Intolerance and persecution always bring down the judgments of God on those who indulge in them. How praiseworthy and devout soever men may be in other respects, yet, if they be intolerant and persecutors, it only needs time for the development of their crime, to shew that God's judgments come either on themselves or on their children. But though it be so unjust and unreasonable, so pregnant with evils and judgments, intolerance has still many secret advocates, neither unjust nor unreasonable men, and who, far from being of a cruel temper, are desirous only of this, that the gospel of peace may have free course and be glorified. Only on the subject of persecution, their belief continues still to be that of the papacy. They want error away; and so they think to put it down by force, and by annexing pains and penalties to the entertainment of it. Not that they would consent (as the papacy did) to the principle that it is lawful to do evil that good may come. They view the sufferings which they purpose to bring on those who are in error, as punishments which the erring deserve. They only omit to inquire whether they have a right to usurp the place of God; and, in the face of the remonstrances of a man's conscience, which is the voice of God to him, to inflict punishments on him for the uncontrollable utterance of that voice. This is indeed very wrong. But, at the same time, persecuting spirits are often to be charged rather with certain moral blunders, and intellectual fallacies, than with any thing that could be called wickedness. There are especially two fallacies, which, could they be but uprooted from their convictions, they would cease to persecute. Of these, the one is the supposing that the truth may be spread by the persecution of those who are in error; and the other is a want of faith in the power of truth, a want of conviction of the fact, that the truth, if only fair play were given it by the principle of toleration being fully carried out, would spread faster in the hearts of men than in any other conceivable way. Now, on the former of these fallacies, let what has been said already suffice; but let us here contemplate for a moment what the result would be as to the spread of the truth, if only every sincere man could assure himself, as the privilege and honour due to his conscientious convictions, of a benignant toleration from the friends of the truth. What, let me ask, would be the effect of such treatment. Would there not immediately, on his experiencing it, arise in the breast of him who was so treated, a prepossession in favour of those opinions which rendered so honourable in his eyes the conduct of those who professed to be actuated by them. This result may be confidently expected from the responsive character of human nature. Nor let this be called an attempt to spread the truth by flattering those who are in error. There is no flattery in the case. There is nothing more or less than justice. Those who hold error for truth, have the common rights of men as well as those who commit no mistake in the matter. And it is but just that their rights should be respected. And this will ever be so inveterately their claim, that they will never take any thing well from the man who begins his message to them by disregarding their rights; nay, they will not give him credit for any kind intention. Let him be just before he be generous will be the universal voice of all who are treated with intolerance by one who professes to seek their well-being. A strange way this (they will say) to gain us to your opinions, or to commend your opinions to us by trampling on our rights in the first place! If you love us as you pretend, and desire to turn us from what you conceive to be the error of our ways, shew that you respect us. Respect our rights, and then we will possibly listen to you; but not till then. Such is the language of the heart of man; and so long as a man can command the use of his own ears, and close them when he pleases, it is all in vain to contend against such a remonstrance, coming as it does from the very depths of humanity. And thus to be intolerant and to persecute, or to do other than respect to the full the rights of those who are in error, is the direct way to make them blind and deaf to the truth, and to place ourselves as stumbling blocks in the way of its propagation. To meet the erring in the opposite spirit, on the contrary, is to gain their good will at once, and to open their hearts, so far as preliminary address can do so, to the reception of the truth. And this is the only manner of address of which our Saviour and the apostles afford us examples-the apostles at least after they were enlightened in the nature of true religion, and of the tidings of peace on earth which Jesus brought. In the early days of their deep but dark devotedness, two of them did indeed ask leave to call down fire to consume the unkind and heretical Samaritans, but our Saviour answered, "Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of, for the Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them."* And this, the spirit of Christ, they learned more and more fully to breathe, the longer they served in the cause of God on earth. And so will every man who loves the Lord Jesus Christ, and seeks the salvation of those who are perishing around him. UNITY AND UNIFORMITY. And now, having thus cleared our way, and laid down these principles, let us make a step towards the details of our inquiry. It follows, from what has been already said, that the Luke, ix. 55. word of God, interpreted by reason and conscience assisted by divine grace, remains in the entire possession of the field, as the only rule of faith, and the supreme authority in every question touching revealed religion. In attempting to discover, therefore, what God has revealed as to the unity or uniformity of the church, let us first attend to the law and to the testimony. "He who speaketh not according to this word, it is because there is no light in him.”* Now, if, in pursuit of this object, we open the Bible even in a few places only, we shall do enough to discover that the word of God emphatically teaches and commends a true unity among all Christians. It represents all as one flock, under one shepherd;† all as fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God, and built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone, in whom all are builded together for a habitation of God through the spirit. It represents all as members in the same body,§ branches in the same vine ;|| in a word, the Bible every where, and in every variety of speech, teaches and inculcates the unity of the church. And while the people of God are thus described as one, and the church as an united body, a house built upon a rock, against which the gates of hell shall never prevail, means have also been divinely provided for accomplishing the end which has been ordained. Thus love, that heavenly principle of union, is exalted in the New Testament, so as to be given as the very criterion of Christian discipleship. By this," says our Saviour, "shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one towards another."** Thus a bond of unity is given to the * 66 Isaiah, viii. 20. 66 Our affections. Nor is it given to them only, but to the intellect too. For there are given unto all, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all."* Nor is this the whole that has been done to secure the unity of the church. It might, indeed, have been thought that our affections and intellect being thus supplied with the materials of unity, the unity of the church might have been intrusted to these principles. But it is not so. Christian unity appears to be a matter of too much importance in the eye of God to be intrusted to mere man. heavenly Father has put it on another footing altogether. Instead of leaving it to the play of our mutable reason and affections, he has himself instituted an unity in the church, which is at once spiritual and indefeasible. He has made every true believer, and consequently every true member of the church, to depend for his very faith, and, consequently, for true membership, on union with himself. He has organized the church, so that every member shall meet in himself, as buds and branches meet in the vine. He has instituted a true unity in the church, which no man can destroy. A man may indeed cut himself off; but the body remains unharmed by him. A man, by indulging in a schismatic temper, may greatly injure his spiritual health and life, and may so separate and divide the visible bonds of the church, that it may seem to be really divided. But though one may say "I am not of the body," and another, "I have no need of you," the church is not necessarily divided notwithstanding. the foot shall say, because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body? Man, who looketh only on the outward appearance, often arrives at different conclusions from what he would do, if he could look to the heart. The truth is often one at heart, where it seems divided on the surface. * Eph. iv. 6. If |