3dly, God has in his Word promised the conversion of the world, but not by the means prescribed in the oral law. His promise to Abraham was, “In thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed.” (Gen. xxii. 18.) Now this can hardly mean that his descendants are to treat all nations, as the Portuguese treated the Jews. The 72nd Psalm gives rather a different view of the fulfilment of this promise. It promises not a victorious soldier like Mahomet, but one “in whose days the righteous shall flourish, and abundance of peace so long as the moon endureth.... All nations shall call Him blessed.” The prophet Isaiah tells us “that out of Zion shall go forth (not conquering armies to compel, but) the law, and the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And he shall judge among the nations, and rebuke many people; and they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.” Zechariah says, “He shall speak peace to the heathen;” and declares that the conversion of the world will not be the reward of conquest, but the result of conviction. “In those days it shall come to pass, that ten men shall take hold, out of all the languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, We will go with you, _for we have heard_ that God is with you.” (Zech. viii. 23.) Here again, then, you see that whilst the oral law differs from Moses and the prophets, the New Testament agrees with them. Account, then, for this extraordinary fact, that whilst the whole Jewish nation lost the great and glorious doctrine of liberty of conscience, it has been preserved for you and for all mankind by Jesus of Nazareth. Just suppose that the principles of the Talmud had triumphed, either amongst the Jews or the Portuguese, what would have been the consequence to the world? If the Talmudists had attained to supreme power, we should have had to choose between compulsory conversion and the sword. If the Portuguese had attained to universal dominion, both you and we should have had the alternative of compulsory conversion or the fires of the Inquisition. In either case, the noblest and most precious gift that the God of heaven ever sent down to earth, liberty of conscience, would have been extinct. But, thank God, the doctrine of Jesus of Nazareth has triumphed over the oral laws of both Jews and Portuguese, and the result is, that both you and we have the liberty of worshipping God according to the convictions of our understanding and the dictates of our conscience. Behold, then, how you are indebted to Jesus of Nazareth. Without him you would not have known religious liberty, either theoretically or practically. He is right on this all-important point, whilst those who condemned him to death and rejected his claims are wrong. If he was not the true Messiah, but only a pretender, how is it that God has made him and his doctrine