cause of religion, would be, necessarily, a work of immense difficulty
and labour. Much, however, might be accomplished, if more of those, whom
God has blessed with power and influence, set an example of labouring
zealously to promote His glory and the advancement of His kingdom. How
often, amongst the higher and middle classes of society, has the
influence of a single individual, of talents and learning, but of still
more eminent piety, been employed with the most beneficial effects. “A
word spoken in due season, how good is it,” {178} has been fully proved,
in the case of many, who, vibrating, as it were, in such perfect
equipoise between good and evil, that a feather would almost suffice to
incline the balance, have been led to “choose that good part, which shall
not be taken away from them;” {179a} by having books recommended or
supplied, by receiving friendly advice and encouragement, or by that most
eloquent and attractive of the modes of conveying instruction—the winning
grace and beauty of Christian example. If, therefore, even a few
individuals or families, in any place, resolved that, by Divine grace,
“as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord;” {179b} I will not be
“unequally yoked with unbelievers;” {179c} as far as in me lieth, no one
shall blaspheme the Holy Name by which I am called, nor malign the holy
cause which in baptism I have sworn to defend; infidelity would be much
put to shame and silence. And it is the duty of all sincere Christians
to adopt this course, for they are bound to use every means in their
power, to discourage infidelity; they must not admit it into the intimacy
and confidence of domestic life; the sacrifice may sometime be painful,
but it must be made; there may not be any compromise of Christian
obligations, which forbid every unholy alliance: “for what fellowship
hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light
with darkness? and what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part
hath he that believeth, with an infidel?” {179d} Believers must warn,
exhort, entreat, and, if in their power, instruct the unbeliever; but, if
in vain, then the divine command applies, “come out from among them, and
be ye separate:” if both parties be sincere, the contrariety of habits,
feelings, sentiments, and even of enjoyments, which exists between them,
must render familiar intercourse little agreeable or profitable to the
servant of God; who, if he be a weak or wavering disciple, may receive
much injury, where he cannot benefit; and, if he be a firm and
established disciple, when he finds his efforts to convince the gainsayer
fruitless, however ready he may still continue to be to lend assistance,
to admonish, and to observe all the courtesies of life; yet he cannot
assign a place in his heart, or receive as a chosen and favoured
associate, one who is not united with him in the sweet bonds of Christian
fellowship: there exists a bar, for the present, insuperable, why such
may not be addressed in the affectionate language of the Psalmist, “thou,
my companion, my guide, and mine own familiar friend;” and that bar is,
they cannot “take sweet counsel together, and walk in the house of God as
friends.” {180}
To defeat, however, the devices and to frustrate the labours of the
emissaries of infidelity amongst the labouring population of the country,
religious associations should be formed: for an evil of such magnitude
will never be remedied, until there are the more extensive and effective
results of well concerted and combined operations, in the place of the
desultory movements of partial or individual zeal. This it may be said
is already done by societies, amongst which the venerable Society for
Promoting Christian Knowledge has stood forward with the most
praiseworthy zeal and activity to stem the tide of infidelity, which has
been, during the last year, spreading poison and death. But increased
efficiency would be given even to the labours of this valuable Society,
by associations of the nature proposed; the object of which would be, not
only the present remedy, but the prevention of evils so dangerous to the
best interests of society. And how great might be the blessed effects,
in checking the secret and open enemies of the Gospel, if its true
friends stood forward, and united heart and hand with their appointed
pastors—giving them all the aid of their rank and influence, and acting,
under their superintendence and direction, in the discharge of duties,
which may with propriety be delegated to laymen!
A writer, who has been already quoted at considerable length, to shew the
deep devices, the bold effrontery, the unwearied zeal, and the alarming
success of infidel teachers in the metropolis, asks the important
question, “what is to be done in a state of things like this? Shall we
look calmly on, and say, let them alone; the authors and propagators of
the mischief are profligate and worthless men, whom nobody will trust;
and, therefore, too contemptible to be noticed. Alas! we should only
deceive ourselves, and be led to neglect others, by taking this
flattering unction to our souls.—It is clear, therefore, that some active
and present remedy must be brought to meet the evil; and there is none
which presents itself so readily and so naturally, as that which may be
derived from the arguments, and the testimony, and the advice of the true
friends of Christianity, particularly of the ministers.” But the whole
labour must not devolve upon the clergy: not from any wish to spare them,
whose duty it is ever to be found in the van, in every attack upon the
enemies of the Lord,—and ever to bear the brunt of the battle; but
because the active co-operation of the laity is essential to the success
of the undertaking. It has been the artful policy of the infidel
teachers to endeavour to persuade their ignorant auditors that our holy
religion is a system of priestcraft; in the preservation of which its
ministers will always, necessarily, be actively engaged, because they are
deeply interested. The deluded followers, therefore, of this satanic
school, may look with more than a suspicious eye upon the anxious labours
of their pastor to undeceive them; they may read in it a direct
confirmation of what they have heard, and ascribe solely to self-interest
what emanates from the pious zeal and sense of duty of him who “watches
over them as one that is to give account.” But when they see associated
with the minister, in the work of Christian charity and instruction,
laymen, whom they know to have no inducement to support a system of
fraud, and whom they may believe to be too honest and honourable to
promote the cause of error, they are more likely to banish the suspicion
of unworthy motives, which, in the present distempered state of their
minds, opposes an insuperable bar to the reception of religious truth.
We have had in all our towns, and even in many large villages, boards of
health formed to visit and enquire into the state of the poor; let
similar religious boards be established under the direction of the
parochial clergy, to promote their spiritual health. Numerous and great
are the evils which have arisen from the population of many parishes
having increased beyond the means of accommodation in the parish churches
and almost beyond the personal visitation and superintendence of the
parochial clergy. It has given rise to much almost compulsory secession
from the Church, has weakened the influence of the Clergy, and has been
productive of the still greater evils of immorality, irreligion, and
impiety. Plans, therefore, have been drawn up and acted upon with the
most happy effect in some places, for the formation of visiting
societies. These have already received the sanction of two prelates, who
preside over populous dioceses, the Bishops of London and Chester, who
have both recommended them in their Charges to their Clergy. “The
vastness of the field,” observes the Bishop of London, “which demands
their exertions, and their own insufficiency to meet that demand
according to the promptings of their conscience, and the impulse of a
truly Christian charity, are matters which lie heavily upon the mind of
many faithful zealous clergymen. In the discharge of those duties which,
in a populous parish, far exceed the physical abilities of the strongest
and most devoted minister, great assistance may be derived from parochial
visiting associations, acting in subordination to the Clergy. By kind,
yet not intrusive enquiry into the wants, both temporal and spiritual, of
the poor; by well-timed aid, by encouragement, and counsel; by
exhortations to the duty of reading the Scriptures, of public worship, of
sanctifying the Lord’s Day, of regulating the behaviour of their
children; by directing them, in cases of sickness, or of ignorance, or of
troubled conscience, to their appointed pastor, such an association may
work incalculable good, and become powerfully, though indirectly,
instrumental in preaching the Gospel to the poor. But it is incumbent on
me to caution the parochial Clergy against relinquishing the
superintendence and direction of these auxiliary labourers; and against
delegating to them their own peculiar functions and duties, as the
commissioned interpreters of Scripture, as the Lord’s remembrancers for
his people, and as the appointed guides of their devotion. There is a
special promise of blessing annexed to ministerial service; and the sense
of that specialty ought not to be effaced from the minds of our flocks,
by the permitted intrusion of laymen, however pious and zealous, into
that which belongs to our own peculiar office. If this be not attended
to, you must expect that tares will spring up in the wheat, and that your
visiting societies will become so many nurseries of schism.” {185}
The Bishop of Chester, after giving a striking description of the
transforming power of Divine grace, thus continues—“And can these things
be? ‘O Lord God thou knowest.’ Earnestness, disinterestedness,
simplicity, godly sincerity, patience in teaching, watchfulness in
seizing the favourable moment for counsel, are known to overcome even
that which seems most hopeless; the effects of natural corruption,
inflamed by evil example, and strengthened by habits of wilful
disobedience.
“It will be asked, however, ‘Who is sufficient,’ physically ‘sufficient
for these things? Certainly in our larger parishes it is not possible
for the strength or activity of the Clergy alone to provide for such
individual instruction. But, there is a resource at hand: when the
population is moderate, nothing is wanting but resolution and
contrivance; and in the case of a denser population, the bane and the
antidote, the evil and the remedy are found together. The same
population, which presses so heavily, affords also that variety of ranks
and degree of superior education, that many fellow-workers may assist the
minister, and diminish his labours. In this manner the Apostles were
enabled to execute the manifold concerns which lay upon them.”—“They have
left us an example. Let the minister of a populous district, using
careful discrimination of character, select such as ‘are worthy,’ and of
‘good report,’ and assign them their several employments under his
direction: they may lessen his own labour by visiting and examining the
schools, by reading and praying with the infirm and aged, by consoling
the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and pursuing the many
nameless ways by which it is in the power of one Christian to benefit and
relieve another. Such charity, even more than any other charity, is
useful to the giver as well as to the receiver: it occupies minds, which,
for want of engagement, might otherwise prey upon themselves: and it
occupies them in a way which better fits them for eternity: in religion,
as in worldly matters, we often learn our best lessons by teaching. What
image more exemplifying the reality of pastoral care, what more truly
Christian picture can be presented to our contemplation, than that of a
minister uniting with himself the best disposed and the most competent
portion of his parishioners, and superintending counsels, and directing
plans which have God for their object, and the eternal welfare of his
people for their end; seizing every opportunity of general and individual
good, correcting mischiefs at their first rising, providing for the
spiritual wants of every different age and class, and thus striving, as
far as may be allowed, to ‘present every man perfect in Christ
Jesus?’”—“Nor is this any visionary notion; pleasing in idea, but
impracticable in reality. Numerous parishes, of different degrees of
population, have been brought under such discipline with more or less
success. And I feel convinced that whoever is anxious to promote the
glory of God, to assist the most important interests of his
fellow-creatures, to confirm the security of his country, or maintain the
stability of his Church, can ensure none of those great objects more
effectively than by means like these. Without them, in some of our
crowded districts of dense and extended population, the Church is lost
sight of, parochial distinctions are obliterated, and the reciprocal
charities and duties of the pastor and the flock are forgotten by the
people, because it is physically impossible that they should be
satisfactorily discharged.”
The awful visitation which has fallen upon the country renders such
societies at this time of increased value and importance. They are
calculated powerfully to assist the labours of the Clergy in endeavouring
to improve, to the religious advantage of their flocks, the apprehension
which is so general. Seasons of alarm and affliction are often
peculiarly favourable for the reception of Christian instruction: “the
fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom;” and when men look around
them and see or hear of death under its most terrible forms, and discover
the insufficiency of human means to prevent or remedy the evil they
dread, they may “fear Him which is able to destroy both soul and body in
hell;” {188a} and thus be led to flee to Him who is able also to save
them to the uttermost that come unto God by Him. {188b} Immense might be
the benefit, which would, through the blessing of God on their labours,
accrue to the cause of religion, if parochial visiting associations were
established generally throughout the kingdom, under the direction of the
Clergy. They might form channels through which the valuable tracts
against vice and infidelity, which the Society for Promoting Christian
Knowledge is now circulating, might be more widely distributed; through
which short addresses, and strong appeals to the conscience, and earnest
calls to repentance, in direct reference to the pestilence, might be
brought home to every family. They might constitute a medium through
which the parochial Clergy might communicate with every part of the most
populous and extensive parishes regularly and frequently; through which
they might diffuse much bounty, kindness, instruction, and exhortation to
their poor and ignorant parishioners. It is impossible not to see at
once that such associations might be so framed as to be productive of the
most extensive and beneficial results to the Church and people of
England; they are calculated to restore the influence of the Clergy, and
extend their sphere of usefulness amongst their flocks. Notwithstanding
all the arts of the enemies of our Establishment, the people of England
always have loved, and still love their Church: wherever a contrary
feeling subsists, it may be always traced to a local or temporary cause;
but still it must be admitted, that the immense population of some
parishes, under existing circumstances, is likely to produce estrangement
from the appointed pastor; an evil, which the visiting societies are
admirably adapted to remedy. Some may object to such associations as
being likely to encroach upon the separate and peculiar duties of the
ministerial character: such would be an evil of the most serious nature,
for no one must presume to intrude himself uncalled upon the priest’s
office: but, though it is true every good is capable of abuse, this is an
abuse which may be always especially guarded against by the clergyman who
selects and controls the visitors, receives their reports, and
superintends their operations: whilst as a further security against the
perversion of such associations to party or sectarian views, it might be
made a standing rule, that no tract should be circulated in any parish,
which had not received the sanction of the incumbent or his curate. To
arrange the machinery and frame the laws of a general system of parochial
visiting societies, must be a work of time; but experience has already
proved that they may be so framed and conducted as to be productive of
great and unmixed advantage. And never could such aid come more
opportunely than at the present time: we have already seen the number,
fierceness, and malignity of the enemies, who beleaguer our Zion, “and
cry, down with her, down with her, even to the ground.” The assistance
of the laity, who are faithfully attached and devoted to the cause of
true religion, will, therefore, be invaluable, at such a time, in
defeating the designs of those who seek to alienate the minds of the
flock from their regular pastors, to corrupt their principles, and make
them ready instruments for the execution of their deep and wicked
schemes: nor will the co-operation of pious laymen, with the clergy, in
using every means to bring the great bulk of the people to humble them
selves before God, in the day of their visitation, be a less important
service. The Christian minister resembles a beacon on a dangerous coast,
which warns against sand-banks, sunken rocks, and precipitous shores: in
fair weather, its single bright and steady light, which, shining through
the darkness, guides in safety the passing vessels, is alone sufficient;
but when the tempest rages, when fogs obscure its brightness, when some
vessels, having struck on sunken rocks, are foundering; when others have
grounded on sand-banks, and others are stranded amid—
“The impervious horrors of a lee-ward shore;”
then other, and most prompt assistance, is required; signal guns are to
be fired, the life-boat launched, and the various life-preserving
apparatus prepared. God has seen fit to cast our lot on troublesome
times; the storms of passion howl around our Church, and her light cannot
penetrate the mists of prejudice: the barks of thousands, therefore,
committed to the stormy ocean of life,—
“Youth at the helm, and Pleasure at the prow,”
are in danger of striking on the sunken rocks of secret doubts, or of
being wrecked on the exposed and rugged shore of dark despairing
infidelity: gladly, therefore, will “God’s watchman,” who looks with
alarm and distress from his watch-tower, on this scene of imminent
danger, avail himself of the friendly hand which offers to aid him in
affording rescue from the impending destruction. Oh! to the ministers of
the Gospel,—who feel how much the value and responsibility of their
sacred office is increased in times like the present; who are almost
overwhelmed by a sense of what is required of them as “overseers over
God’s heritage,” as “watchmen in Israel,” as “ministers of Christ, and
stewards of the mysteries of God,”—assistance from pious, zealous, and
discreet laymen, acting under their direction, must be peculiarly
valuable and acceptable. Oh! only those who “have always in remembrance
into how high a dignity and to how weighty an office and charge they have
been called, to teach and to premonish, to feed and to provide for the
Lord’s family; to seek for Christ’s sheep that are dispersed abroad, and
for his children who are in the midst of this naughty world that they may
be saved through Christ for ever,” {192} can fully estimate the value of
any aid, however feeble, which comes to them at a time, when maligned and
vilified, they find the difficulty of a due discharge of their sacred
duties immensely increased by the impediments thrown in their way by the
enemies of the Gospel.
Perhaps there never was a time which more than the present required zeal
blended with discretion, firmness tempered with meekness, and
faithfulness softened by charity, in the Christian minister: well does
the admonition of our blessed Lord to his disciples apply to those whom,
in this day, he has called to be pastors under Himself—“be ye wise as
serpents and harmless as doves.” There are two other passages of
Scripture which appear to present a striking view of an important duty of
the clerical office in times like the present, and of the mode in which
it is to be exercised: the command addressed to Isaiah, “Cry aloud, spare
not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and shew my people their
transgressions, and the house of Jacob their sins.” {193a} And the
instructions given by St. Paul to Timothy, “The servant of the Lord must
not strive; but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient, in
meekness instructing those that oppose themselves; if God, peradventure,
will give them repentance to the acknowledgment of the truth.” {193b} It
is the duty of Christian ministers to exhort and console each other in
the difficult work they have to perform; “to put one another always in
remembrance;” to “bear one another’s burdens;” to “admonish one another
in the spirit of meekness and brotherly love.” How high is the dignity
of the ministerial office! “Let a man so account of us, as of the
ministers of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God.” {194a} “Now
then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us,
we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled unto God.” {194b} How
awful its responsibility! “Son of man, I have made thee a watchman unto
the house of Israel; therefore, hear the word of my mouth, and give them
warning from me: when I say unto the wicked, thou shalt surely die; and
thou givest him not warning, nor speakest to warn the wicked from his
wicked way to save his life; the same wicked man shall die in his
iniquity; but his blood will I require at thine hand.” {194c} “Take
heed, therefore, unto yourselves, and to all the flock over which the
Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the Church of God, which He
hath purchased with his own blood.” {194d} How great the satisfaction,
how sweet the joys of a successful ministry! “For what is our hope or
joy, or crown of rejoicing? Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord
Jesus Christ, at his coming? For ye are our glory and joy.” {194e}
“Therefore, brethren, we were comforted over you in all our affliction
and distress by your faith: for now we live, if ye stand fast in the
Lord: for what thanks can we render to God again for you, for all the
joy, wherewith we joy for your sakes before our God?” {195a} “Therefore,
my brethren, dearly beloved and longed for, my joy and crown, so stand
fast in the Lord, my dearly beloved.” {195b} “Holding forth the word of
life, that I may rejoice in the day of Christ, that I have not run in
vain, neither laboured in vain.” {195c} And how rich its reward! “Let
him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his ways
shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins.” {195d}
“And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament,
and they that turn many to righteousness, as the stars for ever and
ever.” {195e} Many distinguished bishops and pastors, who have shone as
bright lights in our church, have strongly recommended that every
clergyman should have his appointed seasons in which he “communes with
his own heart, and in his chamber, and is still;” meditates deeply upon
his important, responsible, and sacred office; reads, studies, and prays
over the ordination service; and diligently, strictly, and impartially
examines into how far he has been, through Divine grace, enabled to keep
his ordination vows—to perform his ordination obligations. Such a
practice is of such manifest propriety and use, that doubtless it
prevails extensively: and high indeed, is the standard of duty, and
strict the requirements of service, which our Church imposes upon every
minister: “See that you never cease your labour, your care, and
diligence, until ye have done all that lieth in you to bring all such as
are committed to your charge unto that agreement in the faith and
knowledge of God, and to that ripeness and perfectness of age in Christ,
that there be no place left for error in religion, or for viciousness of
life.” {196a}