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and so he urges his brethren at Corinth 4 , who had " received the Spirit of God," to speak "not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth." Again, in alluding to his own case, he left a legacy to all ministers of Christ when he said, "

Though I preach the Gospel I have nothing to glory of: for necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is unto me, if I preach not the Gospel •! "

The twelfth and fourteenth chapters of 1 Corinthians enforce the same doctrine throughout; the fourth chapter of Ephesians corroborates it; while even the largest measure of success in the exercise of this gift is shown • to be no ground of boasting, but the spirit is chastened and humbled by the exhortation, " He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." To quote the words of St. Peter,

"If any man speak, let him speak as the

* Rom. xii. 6, &c. » 1 Cor. ii. 4. 4 1 Cor. ii. 12,13. • 1 Cor. ix. 16. • 2 Cor.

x. 13—16.

oracles of God; if any man minister, let him do it as of the ability which God giveth: that God in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom be praise and dominion for ever and ever!"

With a reflection like this prominently set before us, you will not be surprised at my cautioning you not to be content with any uninspired model that may be recommended for your imitation. " It is no small matter," writes Baxter r , " to stand up in the face of a congregation and deliver a message of salvation or damnation as from the living God in the name of our Redeemer. It is no easy matter to speak so plain that the ignorant may understand us; and so seriously that the deadest hearts may feel us; and so convincingly that contradicting cavillers may be silenced." You may indeed gain hints whereby you may improve your gifts from many; but be not satisfied by becoming the copyists of any one. If you wish to preach with success, strive to apprehend fully, and to express clearly, the mind of Christ. Aim at preaching like your Master, so that " all men shall wonder at the gracious words which proceed out of your mouth." Endeavour, like St. Paul, faithfully to "preach Jesus and the Resurrection." like Apolloe, strive "mightily to convince the gainsayers, 7 Befbrmed Pastor, ch. ii. s. ir.

showing by the Scriptures that Jesus is Christ'," and, like him too, be

" mighty in the Scriptures \" Like St. Peter, encourage fresh wit*

nesses to come forward and declare their faith; preach from the prophets; announce the Resurrection ; herald the coming of the day of the Lord. Like the same zealous Apostle and his loving colleague, "

obey God rather than men " in your teaching. Like Philip, explain the old covenant by the new, and illustrate the new by the old. Like Stephen, be ready, if need should be, to witness unto death for Him who gave up His life for you!

The great principles upon which the exercise of our gift of preaching should be based, appear to me to be these : faith, obedience, and the sense of responsibility. God calls us to His service, and gives us authority to minister in His Name 1 : we believe and obey. God bestows on us the power, and invests us with the duty of preaching the Gospel of His grace to our perishing, yet redeemed fellow-

sinners: we who receive this power, and this call of duty, are bound to consecrate our moral, intellectual, and physical faculties to the development of the former, and the discharge of the latter. The flocks to whom God sends us, that we may feed them, need instruction in right-

• Acts xviii. 28. " • Acts xviii. 24.

1 On the work of the ministry, see Baxter's Christian Ecclesiastics, ch.

vi. s. 4, pp. 108,109.

F 2

"V"

68 PUBLIC TEACHING,

eousness, exhortation against evil and to holiness, guidance in the way of the life of Jesus: we are pledged by the vows of our ordination, and the commission given to us through our chief pastor in Christ, to supply them with all these needs. " We are ambassadors for Christ as though God did beseech men by us. We pray them in Christ's stead to be reconciled to God! 0

Of the weight of the responsibility thus laid upon us I need not now speak; you are all feeling it keenly; but for your future guidance I would remind you that in the exercise of the gift of preaching the impress of The Mediator rests upon you. Like him who of old stood between the dead and the living and stayed the plague, you have to stand, in delivering the message of the Gospel, between the living author and finisher of your faith, and a people dead in trespasses and sins. Your mission is to stay the progress of sin, and to announce pardon and life to the awakened sinner. Some of you, perhaps, may think this too harsh a view of your mission, addressed as it is to a redeemed and covenanted people who "tcere sometime darkness,"

but are now "light in the Lord;" but let me remind you of the solemn Scripture truths, that" whosoever shall keep the whole law and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all ;'* that " the soul that sinneth, it shall die;" that " death is the wages of sin;" and " that death

th passed upon all men, in that all have

sinned." Therefore your message is "Repent, and believe the Gospel;"

"Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish!"

Is it not true, then, that the impress of the Mediator rests upon you while making known the riches of heaven* to ransomed, though still sin-stained, earth ? The very business of the Christian preacher is mediation; but, oh, if in its sterner impress the shadow of the Mediator is sometimes cast upon you, remember that you have the happiness of sharing His brightness too! Yours is not merely a mission of warning, or of a threatened condemnation; it is also a message of light and life. Though in its exercise you must strive to awaken, yea, and to keep in view the solemn darkness of a conviction of sin, still through this gloom the rays of pardoning love must break; and few more blessed privileges are vouchsafed to man on earth, than to him who is permitted to know that the mission of Jesus is fulfilled to individuals through his lips, and that by the faithful use of his gifts the balm of pardon has dropped upon an awakened penitent; a suffering and believing soul!

With the Bible in your hand, and its truths in your heart, you can never be at a loss for subjects of public teaching; but it may be prudent to caution the young preacher not to assume or presuppose too much knowledge or information on the part of his hearers. Never let a fondness for declamation on principles yon yourself know well induce you to allow your flocks to remain in ignorance of that which they know not. Though we live in a professed age of enlightenment and progress, the world is a wonderfully ignorant world still; and just as John the Evangelist thought it necessary to inform his Gentile disciples that" the passover " was " a feast of the Jews," though the words were to seem a mere iteration to so many thousands since, so you will find it wise to inform the minds as well as to rouse the heart*

of your several flocks; and to give them elementary lectures on history, doctrines, and local customs, as well as expositions of the

deeper mysteries of the faith, and illustrations of spiritual life drawn from the Scriptures of truth.

As a matter of practical experience, and attended by a marked amount of blessing, I may mention that a course of expository lectures on the Old and New Testament, a single lecture only being devoted to each Book, has been found to be of great benefit. In parts of the country where education has not been cultivated, very little is known of the gradual nature of Divine Revelation; and an utter ignorance exists of the connexion between the Patriarchal, Mosaic, and Christian periods. It has been well remarked, by a statesman of the day J , that

' Mr. DTsraelL

though " Judaism would have been incomplete without Christianity, Christianity would have been incomprehensible without Judaism."

And the question asked by one of our divines may be fresh in the recollection of some of you, "What is the Old Testament? The Gospel predicted. What is the New ? The Law fulfilled." The mutual relation of these two great parts of the Bible is well worthy of clear elucidation and frequent reference in your public teaching; but while you seek to interest the best trained mind and the subtlest intellect among your hearers, you should be careful to exhibit a simplicity in your mode of stating the question which shall make your meaning intelligible to the least educated as well.

To secure this result you should aim always at a clear arrangement of your subject-matter, your sentences should be brief, your language simple, your arguments not too complex, your statements of doctrine straightforward, your illustrations copious, and taken from subjects familiar to your hearers.

As to a choice of words, you must remember that teachers must never cease to be learners themselves. If you are much in converse with your humbler parishioners, and much among the children of your schools, you will gather from them what words are, and what words are not " signs of ideas " to them; and while, under a due sense of the dignity of your mission, you

will refrain from the indiscriminate use of provincialisms, you will soon learn to frame your discourse to their profit, and avoid that kind of eloquence which would convey only "uncertain sounds" to those to whom yon are to utter the clear and definite notes of the Gospel-trumpet.

To ensure freedom and ease in the delivery of your sermons, their repeated perusal will be necessary before preaching them; and they should be read once, at least, if not twice, aloud, so that your sentences may be under perfect command, and your voice sustained to the close. A sermon may be excellent in itself, and yet if clumsily or laboriously delivered, or if merely read from your book, and not preached to the understandings of the people, may utterly fail to arouse the conscience, or even awaken the interest of your flock.

It may be desirable to classify your public teaching of sacred truth in threefold form, vis. under the heads of sermon, lecture, and exposition. The first should be not only arranged with method, but composed with great care: the two latter may be delivered from notes more or less copious, or extemporaneously; but never without thoughtful previous preparation. It will be highly useful to acquire, if you do not already possess it, an aptitude for lecturing and expounding without a book before you; but when acquired, be careful

never to let it be a snare to preach ill-digested thoughts in hasty words. God requires, and your people deserve, the best instruction you are capable o£ imparting; and you must never spare your own labour in arranging in the best possible shape the matter you have to impart to them. Above all, bear in mind the instructive axiom, "Bene praedicasse, est bene orasse;" and fail not, therefore, to seek in persevering prayer an increase of power to use your " gift" of delivering God's message more and more profitably; and however graciously your prayers may be answered, never forget your humility, nor lose sight of the fact that in preaching, you are obeying a Master who not only sends you on a mission of grace, but is ever standing near you to see how that mission is fulfilled.

The preaching of the word of God is not, however, the only public teaching which pertains to the parochial clergyman. In days when the printing-press is used as an agent for disseminating evil as well as for heralding truth, it behoves the pastor to exercise a careful discrimination in directing parish literature. His position as a man of education, refinement, and intelligence, indicates his fitness (and this is especially true of rural districts) to influence the mind and guide the taste of others; while his office as the parish priest calls upon him to see that the literary food provided for the mental nutriment of his flock is consistent with the principles of the Christian faith, and the practice of public, social, and personal morality.'

This, of course, assumes his working upon a lower platform than that which theology assigns him: but the example of Paul, both at Lystra and at Athens, seems to me clearly to justify this partial descent from his elevated position as a teacher of direct revelation. The sympathies of humanity should never be forgotten in the dignity of the priesthood; and he is usually the most effective pastor who interweaves (within due limits) the social amenities of the man with the gifts and graces of the minister.

But while the office of the public teacher touches thus the mental, moral, and social, as well as the spiritual life of his people, it is by no means desirable that he should arrogate to himself an autocratic power in directing the literature of the parish wherein he works. If he associates himself with intelligent and right-minded laymen, his part in the work will be rather that of the leavener than the dictator. He may encourage the formation, and exercise a due and discreet influence in the selection of libraries, such as will touch the different classes of sooiety within the field of his ministration. He may wisely take part in the arrangement and delivery of lectures on historical, scientific, and literary topics. He may make it a careful study how most effectually to store the pack of his colporteur or book-hawker, and how to draw up a popular and useful selection of books for school or village reading. The religious tracts put in systematic circulation through his district visitors and distributors,

will of course emanate exclusively from himself; but of the literary part, he may satisfy himself with merely a general power of recommendation and supervision. The influence he thus exercises, though of course less direct than that which flows from preaching the Gospel, will yet have no mean effect in preventing too great a "

conformity with this world," and in aiding what St. Paul calls the

"transformation" of the body, " by the renewing of the mind 8 ."

Imperfectly as these thoughts on public teaching and parish literature have been thrown together, I yet trust they may have some influence in fixing on your minds a sense of the importance and responsibility of the former in a spiritual, and of the probable influence of the latter in a moral point of view. God has given to each of us a mind as the seat of judgment, and a heart as the seat of affection, as well as a soul which is the seat of being; and we are bound not only to seek the sanctification of these in our own persons, for the proper fulfilment of our mission as ministers of the Gospel, but also to strive by every means in our

3 Rom. xii. 2.

power to secnre their sanctification in the persons of our parishioners, that they and we together may " glorify God in our bodies as in our spirits, which are God's."

And now, in drawing this series of lectures to a conclusion, let me briefly remind you of the design kept in view in their preparation.

This has been to impress upon you who are entering upon parochial work,—

1. That no parish is complete without some missionary organization, whereby it may extend to others those " good tidings of the grace of God," which are the chief source of its own internal peace and joy and harmony.

2. That the work of the Church is not done in any parish so long as Dissent finds justifiable matter to feed a grievance upon; and,

3. That your own mission as Priests and Deacons of the Church of England remains unfulfilled till the whole mind of God, as revealed in His word, be laid out broadly and intelligibly before your parishioners by the aid of sermon, lecture, and exposition; and farther (if their condition of intellect and morals so require), their minds be supplied with a stream of pure and edifying literature.

If the blessing of our Heavenly Father (which has been devoutly sought) has rested on this design and its fulfilment, neither my lecturing, nor your listening will have proved in vain.

THIRD SERIES.

LECTUEE L

SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHING.

In resuming the course of lectures I have been desired to prepare, with the view of aiding you in your pastoral work, I can scarcely commence the present series more profitably than by reminding you of those twelve necessary concomitants of the ministerial duty laid down by one of the greatest and most practical of the writers of the seventeenth century *. These are, self-denial, labour, prudence, definite doctrine, plainness in speech, prayer, humility, an union of severity and mildness, zeal, spirituality, love for souls, and, lastly, patience. Truly we may say to the parish pastor of these, as St. Peter said to his converts of his own summary of Christian graces, "If these things be in you and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ."

When speaking on a former occasion of " educational work in the parish/' I was compelled to dismiss very cursorily the subject of Sunday-school teaching. It is, however, deserving of more copious treatment than I was then able to bestow upon it.

It must be obvious to every thoughtful mind that the teaching of the Church in the parish on the Lord's Day must be painfully imperfect,

if it be limited to two sermons from the pulpit. With the utmost care and pains it is very difficult to render the teaching designed for adults of interest to children. The strong meat intended to nourish them that are of full age, is altogether a different thing from the millr which is fit for babes.

The National Church has indeed foreseen and provided in a measure for this difficulty, by her rubric on catechizing; and obedience to this rubric would help to meet it.

Even, however, where public catechizing is carried out, there are few who have the requisite gift to enable them to reach through its means the whole of the children under their pastoral care; and we cannot but be grateful that, half a century ago, the minds of devout men were stirred up to make the Lord's Day a day of loving work wherein the lambs of Christ might be gathered in increased numbers into His fold, and nourished with the sincere milk of His Word.

Nor is the importance of the Sunday-school by any means limited to its declared end of training the young in the nurture and admoni-tion of the Lord. It is an agency beautifully adapted to bring together in union and harmony, and in a work of Christian love, those whom the conventionalities of the world might otherwise keep absolutely separated. The division of society into separate and distinct classes, leads almost necessarily to an estrangement of their affections, the one from the other. It is the business and privilege of the Church to find meeting-points whereby the common life of all in Christ may be exhibited and centralized upon Himself; and when the family of the noble, the gentle, and the simple, are found taking a common part in the common work of teaching the young for Christ's sake, there is found an illustration of the true cement which binds the Church into one, and strives to bind the children of the world into its hallowed union—the cement of Christian love! The up* per and middle classes in any neighbourhood may thus be brought nearer to one another in teaching, while the humbler are brought nearer to both of them in learning, in the Sunday-school.

I ask you, then, to realize to yourselves some of the useful fruits to which you may look forward in your future parishes, by organizing

where they are not, and by superintending and improving where they do exist, parochial and district Sunday-schools. Some of you may not know how to organize such an institution in your parish. A few brief hints on this head may be useful.

Assemble your school not less than one hour and a half before morning service, and not less than one hour before afternoon service.

Open the morning school with prayer, and the afternoon with singing. Let all your teaching be of a directly Scriptural character.

Arrange your classes so as never to give more than twelve to a single teacher, and not more than eight if you can find teachers enough.

Let your own part be rather that of a superintendent than class teacher; and encourage your teachers to look to you for an occasional quarter of an hour's teaching in their several classes, on any subject in which you can be of practical help to them.

Let the discipline be milder, but not less real than that of your day-school.

And now (1), note, first, how the regularity and order and loving discipline of the institution promotes, and in the cultivation of the rising, secures through future generations, the observance of the Lord's Day. The hallowed ordinance of God which " sets one day out of seven apart, that it may be kept holy to Himself/' has, like many other blessings, been converted into a curse to many through the malice

of Satan. To the man whose life is alien from God,—who has no sense of his true " life being hid with Christ in God,"—Sunday is either the dullest or the wickedest day of the seven. Indolence and active vice are the two special emissaries of the devil which strive for mastery on that day; and if either the one or the other prevail in the heads of a family, how can the children be expected to be trained in the service of God ? But if you look well after the children of your parishes, and enlist the sympathies of lay members of your flock of the upper and

middle classes to aid you, the Sunday may be made to the rising generation the happiest as well as the holiest day of the week. Many a parent, too, who had in listless indolence passed his former Sabbaths, will be led practically to reverence the day when he sees his own little ones marching with happy face to the Lord's house, accompanied by a cheerful band of young compeers, and led by their pastor and teachers to worship God with an holy worship!

A very touching instance of this occurred to me in my own parish : "

Ah, sir," said the old bellringer of my church to me, as we stood between the death-bed of his daughter and the sick bed of his wife, "

I little thought ever to see the sight that gladdens me every Sunday, when you and the teachers come up under the church trees bringing your large little flock

g 2

every morning." The dead daughter at twenty years of age had never been to school at all; the sick wife had been a most negligent churchgoer ; and while he thought with sorrow, and I believe with shame, of the past, he looked forward for the rising generation to a better observance of the Lord's Day through the medium of the Sunday-school!

2. Note, next, how the souls of the children are won to the service of Christ by the specially attractive nature of the Sunday-school teaching. In every day-school there must necessarily be a large amount of formality. The child belongs more to his class than to his teacher; perhaps more to the school than either. But in the Sunday-school, where the classes are smaller, the teachers more numerous, and the subjects taught more addressed to the heart than to the head, to the affections than the intellect, there the child belongs to the teacher more than to his class or his school; and he feels by the self-devotion displayed, that in a sense the teacher belongs to him. A feeling of communion between the teacher and taught is here strikingly developed; they stand as it were hand in hand and heart to heart on the same Bock, and that Rock is Christ.

3. Observe, again, how often the attachment formed by the Sunday-scholar to his teacher serves as a sort of Baptist to the mission of Christ to his home. Parents who are inac-cessible to the ordinary clergyman or district visitor, are perfectly ready to receive a visit from the teacher whom their child loves; and even where this alliance does not take place, many a Scripture truth learned by the child at the Sunday-school is brought home to the parent's heart when most needed, and the infant glorifies God by becoming a missionary (though sometimes an unconscious one) to his negligent parent!

4. Another effect of Sunday-schools is the closer and more affectionate union in Christ which is generated between the clergy and teachers. From domestic or social circumstances beyond the control of either, there are many yoig people in the parish whom the pastor could scarcely ever see for the purpose of holding personal conversation, but for their attendance as teachers in Sunday-schools; in town parishes this is especially the case. But how vast is the advantage to society, when a number of the young of both sexes, shortly perhaps to take their station as the heads of growing families, are thus led to partake in the personal and kindly guidance, as well as the pastoral admonition, of their parish priest! The holy devotion they witness in his teaching gives an influence of sanctity to their own; and they are strengthened in the performance of their duty to others, while they have ready

access for advice and sympathy to him who faithfully discharges his duty to them!

5. And this union of feeling and action between clergy and teachers is immensely increased, if (as has been already recommended in a previous lecture) the parish pastor devotes an evening in the week to prepare his teachers by special indoctrination for the school-work of the ensuing Sunday. One hour's close and direct teaching of any Scriptural subject judiciously selected, will fill the teachers'

notebooks, and store their minds with sufficient matter to teach their children through the day. An unity of design will thus pervade the whole school. The teachers will compare their notes one with

another, and what one has lost another will be able to supply. The children, as they go home from school, or during the week, will talk to one another on the several versions they have received of the same truth; and thus a series of doctrines, and of illustrative Scriptural teaching, will be impressed on their minds and memories, which will teach them to love the Bible in their youth, and prepare them for making its teaching attractive to their own children when they grow to be parents themselves!

6. There arises also this farther advantage from this especial mode of teaching. The teachers receive a practical lesson in the art of teaching which improves them; and then they bring out in a lively form, thoroughly intelligible to their children, that instruction which, imparted by the clergyman, would have assumed something of a formal or professional character. Those of us who have been only accustomed to well-conducted schools, and the intelligent children whose wits have been sharpened by constant intercommunication in towns, are sometimes startled to find the utter density of the fog that envelopes the latent mind of rustic childhood. The children do not understand the words we use; they know not the places of which, nor the persons of whom, we speak; they require a medium of interpretation before they can apprehend the ideas we desire to convey. The taught Sunday-school teacher is that medium; and the clear and plain teaching of 1 the pastor, filtered through the mind of the teacher, and reproduced in forms of language to which they are accustomed, becomes at once more acceptable and more profitable to the children. The life-blood of the Gospel thus infused, circulates through the veins of the teachers, and warms and invigorates every class with the sense of the love ofGodf

7. Another beneficial result flowing from the Sunday-school is the increased reverence for the home of God in the parish. In some parishes the school is taught m the church; but this is very undesirable. It is too much to expect that young children can sustain their attention without intermission for three and sometimes nearly four hours: and it almost always happens that, where the school is taught in the churchy the spirit of reverence

rather de* clines than increases. But where they are taken from school to church, as to the house of God, and the active teaching gives place to the calm and holy scene of united and orderly worship within its sacred precincts, the change, while it affords relief to the young body, stimulates the spirit of reverence in the young mind: and divine service encourages reverence for the house, just as the sacred teaching cultivates a happy recognition of the day that is consecrated to the Lord!

8. And note thus how a seal of sanctification is set upon the teaching of the week. Creeds and catechisms and dogmatic teaching, have not been forgotten or omitted in the national school: probably explanatory and illustrative Scriptural teaching have found their place there too; but the mutual study for mutual edification of the practical life and personal teaching of Jesus, and of those holy men who spake in the Scriptures as they were moved by the Holy Ghost,—

these subjects (brought before their minds by teachers who, living in the world, show they are not of the world) realize more than any mere dogmatic teaching to

loving children's minds, the glorious fact of their sonship of God; their membership with Christ the Son of God; their unity in the Spirit of God; and the sure inheritance to the faithful among them of the kingdom of heaven throughout eternity!

9. Hence flows another result—a natural, if not a necessary result.

These young learners gradually become qualified to be teachers themselves ! The seed now sown brings forth spiritual fruit in the next succeeding generation. Not only has the wounded and dying warrior of recent war recalled again and again with gratitude on the gory field of death the collects and the lessons of his pastor and Sunday-school teacher; but the young pupil of one generation has become the steady and life-lone: teacher of succeeding generations.

Few great principles have shown more rapid growth and expansion (and expansion is the truest test of life) than that of Sunday teaching in Christ's name! At the commencement of this century Sunday-schools were few and far between: now, when it is little more than half its age, the Sunday-school teachers are stated on good authority*

to amount to upwards of 300,000 in number, —far exceeding the army, navy, and police, of the whole kingdom!

* See Bev. Joshua Fawcett's Speech at the Town Hall, Leeds, on Nov.

15,1858; reported in the Guardian, p. 945, col. 1, Nov. 24,1858.

10. But apart from the national and social benefit that would seem to arise clearly from the careful development of the Sunday-school system, there is a definite personal reason why each of you, in the exercise of pastoral functions, should give great heed to the Scriptural teaching of the young,—a teaching that you cannot impart yourself personally to each, and yet a teaching that you are pledged, ministerially, to see imparted to all, —a teaching that may possibly be imparted by instruction during the week, but is more likely to be imparted by sympathy through the voluntary teacher on the Lord's Day!

This definite personal reason is to be found by each of us, as teachers in the Church of Christ, in St. Matt, xviii. 5, 6. 10, and 14, and the parallel passages 8 in the Gospels. Listen to the words of the Lord Jesus :—

"Whoso shall receive one such little child in my name receiveth me; but whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea."

Again: "Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones: for I say unto you, That in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven."

* Matt. x. 2; Mark ix. 42; Luke xvii. 2: also Mark x. 13, and parallel passages.

Again: " It is not the will of your Father which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish!"

I earnestly entreat you to study these passages in solitude, with prayer; and I feel satisfied that, if you have not yet realized the inestimable help the Sunday-school, duly superintended, is to the

parish pastor, they will stimulate you, in your several parishes, to rally round you such holy and God-fearing teachers as you can gather; and to secure their help in enabling you to fulfil the solemn responsibility laid upon you to train and cherish for heaven, with tenderest and most careful nurture, the lambs of the fold of Jesus!

LECTURE n.

DOCTRINAL CONTROVERSY IN DOMESTIC

VISITATION.

Domestic visitation is not only one of the most important duties of the parish pastor, but is also the most fruitful in results. An idea has lately obtained currency that this duty not only may, but ought to be limited to the members of the Church in each several parish. I earnestly entreat you never to be led into this dangerous delusion, the effect of which, if generally adopted by the clergy, would be at once to narrow the National Church into one of the sects of the nation. Let your people at once understand that you come among them as one invested with authority, but serving in humility among all. Your Master has sent you to bring the exhortations, the instructions, and the consolations of the Gospel, to every soul within the territorial limit committed to your ministrations. If any of the parishioners withdraw from your public ministry, whether through indifference to their duty

or attachment to a less sound form of faith than the Church presents for their edification, they do it on their own responsibility. That is their concern; not yours. But if, on account of ignorance, or prejudice, or misguidance, they neglect your public teaching and your leading in common prayer, do not imagine for an instant that that exonerates you from the cure of their souls, or justifies you in leaving them un-cared for, and, it may be, unwarned.

There is a very remarkable passage in Dr. Hammond on the Power of the Keys', which seems to bear very pertinently on this subject. "It is the more likely way, as Quinctilian saith, comparing public and private teaching of youth, to fill narrow-mouthed bottles (and such

are most of us) by taking them single in the hand, and pouring in water into each, than by setting them all together, and throwing never so many bottles of water on- them."

Now this practical illustration of the duty of house-to-house visitation, and personal influence over individuals, applies with even greater force to the non-attendants at your church than to the regular members of your congregation; they do not even give themselves the opportunity of receiving the surplusage of the waters of life thrown over the congregation; and a twofold necessity thus lies upon you to 1 Ch. iv. s. 104, p. 113, quoted in the Preface to Baxter's Reformed Pastor (p. xliii).

"take them single in the hand," and see whether you cannot "pour some water" of life " into each."

It is of coarse obvious that visitations of this kind will involve the parish pastor in many difficulties; and I shall seek to lay down some principles whereby those difficulties may be at least mitigated, if not altogether successfully encountered.

When you go forth, then, on your round of visits, be sure you bear in mind the Scriptural injunction that " the servant of the Lord must not strive; but be gentle unto all men; apt to teach, patient, in meekness instructing those that oppose themselves."

. This feeling will preserve you from merely seeking vain disputations, or placing any undue confidence in mere human powers of argument. Many with whom you will be placed in contact know nothing of the principles of reasoning ; what they require is, not conviction of the understanding, but an appeal to the affections; not the conquest of the intellect, but the conversion of the will; and the most conclusive argument may fail to convince some who will be deeply impressed and edified, when they trace in your kindly exhortations " the meekness and gentleness of Christ."

Creeds, you will remember,—however necessary to maintain inviolate the faith of the Church, —were not imposed with a view to

sepa-

rate, but to unite, believers; and as of course you are familiar with the history of the Confessions of Faith of National Churches, as well as with that of the Three Creeds of the Universal Church, you will be able to prove to those who may make captious objections either to the one or the other, that they have grown up from the necessities of the case; and that " articles of religion" in every faithful branch of the Church have been framed, not so much with the view of anathematizing all who were in any degree wrong, as of comprehending all who were in essentials right Before being led therefore into arguments upon detail, you will always do well to test the soundness of your parishioners' faith by a reference to the simple confessions of faith which were admitted as sufficient by the inspired teachers of the New Testament. " Belief in the crucified Jesus as Lord and Christ *" seems to have been all the creed required by St. Peter on his first preaching at Pentecost. " I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God 3 ," was the profession of the eunuch that justified Philip in receiving him into the covenant of grace. "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ/' was the answer of Paul to the gaoler at Philippi, who asked, "What must I do to be saved*?" "

Jesus and the resurrection," was the sum

* Acts ii. 36. 8 Acts viii. 37. * Acts xvi. 30, 31.

and substance of the same Apostle's teaching at Athens 5 ; and, in writing to the Romans, his test of sound doctrine was contained in these simple words, " If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved *."

If you and those to whom you are sent are thoroughly at one upon the great principle of personal salvation through Him who died upon the cross for both of you equally, you will not be likely to quarrel, however widely you may differ, and however important those differences may be, upon subsequent questions of discussion. Every student of Scripture who believes in our Lord as his personal Redeemer and Saviour, knows that He said these words, " By this

shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one toward another;' 9 he will not dare, therefore, to risk that Saviour's wrath—yea, that Saviour's rejection of himself' — by speaking and acting in an unkind and unloving manner toward those to whom he is sent that he may win them to Christ.

Not only this; he will be so armed with the " soft answer that turneth away wrath," and so fenced in by " forbearing in love," that he will neither give offence to, nor take offence from, his neighbour. And when each disputant on a

* Acts xvii. 18, &c. • Rom. x. 9.

question of detail is satisfied that the other has taken firm hold of the Rock of Salvation, and that he has a good hope of dwelling in the Saviour's kingdom throughout eternity, he will be quite ready to argue calmly and dispassionately as to the best mode of doing the Saviour's work on earth, and ascertaining the form, the shape, the functions and the power, which are the attributes of His kingdom in its militant condition in the world. One may " believe in the holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints" as a visible organized body; the other may believe in it as a spiritual body, whose limits are only perceptible to Jehovah's eye; but if both believe that they are spiritual members of the common Lord and Head of that body, they will be so strengthened by their loving sense of that vital union with Him and with one another, that they will love and respect each other, however widely they may conscientiously differ on the subject of external Church-membership.

Contemplate yourself then as a pastor, invested with authority by the Church in which you minister, making a series of parochial visits among your non-conformist parishioners. Is it not patent to the simplest apprehension that, if honest and earnest, these visits will not only render bitterness and hostility to the Church, as such, an impossible thing, but that they will leave a witness for Christ, for His Gospel, and for

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His Church, which would not have been raised, had such visits not been paid ? They demonstrate that a social union in Christ is possible, even where the sins or follies or prejudices of man have made ecclesiastical union impossible for the present ; and by exhibiting the love and care of the Church for souls, even of those estranged from her ecclesiastical pale, they pave the way for future generations to shelter themselves under her fostering wing, when temporary dissensions shall have vanished, and modern sects died out into obscurity, or frittered away their power into infinitesimal divisions.