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And in order to help us to keep this in mind, it is well to dwell much upon that universal analogy so much used by holy Fathers in their expositions of Scripture, according to which they say that in the Psalms every thing refers either to the Church, the Body of Christ, or to the Head, or to the several members, or jointly to more than one of these*.

The habit of tracing this analogy, and of making the words of the Holy Spirit our own according to it, will do much towards clearing our minds to apprehend the true result of our spiritual relations, as bearing upon our own life and practice.

And with respect to the constitution and government of the visible Church, we have not only to remember that Christ is its real origin, and His commission the only entrance to any office or power in it, and therefore to respect all such authority, and to observe all such rules as belong to the undertaking it, but we have also, in the use of all things connected with it, to keep Him ever in view.

It is not a cold and formal respect, as to the mere outward insignia of an absent royalty, that is due to His Hand and Seal.

See this principle fully stated by St. Augustine in his Doctrina Christiana.

His power and His grace are with them, and they are to be acknowledged with confidence and love, with careful bearing, and childlike awe. He dispenses all things as He will, and often through hands that little know what they are doing. We ought not therefore to measure what comes to us in His Church by the infirmities or faults of those who are the outward instruments. It may come in judgment or in mercy, but man is not the measure of it either way.

Only if we be straitened, let it not be, as with the Corinthians, in our own bowels. Let us not be wilful, and determined to be satisfied with nothing but what is of our own choosing, but in all things lawful submit implicitly to lawful authority; and if authority, as it may happen in the hands of fallible men, should ever be opposed to the commandment of God, still there is a way of obeying God rather than man, without setting at nought His power committed to

man.

Indeed it is a fact that will hardly be questioned in the history of the Church, that a good work has often met certain checks and hindrances from duly constituted authority, and even such as is derived from Christ's s 2 Cor. vi. 12.

own commission. It must however be added as equally the result of experience, that such good work is strengthened and purified from admixture of evil, so far as it meets difficulties in the spirit of charity and dutifulness, and on the other hand is apt to be perverted and turned into evil, if the spirit of self-will is let loose in its behalf.

In all these things let us keep in mind the continual Presence, and the Eternal Majesty of our Lord. So when we speak in His Name we shall do it with soberness and awe, although with confidence and determination. So, in whatsoever manner we approach the House of God, we shall look to our feet, and be careful that we enter as by Him. We shall expect not to do our own pleasure, but His will, and if that be not what we should have chosen for ourselves, we shall not be disappointed, but go in and out, contented though aspiring, patient though straitened, and safe though in the midst of dangers, through Him Who hath loved us, and given Himself for us.

And now, at the appointed season, let us pray to Him especially in behalf of those who are shortly to be admitted to the pastoral office, and each of us who are in that office for the renewal and strengthening of

his own gifts, that we may ever lead those committed to us in the paths of the good Shepherd, and that they may find safe and healthful pasture.

SERMON XXVII.

PREACHED AT BRADFIELD ON THE THIRTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY, AUGUST 25, 1839.

JOHN XVI. 26, 27.

At that day ye shall ask in My Name: and I say not unto you that I will pray the Father for you ; for the Father Himself loveth you, because ye have loved Me, and have believed that I came out from God.

I HAVE taken this text from a different part of the New Testament, though with the purpose of explaining the Epistle for the day, because the Epistle is difficult, and these words of our Blessed Lord seem to afford a key to its meaning. He speaks of those who love Him being brought into such close communion with the Father, that they may pray to the Father in His Name, and not need Him to pray for them, but be at once accepted and answered for His sake. They are still accepted for His sake, and

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