It is with the latter, indeed, that we shall be especially concerned in this Lecture; but we must so far dwell on the former, as may be necessary for the sake of illustration and contrast. Instead however of formally arguing against the former theory, and attempting to disprove its basis, (which would draw us too far from our object,) let us rather endeavour to develope the true Catholic conception of Christianity, and show its exact coincidence with the literal Scriptures of Truth. An erring Christian man may by observing this be more likely to suspect, at least, the soundness of the opposite conception. There is a power in truth; and it is often as useful to state it clearly as to argue for it. Many men do not see even the apparent ground on which Church principles rest—they do not enter into our theory, so as to understand what they themselves dissent from. And on the other hand, many right-minded believers, from want of sufficient clearness of views, adopt a mode of defence which sanctions, or implies, Sectarian _principle_. How many Dissenters, for example, oppose us, on the ground of our union with the State; or of our having a written Liturgy; or written Sermons; or certain forms and ceremonies; forgetting that these are not specific _Church_-questions; that these might have been otherwise decided among us than they are, i.e. that we might not have been allied to the State, nor have been accustomed to a written Liturgy, nor written Sermons, and yet that our Churchmanship might have been, in every principle, the same precisely.—And again, how many Churchmen defend our general system just as if the Clergy were the essential, that is, constituent body of the Church; or defend our Episcopacy with confidence from insufficient texts; or defend our Apostolicity on the ground of a Threefold order of Ministration being traceable even to Apostolic times: little thinking how far such kinds of defence are inaccurate, and even involve Sectarian principle.