+II. Walk in meekness+--in a prudent restraint and government of the passions. We shall not be easily provoked, our resentments will not be sudden, without cause or without bounds. If a variance happens, we shall stand ready to be reconciled. We shall be cautious not to give, and slow to take offence. In matters of religion our zeal will be tempered with charity. +III. To our meekness we must add longsuffering and forbearance.+--These terms express the patient and exalted exercise of meekness rather than virtues distinct from it. We are not only to be meek, but longsuffering in our meekness; not only to restrain anger under ordinary offences, but to suppress malice and forbear revenge under the most provoking injuries. +IV. We must endeavour to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.+--Not unity of opinion--this is not possible, nor reasonable to be expected, in the present state of mankind; but unity of spirit, of heart and affection, disposing us to preserve the bond of peace and maintain all the duties of Christian fellowship, whatever differences of sentiment take place. To the same purpose are the apostle's exhortations to all the Churches, and especially to those in which diversity of opinion concerning ceremonial usages threatened their external peace.--_Lathrop._ Ver. 3. _Peace the Bond of Unity._ +I. There is a union of the visible Church and the members thereof among themselves, and this is twofold:+ the one necessary to the being of a Church and being of a Church member, so that a Church cannot be a Church nor a man a member without it, the tie of which is God's covenant with the visible Church, and the Church's laying hold of it; the other necessary to the well-being of the Church, which is entertained by unity in judgment, in heart and affection, by concurrences in purposes and actings. +II. Neither fair pretences for peace and union in the Church, nor seconded but contradicted by practice, nor yet careless endeavours easily broken by difficulties, will God accept as the duty required for preserving or restoring unity.+--There is no less called for than the utmost of our serious endeavours for that end, so that we not only eschew what may give cause of rending, but also be not easily provoked when it is given by others, and when a rent is made spare no pains for having it removed, and weary not under small appearances of success. +III. Whatever differences may fall out among the members of the Church they are not to break the bond of peaceable walking+ one with another by factious sidings, but ought to study unanimous and joint practice in those things wherein there is agreement; and where this peaceable deportment is, it tends to preserve what remains of spiritual unity and to regain what is already lost.--_Fergusson._ _MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.--Verses_ 4-6. _The Sevenfold Unity of the Church reflected in the Trinity of Divine Persons._