Gospel; and they may know but one spirit, the spirit of charity and brotherly love. Let then all Christians be now very zealous for the honour of the Lord of Hosts, and direct their combined efforts against the prevailing sins of the day. True believers “are the salt of the earth;” and the more abundantly they are sprinkled over the land, the more effectually the corrupting effects of sin will be counteracted: they are the “leaven” of the Gospel; and the more thoroughly they are diffused through the whole mass of society, the more certainly a national reformation will be produced. How great is the improvement which an active and pious individual sometimes effects in a neighbourhood!—an improvement which, commencing in one place, often spreads far around. How extensive then might be the blessed effects of the true servants of God acting in full and unanimous co-operation!—General alarm has caused much good to be done, in cleansing the towns and villages of the kingdom from physical pollutions; let there be shown the same zeal and energy in the removal of moral pollutions, so much more pernicious and fatal, as being destructive of both body and soul. And then this visitation “shall turn” out—as does every visitation, when duly improved—“to the profit, and help forward in the right way that leadeth unto everlasting life,” {89a} thousands who might long have continued in a thoughtless and guilty neglect of God. For how beneficial has the furnace of affliction been often found! it is a certain assayer of religious principles; it detects the base coinage of the world, which bears indeed the Divine superscription, but is neither formed of the pure ore of the Gospel, nor stamped with the seal of the Spirit; and proves the intrinsic value of the unadulterated metal of the heavenly treasury which “cometh forth as gold.” {89b}