And is not this state of grace attainable? Let us think of the promises to which the Apostle appeals,-the promises which he had just adduced, and the peculiarity of which is, that they are already, to a very blessed extent, fulfilled in the experience of every true believer. "Ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be My sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty." Here we have the assurance that, even as God selected His ancient people Israel to fix His dwelling among them, so He now regards the living Church of Jesus Christ as His temple, dwelling in the midst of His people, and even in each individual believer, and delighting to reveal in the experience of each His glory and His grace; here, too, we are assured that He will be our covenant-God, imparting to us all that it becomes the eternal God to confer on those whom He specially acknowledges as His own; and here we have the promise, that He will be a Father unto us, giving us the right of filial access to Him, and rejoicing over us to assimilate us to His character, and to fill us with His love. We stay not now to enforce the duty of seeking that perfect purity which these gracious engagements of God show to be binding upon Let it suffice to allude only to the first of them. If God has really chosen His believing people to be His "temple,”—if He "dwells" among us, and "walks" among us, nay, if He dwells in us,-shall He find sin cherished or allowed in His own peculiar habitation? But let us reflect,-for these remarks are designed to be helpful to those who long for established and perfect holiness, but to whom the blessing seems to be at an almost infinite distance,let us reflect, whether these engagements of God do not open the way to our actual and present attainment of the exalted privilege of which the Apostle speaks. Already we enjoy, if we are believers, the indwelling of the Spirit of God; already we claim Him as our covenant-God; already we approach Him as our Father, and are assured of our filial interest in all His perfections, and in all the dispensations of His providence and grace, while we know that He delights especially in our conformity to Himself. And cannot the richer grace of the Spirit, when we believingly claim it through Christ, remove from our hearts the evils that lurk there, and give establishment to every right and pure affection? We want nothing different in kind from that which we now enjoy. We need only the more abundant communication of the sanctifying Spirit, to mature our filial love to God, and to exclude from our hearts whatever is contrary to it.

18.

Among the hopeful indications of spiritual progress in our Connexion, we place the revived attention given to the subject of Christian holiness. We sincerely trust that this state of things will continue; and that in all our Societies there will be called forth an intense desire of that purity in which God delights, and which Christ designs to confer on His believing people. He "gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works." At the same time we are anxious that the beautiful completeness of Scriptural teaching on the subject of holiness should ever be kept in view. That holiness, while it has its seat in the heart, and is, indeed, the result of the indwelling of the Spirit of Christ, making us partakers of the hidden life which flows from our exalted Head, will ever develop itself in our temper and deportment, and in a course of practical obedience to the Divine will. "We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." "Now the God of peace, that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you perfect in every good work, to do His will, working in you that which is well pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.” That holiness, too, is to be sustained by the truth of God, cherished, realized, dwelt upon, and thus interwoven with all our habits of thought and feeling. We should never forget the prayer of our Lord, "Sanctify them through Thy truth: Thy word is truth." Nor should we fail to mark how the Apostle Paul, in his prayers for the Churches, again and again adverts to the increase of heavenly wisdom and spiritual understanding, as eminently conducive to the continual growth of our holy affections, and to our meetness for the purer society of heaven. Let us think only of his prayer for the Colossians: "For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; that ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, unto all patience and long-suffering with joyfulness; giving thanks unto the Father, who hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light." Still further, when we think of Christian holiness, we should remember that there is no state of grace attainable on earth, which will free us from liability to temptation and inward conflict,since even our blessed Lord, the spotless One, "was in all points tempted like as we are," and that there are imperfections, not

involving moral evil, which result from the character of the present state, and from the connection of the mind with the body, liable as the latter is to disease and depression. But while we guard our conceptions of Christian holiness against exaggeration and abuse, let us firmly hold the precious truth, that "the very God of peace," who has displayed the riches of His grace in the whole constitution of the mediatorial scheme, and who is now our covenant-God, is able and ready to "sanctify us wholly," and that, by His energy, retained, on our part, by habitual watchfulness and prayer, our "whole spirit and soul and body" may be "preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." The consciousness, indeed, of our frailty may sometimes suggest that to this state we can never rise; but let us dwell rather on the combined power and faithfulness of HIM `who has brought us near to Himself in Christ Jesus, and whose glory is involved in our purity and our everlasting triumph: "Faithful is He that calleth you, who also will do it."

Among the special duties which claim the attention of Christians, and the faithful observance of which is now, if possible, more than ever important, we would place the cultivation of that brotherly love which our Lord has enjoined in His own new commandment. Surely the bonds which unite us to Him, our common Head, and thus also to each other, are closer and dearer than any other bonds which earthly associations may supply! In many things, which Christ has not settled, we may innocently differ from each other; and, honouring each other's motives, may still feel that we are one in Him. The governing principle of our whole life, as Christians, —our life on earth and our life in heaven,-is devotion to the Saviour:-"For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself: for whether we live, we live unto the Lord, and whether we die, we die unto the Lord; whether we live, therefore, or die, we are the Lord's. For to this end Christ both died, and rose, and revived, that He might be Lord both of the dead and living." That love of spiritual sympathy which is to distinguish believers is unearthly in its character, and can only be maintained by a close personal walk with God. And how great are our inducements to cultivate it! It is the object of our Lord's special complacency; it brings to the mind a deep inward peace; it gives a foretaste of the spiritual friendships which distinguish the heavenly state, and the pure joys of that unbroken unity which will there be realized; and its habitual manifestation would evince, more perhaps than anything else, the reality and power of that working of God which changes and sanctifies the human mind. Never should we forget that our Lord has made the maintenance and development of this brotherly love,-a love such as that which He has shown to us, and which still fills His heart now that He sits upon His heavenly

throne, the test of our discipleship to Himself, and the grand means of impressing on the world that He is the Sent of the Father, and the Source of salvation and life. "A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye have love one to another." "Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on Me through their word; that they all may be one; as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee; that they also may be one in Us; that the world may believe that Thou hast sent Me."

oneness.

And this leads us to reflect on the relative position of the several branches of the Church of God in the present day, and the duty which devolves on them of seeking closer association, and presenting to the world a more impressive manifestation of their essential There is a sacred instinct in the breasts of all who are truly Christ's, which, if it were allowed full scope, would draw them into blessed union in the exercises of devotion. And, in the presence of errors which assail the very foundations of our faith, or oppose the great evangelical principles that form the essence of the Gospel, is it not binding on all who hold these principles in common, and who are intent on the advancement of spiritual religion, to strengthen each other's hands by uniting in prayer and holy effort? There are, alas! many obstacles to this union over which the thoughtful Christian may well weep. One of the greatest, perhaps, is the theory, still accepted and cherished by many, that the system of Diocesan Episcopacy, derived, as it is alleged, from the Apostles, is the only form of Church-order possessed of Divine validity, instead of its being regarded as one among the several forms which the Church of Christ may assume, while retaining all that is essential to the Christian ministry and the Christian ordinances. It is clear that they who cling to this theory cannot frankly and cordially recognise their brethren who have not received episcopal ordination as ministers of Christ; and thus there is induced a shyness which detracts from the comfort of mutual intercourse, and which prevents, or obscures, the manifestation of spiritual unity. If that theory were abandoned, a bright day would dawn upon the Churches, and the hope of closer union and cordial co-operation would dispel many of the clouds which now darken the cause of Christ in the world. For then the way would be opened for all evangelical Churches to combine, as Churches, in meetings for devotion; and the time would not be very distant, we might hope, when, by some little mutual concessions, the ministers and members of the Churches might meet at the table of the Lord, to show forth His death till He come, and to avow their appropriation of His sacrifice for acceptance with the Father and eternal life.

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Even now, we rejoice to think that the sacred impulses of fraternal love lead many of the most thoughtful and devout of Christ's people to seek association in devotional exercises, as individual Christians, holding in common essential truth, and leaving minor questions open. We turn with interest to the recent Conference of Evangelical Christians in New York, and rejoice in the proof which it afforded of the possibility of manifesting spiritual oneness amidst diversities of Church-organizations and of outward forms. satisfaction and gratitude all such gatherings: but we long for the We hail with time when all evangelical Churches, as such, shall cordially recognise each other, and, by their fraternal intercourse, shall show to the world, that "there is one body, and one Spirit, even as we are called in one hope of our calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in us all." In the meantime, it is ours to promote this issue, by guarding against all strife and bitterness, by avowing our principles, when occasion requires us to do so, with meekness and with a respectful regard to the different opinions of our brethren, and by endeavouring to bring together, in our different spheres, "all who love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity."

It would be improper to close these counsels without a reference to our duty to the masses of unconverted men by whom we are surrounded. In every direction there are multitudes practically living "without God in the world; " pursuing the pleasures or the possessions of earth with eager interest, and treating the moral government of Jehovah with careless neglect. In our own congregations, too, there are many who have done violence to the religious impressions received in a Christian home, or in the Sabbath-school, and have entered upon a course of worldliness, though they shrink back, perhaps, from open and flagrant sin. These last have, in many cases, become indifferent to the truths which are uttered from the pulpit, and need a special visitation of the Holy Spirit to arouse them to reflection and to melt them into penitence. Should there not be earnest and continued prayer for such visitations, as well as for the gentle dew of spiritual influence which always accompanies the faithful ministration of "the truth as it is in Jesus;" refreshing the souls of believers, and revealing to hearts, not yet hardened in sin, the mercy of God in Christ? To the utterly careless, who neglect the sanctuary, we should go forth, and endeavour, in every possible way, to bring them under the influence of the truth. We rejoice in the revived earnestness with which out-door preaching has of late been carried on, and in the aggressive efforts put forth in connection with Town Missions. But each individual Christian should seek for himself to win some