have the power to observe it.

Associations may be good and even necessary, but the pastor will be careful that they do not absorb personal activity and responsibility. "The rich and the poor [must] meet together," Prov. xxii. 2.

A

As to the direct care of the indigent, the pastor should ascertain for himself the situation and resources of each one. mind devoted to details, a spirit of industry and benevolence,— this it is which can render him truly useful; this also will make him respected; this it is which gives to the benefactor an authority over those whom he relieves. We must listen patiently to their complaints and narrations, endure a little wearisome prolixity, enter into human nature, and recollect, by our own experience, that "the recital of our griefs is often the best relief."1 We meet, in this region of activity, with so much deception and meanness, we see human nature under so repulsive an aspect, that we are strongly tempted to lose that respect and “honour” for "all men" which should not be denied even to the most abject and depraved.

Let the pastor make it one of his chief cares to raise the mental and moral courage and energy of the poor, to interest them in making the best use of the resources which they may have at command, to maintain and revive the sentiment of selfrespect, to show to them, in their poverty, all the respect to which they are entitled, and which they are able to appreciate.

Not only charity, but also a regard to real necessity, should teach us how to refuse to give to imaginary wants, or to those caused by idleness and selfishness. Let us be careful lest we foster poverty by the very means which we take to remove it. Let us be ever mindful of those inflexible laws which, in the nature of things, determine the general condition of a large population, and let these laws be present to us when dealing with each particular case, since each particular case may not itself suggest them,-may even tempt us to forget them.

The importance for us that there should be no doubt entertained by our people of our own personal beneficence ought not

1 à raconter ses maux souvent on les soulage."--CORNEILLE'S Polyeucte, Act i. Scene iii.

to lead us to connive at the idea, so rife in some parishes, that every case is to be undertaken, indiscriminately, by the pastor or his household. Importunity and indelicacy must be restrained within the bounds of order.

Do not appear as if you expected payment for your assistance in the shape of demonstrations of piety. Do not give the impression that your only motive for relieving the body is that you may reach the soul. In your earliest interviews let religious expressions be subdued and moderate.1

The good which can be done by the pastor himself, is, materially regarded, of small consequence, compared with that of which he is the medium. He is the delegate of the poor to the rich, and of the rich to the poor. The first function is difficult and delicate. We must expect refusals and affronts. Pastors should often call to mind the noble reply of the pastor, who, having received a blow from an impatient rich man, said to him, "This then is for myself; what have you now for my poor friends?" However, it would be wrong to take no account of differences of position and of prior claims. We must know how to refrain appropriately; we should endeavour to interest the rich man in the details of the case which we commend to his liberality, induce him to make the relief of it a matter of his own personal interest, ask of him something better than money, use no moral constraint to obtain it, be content when he gives something, resigned, but not testy, when he refuses; but in all cases we should fulfil this task with as much liberty as delicacy and modesty. [To be ashamed of this duty would be to renounce one of the most excellent parts of the ministry, and to prepare ourselves for continual refusals to our requests.]

1 Beneficence has become an art, the principal rules of which must ultimately become popular. On this subject there are some important works which should be read; as, in French, M. DUCHATEL'S work on Charity, that of M. NAVILLE on the same subject;-Le Visiteur du Pauvre, by M. de GERANDO; and, in English, Dr CHALMERS' work on the Civic and Charitable Economy of Large Towns.

FOURTH PART.

ADMINISTRATIVE OR OFFICIAL LIFE.

CHAPTER I.

DISCIPLINE.'

THIS word has almost lost its meaning in our ecclesiastical institutions, or rather in the character which has been given to them by our times. Discipline is to ecclesiastical order what the police is to civil order; but the citizen, whether he will or no, is subject to law; it is not so with the members of the Church; and when the law of the Church is not sanctioned by public opinion, we may say that it is no longer law. The execution of disciplinary penalties has no longer any civil guarantees or external consequences; so that an external sanction does not lend its weight to internal authority; in one word, discipline has no platform to stand upon. Nothing remains of this function except what the pastor, as an individual, claims to exercise, and what his flock, as individuals, are willing to accept. And it must be allowed that what little remains, existing in defiance of so complete an external amnesty, is excellent in proportion to its limited extent.

We cannot omit to call the attention of ministers to a danger which many of them do not even suspect. Remonstrances and rebukes, which are a part of pastoral discipline, are exercised much more easily on the poor and humble than on the rich and

1 See BENGEL'S Thoughts, § 36.

great. We are tempted to be severe on the former in order to compound for our toleration for the sins of the latter. This is, however, no compensation. And the pastor is unworthy of his mission unless he makes his authority felt by all souls without distinction; since they are to him nothing more than souls. From this, however, it is not to be inferred that no distinction, in manner and form, ought to be observed. The same means have a different value according to the person to whom they are applied; and we may, wishing to pay respect to equality, treat different persons with great inequality.

Excommunication, properly so called, can have no place in a church which is expressly the church of every body. Communicants have no judge without their own body. It is theirs to take heed lest they eat and drink to their own condemnation at the table of the Lord. Wherever the Church belongs to the body politic, and where general consent has ceased to countenance the severities of discipline, we cannot entertain the thought of exercising it, still less of re-establishing the conditions of its existence, which belong to another scheme of social order. The pastor's duty is, however, to dissuade from partaking of the Supper those whom he believes to be unqualified to receive it without danger to themselves, and to warn them collectively from the pulpit. The same rule, and no other, applies to all who sustain office in the church.

CHAPTER II.

CONDUCT TOWARDS DIFFERENT RELIGIOUS PARTIES.

THE first rule to be observed by the pastor with reference to the religious parties which may exist in his parish, whether they are simply parties, or form themselves into separate communities, is to preach the gospel with such simplicity, cordiality, and piety as shall not fail to attract all truthful hearts and minds to that form of Christian doctrine. Such a position admonishes the pastor, as far as possible, to exhibit no colour but that of the purest light. There are few, perhaps no occasions, where the pulpit can be rightly used for polemical purposes. Error flies before truth as the darkness of night before the light of day. In reality darkness is a nonentity, only light is a real existence; to state the truth is to fill a void; error is the absence of truth. Little confidence should be placed in negative means; do not believe that you have been building because you have made some ruins, nor that you have edified because you have conquered. The first, the most natural, and often the only effect of these victories, is impatience and irritation in the vanquished party. Truth is a virtue, a power; we have done all when we have made it to be felt. Virtutem videant.1 [Exhibit virtue.]

We must give our parishioners an example of assistance and of equity, and while making them appreciate, not through reasoning, but by facts, whatever advantage there may be in belonging to our own community rather than to another, we should teach them to love the truth better than their own church, and the image of Christ better than their customs. But, doubtless, it is sufficient for this that we comply with 1 PERSIUS' Satire iii. ver. 38.