Five Sermons | Page 5

was absent. In the House of Clerical and Lay Deputies were the Rev.
Abraham Jarvis, the Rev. Robert Smith, and the Rev. Samuel Parker,
who became bishops. They met to show the world that the charter of
the Church is perpetual, and that the Church has the power to adapt
herself to all the conditions of human society. They met to consolidate
the scattered fragments of the Church in the thirteen colonies into a
national Church, and secure for themselves and children Catholic faith
and worship in the Book of Common Prayer. They builded wiser than
they knew. They secured for the Church self-government, free from all
secular control. They preserved the traditions of the past, and yet every
feature of executive, legislative, and judicial administration was in
harmony with the Constitution of the Republic. They gave the laity a
voice in the council of the Church; they provided that bishops and
clergy should be tried by their peers, and that the clergy and laity of
each diocese should elect their own bishop subject to the approval of
the whole Church. There was the most delightful fraternal intercourse
between the two bishops. In the words of our Presiding Bishop, "The
blessed results of that convention were due, under the guidance of the

Holy Spirit, to the steadfast gentleness of Bishop White and the gentle
steadfast--of Bishop Seabury." A century has passed. The Church
which was then everywhere spoken against is everywhere known and
respected; the mantle of Seabury, White, Hobart, Ravenscroft, Eliot, De
Lancey, and Kemper has fallen on others, and her sons are in the
forefront of that mighty movement which will people this land with
millions of souls. While we say with grateful hearts, "What hath God
wrought!" we also say, "Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy
Nave give the praise." Surely, an awful responsibility rests upon a
Church whose history is so full of the mercy of God. We are living in
the great missionary age of the Church. There is no nation on the earth
to whom we may not carry the Gospel. More than eight hundred
millions of souls for whom Christ died have not heard that there is a
Saviour. One of the hinderances to the speedy evangelization of the
world is the division among Christians,--alas! both within and without
the Church. Our Saviour said: "By this shall all men know that ye are
my disciples, if ye have love one to another." Christians have been
separated in hostile camps, and often divisions have ripened into hatred.
The saddest of all is that the things which separate us are not necessary
for salvation. The truths in which we agree are part of the Catholic faith.
In the words of Dr. Dollinger, "we can say each to the other as baptized,
we are on either side, brothers and sisters in Christ. In the great garden
of the Lord, let us shake hands over these confessional hedges, and let
us break them down, so as to be able to embrace one another altogether.
These hedges are doctrinal divisions about which either we or you are
in error. If you are in the wrong, we do not hold you morally culpable;
for your education, surroundings, knowledge, and training made the
adherence to these doctrines excusable and even right. Let us examine,
compare, and investigate the matter together, and we shall discover the
precious pearl of peace and unity; and then let us join hands together in
cultivating and cleansing the garden of the Lord, which is overgrown
with weeds." There are blessed signs that the Holy Spirit is deepening
the spiritual life of widely separated brothers. Historical Churches are
feeling the pulsation of a new life from the Incarnate God. All Christian
folk see that the Holy Spirit has passed over these human barriers and
set His seal to the labors of separated brethren in Christ. The
ever-blessed Comforter is quickening in Christian hearts the divine

spirit of charity. Christians are learning more and more the theology
which centres in the person of Jesus Christ. It is this which worldwide
is creating a holy enthusiasm to stay the flood of intemperance,
impurity, and sin at home, and gather lost heathen folk into the fold of
Christ. In our age every branch of the Church can call over the roll of
its confessors and martyr, and so link its history to the purest ages of
the Church. We would not rob them of one sheaf they have gathered
into the garner of the Lord. We share in every victory and we rejoice in
every triumph. There is not one of that great company who have
washed their robes white in the blood of the Lamb, who is not our
kinsman in Christ. Brothers in Christ