all things," and to "try the spirits whether they are of God."

The chapter before us opens with a persuasive exhortation to the habitual exer crise of those gracious dispositions which so materially form and demonstrate the christian character:-humility and meekness, longsuffering and love. It is peculiar to christianity to represent the meek and lowly virtues as of transcendent excellence in the sphere of morals. Whilst the instincts of depravity are gratified by the aspirations of pride, the explosions of anger, or the perpetration of revenge; and the more chastened principles of philosophy, so called, lead its votary to regard magnanimity and courage, sensitiveness to personal reputation, and contempt of danger and of death in upholding it, as standing highest among the attributes of moral worth ;-the exercise of patience and meekness under provocation, and the mercy which sacrifices self for the welfare, even of an enemy,-though admitted to be virtues, are regarded nevertheless by the mass of society as too tame to excite their admiration, and too much at variance with the interests and impulses of life, to constitute a high model of character, or to form a principle of conduct. But in

the heaven-descended philosophy of the gospel, the in-being and habitual exercise of such dispositions are essential to that condition of mind in which only a man shall be prepared to meet his God. They were among the radiant excellencies of the Lord Jesus, who was "meek and lowly in heart," and they are still the emanations of his spirit's grace, without whose sanctifying work no man can be his. "The fruit of the spirit, is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance; against such there is no law, and they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. (b) I therefore, (writes the apostle in the first verse,) the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called, with all lowliness and meekness, and with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love."

No association of beings, short of the society of the glorified, will be found in all respects perfect: it is therefore by no means surprising, that even in the apostolic time, discussions and differences of a painful nature should have interfered, at intervals, with the peace of the church. Traces of this are visible in many of the epistles, and are discoverable in this to the Ephesians. That church appears to (b) Gal. v. 22.

have been composed partly of converted Jews, and partly of christianized Gentiles, and from the varied habitudes of their past life, arising from education and other causes, there would be a frequent collision of opinion, that jarred upon those harmonies of feeling, the inviolable maintenance of which was at once their interest and duty. St. Paul, thefore, guards them against this evil, in the admonitory language of the second verse. "Endeavouring-intensely labouring (c) to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace." By "the unity of the spirit," we understand not merely spiritual or eclesiastical consociation, but also that unanimity in sentiment and affection which is worthy of, and springs from, the Spirit of God; the fruit of that holy effluence which descends from the most High, and leads the mind whom it hallows, to Himself again. The presence and dominion of grace like this, will produce the only uniformity of which, in the present state, the christian church throughout the world is capable ;uniformity, (to adopt the expression of Dr. Samuel Clarke) not of opinion in the bond of ignorance, nor of practice-ceremony,-in the bond of hypocrisy,—but uniformity of spirit in the bond of peace."(d) The duty of cherishing this holy unanimity the sacred writer inforces, in the first (c) σπουδάζοντες. (d) Note B.

place, by an argument drawn from the relation which subsist between members of the same church, (a relation so intimate, as to be represented by the unerring spirit of truth, as analogous to that which is found between the several parts of the same vital system ;) partakers of the same grace and participants in the same privileges immunities and hopes; professors of the same faith; sons of the same God. How strong therefore the ties of a relationship like this! -for "there is one body and one spirit, even, or "as also ye have been called to one hope of your calling. (e) One Lord, one faith, one baptism. One God and Father of all who is over (ET) all, and with (da) all, and in you all.

The text comes in immediate sequence to these statements, and constitutes in fact, a second argument for christian unity: since the gathering together and edification of the church in the unity of the spirit, was one of the Redeemer's great designs in the institution and endowment of that astonishing ministry, to the origin and varied designations of which he proceeds to allude: Ver. 7. But to every one or rather, for the same purpose (ƒ) there is giv

(ε) καθώς και εκλήθητε. (f) Ενι δε εκαστω. κ. τ. λ. The particle d is often used to introduce an aditional argument or sentiment on the same subject. The critical reader is referred for examples to Matt. v. 31., Rom. viii. 30., 2 Cor. ii. 12. The manner in which