passions of sin which have hitherto cleaved to them; the fetters of their fears are snapped, and those moral obligations, which before held them in a distressing bondage, become new springs of action: thus captivity is led captive; and they realize in their own blessed experience the truth of the prophet's statement, “ in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength."

CONTROVERSY: ITS EVILS AND

ITS ADVANTAGES.

"WHAT a dreadful evil is Controversy!" Such is the common exclamation both of those who consciously hold errors which they wish not to have controverted, and of those who love Peace better than they love Truth.

Great evils there are connected with Controversy, we fully admit. But the real question is, Are they necessarily involved in Controversy? Do they arise directly out of it, or are they only incident to it? Here we must distinguish. With honest-minded men the only consideration, we conceive, will be, "Is Controversy right in principle? and if so, in what manner ought it to be conducted to make it right in practice."

That Controversy would unavoidably arise in connection with Christianity follows from the fact that it is the Truth, and that every perversion of it, and every other system of Religion, is Error. What the evils attendant upon Controversy are, everyone more or less knows. It provokes anger; it produces bad feelings; it stirs up fierce conflicts, which draw out men's worst passions; it breaks peace; it has a tendency to engender an intolerant spirit; it gives a sharp edge to social intercourse; it too often separates

friend from friend, and brother from brother; it divides families; it sometimes throws whole kingdoms into confusion. All this no one denies. The only question for us to consider is, Which are the greater— its evils, or its advantages? And are not these attendant results the very things which we are taught to expect from the conflict of Truth? Did not the Divine author of the Christian system caution His disciples against mistaking the resultant effects of His Religion, by saying: "Think not that I am come to send peace on the earth: I am not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law." According to a recognised principle of Scripture phraseology, by which a person is sometimes spoken of as directly doing that of which he is only the involuntary occasion,—the meaning of this obviously is, not that He came with the design of sending a sword among men, but that this would be the incidental, and, as men are constituted, the inevitable consequence of His coming. So far from His coming with the design of exciting strifes and animosities, and setting men at variance against each other, He came, as it was prophesied He should come, to be "the Prince of peace;" and "peace on earth, good will towards men," were the angel-sung words that announced His advent. So far, too, from there being anything in the nature or tendency of His Religion to stir up contentions, and strifes, and wranglings, and dissensions, it is fitted rather, by its establishing certainty in theologic truth, to put an end to all doubts and differences, and to unite as one,

through the plastic power of the charity which pervades it, all the families which make up this earth's differently constituted and widely scattered population. As, then, it would be unjust, (though there are some who would do this,) to charge upon Christianity all the discords and differences, the variances and clashings of party, of which it has been, through human perverseness, the innocent and undesigning occasion; so is it unjust to charge upon Controversy all the evils of which, through mismanagement, or men's wrathful passions, it has been inadvertently, not directly, the cause. The design of Controversy, when conducted as it ought to be, is to settle disputes, and not to excite them.

Controversy, it ought to be observed, is the necessary the unavoidable condition of the ascertainment of Truth in all its relations. Whether it be the Truth in political theories, in questions of philosophy, in history, in matters of secular criticism, or even as to matters of fact, it must be open to Controversy, and sometimes actually involve it; and in proportion as it excites men's interests, and arouses their earnestness, it will endanger their loss of temper. The remarkable thing is, that men seldom deprecate Controversy in these matters; they rather regard it as desirable and laudable, with a view to the attainment of its end. It is only in Religion they think all Controversy is to be eschewed. Whence arises this strange aversion from religious Controversy-this hysterical horror at the sight of any contention for Truth-this burnt-childfear of the fire, which, if felt and practised by all persons, would cause the fire never to be stirred that

it might give a brighter blaze? In some it may arise from a mistaken respect for Religion, as too sacred a thing, as they think, for dispute; in most it arises from an impatience of the subject—as a thing in which they feel no real interest-a spirit of Laodicean indifference. If Truth depended upon such persons for its purity and safety, it is very evident that it might soon get overlaid with errors, and lost. In the physical world we see a contention of elements; in the political world a contention of powers; so in the religious world there must be a contention of principles. So long as there is Error in existence to be conflicted with, so long there must be Controversy.

It is a melancholy fact, which we must candidly admit, that Controversy has often been greatly misconducted. Men have allowed their own evil tempers to mix with their arguments, and have contended for 'Victory rather than for Truth. In their unholy zeal, they have too frequently resorted to the weapons which were fitted to humble and irritate rather than to convince. Passion on the one side has kindled provocation on the other; pride being excited, the parties have only erected themselves into loftier and more determined defiance, each being resolved not to give in without the selfish gratification of being the victor; and in the angry affray Truth has been trodden under foot to secure a paltry personal triumph. In this way Charity has been wounded, and Truth, undoubtedly, has often suffered serious damage. But this was the fault, be it observed, of the contenders, and not of the Truth for which they have contended. Nor are the spectators in scenes of theological