He dwelt much in these sermons on the need for unity in the Church at home; it was not then a question of re-union with other denominations which concerned him; that question had hardly arisen yet. It was unity within the Church itself that he felt to be so urgent. The controversies which were distracting it when he returned to England had made a very painful impression upon him. With characteristic tact he attributed them to the increased interest in religious questions roused by the two movements which had sprung up in the Universities during his absence, the Tractarian movement at Oxford and the Evangelical movement at Cambridge. These movements had made so great a change in England in the thirteen years that he had been away that he could say: “now it is a very rare thing to see a careless clergyman or a neglected parish.” He said that it was easy to see how Christian zeal tended to religious strife whilst it led to greater zeal in seeking religious truth. The cure for the evils of controversy which he offered to young men was “to enter into life burning to do their duty in that state of life to which God may call them.” “The best interpreter of Christian doctrine is Christian work.” He added: “For instance, in our mission work, our standard of necessary doctrine is, what we can translate into our native languages, and explain to our native converts. This we know to be all that is really necessary for their salvation.” This test would suffice until the Church should be able to set up tribunals of doctrine to decide “whether the increase of knowledge in the present day would allow of stricter definitions or greater fulness of language.” Much that he said bearing on the special difficulties of the time is of universal application. “There is reason to fear that a great delusion often lurks under the plea of conscience. An over-scrupulous conscience may often be the mere veil for a lack of charity.” He spoke of how a true conception of the Church would lead men to work amongst the poor and the outcast; “to deal with every single soul as if our own lives depended upon the issue. If this be done the Church will soon by God’s blessing reabsorb all dissent within herself, for every sect is still part of the Church.” He believed that the great work given us by God to do was “too vast and too important to be lost in unprofitable discussion.”