Now, I propose to meet these inquiries and reflections promptly and fairly. In the first place, if the church is guided by the spirit of revelation, God, the author of all true revelation, knows what is good for his people, and He will not require them to _gather_ without good and sufficient reasons. For the church that is not guided by the spirit of sacred inspiration, is guided by mammon or the devil; for every church will serve God or mammon. Well, says one, I don't believe that God ever did, or ever will, require people to gather together and leave their country and kindred. Aye, indeed; but you believe the Bible, I trust, which informs you not only how God _has_ gathered his people in different periods of the world, but also, that He will gather them together in the dispensation of the fulness of times. Do I need to remind you, sir, that God required Abraham to rise up and leave his country and kindred, and go in search of a country that he should afterwards show him. He was obedient, and went from one country to another, the Lord being his counsellor and guide. The ancient saints and prophets generally were "strangers" in consequence of being called to leave their home and country. Their obedience to such a call, through faith, constituted them heirs of an inheritance. Abraham became an heir of the country which he was not permitted to possess in time, but he will hold the same in eternity, with a city built upon it according to the counsel of God. In the dispensation given to Moses, he was required to gather the people out of all the land of Egypt, and take them to the land of Canaan; and what was very remarkable, he was required to slay and destroy the inhabitants, in order to make room for the great _gathering_ of the Hebrews. The children of God and the people of this world cannot dwell together; they are always contrary one to the other. What fellowship hath Christ with Belial, or believers with unbelievers? The Egyptians could have no fellowship with the Hebrews after they were told that a prophet had sprung up among them. The Hebrews told a marvellous tale about the Lord appearing to Moses in the "burning bush." They pretended to have revelation and work miracles as in the early days of Potipher and Joseph; but this pretension to angels, prophets, and miracles, speedily sundered all ties of harmony and fellowship, and it was necessary for the Hebrews to leave the country. God required it of them, and even ordered them into an unpromising wilderness, to be subject to hunger, and thirst, and many hardships.