ridicule, and remonstrance, and denunciation, and persecution, have been trying, ever since the Christian era, to establish the unity of the Spirit, and have rather destroyed it. Try you, whether he was not enlightened and sanctified by the Spirit, who said, and acted upon it, “that one ounce of love could do more than many pounds of controversy.” Men may be repelled from you, by your orthodoxy, your zeal, your reasoning, your stout remonstrance. They will be subdued by your forbearance, and will come after you for your love! To the best of you, I say, there is some indifference which you ought to shake off. To the best of you, I say, get farther from bigotry and the spirit of self. SERMON XIII. THE LAW IN THE GOSPEL. ST. LUKE, X., 25. _What shall I do to inherit eternal life_? WE have here the question of a Jewish lawyer, who is said, in propounding it, to have tempted our LORD. This does not necessarily, or even probably, mean, that his object was simply to ensnare and entangle JESUS in his speech: but rather that he was putting Him to the test, that he might judge of the qualifications and orthodoxy of the New Teacher. But, besides this, he seems, from the commendation presently passed on him, to have had a better motive; to have been like the scribe who was not far from the kingdom of heaven, to have felt personal anxiety about salvation, and to have sought from our LORD, in an honest, though somewhat professional and self-sufficient manner, the resolution of a real doubt. “What shall I do to inherit eternal life?” He had listened to the words in which JESUS reminded His hearers, that they had greater privileges than those who lived before them (“Blessed are the eyes which see the things that ye see. For I tell you that many prophets and kings have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them, and to hear those things which ye hear and have not heard them”), and rightly concluding that they were an announcement of the arrival of Gospel times, and the setting forth of their speaker as the Great Gospel Teacher, he asked, what was there _new_ for him to hear and learn, and what consequently remained for him to do, that he might inherit eternal life. The reply of our LORD is remarkable. “What is written in the law? how readest thou?” There is nothing new, nothing taken away, nothing added or altered. I come, to fulfil the ceremonial law, to enforce the moral law, what does that bind upon thee? And he answering said, with much wisdom—much spiritual discernment, “Thou shalt love the LORD thy GOD with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind: and thy neighbour as thyself. And JESUS said unto him, Thou hast answered right: this do, and thou shalt live:” _i.e._, shalt have eternal life. Observe, throughout this lawyer’s speech, how correct is his theology. “What shall I do to _inherit_ eternal life?”