But the _Filioque_ clause of the Creed is alone sufficient to exemplify the confusion of ecclesiasticism and the living Church. There are many who think that the two Churches of England and Russia are kept apart by this clause alone. England holds that the Holy Ghost, the Holy Spirit, proceeds from the Father and from the Son, Russia that it proceeds from the Father alone. Russia’s basis is St. John, XV. 26, “... the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me.” “What does it matter how it is put?” cries the living Church. But ecclesiastical pedantry is strongly entrenched, and whenever the question of the intercommunion of the two Churches is mentioned there arises that fatal phrase—“_Filioque_—and from the Son.” “Does not one of your Thirty-nine Articles lay down that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father _and from the Son_? And is not assent to the Thirty-nine Articles obligatory upon your clergy? Why, then....” To which one can only answer in one’s heart: Thirty-nine Articles, Ye precious little particles, And did God really make the world by you? The same confusion exists with regard to the Church and Life. That which the living Church of Christ possesses is a spiritual communion, not a set of dogmas or a set of points of ecclesiastical law. If a man is really touched to go to church, if he has the impulse from the heart, it is not in order that he may hear dogma. He goes to blend his voice and his thoughts with the voice and the thoughts of humanity in hymn and prayer. But to-day many misconceptions arise. Carlyle could not go to church because the sermon bored him. Many stay away from churches because they can’t stand so-and-so’s sermon. As if the sermon were part of the service! In old days the sermons were often delivered outside the churches after the service was done. The priest came through the worshippers, went out into the church square, and rising to a platform or “outside pulpit” harangued the everyday crowd. The function of the Church service is not to be a frame to a sermon, even a clever or profound or inspiring sermon. Its function is praise. A Jew writing for an important Russian newspaper about the state of the Church of England remarks that “dogmas make many leave the Church, and those who stay remain to preach ethics,” and he goes on to praise ethics as the function of the Church, leaving out of account, and evidently having no notion of, the Church as a temple of religion, a place of communion and aspiration. Surely the preaching ethics is a work begun by parents and confirmed by the schoolmaster. Christ did not die on the cross or forgive the thief who recognised Him in order to preach “Thou shalt not steal!” Yet such a confusion of ideas remains in the mind even of the cultured.