that Jesus gave His commandment to be obeyed; that Ananias thought it was a duty, and that Paul acquiesced in his interpretation of the commandment as binding on Christians. As a memorial of Christ's mediatorial work for us, Baptism is essential to salvation. In the institution of the sacrament of the Eucharist we have an express injunction of Jesus to "Do this in remembrance of Me." It is clearly a memorial feast, and those who have received or profess to be animated by the Spirit of Jesus cannot but admit that they ought to "do this as a memorial of their Saviour; that if they willingly fail to do this "in remembrance of Him," then they are despising His commandment, neglecting to show their faithful remembrance of Him; and are, in fact, either forgetful or defiant of Him. Those who do so can scarcely be regarded as in the way of salvation. They are gone aside;" they are "children of disobedience." Wherefore I argue that the observance of the sacraments at right, proper, and suitable seasons is essential to salvation. 66 God has always manifested Himself in symbol in accommodation to the weakness of the minds of men, and in accordance with the associative capacities of their understanding. The Sabbath is appointed as a holy day to induce in us habits and thoughts of worshipful holiness. He instituted the rainbow as a memorial of mercy; making it, in fact, the visible Sabbath of the sky. The Passover was given, not only as a memorial, but as a type-a memorial of mercies passed, and a type of the sure mercies laid up in Jesus Christ for all who believe on His name. The sacrament of Baptism is representative of the new heart or new birth, the spiritual regeneration or entire change of the principles of our life which the adoption of the Christian faith implies. It is a simple and striking symbol by which to speak to the soul of the perennial commandment of God, "Wash you, make you clean, put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil; learn to do well" (Isa. i. 16, 17). It is a fact that "Christ our Passover was sacrificed for us" (1 Cor. v. 7); and in the Lord's Supper we have a symbol of the broken body and shed blood of our Lord presented before us, and we partake of the symbols of strength and of joy to indicate that Jesus Christ is "the strength of our heart and our portion for ever," and the joy of the whole earth, the whole heavens. That we should have realizing views of the work and character of Jesus Christ is essential to salvation; and, as the appointed means by which this is to be done, we contend that the observance of these sacraments is also necessary to salvation. It is thus that we are to show, figure out to ourselves, the Lord's death till He come. Again: the sacraments are witnessing ordinances. By partaking of them we give public, potent, and patent testimony that we are Christ's-that we have made our election of the way of life, and that we have pledged ourselves before Heaven and in the eyes of men to be true and conscientious followers of Him whom our sins have pierced. It will surely be acknowledged by all that we ought to give evidence of our faith, that we should acknowledge with gratitude of spirit the Lord who bought us, that we should neither shirk nor shrink from duty. "Whosoever," saith the very Lord Himself, "Whosoever, therefore, shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in Heaven; but whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in Heaven (Matt. x. 31, 32). It seems to me incredible that any one who has read this passage can believe that the observance of the sacraments is not essential to salvation. His disciples forsook im and fled is said to their disgrace-how much bet. r are we if, when His table is spread for His erring children, we absent ourselves from the seats at the Lord's table? Are we not faithless friends, forsaking the assembling of ourselves together in the hour of witnessing and proof? Are we not virtually denying our Lord? and, if we deny Him, He will deny us (2 Tim. iv. 12). Baptism is a witnessing to the Church that we have forsaken the world; and the Eucharist is a testimony given to the Church and the world that, as for us, whatever others may do, we will serve the Lord, and have no more fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness henceforth, but have our fellowship with those who assemble in God's house for God's service, and who endeavour to be mindful of His commandments. Jesus has promised that by these sacraments, rightly partaken of, He will apply certain blessings to our souls. "As many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ" (Gal. iii. 27). "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved" (Mark xvi. 16). In the Lord's Supper the bread is "the Communion of the body of Christ," and the wine is "the Communion of the blood of Christ" (1 Cor. x. 16, 17); and Jesus has said, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, ye have no life in you" (John vi. 53). will I think it may safely be affirmed, then, that the tenor of the teaching of the Gospels is to the effect that the sacraments are essential to salvation; and that, though those who, having faith, have not had opportunity to engage in them, may, and indeed we should say, be saved; yet those who, having faith and opportunity, abstain or refrain from their observance, are verily guilty; for unto whom much is given, of them shall much be required. Jesus did not refuse to undergo the baptism of John that He might fulfil all righteousness; nor did He refrain from engaging in and partaking of the feasts of the Old Dispensation, though He was the reality of which they were but the shadows. Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers" (Rom. xv. 8). In the presence of such an example of sacramental observance, who shall venture to gainsay the statement founded on it, that the sacraments are essential to salvation ? ECCLESIA. NEGATIVE ARTICLE.-II. CHRISTIANITY is a real, substantive religion, a bonâ fide faith in God, through Jesus Christ, leading and binding man to obedience, love, and true sanctity; a system of moral and spiritual truths, designed for the highest welfare of man. But it is not a stiff, hard, unbending, arrogant system of institutions, ceremonies, and observances, full of outward form and imposing ritual. God is a spirit, and those who worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth; in spirit, because it is the spirit that quickeneth, the outward form profiteth nothing; in truth, because God is a God of truth, and we are to be Godlike. The repetition of creeds, the signature of articles, the adherence to prescribed forms, do not constitute the ordinance of worship. It is not the ritual of any denomination of Christian fellowship, but the word which Jesus speaks to the individual soul which are spirit and life. These words Christians are to keep with reverential care, treasuring them as sacred, and guarding them from corruption by others or degradation by ourselves. Every deviation from the instructions of Jesus regarding His will and the will of the Father is wrong, and all things which lead the heart, mind, habits, and inmost spirit of man from Christ to symbols or ceremonies constitute deviations, and are injurious to the spirit of man. Hence we say Christianity is not a religion of types and shadows, of observances and ritual, but a substantive religion-one in which Mosaism is abolished, and the typical is displaced because the truth has come. Christianity is a new covenant. The Mosaic law was a schoolmaster to bring men to Christ. It was an outward compelling force, and was full of forms for the training of men, but the religion of Jesus is an inward impelling force, and is free from ceremonial. "There is verily a disannulling of the commandment going before for the weakness and unprofitableness thereof" (Hebrews vii. 18); and redemption is offered unto us by a great high priest," who is made not after a carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless life" (Hebrews vii. 16). We are justified by faith, not by observances; the just not only do live but shall live by faith; "faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." The very spirit and life of the Christian does not lie in things seen and temporal, but in faith in the unseen yet eternal realities of God in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself. Outward ordinances are shadows, but the true Christian is a member of a holy priesthood, whose duty it is to offer up spiritual sacrifice, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. Hence we conclude that outward ceremonials, such as the so-called sacraments, are not essential to salvation; that true faith in Jesus Christ, followed by its proper consequences-repentance, love, endeavour to obey God. rather than man-are alone essential to the soul's supreme welfare. The great aim of our Lord's instructions while on earth was to withdraw men from reliance on the ceremonial observances of religion, from resting in and upon them, as possessed of efficacy; and to impress on them that religion was a thing of the heart and life. Was He then likely to institute any observances in His Church which should have the same tendency to concrete themselves into priestly ceremonial and mere ritual observance, and so repeat and reproduce the same effects in His new-covenant Church as had occurred in the Old Testament one-Pharisaic ceremonialism? Assuredly no! Christ our Passover was once slain, and that once for all; the bread to be eaten by believers was the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth-the very nature of Jesus; the wine which was to be partaken of was the wine of His kingdom-the joy in the Holy Ghost which He communicateth to them who believe. When He said "My flesh is meat indeed, and My blood is drink indeed" (John vi. 55), did not He speak of" the spirit which they that believe on Him should receive?" (John vii. 39). These con siderations incline us to think that P. S. A., when he interprets man's duty as being to receive the Sacraments (p. 94) as oaths to and witnesses for God, has made a mistake; for faith is the pledge we give to Christ, followed by the answer of a good conscience, to all the duties of holiness and truth, which His law demands in order that we may be like Him. He is not a Christian, any more than he is a Jew, who is one outwardly. He is only so who is one inwardly-rites and ceremonies, passovers and circumcisions, baptisms and communions in this matter avail nothing, but a new life. Baptism is spiritual. That only is baptism into Christ's kingdom which is done by the water which Jesus shall give, as "a well of water springing up into everlasting life (John iv. 14)-even "rivers of living water" (John vii. 38). "Jesus himself baptized not" (John iv. 2); think ye if baptism had been essential to salvation Jesus would have neglected to fulfil all righteousness?would we not have had an account of the baptism of the apostles? -but all that they boast of is being baptised into His death, and that was a baptism with which neither they nor we are able to be baptized except through His grace in imputing it to us, and making us partakers in it. Nowhere is the communion supper represented as being of general institution binding on Christians. Jesus had many disciples, but none of them were present at this feast. Only the apostles partook of it-and one of them was a traitor, so that even in this one significant fact we see that it was not essential to salvation-nor indeed endued with saving grave. Faith in Jesus Christ is essential to salvation; nothing else really is. Let us get this, and do not let us trust in the priestly sacraments or the outward ceremonials of institutions. Let us be sacred in heart and in life; and may we have the spirit of Christ within A. T. H. National Education. OUGHT EDUCATION TO BE SETTLED ON THE PRINCIPLES OF THE LEAGUE OR THE UNION ? THE UNION.-VI. THE singular case of the Fasting Girl of Caermarthen has occupied public attention, and excited a perfectly "umbrageous multitude" of leaders from the common leaders of public opinion, and these have stimulated the Government into a prosecution of the parties implicated in the starvation of the poor misguided martyr of fraud or mistake. But how many multitudes of human spirits, all instinct with high powers of thought, have been compelled to fast from the true diet of the soul without one compunctious word or unctuous leader, till it became a political question and a party cry! One case of starvation in the streets of London will fill next day's papers with sensation articles; but the existence of multitudes of starving and starved minds occasions little surprise, and few strong, stinging expostulations with the State and the Church against such waste of manhood and spiritual power. "How many a rustic Milton has passed by, If we ask who it was that saw and strove to remedy this waste of vital thought and mental energy divine-who endeavoured, not only to awaken sympathy, but succeeded in eliciting effort that such things should be no longer, it would only be common honesty to answer and admit that they were and are those who hold the principles of the Union; and I think not a little confusion of face ought to suffuse the cheek of the League and its advocates when truth compels them to assent to the accusation that not to them is due the endeavour and the effort which have been exerted to remedy the educationless state of England. The League has started on the principle that education has become a political and industrial necessity-that we require some means to tame our masters, the newly enfranchised; and that we |