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duties, and lines of conduct on the part of Christians and Christian Churches, which may be said to be practically within the power of such, if so disposed, to pursue, and which strongly tend to union; and if Christians and Christian Churches are not so disposed to do these things, it may then be clearly seen who are the true schismatics that destroy the unity of the body of Christ. We would mention but three of these possible or practicable measures, that, if carried out faithfully, would surely make for peace and union.

(1.) The equal rights of all Christians and Christian Churches to be mutually recognized and practically acknowledged. A true Church of Christ, whatever its name, ought to be regarded by other Christian Churches as entitled to all the rights and privileges that belong to a true portion and member of the body of Christ. Its ministers, or officers, regularly ordained and accredited, should be recognized by other churches as ministers of the Church of Christ, especially since the ordination of a Christian minister does not derive its prime validity from the act of man but from the appointment of Christ. Its members, under due tests and restrictions, should be held to be members of the Church of Christ, and entitled to the privilege of full communion and fellowship in all other churches. There might be, we grant, at first, great practical difficulties in the way of carrying out this plan or mode of inter-ecclesiastical · action, but the difficulties would grow less and less as the churches became more pure and more filled with the love and charity of the gospel. Mutual concessions must be made for the sake of higher objects.* The recognition of the true membership of Christ's body would be a slow process, and caution would have to be employed in the extension of Church fellowship to low types of Christian faith and of so-called Christian Churches. The tests of the gospel, looking to the reality of character, to the work of Christ's Spirit in the heart, to the existence of the common evangelic-life implanted by the grace of

* The Dean of Canterbury recently preached by invitation in the Chapel of Yale College, and was listened to with marked attention and respect. If President Porter were to be invited to preach in the Dean's pulpit, the circle of Christian liberality and courtesy would be complete. It is fair to surmise that if it depended upon the Dean there would be little difficulty in the case.

God in ways and methods, and under forms of religious education and worship quite varied oftentimes from ordinary standards, perhaps in heathen lands as well as in highly civilized de-christianized communities, would have to be applied with a pure discrimination and a broad charity, following the blessed example of Christ and the instructions and spirit of His Word. The largest liberty is not to be feared so long as a true faith in Him who is the meaning, and beginning, and end, and glorious divine life of the Church, is maintained in the hearts of those who are called after His name, and who are appointed to perpetuate and extend His kingdom in the world.

(2.) The community of Christian living, which also includes working, to be observed among all the followers of Christ. There should be open and hearty coöperation among all who call themselves Christians, of whatever Church or denomination, in Christian life and activity. This life proceeds from an inward power imparted by his Spirit to all who serve Christ, and this life therefore should be manifested in common among all Christians as something superior to outward differences. This union was a very practical thing in the apostolic times, and exerted a powerful influence upon the daily life of Christian disciples; it was a great force constantly brought to bear upon the shaping and ordering of their conversation and all their actions: "Wherefore," said the apostle, clinching the instructions with the strongest reason that an inspired mind could employ,-"putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor; for we are members one of another." A common love, a common aim to serve the Master, should bring all together in one, should break down every partition wall, and all hearts and hands should join in the work of doing good, of preaching the gospel to the poor, of building up Christ's kingdom of righteousness on the earth. The individualism of our churches-seemingly growing more and more narrow and divisive--renders these efforts at grand, united, aggressive missionary work almost an impossible thing.

3. Communion in worship. We may as churches and individual believers formally repeat the apostolic creed, credo in sanctam ecclesiam catholicam, sanctorum communionem, but unless as Christians we pray together in the spirit, our faith in the

catholicity of the Church and the communion of saints may be doubted. As the purity of spiritual worship increases, and as the divine fact of Christ's intercession as our only High Priest, by whom through the Spirit we all have access to the Father, is more truly recognized, then the differences even in modes and forms of worship will more and more be done away. Devotion is a bond of unity. It is woven by the thousandfold breath of prayer. If the devotional communion of all Christian Churches should ever gain ground, they would pray themselves into one. They would be benefitted also in the methods and power of public worship-the Protestant worship would gain in richness from the beauty and copiousness of the ancient liturgies, the liturgical Churches would learn the language of primitive spontaneous devotion; but in the breath of common supplication the whole Church would be brought by one Spirit into the unity of the gospel, and closer to the heart of Christ, the ever-living source of a common life, faith, and love.

In a word, this unity of the Church must be a real matter, something more than an easily affirmed and boasted spiritual unity. The spiritual union, it is true, is the essence of the bodily union, but it must be so genuinely spiritual that it shall truly manifest itself, that it shall be seen in the united life of the whole body of Christ on earth. It must not be so inwardly invisible that it is not visible at all. It must not be put off to heaven while Christians are fighting here below; each sect, or church, jealously standing on the defensive on its own fortified hill. We are not opposed, as has been remarked, to those different church-zions. Let them still exist, but let their walls be demolished. Let grain and fruit-trees be planted where once the frowning battlement and grim weapon of defence stood. Let each church cultivate its own field and vineyard in peace, welcoming, however, the mutual help and the common products of its neighbors. We would not have the earth, religiously speaking, to become a monotonous agricultural farm-school, but rather a garden of the Lord, with its infinite variety and beauty. Let those who by education, affinities, and tastes are Congregationalists, or Presbyterians, or Episcopalians, each take good care of

his own-they would probably do more good in this way-but at the same time let them be careful to work not so much upon the line of denominationalism, or narrow ecclesiasticism, as upon the higher plane, of the one universal Church and kingdom of Christ; and we would here commend to all our brethren the words of Dr. Parker of London, that seem to have been inspired by the influences of the late meeting of the Evangelical Alliance:-"Men separated from each other by the widest ecclesiastical distances have looked each other in the face, have bowed in common prayer at the same altar, and extended to each other the right hand of Christian recognition and fellowship. From that advanced line of brotherhood there must be no retreat. The good vow has been spoken and must never be recalled. For my own part my decision is taken, a decision to seek out lines of sympathy and union rather than to magnify points of antagonism and alienation." A noble resolve which all should imitate! "From that advanced line of brotherhood there must be no retreat,"—and there must be also further advance. The evangelical alliance of the future must not be all on the side of Protestantism, but must sweep a wider circle, and comprehend all who, even though in much imperfection, under rites and forms of pure superstition, or in the barrenness of religious ignorance, still recognize in their hearts Jesus Christ as the way of life to sinful men, and as the hope of the world. The next Evangelical Alliance which is formed should not assume an adverse or antagonistic attitude to any, but like the universal gospel which it aims to express, should take into its efforts, prayers, thoughts, and loving sympathies, the whole brotherhood of man,

ARTICLE VII. THE RELATION OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND TO THE OTHER PROTESTANT

CHURCHES.

CERTAIN events connected with the recent Conference of the Evangelical Alliance in this country have brought up anew for discussion the attitude of the Church of England, at present and in the past, towards the other Protestant churches. It is well known that there is now, and long has been, a party in the Episcopal Church, who have refused to hold communion with other Protestant bodies, for the reason that these discard the Episcopal polity, and that their ministers are not ordained by bishops. This party, which goes by the name of the High Church, is composed of two subdivisions. The one class is made up of those who carry their views of doctrine and their notions of worship to the verge of Romanism, and look with more or less yearning towards the Greek and Latin Churches, whose doctrine of transubstantiation is regarded with less aversion than that which is felt to the prevailing opinions of Protestants respecting the sacrament. The other class are hostile to Rome, and to the Ritualism that copies her ceremonies, but maintain the exclusive sanctity of Episcopal ordination, and, therefore, stand aloof from the other churches of the Reformation. The Church of England, with its offshoots and branches, is, in their system, the one true Church, with which alone it is lawful to have ecclesiastical communion. All other churches are shut out of ecclesiastical fellowship, either as being nonepiscopal, or, like Rome, as being corrupt.

Now there is a class of writers of the High Church party who seek to convey the impression, sometimes by direct assertion, and sometimes by more indirect means, that the Church of England, in the first century after the Reformation, or in the period prior to Laud and to the act of uniformity under Charles II, professed the theories which they now profess, and stood in the isolated and exclusive position in which their party, since the middle of the seventeenth century, have striven to` hold her. We do not mean to impute this gross perversion of

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