And if we be asked, How are we to know--where are we to find this ground? We reply, "If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light." "If any man _will do_ His will, he shall know of the doctrine." "_There is a path_" (thanks be to God for it!) though "no fowl knoweth, and the vulture's eye hath not seen it. The lion's whelps have not trodden it, nor the fierce lion passed by it." Nature's keenest vision cannot see this path, nor its greatest strength tread it. Where is it, then? Here it is: "_Unto man_"--to the reader and to the writer, to each, to all--"He said, 'Behold, _the fear of the Lord_, that is wisdom; and _to depart from evil_ is understanding.'" (Job xxviii.) But there is another expression which we not unfrequently hear from persons from whom we might expect more intelligence, namely, "Cutting off the members of the body of Christ."[22] This, too, blessed be God, is impossible. Not a single member of the body of Christ can ever be severed from the Head, or ever disturbed from the place into which he has been incorporated by the Holy Ghost, in pursuance of the eternal purpose of God, and in virtue of the accomplished atonement of our Lord Jesus Christ. The divine Three in One are pledged for the eternal security of the very feeblest member of the body, and for the maintenance of the indissoluble unity of the whole. [22] The expression, "Cutting off the members of Christ's body" is generally applied in cases of discipline; but it is quite a misapplication. The discipline of the assembly can never touch the unity of the body. A member of the body may so fail in morals or err in doctrine as to call for the action of the assembly in putting him away from the table, but that has nothing to do with his place in the body. The two things are perfectly distinct. In a word, then, it is as true to-day as it was when the inspired apostle penned the fourth chapter of his epistle to the Ephesians, that "there is one body," of which Christ is Head, of which the Holy Ghost is the formative power, and of which all true believers are members. This body has been on earth since the day of Pentecost, is on earth now, and shall continue on earth until that moment, so rapidly approaching, when Christ shall come and take it to His Father's house. It is the same body, with a continual succession of members, just as we speak of a certain regiment of her majesty's army having been at Waterloo, and now quartered at Aldershot, though not a man in the regiment of to-day appeared at the memorable battle of 1815.