some inconveniences is productive of this advantage, that truth undergoes a severer investigation, and her conquests are the more permanent for being gradually acquired. On this account the Writer is not so sanguine as to expect his performance will occasion any sudden revolution in the sentiments and practice of the class of Christians more immediately concerned; if along with other causes it ultimately contribute to so desirable an issue, he shall be satisfied.

It may not be improper to assign the reason for not noticing the treatise of the celebrated Mr. Robinson, of Cambridge, on the same subject. It is not because he is insensible to the ingenuity and beauty of that performance, as well as of the other works of that original and extraordinary writer; but because it rests on principles more. lax and latitudinarian, than it is in his power conscientiously to adopt; Mr. R. not having adverted, as far as he perceives, to the distinction of fundamentals, but constructed his plea for tole

ration,* in such a manner, as to comprehend all the varieties of religious belief.

The only author I have professed to answer is the late venerable Booth, his treatise being generally considered by our opponents as the ablest defence of their hypothesis.

I have only to add, that I commit the following treatise to the candor of the public, and the blessing of God, hoping that as it is designed not to excite, but to allay animosities; not to widen, but to heal the breaches among Christians, it will meet with the indulgence due to good intentions, however feebly executed.

* The intelligent reader will understand me to refer, not to civil toleration by the state, but that which is exercised by religious societies.

ON TERMS OF COMMUNION.

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.

WHOEVER forms his ideas of the Church of Christ from an attentive perusal of the New Testament, will perceive that unity is one of its essential characteristics; and that though it be branched out into many distinct societies, it is still but one. "The Church," says Cyprian, "is one which by reason of its fecundity is ex, tended into a multitude, in the same manner as the rays of the sun, however numerous constitute but one light; and the branches of a tree, however many, are attached to one trunk, which is supported by its tenacious root; and when various rivers flow from the same fountain, though number is diffused by the redundant supply of waters, unity is preserved in their

origin." Nothing more abhorrent from the principles and maxims of the sacred oracles can be conceived, than the idea of a plurality of true churches, neither in actual communion with each other, nor in a capacity for such communion. Though this rending of the seamless garment of our Saviour, this schism in the members of his mystical body, is by far the greatest calamity which has befallen the christian interest, and one of the most fatal effects of the great apostacy foretold by the sacred penman, we have been so long familiarised to it as to be scarcely sensible of its enormity, nor does it excite surprise or concern, in any degree proportioned to what would be felt by one who had contemplated the church in the first ages. To see christian societies regarding each other with the jealousies of rival empires, each aiming to raise itself on the ruin of all others, making extravagant boasts of superior purity, generally in exact proportion to their departures from it, and scarcely deigning to acknowledge the possibility of obtaining salvation out of their pale, is the odious and disgusting spectacle which modern Christianity presents. The bond of charity, which unites the genuine followers of Christ in distinction from the world, is dissolved, and the

very terms by which it was wont to be denoted, exclusively employed to express a predilection for a sect. The evils which result from this state of division are incalculable: it supplies infidels with their most plausible topics of invective; it hardens the consciences of the irreligious, weakens the hands of the good, impedes the efficacy of prayer, and is probably the principal obstruction to that ample effusion of the spirit which is essential to the renovation of the world.

It is easier however, it is confessed, to deplore the malady, than to prescribe the cure: for however important the preservation of harmony and peace, the interests of truth and holiness are still more so; nor must we forget the order in which the graces of the Spirit are arranged. "The wisdom which is from above is first pure, then peaceable." Peace should be anxiously sought, but always in subordination to purity, and therefore every attempt to reconcile the differences among Christians which involves the sacrifice of truth, or the least deliberate deviation from the revealed will of Christ, is spurious in its origin, and dangerous in its tendency. If communion with a christian society cannot be had without a compliance with rites and usages