church to forbid us? The great Apostle of the Gentiles. rejoiced so that Christ was preached, "whether in pretence or in truth," "whether of envy and strife, or of good will;" his anathemas were reserved for those who preached another gospel.

The Church is not one society; from the days of the apostles it has been composed of distinct societies, and yet the Church is ONE. We believe in the unity of the Church, but that unity is not the unity of form, it is not the mere unity of a machine; there may be unity and yet variety; there may be variety and yet harmony. Christ prayed to

his Father that the Church might be one; and, he added, as

we are one." This is not a unity of the branches at all, but a unity at the root. The unity that works outwardly into all the manifestations of the Church, is a spiritual, an inward unity. The unity of the body of Christ is constituted by one Spirit. Though some of us are conscientious separatists from the Established Church of this country, we are not guilty of the sin of schism. Schism is the breach of the unity of the Church. That unity is not destroyed because the form is no longer apparent. with all who love the Saviour; and if there be sin in separation, the sin may be with those who required at our hands that which the Scriptures did not sanction.

We are one in heart

Those who profess the same creed, and who adopt the same form, are not one. There is, at this present hour, far more of real unity between the Evangelical Churchman and the Dissenter, than between the contending parties in the English Church. If there be schism at all, it must be in the body; and the Tractarians, the very men who talk so much of unity, are, after all, the schismatics. We believe in one Church, that Church is like some magnificent cathedral,

with its divisions and departments; its massive pillars are the doctrines of the Gospel; its beautiful arches are Christian unity; its painted windows are stored with the histories of saints, and the triumphs of faith; and it contains within its walls the monuments and effigies of all the great and the good who have walked this earth. Is it not evident to you all, that Christ is not the exclusive property of any party? that his salvation is one common salvation? Is it not then arrogance for any section of the Church to act as though by some special enactment her ministers were made the sole agents for carrying God's merciful designs into effect, and as if the merits of Christ had been deposited in their custody? Our nonconformity is at least not incompatible with Christianity. We simply take the Scriptures, and say this is our statute-book. This is the book to which we make our appeal. If you differ from us in opinion, we do not condemn you; and, if there be any sin in our dissent from you, there is equally the same in your dissent from us. We are loyal subjects, and good citizens. We respect and honour human laws and governments; but with our consciences, with our worship, they have nothing to do. We even submit to be taxed for the maintenance of a religion from which we conscientiously dissent. But when men in power say to us, "You must believe what we believe, not because you are convinced of its truth, but because it is our belief! You must affirm that to be true, which you think to be a lie! You must allow us to choose your minister, and to frame your ritual! And if you will not consent to this, you shall have no ordinances and sacraments; you shall have no ministers; and, if possible, we will shut you out of heaven!"

our reply is, convince us: we are open to conviction; we must act conscientiously, and abide the consequences; God

The

help us! Nonconformity is simply calm resistance to intole rance in religion-resistance such as your cliffs, in all their rugged grandeur, offer to the progress of the ocean. rights of conscience are, from their very nature, inalienable. Man never did give them-he never can give them. It is man's inherent privilege to think for himself. And the right of believing where he sees evidence of truth, and of worshipping where he finds the presence of the divinity, as it cannot injure society, cannot belong to society. You have the power to pass an act of uniformity, but you have no power over the heart-the mind. You may impose the penalty, but you can only make men martyrs. You may excommunicate every Dissenter of every sect in these realms. You may declare that they are cut off from the communion of saints, and given over to Satan. And, as a proof of this, you may cite your canon laws: but we quietly ask for authority from God's Word for such an uncharitable proceeding; and appeal from your sentence to another and a higher tribunal. We are not at all afraid of the sentence of excommunication pronounced against us by an "English Priest;" his anathemas do not disturb our repose, or arouse our hostility. Excommunication, from such a quarter, comes to us with all the gracefulness and loveliness of a bride. Those principles must indeed be extreme, not to say Anti-Christian, which could lead one of Christ's professed ministers to declare that, with the exception of three hundred and twenty children in this town, the residue are perishing. Blessed Saviour! thou who didst take little children in thine arms, and bless them, saying that of such was the kingdom of heaven-Thou who didst rebuke thy disciples, because they would have prevented fond mothers from bringing their little ones to theeto thee we commend our children!

O charity, how art thou miscalled! truly we "know not thy definition," if thou didst prompt the priest to give utterance to so foul a statement!

And yet this very man, who could say such words as these, tells us in that same discourse, "These are the burning words, whose undying echo should reverberate from end to end of the universal Church-By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." The words that have echoed from end to end of this town, are not these words steeped in love, but words destitute alike of charity and of truth,-viz., that "Christianity is distinct from Puritanism-is no part or parcel of it; that it has no more sympathy with Puritanism than with Infidelity; and that it is a work of faith and love to help the advance of Christianity over the one as much as the other." Was there ever a greater libel? The priest knows little about the Puritans. Suffer me, in conclusion to say a few words in their defence.

Who were the Puritans? "They were," says one of the first of living writers, "the most remarkable body of men, perhaps, which the world has ever produced; they were men whose minds had derived a peculiar character from the daily contemplation of supernatural beings and eternal interests. Not content with acknowledging, in general terms, an overruling providence, they habitually ascribed every event to the will of the great Being, for whose power nothing was too vast, for whose inspection nothing too minute. To know him, to serve him, to enjoy him, was with them the great end of their existence: they rejected with contempt the ceremonious homage which other sects substituted for the pure worship of the soul. Instead of catching occasional glimpses of the Deity, through an obscuring veil, they aspired to gaze full on the intolerable brightness, and to commune with him

face to face. Hence originated their contempt for terrestrial things." "If they were unacquainted with the works of philosophers and poets, they were deeply read in the oracles of God. If their names were not found in the registers of heralds, they felt assured they were recorded in the book of life. If their steps were not accompanied by a splendid train of menials, legions of ministering angels had charge over them. Their palaces were houses not made with hands. Their diadems crowns of glory which should never fade away. On the rich and the eloquent, on nobles and priests, they looked down with contempt; for they esteemed themselves rich in a more precious treasure, and eloquent in a more sublime language,-nobles by the right of an earlier creation, and priests by the imposition of a mightier hand." In addition to this description, let me say Puritanism distinguished the true from the false in forms and ceremonies: it found mere forms insupportable, and trampled on them, saying, "No forms at all, rather than these mere phantasms and shows." It preferred reality, however unadorned, to the semblance of things, though invested with the world's homage. These men said, in seriousness and with deep earnestness, "We have souls-we know that we have, and we must have the truth-God's truth. We are not children-we want not pageants; we are men, and we must have realities." The Puritan preachers were prime masters of speech-they were nature's orators. They knew nothing but Christ, and him crucified; they had thoughts and words for no other theme; their words were steeped in love; and their burning thoughts found a way into men's minds. It might be said of them, They believed, therefore have they spoken. What was the great offence of the Puritans? They asked, simply, liberty to worship God in their own way;-no unreasonable require