some men reject forms from a remembrance of their past abuse; whilst others more wisely determine, that the advantage they are calculated to produce, ought not to be sacrificed to the evil, which, through the corruption of human nature, may occasionally be derived from them. And this determination is certainly best suited to the state of the party concerned.

Man is a being compounded of soul and body; his religion, therefore, must be suited to his circumstances. That must also have a soul and body, a spiritual and a corporeal part; upon the proper union of which two parts the spiritual life of its professor will, upon experience, be found to depend. For certain it is, that religion may be too refined for the present gross state of the human understanding; which must receive much of its information on divine subjects through a sensible medium. Hence the language of the Bible is, for the most part, a language of similitudes; the eye of sense being made to minister to the eye of the understanding; natural and visible objects being employed to convey to the mind those ideas, which it is not in a condition to receive in any other way. Correspondent with this figurative language of scripture are the forms or figurative services which have been introduced into religious worship. They are designed to minister to a similar purpose; namely, to inform the understanding, and, at the same time, to awaken and keep alive the attention to those spiritual subjects, which might otherwise make little or no impression. Taken in this

light, they may be considered as a sort of explanatory appendages to religious worship; and if made that use of for which they were appointed, must, in a great degree, tend to the spiritual advantage of the parties engaged in them.

On this account they have made a part of every religion, true as well as false, that has apThe Jewish religion, that peared in the world. peculiar dispensation of God, abounded with them; from which our Saviour selected those which were adapted to the Christian institution. From whence the conclusion is, that forms have always been deemed necessary to the support of religion in every age.

Abuses there have been, and always will be, in a business in which man is concerned. The Jew, in our Saviour's day, was a scrupulous observer of forms, whilst he knew nothing of the spirit to which they were designed to lead. He washed diligently "the outside of the platter," whilst the inside was suffered to remain unclean.

The Roman Catholic, who regulates his religious service by his bead-roll, is in a somewhat similar condition. And so is every member of our communion, who substitutes the form of godliness for the power of it.

The object of true religion has been at all times the same, namely, to make man a spiritual being. So far as forms contribute to this purpose, (and from their impression upon the mind they contribute greatly to it) they are an essential part of religion.

* Matt. xxiii. 25.

But there are two extremes in this case, between which the line of the wise man's conduct will be carefully drawn; from a conviction, that the abuse and neglect of forms tend nearly in an equal degree to defeat the desired purpose; the one leading as certainly to superstition and hypocrisy, as the other does to irreligion and profaneness. A consideration which, it may be hoped, will give additional weight to what has been said in a former discourse upon the advantages attendant upon communion with our Church; the forms of which are neither so multiplied as to engross the attention, nor yet so insignificant as not to convey a sufficiently instructive meaning to the mind of the worshipper. Indeed, if any Church has been so judicious as to keep the golden mean between loading the service of God with external forms on the one hand, and stripping it so bare on the other as not to leave sufficient for the purposes of bodily worship and mental contemplation, the Church of England may justly lay claim to this distinction. And he who persuades himself that religion is to be preserved in the world without forms, makes himself wiser than God; at the same time that he manifests his ignorance of the nature and character of man.

The general view of the subject, which has been here laid before the reader, is designed to lead him to the consideration of his own particular case. The established Church of this kingdom is a branch of the Church of Christ. The congregation to which some Christians are joined is a manifest separation from it. The teachers to whose care they have committed themselves, own

no relation to that spiritual society to which all Christians ought to be united. To make use, then, of the language of the primitive Church, here is altar set up against altar, and pastor against pastor. From whence it follows, that if there ever were such a sin as that of schism, in any age of the Christian Church, it is now to be found among us. It behoves those, therefore, whom it may concern, to take this subject into serious consideration. Should our Church require any terms of commu↓ nion with which they are persuaded they ought not to comply, so long as that persuasion lasts, their separation from the Church ought to continue. But it must be remembered, at the same time, that their persuasion in this case will be their jus. tification in the sight of God, in proportion only as it has been built upon rational and conscientious conviction. Should it have been taken up with passion or prejudice, or adopted without examination; and should any means of information have been neglected, which might have been made use of for the direction of their judgment, their error in this case will be their sin, because it has been derived from their neglect; and their consequent separation from the Church will be also a sin; for one sin will not be permitted to be pleaded in excuse for another.

Let me intreat such Christians, then, to exa mine fairly the ground upon which their separation stands. Let the objections which they have to communion with our Church be brought to a fair trial; laying aside every prejudice, not being too wise in their own conceits, but advising with those

who are better qualified to judge than themselves, and from whom they have a right to expect light and direction: remembering, that the Christian ministry was instituted for the very purpose of preventing Christians "being tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive;" and that professing the faith in the unity of the spirit, and in the bond of peace, they might be edified in truth and love.*

Having thus brought to recollection the principal design of the foregoing Discourses, which was to furnish that uniform and consistent notion of the nature, design, and constitution of the Christian Church, which might qualify the reader to judge of the consequences attendant upon a wilful separation from it, I hasten to a conclusion; craving time only to press that part of the subject upon his mind, which it was one object of the establishment of Christ's Church upon earth to promote; namely, that whilst men with one mind and one mouth glorified God, their communication with each other in the same acts of religious worship, might form a bond of Christian fellowship, effectual for the security of peace and good-will among themselves.

It was a remark long since made by a learned writer, that the same fate (if the expression may be admitted) has attended the Christian, which of old attended the Jewish, religion. The great commandment, which constituted the foundation and principal characteristic of the Jewish religion, * Eph. iv. 14, et seq.