III. To cultivate a spirit of warm, devotional piety.

Talent, learning, eloquence, orthodoxy, can never be made substitutes for piety. If the minister is not a holy man, all other attainments are but so much power for evil. And if he is really a converted man, while his piety is greatly alloyed by sloth and idleness on the one hand, or rashness and blind zeal on the other, he had better betake himself to any other calling than the sacred ministry. The man who ministers from God to dying men must be deeply imbued with the spirit of Jesus Christ. There must be habitual communion with God, a strong love for souls, for the closet, for the Bible. This world of sensuality and infidelity and idolatry is not to be brought back in allegiance to God without a ministry whose piety is deep, decided and ardent. Their lives as well as their lips must preach the gospel.

There is danger, that in acquiring other qualifications, this essential one should be too much neglected. The awakened energy of mind and ardor of investigation may restain the affections of the heart, and wither the christian graces. Every seminary is bound to watch and pray against consequences so destructive, and exert a direct influence upon the precious youth within its walls to keep them near to God and ripe for heaven. Piety will not advance without exercise. The heart as well as the intellect must be cultivated. No matter with what firmness of sinew and fulness of muscle the dry bones may be clothed, if the warmth and vigor of the vital spirits are not there, it is a lifeless organization-mere dead matter-fit only for the sepulchre. A ministry for the church of God and the world of sinners must glow with spiritual life and strength, or it is good for nothing for either.

But besides this general method of answering the questionhow shall theological seminaries secure their object?—there is an opportunity for a more particular consideration, by following out some deductions from the main principle.

If it is the object of theological seminaries to furnish the most efficient ministry for the world, then—

1. They must be allowed the free investigation of the Bible. Free inquiry is the natural right of the human mind. There is no general principle within the range of human thought, which the mind may not examine freely and fearlessly. The Bible is as open to investigation as the book of nature. There is a sacredness and solemnity in all truth wherever found, and VOL. XI. No. 29.

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especially in the truths of revelation; but there is nothing there too sacred or too awful for human examination. A reverent and humble spirit may fix its gaze on the holiest mystery which the Spirit of God has put upon the sacred pages. Let the man "put his shoes from off his feet," and he may stand erect before the burning bush while the great "I AM" declares his awful

message.

Yea it is not only the right, but the duty of the human mind to examine the Bible. God has bid us "search the Scriptures," and the obligation applies to all which the Scriptures contain. Especially is this the duty of theological seminaries. Minds are there trained who are to be "set for the defence of the Gospel," and they cannot defend it, if they do not understand it. Mere authority in this age is good for nothing. Ecclesiastical decisions can carry with them no force, any further than they embody truth. No article of any creed can stand any further than it will bear the most rigid examination. Nothing which belongs to religion is to be kept in darkness, or attempted to be sustained but by the power of truth. The opinions of the fathers, the writings of the wise and good of former days should be diligently consulted and carefully pondered. It is but the arrogance of ignorance and folly which affects to despise them as out of date and behind the age. But they are to be regarded as teachers, not tyrants. It is the truth which they contain, and not their age merely, which makes them venerable. Whatever there may be in them which will not bear examination, is as worthless and as determinately to be rejected as the errors of yesterday.

The ministry of the present age is called to meet every form of specious delusion and sophistry and cavilling skepticism. The votaries of sensuality and the worshippers of mammon have a thousand deceitful hiding places. The heathen nations. have their long-used superstitions, and in many cases the most subtle and elaborate systems of error; while the Roman beast and the false prophet have been deluding the nations for ages, and bound the human mind with fetters of iron. The men who are to meet all this hostile array and subdue or annihilate it, must not only be permitted, but trained to examine every thing that belongs to it. Not only the substantial doctrines of religion and their common arguments of defence, but the whole system of theology must be understood, with its modern objections and evasions and perversions, and all that philosophy or

reason or the Bible can bring to bear upon it. This is no time to shrink from the collision of mind with mind—of christian mind with pagan mind—or infidel mind. The contest is already begun; the conflict is even now desperate; neither the friend nor the enemy of the Bible can draw back from the shock of conflicting opinions and purposes. One or the other must fall vanquished on the field, and yield the kingdom to the conqueror. Let the Bible and reason have full scope. truth unshackled grapple with error-and it is not doubtful which shall be victorious. Depraved and rebellious as man is, there is that in Divine truth, applied by God's Spirit, which reaches his conscience and subdues his stubborn will.

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Theological seminaries are designed to raise up a ministry adequate to the exigencies of such a crisis; they must therefore be permitted to survey the whole field and every thing pertaining to it. They should possess such a love to truth, and such an honest mind in seeking it, that they can have no rest in taking things upon trust, or covering ignorance by sophistry. To such a mind all truth is free, and all but truth is worthless. The attempt to chain it by authority, or frighten it by pretensions of sacred awe and mystery, from looking or thinking upon any truth of God, is high treason against the Bible under the name of loyalty. You may as well say that there are some substances too sacred for the chemist to analyze, or some portions of the heavens too holy for the astronomer to bring under the range of his telescope, as that there are some portions of the Bible too solemn and mysterious for the christian minister to examine. There are many things both in nature and revelation which man will not comprehend in this life, but in this fact there is found no prohibition to push his researches to the utmost limits, nor by devout efforts to move that limit, if he can, much further onward into the unexplored darkness, and reclaim the region to the clear possession of human science. God has set them both before us, and when we will, we may examine them. Those especially, who are set to prepare the Lord's ambassadors, must examine, humbly, reverently, seriously, but freely and unhesitatingly, everything that is connected with the sacred office. They must emphatically —“ prove prove all things and hold fast that which is good.'

2. They must not foster a sectarian spirit.

Different views of important doctrines, ceremonies, or modes of government may give rise to separate organizations, with

their different names, and thus perpetuate in the church different denominations. No attempt in the present day to merge them all in one is likely to prove either successful or salutary. Even theological seminaries must be more or less denominational in their sympathies and patronage.

But denominational peculiarities may become too prominent. Notwithstanding an agreement in all that is involved in substantial Christianity, they may be magnified to matters of such moment as to bar the way to christian communion and cöoperation. It then goes beyond a separate organization, having a common purpose though a different name, and becomes a secta party cut off by its own exclusiveness, from the common sympathies and fellowship of the general family of Christ. Denominational distinctions are therefore expedients, and will be perpetual, so long as there is a disagreement in important principles. But sectarianism can never be justified by any differences, while there is a union on the substantial doctrines which are essential to salvation.

The ministry, from the very nature of their relation to the church, must exert a controlling influence on this subject. If they are divided into parties the whole church will in like manner be broken up into fragments. Oh! how does infidelity strengthen itself, and vice and irreligion abound, and all the woes and cruelties of heathenism press upon the millions of its victims, while the church and the ministry are frivolously contending about mere sectarian distinctions. Those "schools of the prophets," where the minds of the future pastors of the church are to be moulded, stand under fearful responsibilities to the great Head of the church on this particular point. They may explain and defend their denominational distinctions, but if the spirit of sectarianism be there, it will diffuse the poison through all the body. Their young men will go forth, with no zeal but for their distinctive peculiarities, to distract the church and disquiet the world with their bigoted notions, arrogant claims and conflicting measures.

There may be differences of philosophical speculation, and peculiarities in benevolent operations, and varieties of method and form, which shall give to different seminaries their distinctive characteristics. In this there is no ground of anxiety nor complaint. But when any of these peculiarities are thrust forward as matters of paramount importance, and made the strong points of appeal to either popular favor or popular odium, it be

comes no longer honorable nor innocent. It is sectarianism in its degraded form, doing its hateful work and exposing its selfish spirit. The next downward step is to the use of all the catch-words and cant-phrases which are meant to mark the party and delude the multitude.

That high and holy effort, which seeks to furnish the most efficient ministry for the world, can have no fellowship with such unworthy expedients. Neither does the church nor the world need any more new theological seminaries, whose foundations are laid in popular prejudices, amid sectarian collisions, clamoring for their share of the charities of the church on the sole ground of their party organization. And that policy, which seeks to build itself upon such local and factitious excitements, is not only worldly and wicked, but miserably short sighted. The flowing tide will soon ebb, and leave them standing high and dry upon the beach.

3. They must not interfere in ecclesiastical government.

The professors in theological seminaries have as men all the civil and social, and as ministers all the ecclesiastical rights and privileges which others have. In proportion to their wisdom and piety, their counsel and influence are valuable, in all these relations. But as professors of theology their sole business is the instruction and discipline of the precious sons of the church under their care, to make them ministers such as the world needs. Their connection with a theological seminary adds no prerogatives to any other relation which they may sustain. As such, neither singly nor combined have they any thing to do with the legislative or judicial affairs of the church. They are not set as judges in Israel, nor as watchmen upon the walls of Zion. The keys are not in their hands,-they have no power to bind or loose. It is not for them to hunt out heresy, nor arraign or expel it from the church of God. She has her own organizations for that purpose, and they are bound both to the church and to Jesus Christ to be prompt and faithful. But in these matters, theological seminaries have no right to interfere. It is a direct violation of the apostolic injunction-" Let none of you suffer as a thief, or as an evil doer, or as a busy body in other men's matters."

The danger may not be very great, that theological seminaries shall publicly seize the sceptre and rod of discipline and wield them directly over the ministry and membership of the churches. But there are many ways of stepping quite beyond