by any party, we cannot conceive that any thing more is wanting to the substantial validity of the external evidences of Christianity, nor how, amid such vivid pictures of its actual workings, the reality of that new Influence, introduced from on high into the affairs of men, can in its essential character be open to question, or received by so many earnest minds with vague and doubting Faith. The delineation of Christ's mind can be collected only from the Gospels; but as evidences of the Reality of some higher influence, introduced by God through the person of Christ into the common heart of the World, the Epistles afford the ground on which the Argument can decisively be conducted.

I. And if the actual appearance of these difficulties, in the midst of the common relations of Heathen and Jewish life, is the best proof of the reality of the Christian Influence, the spirit in which they were met and overcome exalts the character of that Influence to the calmness and comprehensiveness of God, by that "meekness of wisdom" which is the least questionable sign of whatever is Divine. Knowledge, superior enlightenment, the Freedom of a strong mind from religious weaknesses, St. Paul maintains, have their distinctive and Christian value, not in enabling a man to pursue his own way, but in enabling him to tread, with a quiet and sympathizing heart, in the harmless ways which, for a time, the comparative feebleness of others may compel them to adopt. In relation to things indifferent, who ought to yield, - the strong or the weak, the

scrupulous or the enlightened?- those who deem them essential and indispensable, or those who deem them of no vital importance whatever, the one way, or the other? The weak cannot yield, without an injury and violence to Conscience, the worst of all evils; and if the strong will not yield, because they stand on the individual rights of their own Enlightenment, then Christian Unity is broken by those who follow the guidance of Knowledge alone, and take no guidance from Love. The Christian use of a spiritual discernment of things essential, is to enable a large mind to act with forbearance in things indifferent, to yield to the scrupulous who conscientiously cannot yield, and in its tenderness and comprehensiveness to manifest the catholic and healing spirit of true Religion. What is the moral use of Strength, if it does not enable us to bear with the weaknesses of others? The strong, unless they can vindicate their right to walk the world alone, and come into contact with no mind but God's, are the last who can, with a clear conscience, pass by the infirmities of the feeble. It is for the weak to be intolerant of the weak,- for his own helplessness is enough for each, and their mutual infirmities may come into selfish collision; but it is for the strong, who can do it, to forbear, and stoop, and lift the burden, in thankfulness of heart to God, by whose grace it is that he himself is not one of those who crowd, and straiten, and embarrass the way of Life. What is the boasted privilege of Liberty, if we are as much Bigots in our opposition to scruples as others are in their slavery to them? It is the glory

of the free mind, that in things indifferent it can move off its own ground of abstract Knowledge, and with a clear and loving heart go, and join itself, to the weak and the bound, who cannot come to it. This is the Law of guidance in all such collisions, which St. Paul, with exquisite beauty and force of expression, lays down for those Corinthian leaders, who, severing Knowledge from Love, deemed themselves strong and independent in their religious enlightenment. Knowledge, unless placed under the guidance of Sympathy, is not a Christian principle of action, in relation to other minds. Knowledge alone only elateth the individual; but when guided by Love, it buildeth up the Church. "Knowledge puffeth up, but Charity buildeth up.” “If a man thinketh that he knoweth any thing, and that his Knowledge makes for him an independent path in his moral relations to others, then he knoweth nothing as he ought to know: but if any man love God, and sinks all individual pretensions in his common relation to the universal Father, and so rises above self-love into a disinterested affection, the same is known of God, - God recognizes in him His own spirit." Here it is remarkable that the man who loves God is not said to know God, — but God is said to know him. In the same manner, the Son of Man is represented as saying to those who do not manifest the mercies of his temper, "I know you not." Such expressions show how thoroughly the spiritual sentiment had penetrated to the finest sources of language; and in both cases they mean, that the spirit of God, full of Grace as of Truth, has no inti

mate connections with self-centred, unsympathizing natures, — dwells not in such breasts. (viii. 1, 3.)

II. The particular case which required the clear expression of this practical Rule, arose out of the impossibility, in a Heathen City, of avoiding contact with the daily sacrifices of Polytheism. The Temples were, in fact, in a great measure the Markets of the Heathen world. The sacrifices were not entirely consumed on the altars, and what remained were the perquisites of the Priests, or the property of the offerers. A feast in the Temple was the usual sequel to a sacrifice; and a strong-minded Christian, who believed that an Idol was nothing in the world, and that, notwithstanding the Pagan worship of gods. many and lords many, there was but one God our Father, and one Lord Jesus Christ, might have no scruple in partaking of the feast, which could not be an act of worship to the Idol, in whose very existence he did not believe. This is the case which,

in the eighth and ninth chapters, St. Paul discusses with those who took their abstract Knowledge and enlightenment alone, unguided by a Christian sympathy for the scruples of the weaker brethren, as their only Law of social action. Admitting that the thing was in itself indifferent, and that an Idol was nothing in the world, and so could have no worship paid to it, he yet condemns a participation of the Feast in the Idol's Temple, as a wanton disregard of the consciences of others, and a dangerous snare for their own. The Knowledge, alleged in ex"that there was no God but one," and that

cuse,

"God taketh no account of meats, for neither if we eat are we the better, nor if we eat not are we the worse," — was indeed a self-justification, if they had been alone in the world, with God only, - and their conduct had reflected no influences on the souls of others. But no man, except in the silent depths of the spirit, sustains these exclusive relations with the Father of the Soul, no man liveth to himself even in things pertaining to God, and a wise and tender sympathy for the interests of others must qualify and guide his Knowledge, - else," he knoweth nothing as he ought to know." Others of weaker Faith, of temperaments more sensitive to the consecrated impressions of the Past, less free from the lingering vestiges of the old Idolatry, might not have this absolute conviction of the non-existence of the Idol God, and eat in trembling doubt, or with a scrupulous alarm lest the very act of eating might imply worship and recognition, and so the weak conscience be defiled. "Take heed lest by any means this your Liberty become an occasion of sin to those that are weak. For if any one see thee, who hast Knowledge, sitting at meat in an Idol's Temple, will not his conscience, if he be weak, be encouraged to eat things offered to Idols? and thus, through thy Knowledge, without love or selfdenial, the, weak brother, for whom Christ in selfdenial died, will lapse into guilt. And when ye

thus sin against the brethren, and wound their weak

conscience, ye sin against Christ.

Wherefore if

meat make my brother to offend, I will never more eat meat, lest I make my brother to offend."