The true office of the pastors of the Church (and likewise of all believers) is to lead others to that knowledge of the truth which can never be imposed. Their concern for the spiritual welfare of their brethren can never be too earnest; their diligence in guidance and guardianship, too eager; their value for purity of faith, too high; or their apprehension of spiritual danger, too ready or too ardent. But all this concern and apprehension should be justly directed, and this guidance and guardianship exercised with a regard to the rights with which God has invested every man. The first object to be desired is spiritual advancement, to which intellectual rectitude is subsidiary. The first object of dread is moral corruption, and not mental error. The guidance to be exercised is that of an experienced over an inexperienced person. The one points out to the other the snares and dangers into which he is liable to fall, the labyrinth in which he may lose himself, and the various tendencies of different paths; but he has no lawful power to insist upon a particular path being pursued, or to condemn his companion to destruction for interpreting differently the invitation on which they both proceed. The guardianship is faithful as long as it consists in warning off the attacks of temptation, declaring the threats and promises of the Gospel, and educating for independent action; but it becomes tyranny when restraints are imposed on the exercise of the faculties, and any impediments are thrown in the way of a free range through the spiritual world of which God has made every man an inhabitant. It is the office of Christian pastors to study the sacred records with all diligence, striving to ascertain by the help of learning and philosophy, and every other help, what the true faith is, and how other minds may be best disposed for its apprehension; to place before those minds whatever may best tend to enlighten, convince, and establish them; to excite them to activity and stimulate them to further action when aroused. But further than this they must not go. The mind must work out the results for itself; and for those results none but itself can be answerable. Its safety or peril rests with God, who hath given into no man's hand the souls of his brethren.