assures us, that that faith which does not influence its possessor's actions is profitless. A mere assent to the doctrines of the Divine existence, the incarnation of Jesus Christ, and the inspiration of the Bible, is not the faith which justifies. It is well, so far as it goes, says this apostle; but as it fails to affect the conduct, it is valueless. "Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble." The same doctrine is held by John: "Whoso bath this world's good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?" Here the existence of our love to the Creator is denied, if we give no proof of love to the creature. The apostle adds, "My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth." Thus it is that Christianity blesses society through Christians; and thus our heavenly Father manifests His kindness to "the unthankful and the unholy," by commanding the recipients of His salvation to "do good unto all men as they have opportunity." How little does the ungodly world know its obligations, even thus, to our holy religion! The greatest patriots and philanthropists have been those who were animated by the beneficent spirit of Christianity; and there is a stream of happiness ever flowing over society, for which, though it knows it not, it is indebted to the genius of the religion of Christ. And who knows not that our Tract, Bible, Sabbath School, Missionary, and Anti-Slavery Societies, owe their existence to the benevolent influences of this religion on individual minds ?-men who felt that the right discharge of the duties of life could not be neglected consistently with their allegiance to God. We venture to express the opinion, that had the practical truths of Christianity had that prominence in the visible Church, which they have in the New Testament, it would not have exhibited the painful spectacle it does. Its strength has been fretted away, its union destroyed, and its fair fame stained by opinions, which, though they have produced numerous sects, and endless divisions, seem in many instances to have been of little practical consequence. The doctrines of religion are of course important; but while the population remains ignorant of the "true God, and of His Son Jesus Christ," and while the inhabitants of the world perish "for lack of knowledge"-the knowledge that makes "wise unto salvation" we apprehend that any doctrine which does not legitimately lead to evangelic efforts for the removal of the thick darkness that overspreads the people, is of little value. The Christian Church ought to recognise the fact, that the voice of the people, crying for spiritual instruction, is the voice of God commanding her to "go up and possess the land." The zeal of the professed disciple to lead others "into the way of peace," has been justly considered one of the best evidences of the reality of his discipleship. And the same test may be, with equal propriety, applied to the aggregate body. "Son, go work in my vineyard," is a command addressed to every member of the Church of the first-born. But if we spend our energies, "till the going down of the sun," in disputes about the exact shape, size, and temperament of the tools to be employed in labour, the command will be disobeyed, the work will be neglected, and we shall suffer the disgrace attaching to unprofitable servants. Never will the Church of Christ discharge her duty, either to the world or to her Divine Head, until she cease to be the theatre of polemics. Let her various branches wave with the fruits of salvation. Let her various sections" provoke one another to love and to good works;" let them come down from their mountains of sectarian pride, for the purpose of giving battle to the common foe that spreads its countless thousands over the surrounding plains; and the mountain-mists which previously gave them a monster appearance to each other, will speedily dispel before the approving smile of "the Sun of Righteousness. Let them by all means "contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints;" but it will be well, to recollect, that that faith, while it embodies much that is practical, is something very different from articles, confessions, creeds, and symbols-contentions about which always have resulted, and always will result, not in unity and brotherly kindness, but in divisions and "all uncharitableness." There is no necessity for any section of the visible Church trying to invade its neighbour's territory. There is abundance of unclaimed property-unexplored regions,-vast tracts, where the spirit of Christian cultivation has not yet tried its mighty powers,-dark spots, on which the sun-light of revealed truth has not yet poured its glorious beams. "The world is all before us where to choose;" so that we need not be solicitous to enter "another man's line of things made ready to our hands." "Yea, so have I strived to preach the Gospel," said the eminently practical Paul, "not where Christ was named, lest I should build upon another man's foundation; but as it is written, To whom He was not spoken of, they shall see, and they that have not heard shall understand." The spirit of the age is a spirit of progression; and though in some instances it may appear tending towards evil, yet for the general impulse we are indebted to the genius of Christianity. The standard truths of Christianity will receive no fracture by the rapidity of the movement. And if any section of the visible Church seem unprepared to join in the triumphant march of that spiritual army, which is to conquer the nations, and lay the spoils of heathenism at the foot of the cross, we must conclude, consistently with all necessary charity, that there is some drag of earthly manufacture chained to it, of which it must either get rid, or be left behind, to slumber on. Trees that cumber the vineyard are marked for the feller's axe. There is something defective in the organization of that system of religion, that is destitute of the power of expansion. Any system that cannot develope its peculiarities without the aid of local circumstances, is thus incapacitated from embracing the world. Let those parts of the army, therefore, that have laid "aside every weight," run "to the help of the Lord against the mighty;" for those that are "entangled with the affairs of this world," are not in marching condition. Christianity will not be injured even by the dissolution of those local corporations that have borne its name. The downfall of hierarchs may occasion some dust; but the atmosphere will soon be cleared for the free transmission of the sound of the glorious Gospel. Some timid brethren tremble at the idea of such a catastrophe, as if the oracles of truth were to be buried in its ruins; but with equal soundness of argument might it be urged, that the removal of the window-tax would pluck the sun from the firmament. We have been led into these remarks by the thought, that the Author of Christianity has not merely made it imperative on His followers to discharge relative duties, from a principle of obedience to Him, but that He has so constituted Christianity, as to show that its practical value was chiefly aimed at. " Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature," was His ascending injunction; and it has found a ready echo in all ages, in every regenerated mind, that has imbibed the benevolent spirit of Christianity. Nor is there any wonder; for the attempt to monopolize spiritual gifts is repugnant to their very nature. "God hath made of one blood all nations of men, to dwell on the face of the earth;" and our mutual wants, our mutual dependences, and our mutual claims, daily illustrate a fact that lies at the foundation of the social compact, as well as at that of evangelic obedience, namely, "None of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself." The insulating principle, the spirit of egotism, and the cold-souled indifference of Stoicism, are alike condemned by law and Gospel, by Moses and Christ, by the operation of the social affections, and by enlightened philanthropy. The most sublime strains of inspired poetry, and the finest touches of the prophetic pencil, are found in those passages which sing of, and picture, the influence of Christianity in softening into harmonious unity the selfish discords of men; in smoothing their natural asperities; and in knitting society together by the bands of love in one happy brotherhood. Nature is ransacked for images, to represent this fraternity. The wolf and the lamb, the leopard and the kid, the calf and the young lion, the cow and the bear, are supposed to feed and lie down together. "Instead of the thorn and the briar," natural emblems of the curse, "the fir-tree and the myrtle" are promised to spring up; and it is predicted, that there shall be nothing left to hurt or destroy. "And the jealousy of Ephraim shall cease, And the enmity of Judah shall be no more." In reference to the complete fulfilment of these and similar prophecies, we have not the shadow of a doubt. But how is such a mighty and all-glorious revolution to be effected amidst the conflicting and jarring elements of the moral world? By THE BLESSING OF HEAVEN ON HUMAN INSTRUMENTALITY. III. Conventional arrangements do not destroy individual responsibility. We have already remarked, that an intelligent agent is necessarily accountable to the Bestower of that intelligence. Men may constitute systems for mutual benefit or mutual defence; they may organize societies for effecting good to the general body, on the recognised principle that harmonious combination can do that which individual effort would fail in accomplishing; they may empower individuals of their number to make laws for the better regulation of the affairs of the general bodyto which laws every individual of the body tacitly pledges obedience, inasmuch as they have been made by his own delegate. Or men may fraternize for purposes of evil. The principle is originally the same; namely, the power of combination to carry out unity of design. On some such theory as this, both local and general governments are founded. Man is a social creature; his social affections are powerfully operative-witness the family arrangement; and even in savage countries something may be found analogous to combination. Now, whatever may be the principles of organization in the civil compact, or the form of government prevailing for the time being-subjects on which Christianity, I think, gives no direction-and whatever amount of natural individual right may be transferred to the society so organized, there can be no transference of individual responsibility, so far as the duties of religion, or the claims of God on individual allegiance, are concerned. Man cannot surrender his conscience to the keeping of his fellow man. He may yield his property, or his person; he may resign many of his natural rights; he may authorise his deputy to attend to his political privileges; he may do all this, as a citizen of the state; but there are inalienable rights connected with the empire of conscience :-these are not transferable. He cannot believe by proxy, nor render an account to God by delegation. He dare not, without sin, enter into any compromise with man on the subject of fidelity to God. The authority of his Creator over him is as complete, as powerful, and as uninterrupted, as if there were no civil government, and no religious teacher. His position in the spiritual world is not affected by his social or political condition. As a member of civil society he may have duties to perform, but these can never exempt him from the discharge of the higher duties of religion. He is amenable to the civil magistrate for his conduct as a subject of the empire; but he is accountable to the Searcher of hearts-and to the Searcher of hearts alone-for the quality of his faith, and the state of his soul. The relation in which the governor and governed, the minister and hearer, the master and servant, the husband and wife, the father and child, stand to each other, indeed, may increase, but can never discharge from personal accountabilty. 'Every one of us shall give an account of himself to God." "The dead, small and great, must stand before God." The king and his meanest subject are alike subjects of a spiritual dominion, as distinct from all earthly governments, as is the material from the spiritual world. Christianity interferes not with earthly governments; the orbit in which she moves is higher, purer, more spiritual; the object she has in view, is greater and more enduring; but she summons governors and governed too, to acknowledge her supremacy and to bow to her sceptre, not in their corporate, but in their individual capacity. And as Christianity condescends not to to teach political economy, neither ought politicians, in their political capacity, to presume to bring her down from her lofty sphere for the purpose of subserving their designs. The subjects of the civil magistrate are physical, and his kingdom temporal. The subjects of the King of kings are spiritual, and His dominion eternal. No combination, association, or confederacy; no form of government, or species of organization, shall be able, at the awful period of retribution, to screen one of the sons of Adam from the searching eye of the Judge. "Though hand join in hand, the wicked shall not go unpunished." And, on the other hand, no combination of adverse circumstances which at present envelope the lowly Christian, shall be able finally to prevent the glorious outburst of his graces; for the seed of the kingdom, though it often languish in an uncongenial soil, shall be cared for, and transplanted to the verdant banks of the river of life, "The reward of the inheritauce," and the felicities of the heavenly kingdom, shall be theirs. 66 "No more shall hunger pain their souls ; The Lamb that fills the middle throne And drink full joys from living streams." Meantime be it remembered, that the revelation of God assures us that the principles of immutable rectitude are the principles of His moral administration; and that, while every intelligeut being is commanded "Occupy till Ifcome," we are assured that "the son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son; the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him." "Behold," saith the Lord God, "all souls are Mine: as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is Mine: the soul that sinneth, it shall die." And though the impenitent shall "die in his iniquity," his blood will be required at the hand of the unfaithful prophet; for conventional arrangements do not destroy individual responsibility. RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION MORE WANTED THAN LEGISLATION. WHEN legislation has done its utmost, the greater portion of the principles on the direction and development of which the prosperity and happiness of society essentially depend, remain untouched. Legislation can only alter the form of society. It has nothing to do but with its outside. Much, indeed, depends even upon this. In Naval Architecture the very form of a vessel is important. But the whole work of the architect supposes that the materials employed are good. Now, here is the fault of the great majority of Constitution-mongers. They contend about the form, and if there be any deficiency or distress, straightway there must be alteration and reform, and whoever is not in favour of this re-formation of what has been formed, and re-formed over and over again, is denounced as a public enemy. The observer who, while he does not despise form, does not suppose that form is every-thing, may have ascertained that the disappointment has not arisen from the failure of the form because it was a mistaken one, but because the materials were in some places bad. It happens more frequently than mere politicians suppose, that the evils under which society labours, arise from causes beyond the reach of legislation, and which can only be reached by that, whatever it may be,-which is able to rectify the principles and rules of action, which govern individuals. What has not the law done to promote purity of election? But while men are to be found who want to be bribed, others will be found to bribe them. And who can prevent improper fluctuations in the price of an important article, when dealers will systematically have recourse to fraudulent sales, in which nothing is bought or sold, nothing paid or delivered. No laws can prevent deep, and wide, and ruinous commercial distress, while those are to be found who largely speculate, with the mad enthusiasm of the determined gambler, engaging in enterprises in which there was scarcely a single chance of success. May not the spirit of competition, though not so extensively ruinous as the spirit of speculation, slay, if not its tens of thousands, yet its thousands? How is the fair dealer to meet all demands upon him when he is undersold by his neighbour, who deludes the customer by promises and puffs, and pays him in carefully-disguised adulterations? Competition, say the political economists, is, for the public good. Goods are sold at a less price, and the buyer therefore, gets more for his money. That is only one part of the case. There is health injured by unwholesome articles. There is the loss to the community of the fair trader, who loses his trade because he cannot have recourse to dishonest dealings ;-and often the extensive ruin of the dashing speculator, himself, dragging many an innocent family after him. And even that spirit which has often been lauded in parliament, and which, properly directed and controlled, may produce great public benefit-(only it cannot be controlled or directed by legislation,) even that active spirit by which each individual wishes to rise in society, and improve his condition,-how much deadly mischief may be produced by this. The Watchman. THE first mention of psalmody in the New Testament, follows the account of the institution of the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. "And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the Mount of Olives"-(Matt. xxvi. 30; Mark xiv. 26). We find Paul and Silas in the dungeon at midnight "praying and singing praises to God." Several direct injunctions on this subject occur in the Epistles-Eph. v. 18, 19; Col. iii. 16; James v. 13, &c. The early Christians in this matter diligently followed the example of Christ and the precepts of His apostles. Pliny accuses them of holding meetings in the early morn for the purpose of singing hymns to Christ as God; and Lucian also notices their rage for psalm-singing. When driven by fiery persecution to savage dens and caves in solitary places, they found comfort in making the wild rocks echo with the voice of praise and supplication. Ignatius, who lived in the year of our Lord 100, mentions singing as a part of the worship of the eastern Churches. Augustine says, that it was first instituted in the western Churches during the persecution of Ambrose by Justina (mother of the Emperor Valentinian), who had been seduced by the Arian heresy. The devert people kept watch in the Church, ready to die with the Bishop, and sang psalms and hymns, lest they should wax faint through the tediousness of sorrow; "and from that day to this, this custom is retained; divers, yea, almost all the congregations throughout other parts of the world following therein"—(August. Confession, lib. ix. vii). Nazianzen and Chrysostom say, that it was customary to sing psalms and hymns at the burial of a Christian. This was a good practice, for it well befits the faithful to lift the voice of thanksgiving when a brother or sister is taken from the trouble and vexation of this miserable world, to that rest "which remaineth for the people of God." According to Eusebius, it was not till the fourth century that music formed a regular part of the offices of the Christian Church. Congregational psalmody became gradually more gorgeous and elaborate, often, I doubt not, from the contact with Paganism, into which some of the Churches were necessarily brought, and instead of a sweet and simple concord of the voices of the whole congregation, it began to be confined to the monks and priests, till at last it was expressly ordained by the Council of Laodicea, that the laity should be excluded from this part of the worship, and that none but singing-men and canons should presume to sing in the Church. The uses and abuses of singing and instrumental harmony in religious services are so beautifully stated by Augustine, that I venture to extract it: "At one time I seem to myself to give them more honour than is seemly, feeling our minds to be more holily and fervently raised unto a flame of devotion by the holy words themselves when thus sang than when not, and that the several affections of our spirit, by a sweet variety, have their own proper measures in the voice and singing by some hidden correspondence wherewith they are stirred up. . . . At other times, shunning over-anxiously this very deception, I err in too great strictness, and sometimes to that degree as to wish the whole melody of sweet music which is used to David's Psalter banished from my ears, and the Church's too; and that mode seems to me safer which I remember to have been told me by Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, who made the reader of the psalm utter it with so slight inflection of voice that it was nearer speaking than singing. Yet again, when I remember how I am moved, not with the singing, but with the things sung, when they are sung with a clear voice and modulation most suitable, I acknowledge the great use of this institution. Thus I fluctuate between peril of pleasure and approved wholesomeness; inclined the rather to approve the use of singing in the Church, that so, by the delight of the ears, the weaker minds may rise to the feeling of devotion." Basil, Ambrose, Jerome, and Chrysostom encouraged the more elaborate kinds of choral psalmody. The antiphonal mode of singing the psalms was first introduced at Antioch, where Basil and Chrysostom were brought up; it was taken to Milan by Ambrose, and generally adopted throughout Christendom under the name of the Ambrosian Chant. Pope Gregory I. greatly improved eccesiastical music, and from him the Gregorian Chant has its name. The English clergy were wont at first to repair to Rome to acquire a knowledge of this art till St. Austin founded a school for instruction in ecclesiastical music at Canterbury. Alfred the Great VOL. XIV. I |