A LETTER. ISRAEL KNIGHT wrote to his former guardian this : "DEAR SIR : "I have given some attention to nine different denominations of Christians. Many others, more or less akin to some one of these, equally claim my investigation; but I now despair of finding what I seek, viz: the church which shall correspond to the City of the Prophet's vision, whose name deserves to be, The Lord is there., "Though I find something by which to profit in all, there is no one free from my dissent in articles of faith or practice. What shall I do to be saved from my perplexity? Respectfully yours, ISRAEL KNIGHT." "Read more carefully the Prophet's vision of that City with the name for which you look. "There were gates on all sides. Every gate led to the city. 66 Keep straight on any of the roads, the churchgate of which you have entered, and you will come to the place where the Lord is, provided you are right yourself. It is not the gate through which you go, but the heart which you carry through that gate. 'The kingdom of God cometh not with observation. Neither shall they say Lo here! or Lo there! for behold the kingdom of God is within you.' God is no respecter of persons; in every nation he that feareth Him and worketh righteousness, is accepted with Him. "Every church has within it elements of truth and of error. There is no perfection this side of the City of God. "Nothing is more to be deprecated than the prayer that all may come to think just like our own little clan. It would be the utmost misfortune to all Christendom to have only one church. The city to which only one gate led, would be another Babylon, full of the abominations of the earth. "When Christ sent forth the seventy disciples into every city and place whither he himself would come, he gave them no creed, imposed no restrictions save of the merest practical import. To him who, wishing to tempt the Lord, asked him, 'What shall I do to inherit eternal life?' reference was given to the law which read, 'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself.' "Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you,' were the words of Jesus to the twelve in his commission to them before his departure from their sight. The summary of these 'all things' was repentance and faith. This is the utmost simplicity consistent with any expression of doctrine. "Different temperaments with different degrees of cultivation require varying modes of expansion of this central doctrine, in its two-fold expression. This is well. It is promotive of enterprise; it keeps the spiritual atmosphere of churches comparatively pure; it saves man from falling into the grossest error of his · nature, which is tyranny. "Doubtless God sees that this is good, or he would not repeat his signal manifestations of goodness to each and all of the churches. "Therefore I say to him who prefers to journey by the gate of Joseph, toward the City whose name is The Lord is there, let him not turn coldly away from him who cometh by the gate of Dan, or Simeon, or Gad, or Napthali. "This business is between you and God, and concerns no other so nearly. "I enclose for you a branch broken from the palmtree, under which once sat a great Heart. Truly yours, EPHRAIM STEARNS." This was what Israel found enclosed: "Truth indeed came once into the world with her Divine Master, and was a perfect shape most glorious to look on; but when he ascended, and his Apostles after him were laid asleep, then straight arose a wicked race of deceivers, who, as that story goes of the Egyptian Typhon with his conspirators, how they dealt with the good Osiris, took the virgin Truth, hewed her lovely form into a thousand pieces, and scattered them to the four winds. From that time ever since, the sad friends of Truth, such as durst appear, imitating the careful search that Isis made for the mangled body of Osiris, went up and down gathering up limb by limb still as they could find them. We have not yet found them all, lords and commons, nor ever shall do, till her master's second coming; he shall bring together every joint and member, and shall mould them into an immortal feature of loveliness and perfection." Milton's Areopagitica. CONCLUSION. After this, Israel Knight spent some time, chiefly alone. Among his possessions was a solitary estate managed by a tenant with a small family. Thither he betook himself, and sought to discover what manner of man he was. By accident he read of Uriel Acosta, a Portuguese, who embraced so many religious opinions, he suffered many persecutions. Born a Christian, he became a pervert to Judaism, and ended by being a deist. In despair, he finally shot himself. Then Israel said- "There is peril in my thus halting between opinions. (Henceforth, I will seek to be a disciple of Christ. I shall love all men though they love me not. In whatever place I find a true worker for the good of his fellowmen, I will be to him a brother. And with this simple yet sublime faith in his heart, he went forth again into the world, no longer seeking the city. He had found it; and over all the gates on either side, he read this inscription: "Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest.” Why not organise the city a のし and not-beam it as the practice is to ony in the imagination? in the form of 12 gates whe are not themselves, (rethein of Thems on all togather, the lig |