rors and the divisions, which made it necessary that these strong protests, and pointed admonitions against evil doctrines and evil teachers should be both recorded and proclaimed.

That ever since that time, not only schisms, but heresies have abounded in the church, is so, far from being matter of doubt or of question, that, on the contrary, their existence and number have been favourite topics of declamation with the most celebrated champions of infidelity. This has been considered as one of the weakest parts of our holy religion by all those who have laboured either openly or covertly to subvert its foundations. A comparison has even been instituted between Christianity and Paganism, for the purpose of ascribing to the latter a pre-eminence in point of humanity, and of liberality. We have been told of the indulgence which the different nations of the heathen always shewed to each other in this respect; that not only individuals, but bodies of men were allowed, without interruption, to worship such gods, and to use such ceremonies as they had chosen to adopt; while, on the other hand, the several descriptions of Chris tians, though professing to worship the same God, have persecuted each other, even to death, for differences the most trivial and insignificant; and we have been asked, if this was the

charity and the peace which we say that it was the end of our religion to establish?

To these, and the like cavils, very sufficient answers have at different times, and by various persons been returned My present business is only with the fact of the schisms' having existed; which however, to any sound reasoner, will never furnish the least inference at all prejudicial to the interest of Christianity. It must still be apparent that to those divisions, which have so sorely rent the church, the word of God has never, properly speaking, ministered an occasion. In the perverse inclinations of men, and in the violence of their passions, the true source of all these disorders must be sought. And having been, as they were foretold by our Saviour, they are in truth. to be numbered, as I have before hinted, among the evidences of his divinity. It must also be considered as a further proof of the Almighty hand which hath wrought for us, that that disunion, which almost invariably operates to the

1 See Dr. Maltby's Observations upon some of these later attacks, Illustrations of the Truth of the Christian Religion, chap. vii. I cannot help feeling some concern at seeing new, and apparently very Jarge editions of Gibbon's History advertised. If Hume and he are still to continue our great masters in historical knowledge, surely it is desirable that the publication of them should be accompanied with such notes, as should detect and expose their attacks upon religion, and the unfairness of their narrative in all that relates to the welfare and advancement of the church of Christ.

dissolution of every community where it enters, has in this instance had no such effect; nay, that it has even produced consequences that were beneficial; not the least considerable of which has been the preservation of the holy Scriptures in their integrity; while the jealousy of the different sects, watching over each other, has made any material falsification or interpolation almost impossible.

Still, however greatly we may admire the wisdom and the power of God, which can thus bring good out of evil: however firmly we may be persuaded that the existence of schism, far from operating as an excuse for rejecting the gospel, does in reality furnish the strongest arguments against infidelity, we must not suffer ourselves to be deluded into an idea, that it is a matter indifferent in itself, or not an evil of the greatest magnitude. Still less must we imagine, that it is an act against the commission of which we have no need to be guarded; or which, when committed, requires not to be deplored and repented of. We must regard it as, what in truth it is, what it has always in the church, until very late years, been taken to be, a very grievous sin. It is one, of which every congregation, as well as every individual, looked upon themselves as particularly concerned to stand clear. Whenever, therefore, a separation took place in any church, or community of

, Christians, great anxiety was shown by every one of the parties to account for their conduct; and to shew that the guilt, which was universally allowed to follow the act, did not belong to them and to their friends, but to those of the other side. It was wisely reasoned that, although our Saviour had foretold consequences which would follow from his doctrine, this did in no degree operate as a recommendation or approbation of them; that his having declared, that "he was not come to give peace upon "earth, but rather division," would no way excuse the individuals, by whose means peace should be driven away, and division brought in. It was remembered, that in the very same breath with which he had at another time declared that, "It must needs be that offences "should come *" he had added, "Woe to that man by whom the offence cometh."

If we required any arguments to shew, what indeed our reason might of itself point out to us, the great utility, as well as loveliness of union, our blessed Lord has not left us to seek. The repeated and forcible exhortations tending to that effect, which he delivered in his several discourses to his disciples; and more especially in those which immediately preceded his crucifixion, speak but too evidently what was the

*Matthew xviii. 7.

end of his doctrine, and what were the means by which he intended that it should be advanced. He prayed to the Father, that the disciples "might be one, even as the Father and he "were one*;" than which it is impossible to devise any terms more expressive of the completest union in every respect, in thought and in word, as well as in deed. And that this unity of the church was intended to produce great and powerful effects even upon those that were without, we are not left merely to infer; for he goes on almost immediately after to repeat his prayer for the apostles, in order, as he says, addressing himself to the Father, "That "they all may be one, as thou Father art

in me, and I in thee; that they may also be one with us, that the world may believe that thou hast sent met." The union of Christians with one another was, you see, to be an evidence of the divine mission of their great teacher and master. Again, he says, the more to enforce it, "I in them, and thou in me; "that they may be made perfect in one, and "that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them as thou hast loved

met" It is impossible to consider these, among other passages, without being satisfied that they relate, not merely to the preserva

* John xvii. 11.

+ Ib. 21.

+ Ib.