GENERAL PRINCIPLES Gl 



THE TBUB si'IKIT OE CHURCH UNITY 



Let me add a practical word as to the 

 duty of church unity and the spirit in 

 which to promote it. Every day it is be- 

 coming plainer that the problem which we 

 have been discussing is to be solved not so 

 much by logic as by feeling, — godlike 

 charity and brotherly love. The day for 

 mere logic has gone by. No reasonings of 

 ours could ever equal the reasonings of 

 those ancestors, on the other side, who were 

 once in so dead earnest as to exchange the 

 pen for the sword and make martyrs of one 

 another at the stake and upon the scaffold. 

 Nor could any mere logic now beat down 

 our inherited prejudices, denominational 

 rivalries, and social jealousies. The o x ues- 

 tions which still divide us can only be 

 settled by being ignored with mutual tol- 

 erance and left to the natural operation of 

 the laws of thought, or rather to the super- 

 natural influences of heaven-born charity. 

 The Christian love which is already in our 

 hearts must be allowed to embrace all our 

 fellow Christians as members with us of 

 the visible Church of Christ. The supreme 

 test of church unity is our Saviour's own 



