discipline of that ancient church. And, as a proof of this, it is alleged that he exhibited a deeper veneration for the cross than is shown by most Protestants. This, I take leave to say, is an entire misrepresentation. It arose from the simple fact that he used to beguile the tedious hours of sickness by carving the form of the cross in various materials, which he afterwards gave, as tokens of remembrance, to his friends. What more appropriate recreation for the last days of a dying Christian! He was a Catholic, I admit, in the highest and best sense of the term. He extended fellowship to all, and he claimed fellowship with all, the true disciples of Christ, of every name and denomination, who proved their discipleship by bearing the image of their Master. This is the noblest, as well as the primitive sense of the word Catholic. He would have claimed it, and claimed it justly, not only for himself, but for the communion to which he belonged, and the altar at which he ministered. That communion asks no questions as to modes and forms and metaphysical abstractions, but welcomes to the table of her Lord all sincere believers in his divine mission and mediatorial office. We are called Unitarians, but it is not a name of our own seeking. For myself, I abhor all names but that of Christian. I am not ashamed of the name, but then I can not but feel that,

when compared with our actual belief, it has but a negative and barren significance. As things are, it misrepresents us to the common mind. It truly represents us as holding the numerical and personal unity of God. But it is apprehended as denying to Christ the exalted rank which we concede to him in the moral universe; a rank which can not be better expressed than in the words of the apostle, when he says of God, that "he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality and power and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but in that which is to come." We preach our doctrines not as Unitarianism, but as the simple truth of the Bible, and because our most solemn convictions will not permit us to preach any thing else. We claim to have studied the Bible with the best lights that can be brought to bear upon it. We claim the suffrage of many of the profoundest intellects which the church has produced, and we claim, though we do not boast, some of the brightest ornaments of the Christian character. We would gladly forget that there are any distinctions among Christians, for to us the points which have divided the church into separate communions, seem, for the most part, to be utterly unworthy to cause alienation among the true friends of the Re

deemer, who have at heart the common object of the sanctification and salvation of the world.

I can not better close this discourse, than by recalling to your recollection the last occasion on which this impressive preacher officiated in this pulpit. Few, I believe, who heard that sermon, will ever forget it. The text, as you well remember, was, "Come up hither;" and I am happy to find that it makes one of the volume lately published, as "Sermons of Consolation." His emaciated form, his hollow tones, his evidently declining strength, made it seem indeed like a voice from the other world. Do we not all seem to hear him, when he addressed to us one of the closing paragraphs of that discourse. "There are few, to whom I am speaking, who do not hear other voices yet, which though not more animating than the last, are, by the provision of God, nearer to the listening ear, and dearer to the soul. There are few who do not number in their families those whose places are vacant at the table and the hearth, but who are not reckoned as lost, but only gone before. And when the business of daily life is for a moment suspended, and its cares are put to rest,-nay, often in the midst of the world's unheeded tumult,—their voices float down clearly and distinctly from heaven, and say to their own, 'Come up hither.' Our infirmities are relieved, our strength is renewed;

no more.

Our sins We thirst Let not

our fears and doubts are flown away. are forgiven. We hunger no more. We are disquieted no more. your spirits walk on in darkness. Weep not for us; our tears are all wiped away. Forget not the duties which remain for you on earth, but neither forget us, who wait for you here. Hearken to us, and be comforted, Come to us, when your journey is done."

A DISCOURSE ON THE END OF THE WORLD.*

Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, that ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand.-2 Thess. ii, 1, 2.

THE second Epistle of Paul to the Thessalonians is supposed to have been written within twenty years of the ascension of Christ, and yet it contains a caution to those to whom it was addressed, not to be disturbed by the idea that the coming of Christ, or the end of the world, was immediately at hand-a caution which shows that such an apprehension had, even at that period, been entertained, and had disturbed the peace of the church at Thessalonica. In recurring to the history of the church at that place, we can see reasons why such a notion should have been entertained. Paul had been there but three weeks, and then been driven

* Occasioned by the excitement created by Miller, 1843.