A Guide to the Church

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ecclefiaftical unity may be difpenfed with; and that differences on that fubject are matters of unimportant confideration.

will

With these fentiments before you, I truft you no longer think, that the most confirmed judgment with refpect to the nature of the Chriftian church, and the obligation all Chriftians lie under to conform to it, is neceffarily connected with an uncharitable difpofition towards thofe, who think fit to separate from it. To give Chriftians right notions of the church, that, by understanding what is meant by living in unity and godly love, they may be difpofed to conform to the will of its Divine Founder, is, I conceive, one of the greatest acts of charity that a Christian minister can perform. Should he not fucceed in his endeavours to promote the welfare of his fellow-Chriftians, he ought at least to have credit for his intention, and not be made anfwerable for confequences which it is his profeffed object to prevent. Many learned and wife men, from a want either of firmness of mind or decifion of judgment, have been induced to palliate and foften doctrines which it was their duty earnestly to maintain. Others there are, whofe profeffiona! abilities might qualify them to stem the tide

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CONCLUDING LETTER.

of prevailing error, who adopt a maxim unfanctioned either by the Gospel or experience, that false opinions, if let alone, will die of themselves. These are patterns of discretion, after which I feel no wish to copy. The Bible has taught me, what it will teach every man who is difpofed to learn, that there can be no compromise between truth and error. If, therefore, the doctrine maintained in my book refpecting the church, as a fociety of CHRIST's framing, be true; the conclufions drawn from it must stand their ground, how unpalatable foever they may be to those Christians, who, "inftead of drawing living water for the ufe of the fanctuary from the fresh Springs of antiquity, take up with fuch as comes to them at fecond or third hand from the Lake of Geneva."

The caufe I have taken in hand, I am well aware is not a popular one. That weak and temporizing conduct, by which many of the cabinets of Europe have contributed to the fuccefs of the defolating fyftem of French policy, feems to be the conduct which is judged to be best suited to the prefent circumstances of the church. The confequence, it is to be feared, will be, that that deluge of fectarianifm which is now inundating our land on every fide, will in the end fweep away every barrier which the conftitution of

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this country has to oppose to its deftructive progrefs. This idea, however, is not likely, at this time, to be generally adopted. The loofe habit of thinking,

which constitutes one of the characteristics of the present day, must be unfavourable to an advocate for established order. But that minifter of the church who is not prepared to go through evil report, has undertaken an office for which he is unqualified. "If they have called the master of the house beelzebub, how much more fhall they call them of his household." MATT. X. 24, 25.

When I confider what the church of England has been, and what she now is, (to make use of the strong language of a very great man) "like an oak, cleft to fhivers with wedges made out of its own body," it is not without anxiety that I look forward. When I confider, moreover, that the established church of England, an undoubted branch of the church of CHRIST, furnishes the best fecurity for the prefervation both of Chriftian doctrine and the peace and happiness of my country; my earnest prayer to GoD is, that fhe may be reftored to Apoftolic purity. Should it, however, be the will of that Being who ruleth in all the kingdoms of the earth, that, in judgment for the defertion of her profeffing friends,

or the general unworthinefs of her members, the enemies of the church fhall be permitted to lay her honour in the duft, as a minister fincerely attached to her cause, I feel no wish to furvive the fatal event.