But if it be

adopted by

the Mis

descript, yet

form of

discoursed of amongst the people. It is not now the time to discourse of the pastoral office (I shall hereafter), but it were easy to show from the epistles of the Great Shepherd to the angels of the seven churches of Asia, that it is an office in its spirit, consenting with that view of the Missionary office which we labour to establish, and widely dissenting from those views of it which are now current amongst both priests and people. But while those erroneous views prevail of the pastoral office, which is under our eye at home, and from which we derive our notion of the Missionary, it will be in vain to think that the latter notion can be a correct one. Therefore, it is the more necessary, among the many sources of error to which we are exposed in making up our idea of the Missionary, to adhere to the divine platform contained in these verses, and be governed by the jus divinum, the divine authority of that unrepealed constitution.

Therefore I say, let this type of the Misthe Church, sionary stand, that he is a man without a sionary will purse, without a scrip, without a change of stand a non- raiment, without a staff, without the care of the highest, making friends, or keeping friends, without the manhood. hope or desire of worldly good, without the apprehension of worldly loss, without the care of life, without the fear of death; of no rank, of no country, of no condition; a man of one thought, the Gospel of Christ; a man of one purpose, the Glory of God; a fool, and content to be reckoned a fool, for Christ; a madman,

and content to be reckoned a madman, for Christ. Let him be enthusiast, fanatic, babbler, or any other outlandish non-descript the world may choose to denominate him. But still let him be a non-descript, a man that cannot be classed under any of their categories, or defined by any of their convenient and conventional names. When they can call him pensioner, trader, householder, citizen; man of substance, man of the world, man of science, man of learning, or even man of common sense, it is all over with his Missionary character. He may innocently have some of these forms of character, some of them he cannot innocently have; but they will be far subordinate, deep in the shade, covered and extinguished to the world's incurious gaze, by the strange incoherent and unaccountable character to which he surrendereth himself mainly. The world knoweth the Missionary not, because it knew Messiah not. The nature of his life is hid with Christ in God; he is not a man, but the spirit of a man; he is a spirit that hath divested itself of all earthiness, save the continent body, which it keepeth down and useth as its tabernacle, and its vehicle, and its mechanical tool for speech and for action.

keeping

other fea

The standard is a high one, and suiteth not It is in an easy and prudential age, and we that are with the bred in peaceful places, may stumble at it, tures of and some of our self-sufficient spirits may scoff Christian at it. But our fathers held it in reputation when they suffered the loss of all things, and counted them but as dung, that they might win Christ;

discipline;

and the Missionaries who came to our fathers, were accustomed to it. And what is a Missionary who shrinketh at it? Can he stand the stake or the cross, who cannot bear hunger, thirst, and nakedness? Was any man a martyr who could not be a hungered for Christ? What are purse, staff, scrip, raiment and friendship, but the help and sustenance of life, taking their value from the love we have of life? And if we are prepared to scuttle the ship, are we not prepared to sink the timbers, and cordage, and tackle of the ship? This unearthly dimension of the Missionary character is in such keeping with the rest of the Christian dispensation, as to commend itself to our mind on that very account. Had it not been perfect in this its beau-ideal, had it been accommodated to prudence and practice, a plausible, reasonable, fair-looking speculation like that which it seems hasting to become, I for one would have said, This is not like a character of Christ's delineation; it wanteth the touch of the divine hand; it hath not the supernatural air. It is of the earth, earthly it is not of the heavens, heavenly: it is born of flesh, it consorteth with Mammon and hath fellowship with Belial. I doubt whether it be an original or not; for here, in Christ's style, is a description of faith as the substance of things hoped for; and here is a cloud of witnesses, who by faith substantiated invisible things; and here is a description of the Christian life, as a walk by faith and not by sight; and here is a description of charity so perfect as to

make the holiest man abhor himself; and here is a law which condemneth the justest men; and here is a rule of chastity, and a rule for behaving to enemies, and a rule for alms-giving, and a thousand other schemes and rules of Christ; not one of which is calculated in accommodation to man's imperfections, but in accommodation to God's perfections; not in measure with man's weakness, but in measure with the Spirit's power; not for the strength of fallen nature, but for the sufficiency of the grace of God. And shall the individual traits of the Christian character be superhuman, and the whole Christian not be superhuman; shall the Christian be superhuman, and the Missionary not be three times superhuman?

these ac

Stumble, therefore, who pleaseth, at the se- and, on all verity of these institutions of the Missionary; I counts, to glory in them. Tame them down who pleaseth; be upheld. I, while I live, will uphold their sublimity. Temporise with them who please, they do it at their proper risk. Let it be mine to love and reverence my Saviour's words. Nay, moreover, let them who please cool down the temper of the Missionary, and lower the mark of his high calling; be it mine to rouse his spirit, and if duty hindered not, to rouse my own spirit to the height of the undertaking. When the Missionaries, the forlorn hope of our warfare, issue from the gate of our camp, let us cheer them with songs of ancient chivalry, with examples of ancient victory; let the daughter of Zion brace the heart of her warlike sons, with

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her heaven-derived minstrelsy; that they may forth in the spirit of the mighty men of old, and scale the steep which frowneth upon flesh and blood, and plant the good standard of the faith upon the loftiest battlement of the enemy's strongest hold,—which strong and lofty though it be, is not more strong than the strength of our God, nor more lofty than the flights of our faith; which strong and lofty though it be, is permitted thus high to rise and thus sternly to frown, only that it may prove the good temper of the warrior's soul, and prove before the high witnesses of the contest, how humanity in the weakest of Christ's servants, is stronger than death and the grave, than earth and hell, and can triumph over them, and lead them captives, as did the great founder and everlasting captain of the Missionary work. Therefore, I say, let the lineament of perfection stand flaming forth, because it is the failing of human nature to rest satisfied with its attainments, and to come to a stand in its progress, through the might and multitude of surrounding objects. Unto feeble and faithless man, there needeth always a voice like to that which was given unto Moses when the people pressed between the angry sword of Pharoah, and the raging sea stood still in sore dismay:"Speak unto the children of Israel that they go forward." And of all men, the Missionary needeth this voice the most, because his course is the roughest, and his enemies the most inveterate. As the Baptist came