Church;" an intimation, too, it might be added, that controversy itself should be so conducted as to win esteem instead of alienating it.

Some of the advocates of union, indeed, have proposed that societies should be formed, and lecturers be sent forth to disseminate scriptural information on the subject; a plan which might be executed with advantage. Archbishop Wake thought that the adoption of a common church service" would shortly conduce to the union desired. And probably it would. But such a measure presupposes a degree of unanimity, which it should be the laborious endeavor of ministers to produce. Let them follow the example of the apostle Paul in his ministry-preaching "Christ crucified;" glorying in the Gospel as the ministry of reconciliation, an institution for restoring men to God, and to each other in him. Let them copy him in his epistolary correspondence-and what were his letters to the churches but proclamations of peace, inspired edicts from the throne of love; commanding believers, as they valued the favor of the King of saints, and hoped for a crown above, to "be kindly

affectioned one towards another." Let them imitate him in his healing conduct towards those whose differences from each other were only circumstantial, by sending them together to gaze at the cross; by habitually exhibiting and exalting Christ before their eyes as their common centre, and their only hope. Why is it, a person might be ready to ask, on beginning to read the First Epistle to the Corinthians-why is it that the apostle repeats the

name of Christ so often? Not a sentence, but Christ is introduced by name-hardly a clause in which his name and even his titles do not recur, until we feel as if the apostle were writing principally for the sake of repeating that blessed name. Let him read on to the 12th verse, and he will discover that the design is to call off attention from names which divide-such as Paul, Apollos, and Cephas-by centering it on Him in whom these, and all other appellations, meet and merge-the Lord Jesus Christ. Let them go and do likewise; remembering that if little things occupy the attention of their people, it is only owing to the absence of great ones; that "our church" is a little thing compared with our Lord," and our denomination" a trifle compared with our common salvation;" that if those whom they address are saved, they will be saved not as denominationalists but as Christians, and not as members of a particular church, but as belonging to the Church universal. Let them follow him in his magnanimity towards his schismatic rivals; rejoicing that Christ is preached, though from inferior motives; offering to cooperate, and actually assisting, in every endeavor calculated to enlarge the kingdom of Christ; and, instead of eyeing the prosperity of other churches askance, while all heaven is rejoicing at it, sympathising in that prosperity, and thus making it their own. Let them imitate his prayers; wrestling with God, in private, for the peace and unity of his Church; deploring, in public, the existence of so many barriers to the free and general communion of the

Church; confessing its divisions as its scarlet sin; admonishing their people to pray for the impartation of the Holy Spirit as the only and infallible remedy; and taking every opportunity of associating with the ministers and members of other denominations in united prayer for a united Church; remembering that the great Intercessor above prays, not for a party,

that the names of all the tribes are engraven on his breast-plate, and that those prayers are likely to be the most successful which most nearly resemble his own. And let them copy the apostolic example, in often dwelling, themselves, on the final union of the whole Church, and in leading their people to the contemplation of the same august prospect. Let them do this, and they "shall be called the repairers of the breach, the restorers of paths to dwell in." Often let them lead their people to the lofty contemplation of that day, when that name shall be deemed by Christians the most appropriate which is most expressive of their common subjection to Christ, and their universal love to each other-when every party appellation shall be forgotten and lost in the great name of Christ-and when Judah and Ephraim shall be one. Oh, how natural would a spirit of conciliation become, after gazing on such a prospect! As if we had come down from a vision of heaven, from beholding those who while here differed from each other, all united and happy in each other's society there, our necessary concessions would appear so trifling that we should not feel them to be sacrificesour union would at once begin.

CHAPTER XI.

MOTIVES AND ARGUMENTS TO UNION.

IN proceeding to the enforcement of some of the most cogent reasons for Christian union, it might be proper to anticipate two inquiries, which might otherwise impair the desired impression. "Is the present a suitable season for bringing the question of union before the Church? And, have we any rational hope of promoting such union ?"

1. In brief reply to the first inquiry, we remark, that as the obligation to Christian union is perpetual, the obligation of enforcing it is perpetual also; so that from the first moment of division in the Church to the final sounding of the trump of God, the inculcation of the duty can never be absolutely out of place that if the present be a season of peculiar distraction in the Church, so much the more reason for laboring to restore it to its right mind—that as the darkest hour is commonly that which precedes the dawn, so it is historically true, that the gloomiest season of the Church has been generally that selected by God for saying to it, "Arise, and shine, for thy light is come"-that

we really know of no time having elapsed in the past, more suitable than the present, for the inculcation of union; since the subject, whenever raised, could scarcely have failed to awaken discussion on the party questions now in debate that as to waiting for some more suitable period in the future, as we have no right to expect that such time will ever arrive unless we employ the appropriate means, we are solemnly bound to do all we can to hasten it on-and, finally, that it is our sober and cheering conviction that, inflamed as is the state of party feeling in the Church at present, there is (and partly on that very account) as deep a conviction of the necessity of union, and as earnest and powerful a desire after it, in many a Christian bosom, as at any preceding period; that the number of such is increasing; and that a scriptural appeal on the subject is much more likely to affect the heart of the Christian now, with the torn and mangled state of the Church before his eyes, than as if we were deluding each other with the cry of" peace, peace, when there is no peace."

2. Admitting, however, that the present is as suitable as any other season, and in some respects even more so, for the introduction of our subject, "have we," it might be asked, "any rational hope of promoting the union of the Church?" To which we reply, that when we recall to mind the long-established reign of those prejudices by which Christians are divided the almost uniform and total failure of the numerous, various, and strenuous endeavors which have been made to heal them-the