these peculiarities. I am not asserting that such would necessarily be the experience of all persons who endeavour to follow the guidance of the Spirit; nor would I, in any respect, venture to set limits to the sovereignty, freedom, scope, and variety, of divine operation. I assert only that this is our own experience. Such, therefore, being our experience, we cannot but derive from it a strong and satisfactory conviction, that our religious peculiarities appertain to the law of God; for it is certain, that the Spirit of Truth, by whose influence alone men are made truly righteous, and brought into conformity with the divine will, would never lead any of the followers of Jesus into a course of conduct which is not founded on the principles of that law. The inward manifestations of the Spirit are, in themselves, the law of God written on the heart.

I may now proceed to confirm this general argument by more particular observations on the several peculiarities already enumerated; and, in endeavouring to trace the connexion of each of them with the law of God, I shall appeal to the principles of that law, as they are unfolded in the New Testament. For, I consider that it is only under the new and more spiritual dispensation, that the divine law is revealed to us in all its purity and in all its completeness.

CHAPTER IV.

ON THE DISUSE OF ALL TYPICAL RITES IN THE WORSHIP

OF GOD.

THOUGH it is almost universally allowed among Christians, that, when the New Covenant was established in the world, by the death of Christ, the ceremonies of the Jewish law were abolished, there are two religious rites of a very similar description, the maintenance of which is still very generally insisted upon, as necessary to the edification, and true order, of the church of Christ. These rites are baptism with water, and that participation of bread and wine, which is usually called the sacrament of the Lord's supper. So great is the virtue and efficacy ascribed to these ceremonies, that they are considered, by very many Christians, to be especial means of grace, or mediums through which grace is conveyed to the soul; and not a few theologians, both ancient and modern, appear to have entertained the extraordinary opinion, that the rite of baptism, more especially, is indispensable to salvation.

On the other hand, I am informed that, in some parts of the continent of Europe, there are small so

cieties of pious Christians, by whom water-baptism and the ceremony of the Lord's supper are entirely disused; and that such is the fact in the Society of Friends is generally understood. It is our belief that we have been led out of the practice of these rites by the Spirit of Truth; that we could not recur to them without grieving our heavenly Monitor; and that, in fact, they are not in accordance with the entire spirituality of the Gospel dispensation.

In order to explain our principle on the subject, I must remark, in limine, that the ceremonies in question, as now practised among Christians, must be considered as forming a part of their system of worship for they are, in the first place, in the strictest sense of the terms, religious rites performed in supposed obedience to the command of the Almighty; and, secondly, they are employed in immediate connexion with the more direct, and generally with the public, acts of divine worship. Such being the state of the case, the objection of Friends to the use of these ordinances will be perceived to have its foundation in a principle of acknowledged importance, and one which is clearly revealed in the New Testament, that, under the Christian dispensation, the worship of God is not to be formal, ceremonial, or typical, but, simply spiritual.

This principle was declared in a clear and forcible manner by Jesus Christ himself. When the woman of Samaria, with whom he condescended to converse

1 This is the case, as I understand, with the Inspirés in Germany, and with the Malakans in South Russia.

by the well of Sychar, spake to him of the worship observed by the Jews at Jerusalem, and by the Samaritans on Mount Gerizim, our Lord answered, "Woman, believe me, the hour cometh when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father.....The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth."2 In this passage of our Lord's discourse, there is an evident allusion to two separate and distinct systems of worship, belonging to two different dispensations; and it is equally clear that the change was then about to take place from one of these to the other; that the one was about to be abolished,-the other to be established. The system of worship about to be abolished was that which the Jews were accustomed to practise at Jerusalem, and which the Samaritans had endeavoured to imitate on their favourite mountain. Now, every one who is acquainted with the records of the Old Testament, must be aware that this was a system of worship chiefly consisting in outward ceremonies, in figurative or typical ordinances. The greatest nicety of divine direction accompanied the institution of these various rites, which were a " figure for the time then present," and " which stood only in meats and drinks, and divers washings, and carnal ordinances, imposed" on the Israelites "until the time of reformation."3 But now that time of reformation was

at hand, and the law was pronounced by the great Mediator of the New Covenant, that men were henceforward to worship the Father in spirit and in truth. The new worship which was thus to distinguish Christianity was to be in spirit; because it was to consist, not in outward rites of a formal and ceremonial nature, but in services dictated by the Spirit of the Lord, and in direct communion of the soul with its Creator. It was to be in truth; not simply as arising from a sincere heart,—a description which might apply with equal force to the abolished worship of the Jews-but because it was to consist in substantial realities. was to be carried on, not through the old medium of types and figures, but by the application to the heart of the great and essential truths of the Gospel; for the type was now to be exchanged for the antitype, the figure for the thing figured, the shadow for the substance. Such then, and such only, is the true character of Christian worship.

It

We ought by no means to disparage the forms and ceremonies of the Jewish law, as connected with the covenant to which they appertained. We cannot forget that this ministration of worship was appointed by the Almighty himself; nor can we refuse to acknowledge that it was, in its own time, glorious. For, although these ceremonies could not make him that did the service perfect, as pertaining to the conscience, yet was the whole system, of which they formed

4 A similar explanation of our Lord's expressions, respecting Christian worship, will be found in the Commentaries of the following biblical critics :-Theophylact, Calvin, Jac. Cappellus, Grotius, Rosenmüller, Whitby, Gill, Scott, and Doddridge.