Love sent down the Holy SPIRIT to earth, by Whom ye were born again into the kingdom of CHRIST, as ye were born into this world by the breath of the same SPIRIT when ye were but insensible dust. And your spiritual life is surrounded with love and kindness like your natural life, from its beginning on earth to its consummation in heaven. GOD’s Bible, like His world, is full of love and beauty. It tells you to whom you are to listen, namely, His ministers; through what you are to seek grace, namely, His sacraments; through Whom alone you are to be saved, namely, His SON.’ “He then proceeded to show more especially how this love was shown in the institution of the rite of Confirmation, by which careful training of the youth of CHRIST’s Church in faith and practice was secured, and all ages taught how they must act together in furthering the common good, the older being bound to teach the young, and the young to listen to the old; while both learned to feel their submission to the rule of the Church, in having to submit to the Bishop, as its head, the test of their mutual obedience to her laws. ‘But,’ he added, ‘I will not now dwell more on the rite of Confirmation, as the older have already had their instruction in it, and that of the younger will soon follow. I wish to say a word to you all on another matter, which I confess weighs heavily on my mind, and no occasion may again occur on which I can do it so properly as at present. You are surrounded with spiritual enemies on every side, and it is my particular duty to warn you of your danger. GOD be thanked, the foe has not yet scaled the walls of this parish, but he is loudly battering at its ramparts! Look at all the various kinds of dissent from the Church’s unity, which now stalk abroad with shameless front! Now all dissent is _sin_, less or more. If it differs not from the truth, it is the more unpardonable for its schism—if it does differ, so far as it differs it is the more sinful. Look at popery, which is dissent in the mask of unity—error the more dangerous for boasting itself to be the truth. Look, again, at infidelity—the blasphemies of Tom Paine; beware, my children, of this sin, for I hear it has come nigh you, even to your doors.’ (Here a sensation of wondering horror ran through the assembled crowd.) ‘Do you ask me for a safeguard against these snares? I answer, meddle not with them! He that toucheth pitch _will_ be defiled. To be tempted of the devil is trial enough for poor mortals to endure, but to tempt the devil himself, is of all follies the most unpardonable! It is not my duty, for it is impossible for me, to answer all the forms of error; but it _is_ my duty to warn you against them all; and I do so by giving you one simple safeguard, which will apply to them all alike: it is this—_take my word for it_, _that your Church is true_.—_Somebody’s_ word you _must_ take, for you are too unlearned to judge of these deep