partaking of a privilege and discharging a duty at once. Are the children of God to be debarred from coming to His table till the Church on earth is free from formal professors and hypocrites? that is, till the tares have ceased to grow among the wheat? yet this is what your objections will bring you to, if you look into them closely and thus you will find that, by proving too much, they prove nothing. For the Church of Christ upon earth is one: and the ordinance of the Lord's Supper is one. We partake of it, not as individuals,-not as separate congregations, but as members of the universal Church of Christ-even as though all Christians upon earth sat down to one table. therefore, in your own church or chapel, all were believers and worthy partakers-still the ordinance of which you partook would be profaned by the unbelievers and heretics who laid rash hands upon the outward visible signs in other congregations; and would not your objection to receiving the ordinance, though less visible, be equally valid? It is well indeed that we should mourn over the wicked, If who receive the sign of so great a thing only to their condemnation; but why should the presumption of the wicked shut out God's children from a feast which is peculiarly their own, and of which they alone can really and truly partake? Why should we not simply obey our gracious Master's command, and unite with all his faithful people in feeding upon his body and his blood, notwithstanding all the folly and wickedness of the wicked, which can only hurt themselves? When I sat down to write, I did not intend to have entered upon this subject, as I am yet so imperfectly acquainted with your views and your difficulties: but the time is short, and before I can find opportunity to write again, the season of Easter may have come upon us; and I am grieved to think that you should do so much wrong to yourself, and to them also who are fellow members with you of the mystical body of Christ, as to abstain, through needless though specious scruples, from that blessed ordinance in which you and they should be refreshed and comforted together, as one bread and one body;" even as 66 we are all partakers of that one Bread." If these hints should not suffice to satisfy your mind, do let me hear from you again, and I will endeavour to write more clearly and fully. You have so few gospel privileges, that it is doubly desirable that you should not deprive yourself of that blessed ordinance. I cannot here enter upon the question of the union between Church and State, more than just to say, that the whole of the Old Testament is clearly in favour of it; and there is nothing against it in the New. And, when I look at the history of the Church, it is very clear to me, that both the general voice of the universal Church of Christ, and the Providence of God are in favour of it too. I will endeavour to send herewith a few tracts which bear upon the questions now at issue respecting the Church of England; and some hints you will find in my volume of Sermons; as also upon the subject of Prophecy, which would require of itself a long letter, in order to put you into any thing like full possession of my views. I am not however disposed to lay so much stress upon the subject as some of my brethren; nor am I satisfied with any of their systems. I desire to be found waiting upon God in a very humble and childlike spirit, till He is pleased to unfold His own plans, into which (as far as relates to the times and seasons) I cannot see very far. March 27, 1834. MY DEAR FRIEND AND SISTER IN "Grace be to you, and peace, from God the Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father: to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen." I have read with care and attention the first two numbers of Mr. D's Treatise on the Sacrament, which you were so kind as to send me; and I have discovered so much of serious error in it, that I could not but feel in some measure distressed and alarmed, when I called to mind some expressions in your letter respecting this work. And now, my dear Sister, before I proceed, I must ask, whether you can so far see the |