to adopt this course, for they are bound to use every means in their power, to discourage infidelity; they must not admit it into the intimacy and confidence of domestic life; the sacrifice may sometime be painful, but it must be made; there may not be any compromise of Christian obligations, which forbid every unholy alliance: “for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? and what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth, with an infidel?” {179d} Believers must warn, exhort, entreat, and, if in their power, instruct the unbeliever; but, if in vain, then the divine command applies, “come out from among them, and be ye separate:” if both parties be sincere, the contrariety of habits, feelings, sentiments, and even of enjoyments, which exists between them, must render familiar intercourse little agreeable or profitable to the servant of God; who, if he be a weak or wavering disciple, may receive much injury, where he cannot benefit; and, if he be a firm and established disciple, when he finds his efforts to convince the gainsayer fruitless, however ready he may still continue to be to lend assistance, to admonish, and to observe all the courtesies of life; yet he cannot assign a place in his heart, or receive as a chosen and favoured associate, one who is not united with him in the sweet bonds of Christian fellowship: there exists a bar, for the present, insuperable, why such may not be addressed in the affectionate language of the Psalmist, “thou, my companion, my guide, and mine own familiar friend;” and that bar is, they cannot “take sweet counsel together, and walk in the house of God as friends.” {180}