The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 40

IV

IV.

We now endeavour to make some application of the truths to which we have attempted to give expression, with a view to the determination of existing controversies, and our duty in connection with them.

1. And, in the first place, I take leave to ask, Is it possible for any man, with the Bible in his hands, and with the fear of God in his heart, to be, or continue to be, a Voluntary.

It is a fine name, and, if it expressed what some may think to be understood by it, the principle or duty incumbent on all of honouring the Lord with their substance, and of doing so cheerfully and bountifully, it would also be an excellent thing, and the more of it the better. But that is not Voluntaryism. Those who assume the name of Voluntaries do so in opposition to others whom they nickname Compulsories; Com- pulsories being those who assert the duty incumbent, not only on individuals, but on nations and their kings, to receive, profess, and, with all a nation's influence and resources, to promote the gospel and kingdom of Christ; they, on the other hand, calling themselves Voluntaries, in opposition to all such national action, to intimate the refusal of their individual wills and consciences to submit to, or be influenced by it, and to proclaim the principle that 'the power competent to worldly kingdoms is wholly temporal, respecting only the secular interests of society,' or that 'civil legislation ought not to extend beyond the outward and secular affairs of communities.' They profess, indeed, to hold the doctrine of Christ's headship over the nations, but it is only to the extent of holding the general doctrine that the Bible is the Word of God, and the religion of Protestants, that religion is a personal or individual matter, and that a nation, as such, has nothing to do with religion but to let it alone.

In maintaining this principle they make a great outcry about individual rights, political justice, religious equality, and the monopoly of the nation's favour enjoyed by those joining with the nation in its profession of the faith; as if the national will and conscience must be put under bondage to those of the individual, as if, in order to the individual's religion, the nation must have no religion at all, or as if a share in the monopoly was not open to all, and it was not their own self-interposed Voluntaryism that prevents their enjoyment of it equally with others. At the same time, being tolerated, where is the compulsion? Or, is it one sword only that is competent for the civil ruler? Offering them to Christ, it was said to Him, 'Here are two swords'—(Luke xxii. 38). He said, 'they were enough,' but He did not refuse them, because both of them, the spiritual and the civil sword, are competent for Him, and as King of the Jews He employed them both. But so also both of them are competent for the nation's king and civil ruler. Not only are both competent, He is under incumbent obligation to employ them both; employing the one, the civil sword, directly, employing the other indirectly, in the provision of a gospel ministry for His nation, and in taking order that all the ordinances of God he duly settled, administered, and observed. When, then, a national ministry goes forth and does its work, where is the compulsion other than that legitimate compulsion of 'compelling them to come in?' Or, in what way is the individual conscience more injuriously affected under it than under a Voluntary ministry? and this more especially when, except in this one matter of Voluntaryism, the national confession and the national gospel are identically the same as those of the Voluntary? Paul could say, 'Notwithstanding every way, whether in pretence or in truth, Christ is preached; and I therein do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice'—(Phil. i. 18). Not so with the Voluntary. Every way does not rejoice him; on the contrary, he is grieved that the gospel should be preached by the way of a national ministry.

Apart, however, from these considerations, the great question here is, has Voluntaryism any foundation in the Word of God? Confessedly it has none in the Old Testament; none in the Law, none in the Prophets, none in the Psalms. But it may now be seen that it has none in the New; none in the Gospels, none in the Acts, none in the Epistles, none in the Book of Revelation. True, 'Christ's kingdom is not of this world,' and yet it is. It is not of this world, else would His servants fight. Christ does not come into His possession of the earth, and into royalty over it, neither does His Church, by force of arms, but by virtue of His blood, and of the Father's faithful promise and donation. There is one solitary text founded on by Voluntaryism, which is held forth as Christ's law for New Testament times, and which is alleged to prohibit the employment of national resources for the support and propagation of the gospel, and to devolve this duty immediately on the individual members of a church or congregation. Here it is, 'Let him that is taught in the word communicate to him that teacheth in all good things'—(Gal. vi. 6). But, besides the consideration that, according to the style of Scripture, what is applicable to the nation, is applicable also to the individual; while, on the other hand, what is applicable to the individual is to be regarded as alike applicable to the nation, it will be observed that, as truly as this command relates to money and goods, and so to a matter under Cæsar's jurisdiction, so truly, in making this invasion into Cæsar's province, and in laying this command on Cæsar's subject as to money and its use, is Christ to be regarded, in His capacity of Prince of the kings of the earth, as, at the same time, laying a command on Cæsar himself, giving him to know what he must permit, yea, and what he is to promote, and that, in fact, his nation being the great subject of this teaching by Christ's Word, he is to establish and endow His Church. They point triumphantly to the early Christian Church living in a condition of separation from the state, and of self-support for three hundred years; but they do not observe that the early Church, throughout that period, was in the strenuous maintenance of the Establishment principle, was in its several members true churchmen, was pursuing the wilderness course, and fighting the battle with the nation, by which she must attain to her kingdom, and that, accordingly, she finally did overcome by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of her testimony.

It is, however, little to say of Voluntaryism, that it has no foundation in the Word of God, and is unscriptural; it is anti-scriptural, and that to an extent truly appalling. It contradicts the Decalogue, God's law for the nations, and interposing between Him and them, what God commands as incumbent duty, it prohibits as crying sin; and what He makes necessary for the nations' safety, it teaches the nations to regard as that which will bring on them national ruin. It awfully contradicts and denies the work, grace, and fulness of Christ for the nations, and His precious and blood bought claims on them and their kings, as the Prince of the kings of the earth; and although there is blessing in Christ equal to all a nation's need, and although this blessing can be enjoyed only in a national reception of His gospel, and a national union with Him, and although the nation and kingdom that will not serve Him will perish, yet 'the power competent to worldly kingdoms is wholly temporal, respecting only the secular interests of society,' is the Christ denying, nation destroying doctrine, with which Voluntaryism, full of airs and conceit, comes in between Christ and the suffering and perishing nations. As it contradicts God's law, and Christ's grace and fulness, so it contradicts His gospel for the nations, telling them that there is no such gospel, or that, if they should ever hear of such a gospel, they must not receive it, that civil justice demands that they put all religions on a level, and that their only province as regards religion is to let it wholly alone. Here, it may be observed, that Voluntaries and Baptists draw together to a certain extent. Voluntaries deny the national promise in which God addresses kings and rulers. Baptists deny, or ignore, the subordinate family promise addressed to its father and head, and refuse to a father's faith in this promise, its outward sign and seal in the baptism of his children. But there is this great difference between Baptists and Voluntaries, that Baptists do not prohibit parents from evangelising their houses; on the contrary, I suppose that they are as faithful in the use of the means to which the promise has respect as others, and hence, though so unhappily ignoring the promise, the blessing may come. But it is quite otherwise with Voluntaries. They absolutely prohibit the use of the national means. Kings and rulers may do what else they please, but they must not provide for the necessary evangelisation of their people. Thus, God's appointed channel for communicating the blessing which the nation needs is taken away, and if Voluntaryism continues to prevail, the nation must ultimately perish. God's purpose in Christ as regards man can be accomplished only in the appearance of saved nations on the earth; and bringing His purpose to pass, He is in course of dealing with men supremely as nations, and this, not only in His providence, but by His Word in its law and in its gospel, and by His Spirit. Voluntaryism, however, ignores God's purpose as regards the nations, and sets itself with all its might to oppose what God, nevertheless, is thus accomplishing, and will accomplish. In short, although the obligation lies on the nation to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, that other things may be added, and although the chief end of man, especially in the nation, the highest style of man, is to glorify and enjoy God, yet Volun- taryism teaches them that they must seek first no such thing, that the chief end of man in the highest style of man is wholly temporal, and that in his national capacity he is to concern himself only with what is outward and secular.

How then can we have anything to do with Voluntaryism, except in the way of opposing it with all our might? Must not the many excellent and able men who have suffered themselves to be deceived by it cast it from them with abhorrence? And as so clearly a plant not of God's planting, must not all unite in plucking it up, and in making it to become, what it deserves to be, a universal anathema.

In respect of their Voluntaryism, its advocates are in a state of schism as regards the whole Old Testament Church, as regards the whole New Testament Church, as well as all the Churches of the Reformation, and the Historic Church of Scotland. It was not heard of in Scotland till about 1795, the period of the French Revolution, and its origin is immediately connected with the circulation in Scotland of Paine's 'Rights of Man,' and the dissemination of the same infidel and revolutionary principles as gave to the United States of America that godless constitution, according to which, 'in some of their treaties with foreign nations, they are declared to be a nation in no sense founded on the Christian religion, and to be formally, not unlike Mahometans;' a constitution under which the American nation, notwithstanding so many admirable Christian appliances, is even now festering in its sins, and begins to stink among the nations. Hence, as having had such an origin, Voluntaryism's lofty talk of compulsion, its impatience of state influence or control, its assertion of individual rights, and its outcry for political justice and religious equality. It entered the Churches, of which it has taken possession, under the disguise of professed adherence to the former principles of these Churches, keeping up the disguise until it could declare itself more boldly, and, at the same time, secure the Church's property for its own maintenance; and its history hitherto has been, on the one hand, one of astute clerical management and double dealing, such as would be utterly scouted among honest men of the world, and, on the other, of division, strife, and heart-breaks. The bitter enemy of the established Church, it has, alike before the Disruption as after it, misrepresented its good, magnified its evil, rejoiced in and helped on its calamity, and been grieved, and, beyond measure, irritated at any appearances of revival and prosperity. Joining in its demands with Popery, it has paralysed national action in opposition to Popery, has thrown open the door, and has very conspicuously aided in elevating Popery to its present alarming ascendancy. By its incessant deputations and dunning of its principles and demands into the ears of government, it has, to a large extent, corrupted the mind of the nation, and has already succeeded in barring out the Church's most just and necessary superintendence of the education of the young, has procured the withdrawal of all state inspection, concern, or pay for a religious education, has all but excluded the Bible from the national schools, and, if it could, it would have excluded it altogether. 'The results of the labours of fifteen years are now before the Synod,' says the gentleman who submits the report on royal proclamations, and here is the magnificent result of fifteen years of persistent dunning. 'The substance of the changes secured is as follows :—The words, 'as they tender the favour of Almighty God,' and 'that none pretend ignorance' are deleted, 'proclaim' or 'declare' is substituted for 'appoint,' and 'earnestly exhort' for 'command.' Even 'exhort' is found too strong for the feelings of some of the Voluntary 'brethren,' and negotiations have been renewed with the view of getting it altered to 'invite,' or some other clearly unauthoritative term. The king of Nineveh, then, it would seem, did something very wrong in his day, when he rose from his throne, covered himself with sackcloth, and caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh, by the decree of the king and his nobles, that there should be an absolute and universal fast, that they should cry mightily to God, and that they should turn every one from the evil of his ways; and yet, the surprising thing is, that not only was God not displeased with the action of the king and his nobles, but, first, He graciously gave it a happy success in the consent of a willing people, and then He crowned it by extending mercy and favour to the king, his people, and his land. Talk of the mischief which the poor abused, and deluded state has done to the Church, and of the danger to religion from state connection. The state has never done the mischief to the Church, which false and erring Churches have done to the state. The Lord took Amos of old, saying to him, 'Go prophecy unto my people Israel;' and who was it that sent to the king of Israel, saying, 'Amos hath conspired against thee in the midst of the house of Israel, and the land is not able to bear all his words'—(Amos vii. 10-13). So again, who arrested Jeremiah, and delivered him to the princes, saying, 'This man is worthy of death'—(Jer. xxvi. 11). Yea, and who were they who delivered up Christ, and denied Him in the presence of Pontius Pilate when he was determined to let Him go? We need not follow the sad history of the Church's pernicious influence on the state. In fact, drawn hither and thither, it has been very much what the Church has taught and made it to be. And now, in our own day, we have men like Mr Spurgeon, not rebuking, but encouraging the government, and rejoicing in its Erastian and Popish action, while reserving all his invective and all his thunder for an oppressed Church? While here again also we have an erring Church, after releasing the state from all its high responsibilities before God, inducing it to denude itself yet further of its God-given and most legitimate authority, and this an authority whose exercise God is found so signally to bless and crown with favour. Does it not remind us of Elymas withstanding Paul before Sergius Paulus, and seeking to turn away the deputy of the country from the faith? Or, rather, is the spirit of Voluntaryism that of one of the three ceaselessly croaking frogs that go forth to the kings of the earth to gather them to the battle and destruction of Armageddon? How long will others stand by unconcerned and see the national mind thus corrupted? Or, how long will good and able men be found suffering themselves to be carried away with so antiscriptural and disastrous a principle, and even glorifying themselves as being in the 'very front rank' of a good and holy cause?

2. But, in the second place, in connection with present controversies and present duty, I proceed to ask, with all deference, Can we be Free Churchmen, as that Church is now dominated and characterized, and in view of all its resolute, and still onward tendencies?

Once, indeed, the Free Church occupied a scriptural, a noble position, the very position of the early Church, without her kingdom, indeed, but claiming it, pledging herself to urge her claim, and calling on all her people to unite in supplication to Almighty God, that He would be pleased to turn the hearts of the rulers of this kingdom to grant it. Then, too, warned by the experience of preceding secessions from the Established Church, of the danger connected with a disestablished condition of lapsing into Voluntaryism, from the first she fortified herself in every way possible against the danger: providing that all her ministers and office-bearers should be thoroughly instructed in her principles, and before admission to office should be taken bound, and pledged as by solemn oath, firmly and constantly to adhere to, and in their station, and to the utmost of their power, to assist, maintain, and defend them; and also providing that from her pulpits, and by catechisms specially prepared, her people, old and young, should become intelligently acquainted with, and should also faithfully hold and maintain her distinctive principles. Farther, by public authoritative declarations, made over and over again, the whole Church, has been pledged, as with hand lifted up to heaven, to a stedfast adherence to her principles, and to the strenuous maintenance of them, as in the solemn words: 'Holding firmly to the last, as she holds still, and through God's grace will ever hold, that it is the duty of civil rulers to recognise the truth of God according to His word, and to promote and support the kingdom of Christ,' etc. Finally, the utmost care was taken that no minister or probationer joining her communion from other churches, or other churches seeking to enter her communion, should be permitted to do so, until thorough satisfaction was given as to their understanding and holding in their integrity the distinctive principles of the Free Church. Nor was she without many tokens of God's favour while seeking thus zealously to maintain her own peculiar testimony, and, in the providence of God, she came at length to occupy a position so commanding that, by the blessing of God on the faithful endeavour, there was every prospect of her being able to unite the whole Presbyterianism of Scotland in one united Free Established Church, looking forth on the surrounding kingdom of darkness, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners. But all at once a change came over the spirit of her dream. She had been on her trial, she had been raised to the very position in which to fulfil her mission; how did she acquit herself? In an evil hour she suffered herself to be turned aside from her upward course and her conflict with the nations, and descended into negotiations for union with Voluntaries, here find her rest among the tribes of the desert. On the occasion of his visit to Shetland, Dr Guthrie expressed to the writer his regret that these negotiations had ever been entered into, and told him, at the sametime, that they never would have been entered into, but for the wishes and influence of certain influential elders; and it is notorious, that the unhappy project was all planned and resolved on by a few gentlemen met together round a dinner-table somewhere in Edinburgh. At the same time, no doubt, the circumstances were favourable. Many were already only too ready to enter into the proposal, some with political ends in view, some under mistaken views of the good to be accomplished by such a union, and some from sheer love of diplomacy, discussion, and of having some great and high-sounding undertaking on hand. It was never supposed, or proposed that Voluntaries should change their principles, nor could Free Church people be boldly asked to change theirs; union, therefore, could only be effected by making the difference between them an open question; and it was with the end in view of this open question from the very first, that,—labouring to invest the already privately pre-pared plan with a grave and solemn momentousness, that is apt to strike one now as having been hypocritical and ridiculous, and to bind the Church under the most awful sanctions not to resile from this good work, but to prosecute it to a suc- cessful issue—the scheme of this union came at length to be proposed to a too confiding and unwary Church, on one of her Assembly's high days. Accordingly, the open question was all already duly provided for in the 'due regard' to Free Church principles, which the leaders of the movement were so careful to make to be the Church's instructions to them, on their being appointed a Committee to confer with the United Presbyterian Church. Then, in due course, came an Assembly's resolution that there was no bar to union on the first head of programme, that is, on the distinctive principles respectively, of the Free and United Presbyterian Churches on national duty to Christ. Then came the two-faced articles of agreement, so dexterously worded and contrived as that, while the Free Church might easily read them in a Free Church sense, Voluntaries might read them with equal ease in a Voluntary sense. At length the open question came to be boldly submitted, and successfully carried by the voice of a majority of Presbyteries, affirmed by a sweeping majority in the Assembly, in the public and authoritative declaration of the Church, that there was no bar in principle to a union between the Churches on the basis of the Confession of Faith as received by the respective Churches—the Free Church receiving it entire, with its twenty-third chapter, asserting the right and duty of the state to receive, establish, and endow Christ's truth—the United Presbyterian Church receiving it with that chapter, and all its assertion of national duty, and everything else in the Confession of the same nature, as if 'excised' out of the Confession 'with a scissors.' Thus, at length, was the Free Church reduced to the United Presbyterian platform; both Churches now stood on a level, and nothing more remained but that they should pass into each other with all convenient speed. Accordingly, an act soon followed, also agreed to by a majority of Presbyteries, and passed by the Assembly, making the ministers of the two Churches mutually eligible by the congregations of the one Church and of the other; and there and thus related the two Churches now stand.

True, strenuous opposition to all this was made by a minority; and in the eye of the law of the land the original constitution of the Free Church Association so far remains, as that, possibly, if the full and open incorporation of both Churches were immediately to take place, it might adjudge property destined for original Free Church purposes to the minority; but it is to that effect, and to nothing more that it remains. The original principles of the Free Church have ceased to be the profession of that Church. The Church, as a Church, has made an open question of national duty to Christ, and, in doing so, even as to her proud claim, to have her spiritual independence as the Church of Christ recognised and acted on by the State, it has subsided into the Voluntary one of being let alone, or for mere toleration among other tolerated sects. What then is the use of a constitution repudiated by three-fourths of the Free Church membership? Or of a constitution, notwithstanding of which Voluntaries of almost any shade may enter by the wide door and effectual that has been so skilfully constructed for their admission, in the altered language, in conformity with the United Presbyterian view, in which she has come to give expression to her principles, by the new meaning which she has come to give to her formula of subscription, and even to its preamble, by her denial now that national duty, as hitherto understood by the Church, is in the Confession of Faith at all, by her giving her people to understand that they have liberty to question whether it be even in the Bible, and that they may be Voluntaries if they choose, and by her virtually intimating to United Presbyterian ministers called by a Free Church congregation under the Mutual Eligibility Act, that they need have no difficulty now in accepting of the Free Church definition of national duty, and in subscribing her formula, and bidding them quietly to make no difficulty, seeing that provision has been made that no questions shall be asked as to how they understand them? In fine, therefore, what is the use of a constitution, notwithstanding of which an incorporating union in order to a common profession of their open question is not abandoned, but only suspended, or rather is still in course of prosecution by every means likely to bring it about; its opponents becoming continually fewer, and their opposition weaker, the Free Church, as a whole, becoming continually riper for it, and unless God Himself in some remarkable manner interpose to prevent it, the union as certain to take place at no very distant day, as that the sun will rise to-morrow, or that after ebbing the tide will flow.

The goal has been reached, the original purpose has been consummated, although under loud protestations of having been 'beaten,' which the diplomatic victors could well afford to make; the insulted and down-trodden minority, that accepted of an empty concession, and lost both its opportunity of escape, and its power, is in course of being helplessly borne along; while over all, instead of the old blue banner for Christ's Crown and Covenant, there floats now that of the open question that has been made of national duty to Christ.

But can we have part with, or can we give place to the Free Church, even for an hour, in such an open question as this, and to which too she has come, not in the way of rising up in an honest search for truth, but in the way of coming down by an apostacy from truth already attained, and from her solemnly pledged profession of it? Consider what this open question implies, or what it is that has been made an open question of.

She has made an open question of the terms on which Christ, the Prince of the kings of the earth, permits that earth of which He is the Proprietor and Lord to be occupied by the nations. They must occupy under Him, they must occupy on the footing of the blood by which it has been redeemed for their occupation, and thus occupying it they must at once duly acknowledge His superiority, and at the same time, give attestation of their dependence on the blood, by rendering to Him His tenths. Failing this, most assuredly they fall to be dispossessed, and His indignation lies on the nation. Nor, in order to this, is it enough that individuals, in greater or less number, make the due acknowledgment for themselves. Individuals are but as sub-tenants, occupying under the nation. The nation supremely is the occupier of the soil, and it is to the nation supremely that Christ looks for His tenths. And yet it is of this, of Christ's proprietorship of the earth, of the necessity of the nations occupying under Him, and of making due acknowledgment of it, that the Free Church has come to make an open question.

Then she has made an open question of the nation's need of the grace of Christ for healing the plagues and miseries of the body politic, of His grace as the sole but sufficient remedy for the cure of all its maladies, and so also an open question is made of that national union with Christ in which alone this grace can be enjoyed, and so national cure, and health, and joy attained to, 'The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot to the crown of the head there is no soundness in it; but wounds, and bruises, and putrifying sores'—(Isa. i. 5, 6). 'For the hurt of the daughter of my people am I hurt; I am black; astonishment hath taken hold upon me. Is there no balm in Gilead, is there no physician there? why then is not the hurt of the daughter of my people recovered'—(Jer. viii. 21, 22). Otherwise than by the balm of Gilead, and the Physician who is there, there is no cure for the plagues of the body politic; thus, however, may the nation be restored to perfect health and joy; and yet of this precious balm, of this gracious and mighty Physician of the nations, the Free Church has come to make an open question.

But, farther, to make an open question of national duty to Christ, as the Free Church has done, is to make an open question of the chief end of man, and of this in the highest style of man. The chief end of the nation, and that alone in which it can find its happiness and glory, is to be a Bride for Christ, and in marriage fellowship with Him, to be a national son of God. ' How shall I put thee among the children, and give thee a goodly heritage of the hosts of nations? And I said Thou shall call me, My Father; and thou shall not turn away from me'—(Jer. iii. 19). 'Be wise, now, therefore, O ye kings.' They listen, they look for counsel. What answer shall we give them? Shall we go on in the words of the second Psalm? 'Serve the Lord with fear. Kiss the Son, lest He be angry.' At the least, with the Apostle Paul, shall we show them that God made and settled even the heathen nation, 'that they might seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after Him, and find Him'—(Acts xvii.). No, says the Voluntary, pompously, and with a great show of wisdom, 'The power competent to worldly kingdoms is wholly temporal, respecting only the secular interests of society.' 'I could, at one time, give you a very decided answer,' says the Free Churchman, 'and perhaps I may do so again, if we exist as a Church at the millennium, but, in the meantime, I am in for union with Voluntaries, in whose company I have passed many delightful hours, and whose 'great principle' many of us have adopted, and you may go about your business just now, and do as you please for me.'

Then, to make an open question of national duty to Christ, is to make an open question of that principle of headship and trust according to which, throughout, God deals with men, supremely and fundamentally in the two Adams, subordinately and in respect of union with these, in the nation and family; and so it is seditiously and disastrously to interpose between the Head and that which God has put under and committed to it, releasing the Head from its duty, or disallowing and annulling the faith and believing conduct on the part of the Head, by which the safety of the great trust committed to it must be secured. For the sake of union with Baptists, the Free Church will not make an open question of the family promise, nor yet of faith and duty in order to it, as exhibited, for instance, in Abraham: 'Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him. For I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord to do justice and judgment; that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which He hath spoken of him'—(Gen. xviii. 18, 19). And yet, although in that duty Abraham is to be regarded as acting not only as the father of a family, but as a king, doing now for the incipient nation what its kings must continue to do when the nation has multiplied, the Free Church makes an open question of the national promise, and of all the duty incumbent on rulers and kings in order to it.

But what need I say more? To make an open question of national duty to Christ is to make an open question of the Decalogue. It is to make an open question of Christ's work, and of all His fulness for the nations, as the Good Olive Tree. It is to make an open question of the gospel, which must he preached to every creature, and supremely to the nation and its king. It is to make an open question of the national conversion of the Jews. It is to make an open question of the conversion of the nations. It is, moreover, to make an open question of Christ's spiritual kingdom, house and family, and of the manner in which it must he replenished with children; the open question cutting off the nation from its promise, duty, and dependence as Christ's intended Bride, and so from that subservience to Christ's spiritual kingdom in which the nation is designed to stand, in respect of its 'material resources, in respect of its populousness, and in respect of its being a suitably glorious outward representation of it. And, in fine, in so far as man can do it, it is to make an open question, yea it is to deprive God, of the glorious temple which Christ's spiritual family duly built up is to constitute for Him, and of all the glory also to accrue to Him from Christ's spiritual kingdom, and from man's outward kingdom brought into its due subservience to it—man being intended to rule the earth for Christ, Christ to rule man for God, and God to be glorified over all and in all.

These are the things of which men make open questions, in making open question of national duty to Christ. It is by this open question that the Free Church, by a majority of her Presbyteries and the affirmation of her Assembly, has now come to be dominated and characterised. Apart from the assertion of national duty, the claim to spiritual independence loses its meaning, or resolves itself into one for liberty to a majority to do as it pleases. National duty to Christ was the Church's primary and fundamental principle, the assertion of spiritual independence coming in as a necessary consequence, or, in connection with the negotiations to which the performance of national duty leads; but she has come to give herself over to that 'detestable indifferency or neutrality' regarding it which our forefathers abhorred. 'I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth'—(Rev. iii. 15, 16).

Can we then have part with the Free Church in her open question? Is not the Free Church herself bound to retrace her steps? The writer may be allowed to take occasion here, in all humility but in all sincerity, to witness that this open question of national duty to Christ, so contrary to vital Bible truth, and to the Church's own sworn principles, and so un-righteously imposed on her by what he conceived to be an apostatizing and tyrannical majority, compelled him to resign his ministry in, and to withdraw himself from, the Church which he loved, and for which, in his own remote sphere, he had laboured and sacrificed as much as any of the majority themselves, and that in compelling him to resign his ministry, it also drove him and his family out of house and home. *

3. In fine, in connection with present controversies and present duty, I come now to ask whether it is not the duty of the Free Church, of the United Presbyterian Church, and of all the other Presbyterian Churches in Scotland, to seek establishment in connection with the presently existing Established Church, and to unite in the formation of a United, Free, Established, National Church of Scotland.

One thing is certain, that it is a prime duty incumbent on every Church to seek establishment, and that it is not allow-able, it is not lawful for any Church to rest content in a disestablished condition. This, indeed, is what Voluntaryism leads its followers to do on principle. In their view, the state is regarded as an unclean thing. It can touch religion only to defile and injure it. The Church is then only in its right place when it is disestablished; and their only claim for it is toleration on equal terms with all else that may be tolerated. But this also is what the Free Church has come to propose for herself. There is no hope of bringing the nation to do its duty in relation to Christ and His Church, and it would be idle to make the attempt. There is danger in state connection, and she would think twice about it before returning to the best establishment that could be offered to her. She has made a position for herself, and she is very comfortable as she is, at least her leaders are; and releasing the nation from its duty, and taking the nation's work, and for which only the nation is competent, into her own hands, she makes the vain profession that she is able, out of her own private resources, to overtake all the destitution of the land. Thus she means to have nothing to do with the state, she will continue disestablished, and her ministers are even now calling this, and are labouring to sanctify it to themselves, and to an ignorant people, by calling it a 'standing fast in the liberty with which Christ has made them free!"

But is this lawful? Is it allowable for any Church to take up such a position as regards the state, to use no means with a view to establishment, and to rest content in a disestablished condition?

I submit, that under duty to the nation, to herself, and to God and His Christ, it is not lawful; that, on the contrary, it is in the highest degree sinful, and must be followed with sin's consequences.

1. It is not allowable in view of the nation. It is not allowable in view of that condition of revolt from God in which the nation is, and because of which the indignation of the Lord is so surely lying upon it. It is not allowable, in view of a gospel for the nation, and which, with a view to the nation, is primarily to be addressed to the nations' rulers and king. It is not allowable in view of the chief end of nations, and of God's gracious will and purpose regarding them, with reference to Himself and His Son. And it is not allowable in view even of the individuals of the nation, and that wide ingathering of individuals, with a view to which God is seated on a throne of grace, the gospel has been imparted to the nation, and which the Church herself professedly seeks. She thinks to obtain this wide ingathering by beginning at the bottom of the national constituency, and by operating on its scattered individuals. But in this she is taking a course which is contrary to nature, contrary to the gospel, and to the will and command of God. God has given kings, rulers, princes, nobles, men of standing, a natural influence over those under them; and those under them naturally follow and obey, especially if the direction in which they are led appears to be good and commendable. Naturally, therefore, if the nation is to be widely influenced, it must be through its natural leaders. But the way of nature is the way of God and of His gospel: 'He shall bear my name before nations and kings.' The Church, therefore, must not ignore, must not neglect to avail herself of the natural influence of princes on their people, and which God has given them, not surely merely for civil ends, but with a view to His gospel, but striving, by all means to get that influence imbued with the gospel, and the grace of God, and getting it, as thus imbued, brought to bear on the people, it is thus, and thus alone, that she need look for a wide-spread ingathering of the individuals of a nation. Under Voluntaryism, or in connection with a Church satisfied with a disestablished condition, there never will be a wide ingathering, there never will be the conversion of a nation; and in view of the ingathering even of individuals, it is not allowable for any Church to act on a principle that leads them to reject an influence which God has provided for them, which He commands them to use, and which, as thus rejected, can, on the other hand, only be an influence for evil.

2. But again, it is not allowable to rest content in a disestablished condition in view of the Church herself, and of the 'unctions with which she has been invested, and must fulfil. The Church is Christ's Bride, His spiritual kingdom. She must not degrade herself by taking up the position, voluntarily, of a merely tolerated sect, and where she has no higher standing in the eye of the law of the land than that of a secular association. She must assert herself, and procure recognition according to her high relationships, dignity, and claims. Then the Church is the heir of the world, and it is only in the converted nation that she can enter on her inheritance. As, therefore, she would rise to her reign and rest upon the earth, she must renounce her Voluntaryism, she must renounce her self-satisfied Free Churchism, she must have to do with the nation and its king, and she must fulfil, on their behalf, all the duty devolving on her as the heir of the world, and the believing, prayerful, expectant of the Church's promise of the land. The Church is also Christ's witness, Christ's ambassador to the nation. She has a message from the Prince of the kings of the earth to the nation and its king; and woe shall be to her if, from Voluntaryism or Free Churchism, or any other cause, she fails in speaking of His testimonies before kings, and in making faithful and urgent submission of His claims. Once more, the Church is Christ's battle-axe and weapons of war. He promises to be with her as captain of the Lord's host. She need not fear, therefore, of success in the delivery of her message. His word applied to kings will be a sharp two-edged sword. It will be mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds. She will surely bind the kings with chains, the nobles with fetters of iron, and in the converted nation she will, in due time, enter on her inheritance. The position, therefore, of Voluntaries, and of the Free Church, is altogether untenable. It is not allowable, it is highly sinful for any Church to rest in a disestablished condition.

3. But, once more, it is not allowable in view of Christ. Christ is the King of the land. He is the Proprietor of the soil. He is the Prince of the nation, and of its king, and he comes that, delivering the nation out of the hands of all her enemies, she may become His Bride, and the fruitful mother of the children that He requires for His spiritual house and family. May the Church, then, Christ's witness, stand idly by and see Him, the King of the land, refused His crown, and refused the homage due to Him? Can she see Him unrecognised, or only tolerated among a motley crew of tolerated parties and claims. Can she thus see Him, and yet refuse to lift up her voice in loud assertion of His claims, and be guiltless? Sent on Christ's message of love, and called on to bring the nation home to Him as a Bride, may she lawfully withhold His message, or even loiter by the way. Abraham, in his day, sent out his servant to bring home a bride for his son Isaac, in doing so assuring him that the angel of God would go before him and give him success; and with what diligence and faithfulness did that servant fulfil his mission, and with what success, beyond all expectation, was his faithfulness crowned? With a like promise is the Church sent forth; and let her only manifest the corresponding diligence and faithfulness, and with a corresponding success will her mission, too, be prospered. Under faithfulness, therefore, to Christ and His claims, and as she would fulfil the high mission with which she has been entrusted, the Church cannot rest satisfied in a disestablished condition; on the contrary, with all fidelity and earnestness she must seek it, nor can she rest until it has been obtained.

4. But, in fine, Christ has a wicked, a specious, and dangerous rival, and it is not allowable for the Church to rest satisfied in a disestablished condition, because of the insidious and portentous claims which even now antichrist is making on the nation. Whether the Church understands or not Christ's relation to the nation as the nation's king, and that the chief end of the nation is that of being a Bride for Christ, antichrist understands these things well; and whether the Church understands or not, her mission and function as regards the nation, and where and with whom to begin, antichrist has fathomed and fully comprehends them. Not only so, acting with boldness and vigour on her views, the Church of Rome boasts, and with reason, that she alone can be seen to have fulfilled the Church's mission to the nations. But how are antichrist's claims on the nation to be met? They are to be met, not certainly by the persistent assertion of Voluntaryism, which can only betray the nation over into his power, but by the clear and faithful exhibition to the nations and their kings of Christ as their true Prince, as the glorious Bridegroom with whom alone they must be married, and in connection with whom alone they are to become the national sons of God, or of His Church. In no other way are antichrist's claims to be met, or will they be successfully resisted; and the duty devolving on the Church to make this faithful exhibition of Christ's claims, and being called on here to be a witness faith- ful even unto death, let the Church be found unfaithfully, or remissly, carrying out her witness-bearing, then only one consequence can follow. If the nation is not won for Christ, it will be won for antichrist. Even now to what is the present alarming and increasing ascendency of popery in the high places of the land to be ascribed? The Church has been unfaithful, her unfaithfulness being largely owing to the paralysing influence of Voluntaryism, and, let the same influence continue to be exercised for a little longer, and it is not all the intelligence of the nineteenth century, nor all the learning of Oxford, that will save our princes and our nation from once more giving their strength and power to the beast. The Church must seek herself to be established, she must get the nation married to Christ, she must get the nation back into covenant bonds with God, and only thus, as of old, will popery be either cast out, or kept out.

On these grounds, then, it is not lawful for any Church to take up with, and rest content in a disestablished condition. The Church must seek establishment, nor can she rest until the nation, as such, has become a united Church, and so the Church also has become a nation reigning on, and inheriting the earth.

But if the disestablished Churches are under such obligation to seek establishment for themselves, can it be lawful for them to seek the disestablishment of the presently existing Church of Scotland? Is it not rather their incumbent duty, and that of all patriotic and enlightened Christian men, to unite with her in order to the formation of a United, Free, Established National Church of Scotland.

'Disestablish the Church of Scotland,' that is the cry with which the Free and the United Presbyterian Churches are now uniting to fill and agitate the land.

In the Church of Scotland they see their own identical Confession, except the part, indeed, excised out of it, or made an open question of, in favour of Voluntaryism, and their own identical form of Church government and worship already received by the nation, and recognised as the very truth of God, and as all according to His word, and yet they would have the nation to reject this their own creed, and form of Church government and worship, to cease to recognise them as of divine authority, to divest itself of the last rag of acknowledgment of dependence on Christ, and to become absolutely godless as a nation.

In the Church of Scotland they see the very confession and form of Church government and worship, with which they themselves are bound to seek to get the nation married to Christ, they see them already received, established, and endowed by the nation, and thus a troth virtually plighted which they might well rejoice to foster into a perfect marriage, and yet they cry disestablish the Church of Scotland.

Ingenious minds and clever lawyers can make a case out of anything, and there are none so blind, or so exacting, as those who will not see; but yet, in the Church of Scotland as now happily released from the oppression of Queen Anne's Act, so unrighteously imposed on her by the British Parliament, we have that Church as, consequent on her own faithful contendings, she was established by Scotland's own Parliaments, and when she had secured to her, at the same time, her own exclusive spiritual jurisdiction, and independence in spiritual matters of all civil control; and yet this is the Church, and when, and just because she has been so released, and has become the very house in which our fathers worshipped, for whose disestablishment there are Scotchmen faithless enough to agitate and to cry.

The Church of Scotland was the best Reformed Church of the Reformation; and just because of her purity, and the power for good which, as the Church of the nation, she was fitted to exercise, she has been throughout her sad, but noble history, the special object of the devil's malignant spite, who, watching for evil, has ever had some dire opposition with which to assail, and clash her again to the ground, on every occasion of her succeeding in getting herself rightly constituted, and placed in circumstances in which to engage hopefully in her national work. So it was when, after prolonged contests with the enemies of the Reformation, she came to be finally established in 1592; for scarcely had she succeeded, when, under the crafty and tyrannical policy of James, every means were used to overthrow her Presbyterian polity and government, and to establish Prelacy instead. Then, when Prelacy was cast out, and Presbytery restored at the period of the second Reformation, how soon was this followed, in addition to other troubles, by the dark and bloody times of the closing years of the Stewart dynasty, during which the Church was so sorely scattered and peeled, and became as a partridge hunted on the mountains. Then, no sooner had she been re-established under the Revolution settlement, and had all her liberties and privileges as the Church of the nation farther firmly secured to her by the treaty of union, than Queen Anne's infamous Act, restoring patronage, the cause of all her troubles since, came to be imposed on her, contrary to the faith of nations, by the British Parliament. Then following quick on that new period of revival which came over her, and of which Dr Chalmers was the harbinger and so largely the promoter, came the Ten Year's Conflict with the civil courts, and the Disruption. And now, finally, when once more she is restored to her standing and privileges, and is fitted for becoming again the Church of the nation, how does it fare with her? What new mischief has the arch enemy of Scotland's national kirk in preparation for her? She has the worst of all; and if he has not quite succeeded in destroying her by that infamous Act of Queen Anne in one way, he will do it in another. She has those whom she has reason to look upon as her own children, in ignorance of Satan's devices, and not observing the use which he desires to make now of the divisions which that Act has occasioned, carried away with an antiscriptural Voluntaryism, seeking to rase her to the ground, and so to prevent the possibility, henceforth, of a national Church of Scotland at all.

It was in connection with the Church of Scotland that the Scottish nation was brought up so graciously and gloriously out of the land of Egypt and Popish house of bondage. It was in connection with her that the Scottish nation, her nobles with one mind and one heart taking the lead, became a covenanted nation, pledged to be the Lord's people, so as no other nation has been since the days of Israel of old, and her land a holy land. It is only, moreover, in connection with the national Church that Scotland can ever become a covenanted nation again, and while this is so necessary, and would be so glad a consummation, even now, for instance, it being not individuals, nor even a number of divided denominations, but a united nation, that Christ so earnestly desires and looks for to become His Bride, let the Free Church, the United Presbyterian Church, and all the Presbyterianism of Scotland, laying aside their prejudices, misconceptions, and misrepresentations, and returning to their original principles, return also to the Church of their fathers, how soon, under the blessing of God on such a scriptural union, and perhaps even with her own nobility restored to her, might Scotland, as a united nation, be presented as a chaste virgin to Him. What a blessing to herself! what an example, what a witness, to the nations would she then become! what a power for good would she then wield as regards her sister, England! She would be the saving of the three kingdoms, bringing denominationalism to an end, and in terms such as might be suitable, through the Lord's giving Sion's watchmen of all the denominations to see eye to eye, uniting the whole once more in a solemn league and covenant with God, and among themselves, and against the kingdom of darkness. And yet must the cry still be for disestablishment?

Why must this be so, or what the grounds on which such a demand, so bitter and extreme, is made? It is made not certainly on the grounds of the faults real or alleged, still adhering to the establishment. These, indeed, are eagerly sought out. Faults are found which have no existence, such as exist are magnified, nothing is too bad to be said of the Church of Scotland, and, as if the end in view justified the use of any means, men are freely indulging in bearing false witness against their neighbour. Still, it is not the faults of the Church of Scotland that have led to the present agitation. Men were silent when there was more cause to complain, and if now they were as earnest for union with the Church of Scotland as they are for another union, such as have been capable of swallowing the Voluntary camel would not be found straining so hard at gnats. They would find fewer faults in her, and as for those that might still remain, they would think of them only with a view to their removal. But the fact is, the Free Church, in common with the United Presbyterian Church, in their present mind, would not join the Church of Scotland as an established Church, no matter what her purity, and it is, therefore, in sheerest pretence that her faults are held up as the reasons of their movement. Neither do they seek disestablishment with a view to reconstruction and a purer establishment. No sane man would, in these days, propose disestablishment with that end in view. They seek disestablishment, because, regarding the Church now as a dangerous rival, they have become, all at once, jealous of her; they seek it in the selfish interests of their own endangered denominations; and they seek it, further, with a view to that union of the Churches in Scotland on a Voluntary platform, which they have been so long striving to effect, and which they hope now to secure by an Act of Parliament that shall crush down all their present opponents into this amalgamation of the Churches on a Voluntary platform. But perish the selfish denominational interests that can be conserved only by such a sacrifice! And God Himself will surely confound a scheme for union which proposes to abandon the nation to antichrist, infidelity, and ruin; which has for its object to withdraw the Church from all her high functions and incumbent duty as regards the nation, and to reduce herself to the degraded condition of a merely tolerated sect, yea, and in which she has no higher standing in the eye of the law of the land than any ordinary secular association; and which proposes, farther, in the name of spiritual independence, and of a pretended faithfulness to Christ, to come in between Christ and the nation's crown, and all that high recognition, and hearty homage, and willing service, which He is looking for at the nations' hands.

They have had enough surely of disestablishment already, not easily to be repaired, in the disestablishment and disendowment of religion, and of the Bible itself, out of the schools of the nation, under which the nation already smarts, but the full mischief of which has yet to be reaped, and for which the nation will yet hold them answerable.

No, the Churches, and all Christian patriots, must look at this great question, and at this great crisis, through other spectacles than those of a wretched denominational jealousy, or than those of the comforts of that 'new house,' which the Free Church has been able to build up for herself, or than those of an antiscriptural Voluntaryism; and by every obligation of Christian patriotism, as well as every obligation of vital divine truth, affecting both Church and nation, and by all the gratitude due to God for granting to this land, and procuring the national establishment in it, of the best Reformed Church in Christendom, are they bound to seek union with, and so to build up their own national Church of Scotland, as to constitute this nation a Church, the Bride of Christ, and a national Son of God. To this also we are called, as the descendants of a covenanted Church and nation; by all the favour, also, which God still has to us, as such, saying of us, 'I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, and the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown;' and still farther, by that very special instance of this favour which He has so clearly manifested, at this very time, in turning the hearts of our rulers to lift from off Scotland's Church the oppression of Queen Anne's infamous Act, and so to open up the way for the formation of a truly united and national Church, at the very juncture when both the nation and its Churches were about to be turned aside, and to act on the principles of a disastrous, and utterly antiscriptural Voluntaryism. Never had wise, large-hearted, and Christian-minded men, having knowledge of the times, and what Israel ought to do, a better opportunity set before them for the saving and glorifying of their nation. The veritable house in which our sainted fathers worshipped, stands open for the reception of all Scotland's Presbyterianism. Fill it, throng it once more with all Scotland's piety, and let the prayers and the praises of a united nation he heard once more within its walls. Take possession of the Church, take possession of the nation for Christ; let them become the nation's Church, and let the nation become the Church's nation, and so in union with Christ, and in covenant with God, let the words be verified: 'The covenants, the covenants, shall yet be Scotland's reviving.' Away with resentful remembrances of conflict, and of grievous things done and said, which may well be regarded as oh all sides sufficiently retracted, and which have no existence, and can have no effect now. Cease to magnify the faults still attaching to the Established Church, and think only of how they may, and by the blessing of God, shall be removed. Are they themselves, forsooth! faultless, with their Voluntaryism and their open questions? Are the faults attaching to the Establishment now equal to those of the Church of the Revolution settlement? and yet did not our fathers thankfully accept of it, in the hope of being able practically to effect under it all the great ends of the Church? And, accordingly, notwithstanding of all subsequent defections and backsliding, did not God's blessing still rest on the national Church of Scotland; and was it not this very Church that gave birth to and educated that noble band of men, ministers and laymen, which constituted the Church of the Disruption, and of which any Church or land might well be proud? The Cameronians had much better reason for standing aloof from the Church of the Revolution than the Free Church has for standing aloof now, and yet did they do well for themselves, or for the Church, or kingdom of Scotland, in refusing to come in, and strengthen the hands of men as well-principled as, but knowing better what Israel ought to do, than themselves. Why then should their error be repeated now? The Free Church, as a separate Church, has fulfilled her mission. She sees it in the abolition of Queen Anne's Act, which, but for her, would never have been abolished. God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform. He has led them round about, but He has led them by the right way, and seeing now the end of her being accomplished, she should enter by the door which she has virtually opened for herself, and devote all her energies now in building up a national Church, and promoting a national union, such as would do honour to her true principles, and consistently and victoriously crown all her faithful contendings for them. This is a union into which she might bring all her principles and all her property, her Sustentation Fund and all her Christian liberality, and in which she might stimulate and guide a national Church in devising yet grander schemes of usefulness for our own and other lands, and aid in consecrating a nation's gain to their support. And might not United Presbyterians, acknowledging the antiscriptural character of Voluntaryism, and returning at length to their own original principles, and all the other Presbyterian Churches with them, follow, or lead, the Free Church into this most patriotic and most scriptural union, and with all their special gifts contribute to the excellence and glory of Scotland's national Church? But what the Churches and Christian men have to do in this great juncture for Scotland must be done without delay. This is not a time for men to stand idly by, every one expecting his own special optimism, and looking critically to see whether other men are going to realise it for them, instead of coining, without delay, and aiding in the realisation of it themselves. Storms are impending, and notwithstanding all her diligence, they may be upon the Church and nation before she has put her house in order suitably, or safely, to meet them. Besides, death is busy, and there are great and experienced men happily yet alive, whose services would be indispensable in building up a united national Church, but who may be called on to enter into their rest all too soon for the Church and nation which they leave behind.

'The God of heaven, He will prosper us, therefore we, His servants, will arise and build.' 'Thou shalt arise, and have mercy upon Zion; for the time to favour her, yea, the set time, is come. For thy servants take pleasure in her stones, and favour the dust thereof. So the nations shall fear the name of the Lord, and all the kings of the earth thy glory.'

The following extract from 'The Bible and The Family,' bearing on the divisions of the Decalogue, and the order in which it is to be read, is appended, in order that the references made to the Decalogue in this Treatise, may be more readily understood:—

The divisions of the Decalogue, and the order in which its several precepts are to be contemplated, do not seem as yet to have been sufficiently considered, or determined; and yet it is in vain to attempt any exposition of the Decalogue until these have been ascertained.

In regard to the divisions of the Decalogue:—

The first is that which divides the Ten Commandments into two main parts of five and five.

This important division should be obvious at a glance, and yet, too commonly still, the first table, or first division of the law, is reckoned to consist of the first four precepts, the second being supposed to include in it the remaining six.

But, (1.) This unequal division faultily slights whatever design God had in view, in such a purposely made arrangement of the law, as comprehends the whole under ten words, or precepts; as well as the importance, so clearly attaching to numbers, all through the Scriptures.

(2.) It does not observe that the broad seal of: 'The Lord thy God,' seals the fifth commandment equally with the fourth and all that precede, thus clearly marking off the first five from the second five, and putting an important distinction of some kind between them;—it ignores, too, the fact that filial duty is actual piety—(1 Tim. v. 4);—and, in short, the fourth and fifth commandments being internally inseparably united together, it fails to mark the connection, and violently and mischievously separates between them.

(3.) Not only so, but while taking it erroneously for granted that the fifth commandment prescribes morality, it proceeds upon the farther groundless supposition, that the proper distinction between the two tables of the law, is that which makes the first treat of piety, or of the duties which we owe directly to God; and the second to treat of morality, or the duties owing to our fellow-men. It will be found, however, that both tables alike treat of piety and morality, and that this supposition, although so universally held, is groundless; that, in fact, in connection with an understanding of the Decalogue, it is a mischievous mistake; and that, each table consisting of five precepts, the distinction between them is of quite another description, and must be very differently stated.

But the ten being divided into two main parts of five and five, each of these admits of and requires a sub-division.

Thus it will be found that the first table is made up of two distinct portions, attention to which is indispensably necessary to any right understanding of the Decalogue; the first of these portions consisting of the fourth and fifth precepts, which are tied together into one by inseparable connections; and the second portion consisting of the first three precepts, which are in like manner indissolubly joined together.

Then, again, it will be found that the second table is also to be divided into two subordinate portions; the first consisting of the tenth precept, which makes a subdivision by itself; and the second, made up of the remaining four precepts of the second table.

Having marked what the divisions of the Decalogue are, we must next notice the order in which, under each table, the subdivisions and their several precepts, are to be taken up and considered.

Now, this is the reverse of the order of their promulgation, or in which they are seen to issue forth from God. We begin where He ends, and it is beginning where He ends that, finally, we attain to where He begins. Thus, in connection with the first table, the point at which submission and obedience to it begin, the very door of entrance into the kingdom of God, is in the fifth commandment, from which we pass, and rise up into the obedience of the fourth; and so, through the third, and by the second, to the first, where we reach the inmost shrine of Deity.

This is the order rendered necessary by the real meaning of the several precepts, and by what will be found to be their mutual relations.

It is the order also to which our attention is called, and which is rendered necessary, by the otherwise inexplicable language of the apostle (not but that explanations have been attempted) in regard to the fifth commandment, which he definitely settles to be: 'The first commandment with promise.'—(Eph. vi. 2).

And it is the order further, that we see exhibited, and to which attention was called of old, when the truth of the Decalogue reappeared in the tabernacle; the order of appointment and construction—which was the Most Holy Place, the Holy Place, and then the Altar, and Gate of entrance—being the reverse of the order of entrance—which was, back again, by the Gate, to the Altar, through the Holy Place, and so to the inmost Sanctuary—(Exod. xxv-xxvii.)

In short, in no other order or way will the truth and duty of the first table ever be ascertained.

But this being the order in which it is necessary to take up and consider the first table of the law, it is, in like manner, that in which it will be necessary for us to consider the second table; beginning with its first division, as formed by the tenth precept, and proceeding next to its second division, and contemplating its several precepts in an order upward from the ninth,—being led to this order, as well by the meaning of the several divisions and precepts in themselves, as by the example of the first table.

Finis.

Okawford and M'Cabe, Printers, 15 Queen Street, Edinburgh.

* Once and again he had occasion earnestly to assure the brethren of his late Presbytery that by every vote which they gave for the kind of union that was proposed, they were certainly driving him, for one, out of the Church. In the Presbytery also, when the proposal of the open question came to be plainly made, he did his best to oppose it on the grounds stated above. When it came up for discussion afterwards in the Assembly, although well aware how little capable he was of influencing it, and shrinking most painfully from the task of attempting to do so, yet, under the pressure of the occasion, he put himself forward for a whole day, trying to get an opportunity of giving some expression to his views and convictions. Once he nearly succeeded. Dr Adam, who had risen, kindly offered to give way; but he was on the wrong side of the House, besides he was but a country minister, and the Moderator, Dr Elder, ruled that he was out of order, and put him down. That day the open question that had been agreed to by a majority of Presbyteries, was, in due course, affirmed by the Assembly and a triumphant majority there; but from that day the Free Church ceased to be the Free Church for him. Next day, with his views and convictions, he found himself in the painful position of being unable even to return to the Assembly. He held on, however, for another year. Then there were defections from the anti-union ranks. They came also to be divided among themselves as to what should be a cause of separation, and when separation should take place. He thought that that cause had already been sufficiently given, and he came to be thoroughly satisfied, either that the whole matter would end in a compromise to which he could not agree, which has actually come to pass, or that a separation would be postponed to a point much beyond that to which it would be possible for him to go. Then with this there came the Free Church's action, in conjunction with Voluntaries, in procuring the passing in Parliament of an Education Bill for Scotland, which needlessly handed over to the heritors about a million of money hitherto avail-able for the education of the country, the rate-payers coming to be burdened with the maintenance of schools; but which, more than this, has separated between the Church and the education of the young, has disestablished and disendowed religion in the schools, which all but succeeded in expelling the very Bible, and which, as it is, limits and shuts it up in a comer, where it lies outside all government inspection, pay, or care, and which has handed over so sacred a thing as the education of the young to men of any religion, or of no religion, as the case may be; Papists, as the writer has reason to know, coming now to exercise a preponderating and evil influence in some Boards; and having at the same time power, under the Bill, for procuring government grants for strictly Romish schools, and so for the support and propagation of Popery. Then, once more, that union screw, to whose increasing pressure the Church had been subjected from year to year, was put afresh into motion, and got that new and violent turn which it received in the Mutual Eligibility Overture. The pressure now became intolerable. He found, for himself, though humble as an individual, that he could have no connection with an open question of so disastrous a description, and which was advancing to such issues. In much distress, but calmly and deliberately, he resigned his ministry in the Free Church, he offered himself to the Church of Scotland, and was kindly received, and having first cast himself and his family on God, he then had to cast himself, solitary and alone, on the cold and supercilious regards of an ignorant and unsympathising world.