Religion for the salvation of mankind, and yet studiously left many of its parts vague and doubtful, so that it would be almost impossible for sincere men to ascertain them with any thing approaching to certainty? Could he have left the way to heaven, which it was his special mission to point out to the world, so very obscure and uncertain? If so, then he tantalized mankind with a promise of salvation which he never intended to fulfil. Therefore, if you believe that he was both infinitely wise and infinitely good, you are compelled, of logical necessity, to admit the principle above laid down.

3. The third principle, that Christ required all mankind to embrace his one Religion, as settled and defined by himself, under the penalty of eternal condemnation,-is equally undeniable as the two precedings ones. It necessarily follows from the very genius and purpose of Christianity, and from the character of its divine Founder. If men could go to heaven without embracing his Religion, then where was the necessity, and what was the object, of his mission to earth, and of the Religion which he came to establish? Why did he insist so much on the necessity of a belief in, and a practice of his heavenly system? Why did he, in his farewell address to his apostles, pronounce the awful sentence of eternal comdemnation on all those who would not believe "all things whatsoever he had commanded them to teach"?* Why did he endure so many privations and sufferings, and at length die on the cross, to establish and confirm this Religion? Why did his apostles, clothed with his authority and filled with his spirit, brave death in a thousand forins, and gladly lay down their lives for this Religion, if, after all, it was not necessary for the salvation of man? Why did such vast numbers of martyrs willingly pour out their blood like water for this faith, if it was not obligatory on men? Why, in a word, is so much interest felt for this Religion by all Christians, even by those who would be disposed to question this principle, if it is not viewed by them as essential to the happiness of mankind for eternity?

4. The fourth principle,-that Christ made his Religion Compare St. Math. xxviii. with St. Mark xvi. as above cited.

plain, and provided means by which all sincere inquirers might easily and certainly ascertain it, come to the knowledge of the truth, and thereby save their souls,-is a logical corollary from the third just established. How could Christ have required all men to embrace his Religion, unless he had, at the same time, provided them with ample means for ascertaining it with certainty? Would it have been just to impose the penalty of eternal damnation upon those who would reject a system for a certain knowledge of which sufficient means had not been provided by its divine Author? Would it have been just to consign the bulk of mankind to endless perdition for the sin of not having embraced what they had no adequate means of ascertaining? The bare idea is revolting in the extreme, and it implies a horrid blasphemy;-that God will punish his creatures eternally for what they could not avoid. What Christian is prepared to think or to say this? And yet it must be said, unless you admit the principle for which I here contend.

You ask me, what then will become of those to whom the gospel was never preached? The question is reasonable and opportune, and I confess that it is difficult to answer it with certainty. Nor does my present position require me to solve this difficulty. The principles I have laid down are certain and self-evident, even though I should not be able to meet it with a satisfactory answer. I am addressing Christians to whom the gospel has been preached, not pagans who have not enjoyed that privilege. And I leave it to you to decide, whether the principles above indicated are not evident and true, even though we should not be able to ascertain how far they are applicable to pagans, or whether they are applicable to them at all. God only can know this, because he alone can judge the hearts of men, and he alone can decide whether and how far, they are culpable for rejecting or not receiving his truth. Two things, however, we do know with certainty on this subject: first, that God will not condemn any one eternally without wilful and grievous fault on his part; and second, that all shall be judged according to their works, weighed by the lights, opportunities, and graces they have severally had. God only can decide on all this, because he alone can be

fully acquainted with the whole cause: we leave the judgment to him; but, at the same time, we must admit his truth in all its length and breadth and application to ourselves to whom it has been preached; and we must tremble for our own responsibility to him. St. Paul lays down this principle of the divine judgment, when, speaking of the pagan nations, he says that they shall be judged by "the law written in their hearts, their consciences bearing witness to them, and their thoughts within themselves accusing them, or else defending them, in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men, by Jesus Christ."* This is all that revelation says on this difficult question, and it is enough for us to know, that we will be judged by a much higher standard, on the principle that "unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required: "+ for, as our blessed Lord says, "that servant who knew the will of his Lord and hath not prepared, and did not, according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes, but he that knew not and did things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes."

Such then, my beloved brethren, is the nature, such are the leading characteristics of the Religion which Jesus Christ established for the salvation of men. What I have hitherto said, and I hope proved to your satisfaction, may be summed up in a very few words. The Religion of Christ is a divine institution, embracing all that Christ taught, whether by his own lips or by those of his inspired apostles, neither more nor less, and depending for its nature and its principles solely upon his will, and not upon human ingenuity or speculation; it is a divine system which rests upon a fact,—that God hath so and so spoken to us, through his Son Jesus Christ, and upon the principle necessarily inferred therefrom,-that our inquiry should not go beyond this fact, but should yield to conviction and obedience so soon as it is once ascertained; and finally must necessarily be one, must have been clearly defined and fully settled by its divine Founder, must be obligatory on all, and consequently must be easily ascetrainable by all. No Chris tian, I presume, will be disposed to question any one of these facts or principles.

* Romans ii. 15. + St. Luke xii. 48. Ibid. vv. 47, 48.

To preserve this divine Religion and to transmit it unchanged and entire to the latest posterity, Christ established and organized a CHURCH. The holy scriptures proclaim this fact on almost every page of the new testament, and all Christians admit it, how much soever they may differ in their opinions on the nature, prerogatives, and powers of this Church.

As it is not my purpose, at this preliminary stage of the investigation, to lay down any principle or to make any statement, which our adversaries might feel disposed to controvert, I will here content myself with defining the Church "an external, organized body or society of men professing the one true Religion of Jesus Christ." No reasonable Christian can object to this definition. It embodies the elemental principles and primary notions which every one has of that institution. A merely invisible and wholly spiritual Church, is a fiction, an absurdity. It has never had an actual existence in history; according to the very nature of things, it never could have existed. Had Christ established his church for the benefit of angels, it might have been an invisibie institution; as he established it for men, it was necessarily an external and visible body, else it could not have been adapted to their condition and wants, and could not have answered the purpose for which it was appointed. For how could men be held together in the bonds of a society which they could not see, and whose voice they could not hear? How could an invisible Church preserve and securely transmit to posterity the one Religion of Christ? Are not all the means which Christ himself appointed with a view to enable it to discharge these offices, external and visible? How could an invisible Church preach the gospel to every creature, administer the sacraments, make an external profession of faith, convert sinners, and exercise discipline upon offenders? And yet, as all admit, Christ imparted to his Church all these powers.

Man is composed of two distinct parts blended into one individual, body and soul; and the Church of Jesus Christ, to be fully adapted to his wants, must likewise necessarily consist of two distinct corresponding elements, intimately united and harmonizing with each other,—the external and the spiritual.

The Religion of Christ is the soul, the CHURCH is the body united with this soul. On the day of Pentecost, Christ infused into the body of his Church, already organized, the Holy Spirit, and "it was thus made into a living soul." Destroy either of these essential elements, and you destroy the individuality of the Church, just as the individuality of man would be destroyed by the removal or destruction of either the body or the soul. In each case the conjunction of both elements is essential to the individual. In man, death alone can sever the union; in the Church there is no death, so long at least as this world will last, and the union is, therefore, as lasting as time itself.

While on earth, Christ gathered together a body of disciples; he organized them into a regular society by selecting from them a body of officers composed of two distinct orders,―the twelve apostles and the seventy-two disciples; he imparted to these, especially to the apostles, the power of binding and loosing, of forgiving sins, of preaching the gospel, of administering the sacraments, of punishing offenders by casting them out among heathens and publicans; while on the great body of the disciples he enjoined the duty of hearing, of being taught, and of obeying. Thus the society of his followers was naturally distributed into two classes; that of teachers, and that of the taught. No one will question this fact, which is as clear as any thing else in the entire gospel history. St. Paul asks emphatically: "Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers?" And, in another place, he clearly lays down this same principle: And some, indeed, he (Christ) gave to be apostles, and some prophets, and others evangelists, and others pastors and teachers, for the perfection of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edification of the body of Christ." +

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It is plain, then, my dearly beloved brethren, that the Church which Christ established was organized,-precisely like every other visible society on earth,-by the distribution of its menbers into officers and subjects, with special powers and duties assigned to each. The specific nature of the organization in all its details depends wholly and solely on the will of Christ, *I Corinthians xii, 29. + Ephesians iv, 11, 12.