In the first place, the argument: supposes a condition of things that has now ceased. When creeds were accepted in their literality by the bodies professing them, when the state of general opinion contained nothing hostile, and suggested no difficulties,--for any one member of a body to turn traitor may have well seemed mere perversity, temper, love of singularity, or anything but a wish to get at truth. The offence assumed the character of a moral obliquity, and discipline can never be relaxed for immorality proper. All the circumstances are now changed. The ministers and members of religious communities no longer cherish the same set of doctrines with only immaterial varieties; they no longer accept their articles in the sense of the original framers. The body at large has contracted the immoral taint; the whole head is sick; any remaining soundness is not with the acquiescent mass, but with the out-spoken individuals. In such a state of things, ordinary rules are inapplicable. There is a sort of paralysis of authority, an uncertainty whether to punish or to wink at flagrant heresy. To say in such a case that the relaxation of the creed is not a thing to be proposed, is to confess, like Livy on the condition of Rome, that we can endure neither our vices nor their remedies. Too much has at all times been made of individual divergences from the established creed. The influence of a solitary preacher smitten with the love of heretical peculiarity has been grossly overrated. The assumption is, that his own flock will, as a matter of course, follow their shepherd; that is to say, the adhesion of individual congregations to the creed of the Church depends upon its being faithfully reproduced by their regular minister. Such is not by any means the fact; the creed of the members of a Church is not at the mercy of any passing influence. It has been engrained by a plurality of influences; one man did not make it, and one man cannot unmake it. Moreover, allowance should be made for the spirit of opposition found in Church members, as well as in other people. [INDIVIDUAL DIVERGENCES UNIMPORTANT.]