Page:Tracts for the Times Vol 2.djvu/43

Rh "darkness." I say this before passing on to consider (as I mean to do) the other kind of Dissenters, those, viz. who dissent for some lesser difference, merely lest you should suppose that I consider a person absolved from all guilt, on the ground of his being conscientious; for as a good conscience is a great treasure, so a dark conscience is like the blind leading the blind. Now then let me address myself to that larger number of persons who have no material objection against the Church as to its doctrines or discipline, and who do not think that a Dissenter will be saved a bit more than a Churchman; who, indeed, are so far from condemning the Church, that they always feel rather disposed, when acknowledging their Dissent, to make a sort of apology or explanation for their leaving the Church, as, e.g. that "it was so far to go to Church," or that "their health was weak," or "no good sittings were to be had," or that "they had an objection to the clergyman of the parish," or that "they were more edified by the service at Meeting, as more spiritual," or such reasons. I shall begin by placing before you some arguments, which indirectly support my assertion concerning the sinfulness of Dissent.

(1.) Christians are required to unite in serving God in mutual charity and hearty concord. Hence such directions as these from the Apostles to different Churches, viz. that they should endeavour to keep "the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace," that they should be "like-minded, having the same love," being "of one accord, of one mind, standing fast in one Spirit with one mind," that they should "walk by the same rule and mind the same thing," that "with one mind and one mouth they should glorify, the Father of our ," that they should "all speak the same thing," that there should be "no divisions among them," but that they be "perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment ."

As to the construction which some persons put on such passages, viz. by making them to refer to an unity in the spiritual sense, to a mystical union of the faithful all over the world, in