again to the assaults of the world, or to the fear of ridicule; that thus you virtually obey man rather than God; let the Services of this day, reminding you that the true source of strength is in the support of the Holy Spirit, lead you to seek it by the same means to which, of old, it was vouchsafed. And if, following in the steps of the Apostles, who in this were like ourselves but Christian men, we continue all" with one accord in one place;" that is, if, with a united and true heart, we use all the means of grace freely offered; then, in the degree needful for each, the Holy Spirit will descend and dwell in our hearts; and we, admitted by God's providence to be numbered with Christ's visible Church on earth, shall be numbered, also, with that triumphant Church in heaven, in which, as the appointed fruit of his suffering, Christ reigns as head, "God over all, blessed for ever."

SERMON XII.

MATTHEW xxviii. 19.

"Go YE THEREFORE, AND TEACH ALL NATIONS, BAPTIZING THEM IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER, AND OF THE SON, AND OF THE HOLY GHOST."

THE man who requires that religion should present to his mind nothing mysterious; nothing beyond what he can weigh in the balance of his judgment, and pronounce, with exactness, wherein it exceeds, and in what comes short of a reasonable belief; requires what God has evidently judged it unfit to give. For many things there are in Scripture which, though they cannot be said to oppose our

reason, as being of a character not subject to it, are yet altogether beyond its compass. Such, for example, is that mystery of the faith which the Service of our Church this day celebrates; which is declared with plainness in the general teaching of Scripture, and most simply in the words of the text, in which the blessed Trinity is announced, "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost."

But not only is it manifest that he who requires a form of doctrine unencumbered by any articles of faith, the fitness of which he cannot at once, by a pure effort of reason, determine; requires what God does not allow : but we may go farther, and uphold, as an unquestionable truth, that he requires a thing inconsistent also with the dignity of his own reason-the very plea on which he would have so much of simpleness in spiritual things. For to imagine a revelation of God, in which there should be nothing beyond the grasp and com

pass of human intellect, would be, in effect, to conclude that there is nothing of higher attainment and knowledge reserved for the reason of man, in a future and more perfect state of being a state wherein the vision of all knowledge shall be opened; where we shall see God as he is. If the divinity were now in all things so revealed, that his being and attributes were comprehensible to the faculties of man, then, it is also manifest, that man's faculties would already have attained to their highest development; and in taking from religion her mysteries, we should be taking from ourselves the highest motives for hope and for obedience: for we should have less of glory to anticipate in that change, which shall add felicity and dignity to reasonable beings, for this

very cause among others, that then they shall no more see as through a glass darkly, but shall see even as they are seen, and shall know God.

Thus reason in her noblest exercise would

desire to find in all her contemplations of the Godhead, that there was that yet left to learn, which should form the worthy and sufficient employment of a higher sphere of being: and therefore, every unrestrained desire to free revelation from the veil which extends over the mystery of the Godhead is, rightly viewed, a desire to take away from man the eventual enlargement of his faculties.

In depriving the divine being of any of his mysterious distinctions, we might appear, on a superficial view of the question, to render him for a time a more reasonable object of our service; but if we argue more accurately, we must conclude the contrary: that every thing which in truth elevates the Eternal above his creatures, increases his claim to our worship and adoration, and, therefore, renders our service that which he indeed requires, a "reasonable service."

But better than all argument, and carrying greater conviction to the sober and devout