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Is the church called a city, ministers are the watchmen stationed on its walls, to descry danger from afar and sound the alarm. Is the Church a sheepfold, they are the shepherds, guarding and feeding the flock. Is she a building, rising in fair proportions, eventually to be polished after the similitude of a palace, they are the builders rearing the gigantic and beauteous structure. Is Zion an army with banners, they are the standardbearers. Is this world a revolted province of God's empire, they are the ambassadors, sent forth to adjust the claims of heaven's court and beseech men, in Christ's stead, to become reconciled to God. Is the Church on earth an object upon which the ascending Saviour wishes to bestow the richest boon, ministers are the precious donation. "Wherefore when he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men. And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." Would the enraptured Isaiah depict the future glories of the universal church, ministers form a prominent object in the glowing picture: "How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace; that bringeth good tidings of good, that publisheth salvation; that saith unto Zion, Thy God reigneth! Thy watchmen shall lift up the voice; with the voice together shall they sing; for they shall see eye to eye, when the Lord shall bring again Zion."

3. The ministerial office assumes an aspect of vast dignity because of its rich fruits-its countless and transcendent blessings. Pen cannot recount, tongue

cannot utter, history will never adequately record the blessings which accompany and flow from the establishment of the Gospel ministry-diffusing themselves in ten thousand channels, over the Church and the world, over religion and science, over refinement and laws. Since the days of Christ and his inspired apostles, the voice of the living preacher has been the method the most conspicuous and the most honored of God in propagating the truth and conserving the world. For ever since that period, the chief function of the ministry consists in preaching, accompanied with prayer and the administration of the ordinances. There are no successors of the Jewish priests-there are no successors of the twelve apostles. The ministry now hath no sacerdotal or apostolic character. There are no lords over God's heritage. All God's ministers are equal. All are bishops, and all are brethren; and Christ alone is Head, and Christ alone is King. And in compensation for the withdrawal from the world of miraculous gifts, prophetic tongues, apostolic pens, and angels' visits, God has concentrated the essence of all former honors and offices upon the Christian ministy. Yea, there are clear intimations in Holy Scripture of God's design to circumscribe great spiritual blessings within its immediate range. "How, then (saith the apostle), shall they call on him in whom they have not believed; and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard; and how shall they hear without a preacher; and how shall they preach except they be sent." "So faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." As true as God does not warm men without fire, nor nourish men without food, nor drown men without water, just so sure does he not usually convert men without preaching. Though there ever have been, and ever will be, cases of sincere conversion without the public preaching

of the Gospel, yet they are of rare occurrence-exceptions to God's great rule. "The pulpit

“Must stand acknowledged while the world shall stand,
The most important and effectual guard,
Support and ornament of virtue's cause."

What myriads of sacred influences and associations cluster around the pulpit, calculated to enhance its importance as a moral power. There is a vast element for good in having a class of men expressly set apart to instruct the people in holy things-with minds stored with learning with hearts warm with love-with lips eloquent with truth-whose themes are divine-whose topics are the whole range of Bible facts-and whose arguments and motives are drawn from life and from death, from time and eternity. Look also at the influence of numbers, the power of sympathy, the expression of the human eye, the tones of the human voice, the whole force and magnetic power of human eloquence, calculated to awe, to thrill, to convince. Who can fully estimate the amount of knowledge communicated by the weekly ministrations of the Sanctuary, to a people many of whom are thoughtless and would never otherwise pause and reflect, and many are defective in education and incompetent to comprehend without a teacher? Who can recount the blessings to neighborhoods and villages in the instruction given, the impressions produced, the vices restrained, the public order upheld, and the peace, harmony, and friendships created by a regular ministry? And, on the other hand, what a melancholy scene presents itself to the eye, where there is no Christian ministry-in Sabbaths desecrated, public morals lowered, youth unrestrained, the Bible unread, and God and eternity forgotten-vice stalking abroad unrebuked, and the large mass grasping after wealth and

pleasure, and no one to raise his voice and warn them to flee from the wrath to come.

And Oh, when we take a higher range-when we look upon the ministry as chiefly designed to proclaim to men a crucified Saviour, and qualify them for heaven, how the office swells in honor and dignity. And next to Jesus, the Lamb in the midst of the throne, the chief objects of interest and attraction in the upper state, will be those ministers of the Gospel, who have converted the largest number of souls to God. For "they that turn many to righteousness, shall shine as the stars. forever and ever." Raphael took a piece of canvas, of which the maker thought nothing, and the vendor thought nothing, and threw upon it his own immortal colors, and has made it live forever in the galleries of Europe. So a minister of the Gospel takes a human heart, for which the possessor cares but little, and retraces upon it the lineaments of God's own image, to be exhibited forever in the galleries of heaven, as a trophy of redeeming grace.

Turn for a moment more to earth, and look at the temporal achievements of the ministry. What hath God wrought by preaching? The Roman empire was Christianized by preaching—the preaching of Paul and his noble companions. And though the "weapons of their warfare were not carnal, yet they were mighty through God, to the pulling down of strongholds." There sat Paganism at the capital, enthroned above the heads of kings and emperors-clad in all her dazzling splendor with her magnificent temples-her gorgeous train of priests-her holy vestal virgins-her learned interpreters of the sibylline oracles--her gladiatorial shows her vast amphitheatres, some of which could contain tens of thousands of spectators. But Paul preached, and institutions venerable by ages tottered

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and fell. The glorious Reformation was chiefly brought about by preaching-the preaching of Luther. The Republic of Geneva, after which our own Republic was fashioned, was produced by preaching, the preaching of Calvin. The sturdy national character of Scotland was formed chiefly by the preaching of men like John Knox, of whom at his grave it was said, "There lies one who never feared the face of men." The present quiet of every New England village was laid far back in the preaching of the Stoddards, and the Mathers, and the Edwardses. The present national existence of the Sandwich Islands, whose people forty years ago were wild cannibals, is the fruit of the preaching of American missionaries. The foundations of the American Union were laid in the labors and toils of such men as George Fox, the Quaker, and John Wesley, the Methodist, and George Whitfield, the Calvinist, who traveled and preached from Massachusetts to Georgia, and aided the people to form religious and ecclesiastical affinities, before the cry to arms rung out from old Faneuil Hall. Civil liberty, in the days of our fathers, was perched upon the standard of the cross, and will always visit every land where that standard is unfurled. And the conversion of the nations to God, and the final and universal triumphs of the Gospel, will be effected mainly by the same heaven-ordained and heaven-owned method. For the Lord shall give the word; great shall be the army of the publishers. "For an angel shall be seen, flying through the clouds of heaven, having the everlasting Gospel to preach to every nation." And as that blessed Gospel shall begin to walk abroad on its last triumph, thrones shall tremble, oracles shall grow dumb, and the brows of tyrants shall turn white as ashes. Then cities and palaces shall fling wide their gates at her advancing tread, and the great mass of

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