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multiplied their unhallowed altars, and wandered from place to place, to hear what the Lord will say to them there, whilst they watch an opportunity to overthrow his church-and have perished in the gainsaying of Core. (V. 11.)

But how can the example of Corè apply, as the apostle expressly does apply it, to those professed teachers of the Gospel who separate themselves from the apostolical church?

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In order to answer this question, let us consider the crime of this man, and its: punishment. Corè and his company murmured against that ministry which God had authorised by a visible and special appointment; they accused this ministry of priestcraft and corruption, and thus excited a schism in the church of Israel:-They gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and said unto themYe take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation of the Lord are holy, every one of them, and the Lord is among them: wherefore, then, lift ye up yourselves above.. the congregation of the Lord? Upon this plea of general sanctity and private in

spiration, they began to assume to them selves the office of the priesthood, and took : up their censers to offer incense.

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Such was their crime: but though mul titudes esteemed them in a peculiar manner. as the people of the Lord, there was wrath upon them, and they perished from among the congregation. Their act, like the united efforts of our present sectaries, had an external shew of resisting the undue influence of the established ministry, of promoting the cause of religious freedom, and advancing the glory of God; but it was an act of rebellion against the divine decrees ; it was a direct violation of sacred and con stituted order; it was an impious presumption, to espouse the cause of God in opposition to the authority of his declared laws; › and, therefore, it was visited with the penalty of disobedience. The decrees of God are not yet cancelled: for the apostle views the conduct of those self-constituted ministers of the Gospel those murmurers and complainers who should appear in the last time-those that separate themselves: from the one evangelical church-as exactly parallel with the gainsaying of Core. He

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also declares, that a similar punishment awaits them. This will come to pass, perhaps, in the present world; if not, most assuredly in that which is to come; for the Scripture cannot be broken.

Such is the manner in which the apostles of Christ speak of those who introduce dis order, and divisions, and heresies, prejudicial to the unity and harmony of the church. In handling this weighty subject, upon the present and upon former occasions, I have, as much as possible, confined myself to the express declarations of those apostles, and to such reflections as necessarily arise from them. For it is not any opinion of my own, or of fallible men like myself, that I strive to enforce. It is the unerring and une equivocal sentence of that Gospel which we all receive as the rule of our faith, and as the law by which we expect to be judged in the great day. And here we need not have recourse to a few texts of doubtful. meaning, or difficult interpretation. The declarations of the apostles and evangelists upon this subject are plain, frequent, and consistent. They pervade the whole of their writings. And coming from the mouth of

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the Son of God, and from the suggestions of his Holy Spirit, they claim a place in our hearts paramount to all predilections of party, all prejudices of education, and all deductions of hypothetical reasoning: for if we build our hopes upon what is revealed from heaven, we must receive it as it is revealed. It is not the part of human wisdom to instruct the Holy Spirit of God. That Spirit has declared, that the separation of professed Christians from the one apostolical church is a grievous sin-is an act of perverse disobedience to the laws of the Gospel. And it must, therefore, be obvious to every reflecting man, that such separation for causes merely trivial and cir cumstantial, not having the plea of necessity in its favour, has less hope of being pardoned in consideration of human infirmity.

Far be it, however, from me to determine to what degree God will punish this daring and mischievous sin; or to what extent the divine goodness will have compassion on the weakness, the errors, and the perverseness of men. It is not my province to judge; but it is my duty to declare to all men, that the words which our Lord and

his apostles have spoken, will judge them in the last day-that the promises of the Gospel are exclusively directed to the faithful, the obedient, and the charitable members of one undivided church; and that those professors who lightly separate themselves from this church, and yet hope for salvation, must hope without promise and without Scripture.

That the divine laws are founded in right reason is a most certain truth, though we are not always competent to judge of their reasonableness. But of the fitness of that law which enjoins the unity of the apostolical church we may form an accurate idea, if we only consider the pernicious effects which needless separation, and a persuasion of its lawfulness, produce upon society in general.

́In the first place, it gives the conceited, the self-willed, and insubordinate, an opportunity of framing trivial and imaginary objections to the faith, the forms, and the discipline of the church; and thus of breaking asunder the universal bond of charity, under the illusive pretence of tender conscience.

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