this notion of an absolute and visible oneness as necessary to discipleship. "But Jesus said, Forbid him not." And on thus prohibiting their enforcement of an exact and visible uniformity, he addressed to the disciples then with him one of his most solemn discourses; placing before his church, in all ages, truths, obedience to which, without producing disorder in any Christian society, would have combined all Christian societies in harmonious co-operation, for the removal of the same widelyspread mischief, and the attainment of one common object. 'No man which shall do a miracle in my name, can lightly speak evil of me. He that is not against us is on our part. Nay, in forbidding him, because he associates not with you, you may become an occasion of stumbling to him, and not only prevent him from casting out devils, but deliver him, as stumbled, into their power; and then what will you not have to answer for? Whosoever shall offend one of these little ones that believe in me, it is better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he were cast into the sea. Renounce every practice, every opinion, every feeling, that might lead you to transgress the law of pure and humble love. If thy hand offend thee, or thy foot, cut it off; or thine eye, pluck it out it is better for thee to enter into life without these, than with them to be cast into hell-fire, where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. Ye are the salt of the earth, not because ye profess merely, but because your profession is caused by possession. Salt is good; but if the salt have lost his saltness, wherewith will ye season it?

Have salt in yourselves, and have peace one with another." John, in his eagerness,-which soon after led him to ask if they might not call down fire from heaven on the bigoted Samaritans who would not receive Christ, "because his face was as though he would go to Jerusalem," overlooked the solemn truth, that Satan submits not to the word of man. He derides those who would exorcise by their own

power: "Jesus I know, and Paul I know; but who are ye?" Reflection would have shown him that none could cast out devils in Christ's name, but by Christ's own power; and that if it had pleased the Master to endow them thus, one particular company of disciples was not to interpose and forbid them, nor to imagine that discipleship was to be limited to themselves. Whatever agencies may be employed in effecting it, ultimately, union with Christ is spiritual, and by faith, and is proved by those evidences which, as they cannot exist without it, so do they always exist with it. There is no withered branch in the true vine: there is no fruitful branch separate from it. Wherever, therefore, the undoubted evidences of Christ's own operation are exhibited,-referring all such cases to the law and the testimony, as the only and sufficient standard, there should Christ himself be honoured, in his power, by the acknowledgment of his work; and in his Mastership and supreme authority, by the fraternally-affectionate recognition, as fellow-disciples, of all whom He has evidently received, even though they "follow not us."

The mischiefs occasioned by the spirit thus promptly, and with such earnest solemnity, checked by our Lord, it would be impossible to estimate. Order, the preservation of which has usually been put forth in its justification, has not been preserved. Ecclesiastical history presents no fact more undeniable than this,that those religious societies which have been most rigidly exclusive in reference to others, have also been the most disorderly, taking the New Testament as the standard according to which all things are to be "done decently and in order." Submission to some particular and outward ceremonial, or form of government, there may have bee; but of the order by which the precious is separated from the vile, and all discordant varieties of doctrine are prevented, -the order, in a word, of genuine discipline,-scarcely a vestige is to be found. And while order itself has been lost, the bigotry

which denies brotherhood to all who are not included in one form of association, and the terribly selfdeceptive presumption which gives it to all who are, become the characteristics of the society. The time has evidently arrived which calls for a treatment of this spirit different from that which it may have heretofore received. Instead of defending themselves against loud, but pointless, charges of schism, these schismatics must now, without acrimony, and in the spirit in which St. Paul wrote concerning certain enemies of the cross of Christ in his day, tell their opponents, that, instead of attacking the discipleship of others, they would be better employed in establishing their own. Who are the schismatics, but they who refuse to acknowledge those whom Christ has evidently received; alleging no other reason than one which, when divested of all with which a special-pleading rhetoric has dressed it up, just amounts to a repetition of the promptly-forbidden "He followeth not us?"

As Protestants, we have utterly repudiated the not only unscriptural, but antiscriptural, doctrine, that when the risen Saviour ascended into heaven, he left his church to the government of a visible head, limiting his grace to the channels which might thus be marked out. Christ actually, personally, as a living, observing, active Sovereign, governs his church, with which he is ever present by his living and ruling Spirit. The officers in Christ's church are not viceroys, but undershepherds. There are duties which they are called to fulfil, and there are works which He alone can perform. If it is wrong, on the one hand, for the flock to withhold due honour from those who really are, by the Master's call, under-shepherds in the fold; so is it wrong for any of these professed under-shepherds to deny the right hand of fellowship to others, who are proved to be undershepherds by the genuine signs of an Apostle. Let the entire aggregate of professing Christian societies, be carefully noticed in reference to the undeniable fact of the personal govern

ment of Christ. He has received gifts for men: he gives gifts to men. In this administration is there anything restrictive? We write freely, for the times now demand it. The honour of that revived and primitive Christianity which is called Protestantism, calls for it. Does the Head of the church in any degree limit his gifts and graces to the diocesan Episcopacy of modern times, very different from the episcopacy even of Cyprian and Ignatius? He who ascended on high, and led captivity captive, and received for men the gifts which he bestows upon them, that the Lord God may dwell among them,-has be caused either the Roman or the Anglican Episcopacy to stand forth, evidently distinguished as the Churches which he alone acknowledges to be such? He who, when he instituted the Christian ministry as a perpetual ordination, and promised to be to the very end of the world with all whom the Holy Ghost should make the overseers (the ETσкOTO) of his church,-has he limited the scriptural marks of his presence to the men of high and exclusive claims, who say that they, and they alone, are his authorized Ministers? Is their word alone a word of power? Do they alone possess the scriptural signs of apostleship, the multitudes of converted men and women? If all congregations of faithful men, having the word of God faithfully preached, and the sacraments duly administered, are yet congregations of schismatics, and their Ministers selfcalled, unauthorized intruders, because they submit not to the Ro

man

or Anglican Episcopacy;-if this be a truth so evident and fundamental, as to justify the officebearers of those episcopacies in their absolute refusal of the right hand of fellowship, and in withholding the slightest mark of fraternal recognition;-is the Lord of the vineyard unmindful of the order which he is thus supposed to have established, and which he is thus said to have made, not merely important, but fundamental? We will not pursue the comparison to the extent

to which it might be pursued. We will only say, that these denounced portions of the vineyard exhibit no lack, either of the outward agencies ordinarily employed for guardianship or cultivation, or of those spiritual influences by which alone outward agencies can be made effectual to the salvation of the soul. Let observation be limited to one single branch of an extensive subject. In the order of Providence, there is now a way by which usefulness may be extended beyond the limits of life,-a -a way by which the servants of God, even though dead, may continue to speak in their writings. And are these, the undying teachers of generations, confined to those who have received the ordination of diocesan Episcopacy? We have no wish to undervalue Church divinity. The theological student has often to be grateful to God for the assistance which, on many subjects, he derives from Episcopalian writers. But do their works stand alone? We pity those whose erring and exclusive bigotry leads them to the rash and unhallowed speech,-"We never read Dissenting divinity." They inflict on themselves a punishment of loss, of which they seem unable to form any conception. On subjects connected with the spirituality of religion, on those doctrines which relate immediately to the personal salvation of the sinner, to his free justification by the grace of God through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, and to his regeneration and sanctification by the Spirit and word of God,-to the laws, and operations, and developements of the life which is hid with Christ in God, on such subjects as these, the "Dissenting divinity" is either rich beyond competition, or only finds competitors in men like Usher and Leighton. Where Christ crucified is properly honoured, and his salvation duly sought, and the great principles of church-union are acknowledged, and its rules arranged in reference to their great object, the furtherance of the work of God in the hearts of believers, and in the world of mankind; the church-character of these societies is mercifully

recognised by the great Head of the church universal. In answer to their earnest prayers, the two great blessings, without which a church is but a barren wilderness, a salt land not inhabited, are bestowed on them,-an unfailing and suitable ministry, and the life-giving influences of the Holy Ghost. And the professed servants of Christ would do well to learn a lesson from this, of mutual forbearance, and of mutual, affectionate, honouring recognition. They agree in the great essentials of truth, and God receives them; and as men are liable to error, so do they for a time differ from each other. But as piety increased, and the light of truth shone more clearly, differences would gradually dis. appear, and the movement of the churches to a more complete agree ment be visible and certain. While thus loving, honouring, and recognising each other notwithstanding their differences, those differences would not be an occasion of triumph to Papists, nor of stumbling to infidels. Were this the state of things now in England, the prospects of the churches would be as bright, as their condition would be pleasing. But, as it is, are not men's hearts failing them for fear? Is not the future contemplated with feelings approaching to awe? Is there not an almost indescribable, and yet unconquerable, apprehension of an impending crisis? Not long ago, Christians were rejoicing as if the brightness of the latter-day glory, were in clear, though distant, prospect before them; and now, almost imperceptibly, a thick cloud has gathered, obscuring the prospect, and chilling their spirits. And in what period, and under what circumstances, has the change taken place? The beginning of the century appeared to be opening a new era. To the authority and power of the word of God, revived and pub lic homage was paid; and this found a happy expression in the establishment and early triumphs of that blessed institution, the British and Foreign Bible Society. No sooner was this homage paid to the word of God, than bigotry seemed to

receive an instant check; and Christian charity, too long dormant, to awake with reconciling power. But, after a while,-we ask not for causes, we simply state facts,-the so-called Church-spirit revived, and the BibleSociety spirit declined. And from the time that agreement in fundamentals, charity in subordinates, ceased to be the ground occupied by Christians in Britain, infidelity and political disquietude have increased; Popery, for a time slowly advancing, has now come forward with her highest claims; cold, semisceptical religious formalism and indifference has spread its sad influence among the great men of the land; and, at length, Popery seems as though it were permitted to take a sort of lead, and, though on different grounds, and with different forms, to have obtained from infidelity, from disaff ction, from formalism, and from indifference, such actual support as justifies, to human calculation, the hope of certain and speedy triumph. Had there been a union of affection and recognition among all true Protestants in Great Britain for the last five-and-thirty years, this powerful combination could never have existed. Had English Episcopalians, and evangelical Presbyterians and Congregationalists in Great Britain and Ireland, and Wesleyan Methodists, been agreed, as they might have been without the abandonment of a single New-Testament principle, we should not be compelled to see revealed religion insulted by infidelity, spiritual religion opposed by formality, zealous religion taunted and contemned by indifference, and Protestantism threatened with overthrow by Popery, strong in the support contributed by infidelity, formality, and indifference, and in the subtlety which knows how to direct every separate movement to her one great purpose. "Be ye followers of God as dear children," is a command for churches, as well as for individual believers. He is to be honoured in his gifts, wherever those gifts are found. And painful as it is to contemplate the exclusiveness of those who, in Protestant Britain, hold the

fundamental principle of Rome, it is delightfully encouraging to behold the continued tokens of the divine favour and blessing, as manifestly vouchsafed to those whose churchcharacter is so unhappily denied. What evangelical church, practically acknowledging Christ's Headship and power, is left destitute of the instruments by which churches are to promote the objects for which they exist? Nay, not merely general and ordinary instruments, but such as are required by particular exigencies, and for specific purposes. Where the work of the Spirit in calling to the holy ministry, is duly honoured, God, in his wisdom and love, raises up just such agents as existing circumstances may require. There is not an evangelical church in Britain which has not had occasion, from time to time, to admire those specific adaptations of workmen to work, with which they have been favoured. And as to the provision for general instruction, there has been the same benevolent and impartial distribution. That an individual should be able to teach by writing,-that his writings should be evidently writings not for a denomination, or for an age, but for the churches at large, for generations to come,-this is God's gift. And what church is there which God has not thus honoured? In fact, so decidedly is it the case that God has thus honoured all the evangelical churches who have acknowledged him, that another lesson is suggested. God's gifts are not confined to any one church; and yet it is in connexion with some one particular church, that these gifted instructers of the churches generally are raised up. They have been church members; and, by their positive and visible union with some one part, they have been, by God's grace, prepared to communicate instruction adapted to the whole. God gives his blessing neither to a narrow, limiting bigotry, nor to an unsettled, homeless vagrancy. The lights of the church at large have shown their love for the communion of saints, by that particular churchmembership which enabled them to

enjoy it. They were sectional, that they might be truly catholic.

We need not say, that we differ from the Baptists on those subjects by which they are denominationally distinguished; but we must be blind indeed to the evidences of spiritual gifts, if we did not see that from amongst them, as from amongst other churches, men have been selected whose names have become the property of the Christian world. Their home has been denominational; but their influence has been as extensive, and in many cases is likely to be as lasting, as the language in which they have written. Fuller and Ryland; Carey, Marshman, and Ward; Hall and Foster; were all Baptists: and such men, while they belong to the universal church, are evidences that the society to which they belonged, rested on the right foundation; and so acknowledged the ascended Saviour and Sovereign, as to participate in the gifts which, as the Head of the church, he has received for

men.

The name last mentioned-that of John Foster-has long been placed on the list of British classical writers. So long as profundity of thought, on subjects of the highest importance, powerfully expressed, shall be considered as giving value to the productions of an author, so long shall the productions of Mr. Foster occupy the position which, almost from their first appearance, has been conceded to them. That the present age is too much attached to a sort of reading which is comparatively superficial, provided it be passionate and exciting, is, we fear, only too true; but that there are many readers of a very different class, is proved by the reception given to works like Mr. Foster's

editions, what a quantity of invalu able instruction has been diffused! And in numerous instances a still more important effect, we cannot doubt, has been produced. Besides the light that has been poured forth, the mind has been stirred up from the inactivity of taking-for-grantedness, to vigorous, and accurate, and well-directed, to watchful and guarded, but independent, thought. Mr. Foster's mental labours must have been great and incessant; but he would feel himself richly recompensed by their success.

The leading events of Mr. Foster's history, so far as public interest is concerned, are few, and may be very soon told. His parents resided on a small farm at Wadsworth, near Hebden-Bridge, Yorkshire; and here, in September, 1770, the future Essayist was born, and spent the first years of his life. His father was a weaver, and intended that John should follow the same trade. Both father and mother were members of the Baptist church under the care of the pious Dr. Fawcett. They are represented as combining piety and good sense in happy union; and though possessing no worldly advantages, yet commanding, by excellence of character, the esteem of their Pastor, and of all the fellow-members of the church to which they belonged.

To their children, John and a younger son, these Christian parents paid due attention; and under the influence of their judicious training, and of the evangelical and impressive ministry of Dr. Fawcett, John grew up, with his mind deeply imbued with scriptural truth. What was better, his heart and conscience were affected by it; so that, in his seventeenth year, he felt it his duty to give himself unto God, and to the church by the will of God. He thus exemplified the important influence on the subsequent character of religious training, and furnished an example of early piety which the young may always consider with advantage. Happy was it for others, as well as for himself, that he sought "first the kingdom of God and his righteousness." To the