Page:Dennet - The Plymouth Brethren.djvu/32

 “There is a very material difference between those occasions on which the Assembly is gathered for worship and the special services of Brethren. In these latter the Evangelist or the teacher, the preacher or the lecturer, serves in his individual capacity, in responsibility to his Lord. Nor does it make any difference whether such services are conducted in the rooms usually occupied by the Assembly or elsewhere. The members of the Assembly (I cannot but note that we are condemned for saying members of the Church) may be present or not, as they feel disposed” (p. 49). On the other hand, they feel very differently in regard to the advancement of the views which characterise them as Brethren. The same author says: business is with the saints in those systems, to seek, by every spiritual and Scriptural agency, to get them out into their true position in the Assembly of God” (p. 27)―which means, when translated, by any and all possible means make them “Brethren.” And, unless you are acquainted with them and their literature, you can have little idea how zealously and persistently they keep this object in view. They have numbers of tracts written for this special end, and, after having read a large number of them, I am compelled to acknowledge that they are most ingeniously and cleverly written. But, somehow or other―from ignorance I do not doubt―the principles, views, and proceedings of other Christians are most systematically misrepresented. In support of these statements, I may cite the fact that very recently a lady―a “Sister”―hearing I was to lecture on this subject, sent me a pamphlet, that I might be the more correctly informed as to their views. For her courtesy I was exceedingly obliged, but on the second page I found a passage to this effect―that no Christian would be received by the so called Dissenting Churches unless he adopted all their peculiar views, and I have met with this assertion again