But let it then be asked, are the motives of Christianity so little necessary to the practice of it, its principles to its conclusions, that the one may be spared and yet the other remain in undiminished force? Still then, its _Doctrines_ are no more than a barren and inapplicable or at least an unnecessary theory, the place of which, it may perhaps be added, would be well supplied by a more simple and less costly scheme. But can it be? Is Christianity then reduced to a mere creed? Is its practical influence bounded within a few external plausibilities? Does its essence consist only in a few speculative opinions, and a few useless and unprofitable tenets? And can this be the ground of that portentous distinction, which is so unequivocally made by the Evangelist between those who accept, and those who reject the Gospel: "He that believeth on the Son, hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son, shall not see life: but the wrath of God abideth on him?" This were to run into the very error which the bulk of professed Christians would be most forward to condemn, of making an unproductive faith the rule of God's future judgment, and the ground of an eternal separation. Thus not unlike the rival circumnavigators from Spain and Portugal, who setting out in contrary directions, found themselves in company at the very time they thought themselves farthest from each other; so the bulk of professed Christians arrive, though by a different course, almost at the very same point, and occupy nearly the same station as a set of enthusiasts, who also rest upon a barren faith, to whom on the first view they might be thought the most nearly opposite, and whose tenets they with reason profess to hold in peculiar detestation. By what pernicious courtesy of language is it, that this wretched system has been flattered with the name of Christianity. The morality of the Gospel is not so slight a fabric. Christianity throughout the whole extent exhibits proofs of its Divine original, and its practical precepts are no less pure than its doctrines are sublime. Can the compass of language furnish injunctions stricter in their measure or larger in their comprehension, than those with which the word of God abounds; "_Whatsoever_ ye do in _word_ or _deed_, do _all_ in the name of the Lord Jesus;"--"Be _ye_ holy, _for God is holy_:"--"Be ye _perfect_ as your Father which is in Heaven is _perfect_?" We are commanded to _perfect_ holiness, to go on unto _perfection_.