Indeed if by _order_ were meant, _true Christian discipline_, whereby all the living members of Christ are knit together in one, and all that are putrid and dead, immediately cut off from the body: this _order_ I reverence; for it is of God. But where is it to be found? In what diocese? In what town or parish, within _England_ or _Wales_? Are you rector of a parish? Then let us go no farther. Does this _order_ obtain there? Nothing less. Your parishioners are a rope of sand. As few (if any) of them are alive to God; so they have no connection with each other, unless such as might be among _Turks_ or _Heathens_. Neither have _you_ any power to cut off from that body, were it alive, the dead and putrid members. Perhaps you have no desire: but all are jumbled together without any care or concern of yours. It is plain then, what _order_ is to be found is not among _you_, who so loudly contend for it, but among that very people whom you continually blame, for their _violation_ and _contempt_ of it. The little flock you condemn is united together in one body, by one spirit: so that _if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it, if one be honoured, all rejoice with it_. Nor does any dead member long remain; but as soon as the hope of recovering it is past, it is cut off. Now suppose we were willing to relinquish our charge, and to give up this flock into _your_ hands; would _you_ observe the same _order_, as we do now, with them and the other souls under your care? You _dare_ not: because you have respect of persons. You fear the faces of men. You _cannot_: because you have not _overcome the world_. You are not above the desire of earthly things. And it is impossible you should ever have any _true order_, or exercise any _Christian discipline_, till you are wholly _crucified to the ♦world_, till you desire nothing more but God. ♦ “wold” replaced with “world” Consider this matter, I intreat you, a little farther. Here are thirty thousand persons (perhaps somewhat more) of whom I take care, watching over their souls as he that must give ♦account. In order hereto it lies upon me (so I judge) at the peril of my own salvation, to know not only their names, but their outward and inward states, their difficulties and dangers. Otherwise how can I know either how to guide them aright, or to commend them to God in prayer? Now if I am willing to make these over to _you_, will _you_ watch over them in the same manner? Will _you_ take the same care (or as much more as you please) of each soul as I have hitherto done? Not such _curam animarum_ as you have taken these ten years in your own parish. Poor empty name! Has not your _parish_ been in fact, as much a _sine cure_ to _you_ as your _prebend_? Oh what account have _you_ to give to the great Shepherd and Bishop of souls! ♦ “account, in” replaced with “account. In” per Errata