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pensable practice of the gospel system. Fi nally, brethren, farewell. This is the ardent wish, or the fervent prayer of pastoral charity, in absence or cessation of intercourse anticipated. That the object of this pious prayer, rising out of professional solicitude, may be happily fulfilled, the Apostle adds, Be perfect. That this perfection is an attainable quality we cannot doubt, since it is thus distinctly commanded. It consists, first, in yielding the heart to the guidance of God's holy Spirit, without which we can never atChristian object. It consists, secondly, in unity of principle, which is the practice of Christian charity, as that heavenly disposition embraces all human kind, but especially them that are of the household of faith. It is equivalent to the command in the sermon on the mount,-Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. This command, in any intelligible sense, we can fulfil, by the aid of God's grace, only by the most distant approximation. In God, the quality or attribute referred to is mercy, which is over all his works: For "he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on

the good, and sendeth his rain on the just and on the unjust." This illustration sufficiently indicates, that in Christians the quality commanded is charity, which requires us, in humble, and in distant imitation of the divine attributes of mercy and goodness, to love our enemies, to bless them that curse us, to do good to them that hate us, and to pray for them who despitefully use and persecute us. Be of good comfort. He who, by the grace of God, is enabled to attain and to exercise the charity which the previous precept commands, will never, even under the pressure of the severest calamities, want that good comfort and that solid consolation which come from God. For the charity, which he is thus enabled to cultivate, makes him the child of his Father which is in heaven, and exempts him, by the special ordinance and influence of God, from the worst evils with which humanity can afflict him. Be of one mind; live in peace. To be of one mind implies unanimity; and to live in peace, the consequence of this unanimity, implies the obligation which the gospel imposes upon us to endeavour, with all lowliness and meekness, with long

suffering, forbearing one another in love, to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. Such being the happy principle, and such being the salutary practice of your Christian life, the God of love and peace shall be with you, that is, the greatest blessing, the highest consolation, which can accompany your mortal career in your passage through the troubles and trials of time to the heavenly joys of an endless life. In the world there is discord and enmity, and violence, with which He who maketh men to be of one mind in a house can have no communion. That we may ensure the habitation of the Prince of Peace, and of the Spirit of Comfort in our hearts, and in our mystic Zion, we must be all of one mind; and to be all of one mind implies much more of practice than of speculation. It implies that we have compassion one of another, that we love as brethren, that we be pitiful and courteous, not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing, but contrariwise blessing: knowing that we are hereunto called that we should inherit a blessing. In the long and interesting discourse which is recorded by St John in the 14th, 15th, and

16th chapters of his Gospel, our blessed Lord dwells with a peculiar emphasis, and with a very affecting pathos, on this high and holy principle of Christian unity. He prays for his disciples, to whom the discourse was addressed; and not for them alone," but for them also," he adds, “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. And the

glory which thou gavest me I have given them, that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and Thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that Thou hast sent me, and hast loved them as Thou hast loved me." The importance of this unity we may much more easily imagine than express, if we allow thesef most remarkable words, and the circumstan ces in which they were uttered, their proper influence on our hearts. Twice, in this shorti compass, does the Divine Redeemer declare this practical unity amongst his followers to be the most decisive proof of His own divine mission, the most effectual evidence of sthat

divine influence which constitutes and conducts the Christian life from its commencement to its close.

This unity, which is the principle of charity reduced to practice, in peculiar circumstances, is founded in truth, in that essential truth which God has revealed in Christ. "Sanctify them," says the Divine Redeemer, "thro' Thy truth: Thy word is truth-and for their sakes I sanctify myself that they also may be sanctified thro' the truth." It is manifest, if we could all be brought to agree in the essential truths which constitute the Gospel, and in the practice resulting from those truths, that the unity, which is so necessary an ingredient in the Christian character, would be the happy consequence. In the meantime, there have been from the beginning, and there must also be to the end, "heresies among you, that they which are approved may be made manifest among you." As man is constituted, nothing is more difficult than to produce agreement, in those truths especially which affect the conduct, and which influence the passions. Even the truths of science, and the occurrences of history, excite the keenest disputes