(_b_) As zeal is good for ourselves individually, so it is also _good for the professing Church of Christ generally_. Nothing so much keeps alive true religion as a leaven of zealous Christians scattered to and fro throughout a Church. Like salt, they prevent the whole body falling into a state of corruption. None but men of this kind can revive Churches when ready to die. It is impossible to over-estimate the debt that all Christians owe to zeal. The greatest mistake the rulers of a Church can make is to drive zealous men out of its pale. By so doing they drain out the life-blood of the system, and hasten on ecclesiastical decline and death. Zeal is in truth that grace which God seems to delight to honour. Look through the list of Christians who have been eminent for usefulness. Who are the men that have left the deepest and most indelible marks on the Church of their day? Who are the men that God has generally honoured to build up the walls of His Zion, and turn the battle from the gate? Not so much men of learning and literary talents, as men of zeal. Bishop Latimer was not such a deeply-read scholar as Cranmer or Ridley. He could not quote Fathers from memory, as they did. He refused to be drawn into arguments about antiquity. He stuck to his Bible. Yet it is not too much to say that no English reformer made such a lasting impression on the nation as old Latimer did. And what was the reason? His simple zeal. Baxter, the Puritan, was not equal to some of his contemporaries in intellectual gifts. It is no disparagement to say that he does not stand on a level with Manton or Owen. Yet few men probably exercised so wide an influence on the generation in which he lived. And what was the reason? His burning zeal. Whitefield, and Wesley, and Berridge, and Venn were inferior in mental attainments to Bishops Butler and Watson. But they produced effects on the people of this country which fifty Butlers and Watsons would probably never have produced. They saved the Church of England from ruin. And what was one secret of their power? Their zeal. These men stood forward at turning points in the history of the Church. They bore unmoved storms of opposition and persecution.--They were not afraid to stand alone. They cared not though their motives were misinterpreted.--They counted all things but loss for the truth's sake.--They were each and all and every one eminently _men of one thing_:--and that one thing was to advance the glory of God, and to maintain His truth in the world. They were all fire, and so they lighted others.--They were wide awake, and so they awakened others.--They were all alive, and so they quickened others.--They were always working, and so they shamed others into working too.--They came down upon men like Moses from the mount.--They shone as if they had been in the presence of God.--They carried to and fro with them, as they walked their course through the world, something of the atmosphere and savour of heaven itself.