The Church is a gathering from among the nations to the standard of the Lion of the tribe of Judah, seen at different times in different positions, but always requiring care and circumspection. As a city, she needs watchmen on her walls, lest she be surprised of the enemy; yea, because of her liability to attacks from without, walls and bulwarks have been provided, emphatically named of the Holy Ghost" salvation." On looking at her in another aspect, as passing onwards through the wilderness towards her inheritance, her sons find safety by abiding within her camp. Hence the proverb, "Extrà ecclesiam nulla salus”—i. e., apart from the Church is no safety. Here is the shield from the darts of the enemy-the defence against false doctrine, heresy, and schism; here is the light of God's truth, the guidance of His counsel, the leadings of His Spirit; here is safety from false light, safety from seducing spirits, safety from all the forms of error and evil which men have not failed to fall into who have walked in paths of their own, and have followed leaders of their own choosing. The way of salvation is trodden by the meek, the humble, the confiding, who desire to know God-who love the truth -who have no confidence in the flesh-who are willing to be led-who know that unto the Church as one body, one community, was the Spirit given ; that it is the Spirit's work to guide into all truth, and that He fulfils His office perfectly only as there is an abiding in the fellowship of Christ's Church, which alone holds the Catholic faith. From the Church goes forth the daily litany: "Graciously

hear us, that those evils which the craft and subtilty of the devil or man worketh against us, be brought to nought, and by the providence of Thy goodness they may be dispersed." It is the Church which is entitled to pray God that "He would keep His household continually in His true religion," acknowledging that she cannot continue in safety without His succour." Yea, her safety is in Him: He saith, "I am thy salvation." And by Him must you be taught through His ordinances, and through them He still speaketh to you from heaven: "See that ye refuse not Him that speaketh; for if they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape if we turn away from Him that speaketh from heaven."

That the mere possession of the Scriptures, and their interpretation apart from the teaching of the Church, cannot and do not preserve men from the evil that is seen on every hand, in so many fearful forms, is sufficiently manifest. All possess the Scriptures, yet is Christendom full of iniquity and "nigh unto cursing." The present condition of professing Christians answers too truly to the state of the Jewish nation at our Lord's first advent. The Jews possessed the sacred Scriptures of the Old Testament. They read them diligently, and thought that in them they had eternal life; but they knew not Christ, of whom they testified-they understood not the writings of Moses nor the prophets; and therefore they received not the words of the Lord Jesus which He spake unto them! What a reproof was that which He gave them when He said, "Search

the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life and they are they which testify of me!" The Scriptures of the New Testament, as well as the Old, are as little understood by Christians generally, as the latter were by the Jews, and chiefly because they have neglected the means of grace, and have not walked in that state of salvation into which they were brought, but have walked after the light of their own eyes, and in the imagination of their own hearts.

In searching the sacred Scriptures it is of the first importance that you should not rest in your own sufficiency, as though you were able, by your own wisdom and learning, to understand them. The sacred Scriptures are the word of God. The holy Bible is not man's book, but God's; and God has written that book that it might be understood, but not by man's wisdom. He has reserved to Himself the prerogative of opening His own word. He alone' can interpret it. "All thy children shall be taught of the Lord, and great shall be the peace of thy children." For this end God has given the Holy Spirit unto the Church: "When He, the Spirit of truth is come (saith our Lord), He shall lead you into all truth." In like manner St. John speaks: "Ye have an unction of the Holy One, and know all things." The sacred Scriptures are delivered unto the Church, that all may read and understand them through her teaching, by the anointing of the Holy Ghost; therefore should you search the Scriptures with all the humility of little children, whom God your Father would have to be instructed-for

whose teaching He has set divers ministries amongst you, and to whom He hath given a spiritual capacity for the receiving of every truth which they contain.* This is the privilege of every member of Christ's body. Being members of Christ's mystical body, even of that body which is the fulness of Him that filleth all in all, you are capable of apprehending the truth of God revealed unto us in His holy word. And blessed, thrice "blessed are the people that know the joyful sound; they shall walk, O Lord, in the light of thy countenance. In thy name shall they rejoice all the day, and in thy righteousness shall they be exalted." As your privileges are great, so are your responsibilities also. God has rendered you capable of apprehending spiritual things, therefore He expects more from you than from the un→ baptized. He would "that you should be knit together in love, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the acknowledgment of the mystery of God, and of the Father, and of Christ, in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge."

But, at the same time, you must remember " that no Scripture is of any PRIVATE interpretation." It is a great and fearful error to suppose, that because you are members of Christ, and partakers of the Holy Spirit, you are rendered independent of the ordinances of the Church. Such, however, is the temptation which Satan often sets before men, and into which snare and condemnation of the devil many

* Isaiah liv. 13; Matt. xi. 25, 26; 1 Cor. ii. 9-12.

fall. You dare not lean on your own power and ability, to the neglect or prejudice of the ordinance under which God has placed you. Such conduct is virtually to pass by the Church, and to set aside its ordained ministry, and in so far to be without God. It is to maintain, that man is sufficient of himself unto himself, and to deny that his sufficiency is of God. Yea, it is the old snare of being as God, and involves a virtual denial of the Lord Jesus. It is against this snare of the Evil One that St. Paul warned the Corinthians, saying, "I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ."* God has constituted you members of that one body into which you have been baptized, not independent of, but dependent on, one another; so that no one member can say of another, "I have no need of thee." Much less can any one be independent of the ministries which God has set in the body of Christ. God has instituted a ministry in that body: "There are divers administrations (ministries), but the same Lord."+ The ministries of the Lord Jesus are as essential to the well-being of the Church, and of every individual member of it, as is the gift of the Holy Ghost. St. Paul says, "that they are given for the perfecting of the saints, for the edifying of the body of Christ." For any one to suppose, that because he is a member of Christ, and a partaker of the Spirit, therefore he needs not the ordinance which God has set over him for teaching, rule, and

* 2 Cor. xi. 3.

† 1 Cor. xii. 5.

Eph. iv. 13.