Year: 1868

Individuality in Religion.


The Gospel, says Alexander Clark, in
late number Of the PHren0logjcal Journal,
was never designed to be IN -Bibled and made
into lettered catalogues of Dusts and must
aots. The letter kilIeth-the spirit giveth
life" The restraints of religion do not lie
along the Christians pathway as so many
roseless thorns TO pierce and pain US at every
step. Christianity does not require us to be
forever looking after the faults and failures
of others, in order that we may know ex-
aetly what things not to do. 1t Is not a list
Of uneasy negatives 1t is not system ar
ranged to push or drive by rearward forces.
No man, since grace and truth were re-
vealed inaJesus Christ, was ever scoIded or
scared any nearer heaven. The thunder of
Sinai threatened and made men tremble
but there is another mount, though not so
high and dark and awful, whose summit held
a cross, and He who was lifted up thereon
draws all men unto him The blood of
Calvary is greater than the lightning of
Sinai. Henceforth love is mightier than
precept Henceforth religious life is not so
much form as a service-a service which
is the highest liberty, because it is emanci-
patton in Christ Jesus who makes his fol-
lowers free indeed.


We are not obliged to pass on in our dis
cipleship with book in hand or mortal CON
fessor in sight reading ceremony, or lis
fau1rrr to q. eCupd on -, Al -
lished sins of other people, else we should
commit new ones ourselves so rapidly and
unexpectedly, that the most orthodox creed
arrapger would become bewiIdered in the
attempt to classify them. The religion Of
Christ does not annoy us with mere formal
techncalities. There are no chronometer-
guaged exaehons to goad US to duty as a
mIserIy creditors corstables dun poor
debtor for dues. No boil OF faith and
service outside the Bible are worthy the
permanence Of stereotype plates to be printed
from. No true man who recognizes his own
individual accountability for deeds done IN
the body (not for words pronounced or un-
pronounced from the creed)-no true man
can live in these grand republican years
with any ecclesiasticism ahold of him, drill
ing and driving as machine. The Scrip
lures of divine truth do not require that my
souls worship shall be strict duplicate of
| the worship of somebody else's soul. Mel
ther is my work to be estimated by the mum
ber of chips and shavings at the bench of
the robuster brother who has double the
muscle that God has given to me


Christianity gets deeper into a man than
his clothes or his skin. 1t does a nobler
/ thing to a man than bow and bend, and halt
and turn, and shove him hither and thither
in the crooked groves Of some blunderer who
/ lived in the dim ages long before the wood
Of the cross began to crow. I5has grander
mission than merely TO take charge of the
seen and heard Of a man; it lodges deep in
the inmost soul and works oct from that
center. until the world not only sees and
hears, but knows and feels, that he " has
| been with Jesus and learned Of Him"


l may subscribe to a system of rules, and
/ be as exact in my observance Of them as "a
clock is in ticking It's swinging monotoniea
all day long and all night through; and just
like the clock, be only running down the
while The Gospel is marvel in its free
dom from all non-cssential sectarianisms
which any mimic of a man might observe
to the very shadow Of a letter without being
a spark the brighter or a degree the better
for his trouble 1t is time the Church had
grown ont of the childhood ages of the
world-time that she walked up in the new
morning tits side the long night of rituals
tic shades and symbols to the light and
liberty Of the Saviour come and risen. The
Christian system, simple but sublime, Infused
by the impulses of the promised Spirit ol
all Truth, lifts men out of deep worn chan
nels, and places them on elevations Of light
and glory from whence vast and beautiful
horizons sweep around, and glowing with
living workers for God and man. / here is
growth from minority to manhood ip the
Gospel, and equal suffrage for all and for
ever.