rightly apprehended and applied. Conversant as we are, by the very constitution of our nature, about objects of sense; ever disposed to walk by sight rather than by faith; there is some danger of forgetting the invisible God in the details of a visible Church of resting in the sign, instead of regarding the thing signified; of unduly exalting the ministers of Divine ordinances, and unconsciously depreciating the operations of Divine grace. Thus the Corinthians, who were a highly polished and intellectual people, practised in all the subtleties and sophistries of Grecian philosophy, regarded the power of human eloquence as essential to the preaching of the cross, and relied upon the "excellency of man's speech and wisdom" to accomplish that inward change of heart, which could be the work of the Spirit of God alone. Against this error St. Paul enters an immediate and most emphatic protest. He reminds them, first, that his own apostleship and ministry, having been received direct from God, claimed, for that very reason, a degree of authority and reverence to which no subordinate ministry could pretend; and having thus dissuaded them from thinking too highly of others, he proceeds, with his characteristic humility, to develope the grounds on which they ought not to think too highly of himself. "Who," he asks, "is Paul, or who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed;" not according to the measure of their

several acquirements or abilities, but "as the Lord gave to every man. I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase. So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase. Now both he that planteth and he that watereth are one (not one in person, but one in office and in ministry) and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labour. For we are labourers together with God: ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building." Apostles, then, and all to whom their ministry may be transmitted in direct and lineal succession, whether as Bishop or as Presbyter, are "labourers together with God," and this it is which magnifies their office; but the efficiency of their labours will be in exact proportion to the "grace given unto them," and this it is which abases the individual. The Church, regarded as a field or vineyard, however it may seem to be cultivated by human instrumentality, is yet God's "husbandry;" the Church, regarded as an edifice, however apparently constructed and compacted by the combination of human artificers, is yet God's "building." Thus the two most striking illustrations which, perhaps, the respective fields of nature and of art could supply, are employed to elevate our views from the ministers who are perishable, to the ministry which is perpetual; and to impress upon us this great truth, that in the ordinance of

an unchangeable ministry we are to look for an unchangeable God, even for "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever."

We will consider Christian ministers, therefore, -and by this term we understand those who not only claim apostolical descent, but who verify and vindicate their claim by holding apostolical doctrine -as "labourers together with God." And we will first ground our estimate of their labours on that analogy which nature herself first suggested to the mind of the apostle-I mean the analogy of the husbandman. Now it is the province of the husbandman to plant and to water; but who does not know, that neither can any dexterity of planting ensure the striking of the root, nor can any diligence in watering command the ripening of the fruit? If the root, after the planting, do not strike, what avails the watering? If the root, before the planting, be cankered or diseased, how can the corrupt tree, despite all the skill, and care, and vigilance of the most experienced cultivator, bring forth other than corrupt fruit? A mightier power must be continually in operation, both extraneous and imperceptible to man, or else no human effort can avail; and this was clearly implied by the Lord Jesus Christ when He declared, "Every plant which my heavenly Father hath not planted shall be rooted up." In the spiritual husbandry of the Church, therefore, all is God's-the field, which is

the world; the plants, which are the men; the instruments wherewith the stubborn clods are tamed and broken, which are His appointed ordinances, sacraments, and means of grace: the plan or scheme for the division, direction, and combination of labour, which is His Word; the water, which is the purifying influence of His Spirit; the sunbeams, which are the quickening and cheering manifestations of His love. For, while in this spiritual husbandry, He ordains and apportions, so to speak, the manual labour, He controls also the elemental influences; and, though He deigns to put such high honour on the ministry of man, that "faith cometh by hearing," yet it is expressly on the condition that hearing is by "the word of God." What would watering avail without sunshine? and what would planting profit without rain? As, in nature, "the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth," argued St. James, "and hath long patience for it, till he receive the early and the latter rain ;"-relying implicitly upon the Divine pledge, of which the bow in the cloud is the token to all generations, that "while the earth remaineth, seed-time and harvest, and cold and heat, and winter and summer, and day and night, shall not cease;"-so the faithful minister of Christ, in the utterance of those time-honoured prayers which have been consecrated by the devotion of many generations-in the preaching of that

Gospel, not one jot or tittle of which hath undergone a change since the days when they "of whom the world was not worthy" were content to seal the testimony with their blood-so the faithful minister of Christ, duly called according to the will of Christ and the order of the Church, pursues his spiritual husbandry in patience and in faith, " troubled, it may be, on every side, yet not distressed; perplexed, but not in despair; cast down, but not destroyed; as sorrowful, yet alway rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things." So long as he sets himself to "sow in righteousness," he may expect that he will "reap in mercy." So long as he "breaks up the fallow ground, and sows not among thorns," he may confide that the Lord will "come and rain righteousness upon him;" and if any demand a reason of the hope that is in him, his answer will be returned in the words of the prophet, "As the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but maketh the earth bring forth and bud, till it give seed to the sower and bread to the eater: so shall My Word be that goeth out of My mouth, saith the Lord: it shall not return to Me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and prosper in the thing whereto I send it." Accordingly, while the sowing and the planting must be of man, it is God alone who giveth the increase and the power of the ministry lies in