other, and shall show the fruits of a genial and effective parish life. Hence we have the three main functions of the Church-instruction, worship, fellowshipthe three functions, indeed, closely connected, and almost identical with each other, yet, indeed, in some respects distinct, and symbolizing themselves severally under the names of the Pulpit, the Altar, and the Pastoral Walk. The Pulpit is to present God's Word to men; the Altar is to present man's soul to God; the Parish is to nurture the life of piety and charity—that is, the practical reconciliation between God and man."-Meadville Address, pp. 9, 10.

In describing the Pulpit, Dr. Osgood forcibly urges the importance of vital convictions in the preacher's own mind, and an unction which shall lift him above the rank of a theological or ethical teacher, or a mere rhetorician. The preacher is not to be a harsh dogmatist; nor is he to be a lecturer, or essayist. "Liberal Christianity," in Dr. Osgood's opinion, has suffered greatly from the secular and academic tone of its pulpit. He recommends to his hearers to cultivate, at whatever cost of discipline, the power of extempore speaking, and throws in a caution against ambitious efforts to produce brilliant and startling sermons:

"No man can write, probably, more than a dozen great sermons a year; and if the aspirant is not content with being in the main a good preacher, he must either turn itinerant, like the Methodists, that he may constantly exhibit his familiar samples in new markets, or else he must weary his people out of all patience by the repetition of the same well-known compositions, his brain turning bankrupt towards the demands for constant brilliancy, whilst the people, more clamorous for dainties, never, except by dismission, give him the benefit of an insolvent act."-Meadville Address, p. 12.

The Altar is taken as the symbol of worship, including praise and prayer. He would have two distinct places in the sanctuary for preaching and prayer, and would have the pulpit stand more among the congregation. Without giving up free prayer on the part of the pastor, he would intermingle written sentences and collects of devotion, together with liturgical responses from the people. The choir should be "a well-trained band of voices from the congregation, who could lead the choral pieces for the whole assembly, and give, with due expression, the airs that deserved finer skill and a more choice execution." Solemnity and tenderness should mark all the services of praise and supplication; and all these should

be regarded by the congregation as their own act, expressing their affections towards God and his people.

The Parish, and the duties of the pastor in it, are next discussed:

"Believing, as he does, that the essence of Christianity consists in being impressed with a living sense of God in his relations with our humanity, and in expressing that living sense in living desires and deeds, he will rejoice in being free from the spectral austerity that mistakes what is unearthly for heavenly, and in identifying the truest spirituality with the best utility. His aim will be, alike in the sanctuary and in the household, whether teaching the young or conversing with the mature, to carry out this conviction, and so to win as much reverence for the gospel by pastoral affections as by church services. He will be genial and easy in his social relations, but he will never forget the spirituality of his mission, nor sink the Christian pastor in the frivolous gossip or jovial boon companion. When most playful, his play will be the gambol of fancy and feeling, that are all the more free because perfectly sure of their ground, like the flock sporting merrily in green pastures, by still waters, under the good Shepherd's eye"-Meadville Address, p. 15.

"We need a far broader pastoral principle, with its consequent policy. Our principle should be, that all the affections, concerns, and duties of life shall be consecrated by religion, and that Christianity is the point at which all truly human interests meet together before God to receive his blessing and interpret it into deeds. The policy to be followed may perhaps be fitly expressed thus, in order to secure the variety and uniformity characteristic of a broad and harmonious fellowship: The pastor should try so to adjust his ministrations, whether public or private, as to bring out the diversities of gifts among his people, by presenting the whole compass of God's truth and providence, and to assimilate these diversities together as much as possible in unity of spirit, by a due round of activity and fellowship. To. meet the great diversity of gifts, it will be well for him to secure a due range of subjects and incentives by a judicious division of the year into seasons, and the voluntary offices of the parish into departments, so as to give every mind its due food and exercise. When this variety is sought in a true spirit, it will tend to harmony, and the whole body will be one, because each member is in its own place, and true to its own function."-Meadville Address, p. 17.

Dr. Osgood recommends a rational use of the seasons of the Christian year, from Advent to Whitsunday. In place of the saints in the ancient calendar, he would commemorate persons whose names are worthily connected with the recent progress of the race. In the room of Dunstan and Dominic, he would exalt Fénélon and Howard. The hours of the Sabbath must be used to greater advantage than they are at present. It may be that while preaching is confined to the morn

ing service, the afternoon should be given to the instruction of children and youth, and the evening to meetings for social conference and prayer.

"All the members of a parish cannot be expected to be intimate friends, and some persons have an almost invincible repugnance to each other, so that they cannot be happy in close association. Yet a true pastoral policy will bring the parish at large into harmonious relations, by touching every congenial chord, without attempting to force any overstrained familiarity, or to do violence to the elective affinities of the people. The wise pastor will not be discouraged by the ill-success of the poor attempts usually made to make people acquainted with each other without the help of some engrossing object, for the first principles of human nature will teach him that nothing so brings out antagonism as to try to combine elements that have no common solvent or means of assimilation. He will find that the very people who were oppressive to each other when brought together without a common object, will kindle with a new fellowship the very moment that some central truth or common enterprise animates them, as when a company of soldiers who are lounging about the field, perhaps venting upon each other, in hard looks and words, the weariness of their own empty hearts, light up with a common enthusiasm, and obey a common loyalty, the moment the bugle sounds or the flag is unfurled, that puts them upon their allegiance, and calls each man to his own post of duty and of honor." -Meadville Address, pp. 20, 21.

From considering the functions of the Coming Church, Dr. Osgood passes to the mode of its organization. How is this ideal Church to be brought into being? We have attended to this portion of the discourse with much curiosity. The promoters of the Broad Church are neither very lucid nor uniform in their answer to this inquiry. It is much easier to describe the Church they would like to see, than to define the steps which are to procure its existence and obtain for it prevalence. Dr. Osgood is too sensible a man to put "faith in the power of Christian denominations to create vital Church organizations by the passage of resolutions, or the adoption of articles of government. Religious, like political constitutions, must be the growth of the habits and principles of the people, or they are but so much wasted ink or paper." He does not believe that a new Church Catholic will arise and take to itself hierarchical authority over Christendom. The Church of the Future is to be free and spontaneous in its growth, and its unity is to coexist with diversities of cus

tom. None of the leading sects is to be extinguished, but each is to develop its own gifts and take its own position in the kingdom of God. "Let each denomination affirm its own positive convictions, and respect the worthy elements in its neighbor's convictions, and we shall all be richer because of the other; and in religion, as in nature, the vast variety of species will prove the grandeur of the Creator." The want of a warm and earnest Church feeling in the Unitarian body from the beginning, is well stated:

"In the leading towns of New England, the Unitarians were mainly the select patrician and commercial class; and perhaps some of the leaders of those privileged societies might have been a little troubled, if, in removing to another place, they found a congregation much greater in numbers, but less select in quality than the religious clique in which they had been educated, so much more powerful often is social caste than theological opinion.

"This fastidious taste, of course, is opposed to the fervor of true Church life, and especially when it is associated with a critical temper that is more observant of defects than enthusiastic for merits, and with a disposition to give to the intellect and conscience a much larger part than to the affections and to faith in the province of religion. Whilst we had a good share of the piety, and a large measure of the uprightness of the old New England character in our ranks, we had a considerable portion of the Sadducean leaven of worldly respectability and financial pride, which is the natural reaction against Pharisaic sanctimoniousness and superstition. The element of divine influence, moreover, was made little prominent in the thought of some of the Unitarian leaders; and the worth of virtue, and the rewards of a good conscience, were more insisted upon than the blessedness of a filial faith, the power of Christ's grace, and the ministry of the Holy Spirit."-Meadville Address, p. 25.

Dr. Osgood calls for a reform in these matters where his denomination has erred; but he does not propose to desert its banner, but rather to grasp it more firmly and to gather into a more compact body the ranks which follow it. Yet he would accept of whatsoever "truths, incentives, and methods" may present themselves, which do not subvert former convictions. He hopes to see a truer model of a Congregational Church, and believes that the orthodox will unite with the Unitarians in its construction. In his other Addresses on the same subject, he speaks of the Broad Church as now "rising in every quarter of Christendom," and utters glowing anticipations in reference to the numbers who are to

flock into its open gates. We are at a loss to decide whether he counts upon a large accession to the Unitarian denomination in consequence of the changes which he advocates, or sees such tendencies in the other religious bodies of Christendom as will ultimately place them in cordial fellowship with his own. At times we should think that denominational lines are to be obliterated; but this, we are assured in passages quoted above, is not to be the fact. We are left to conclude that the various denominations are expected to enter into the Broad Church by the adoption of a more comprehensive test of doctrine, which shall open a wider door of admission into their pale; by the introduction of devotional and edifying rites of worship in the sanctuary, and by becoming more disposed to infuse religion, as a leaven, into every department of life.

There are some features of this movement for a Broad Church which we, from our point of view, are able to appland. It indicates, in Dr. Osgood and Dr. Bellows at least, a reaction against the radical and unbelieving spirit which would convert the Church into a Lyceum Hall or a platform for agitating the special reforms of the day. They have come to feel that the world is not to be recovered from sin by the outcries and denunciations of men who stand aloof from the Church and revile its methods of doing good. There is a growing disgust for the self-righteousness of our radical reformers who profess to be too pure to belong to the Church, and a growing perception of their utter inability to accomplish any wholesome and permanent effect by their convulsive exertions. The public is becoming heartily tired of hearing their "railing accusations." Their uncharitable and violent, and not very truthful harangues, are coming to be too common-place to attract much notice. It is evident that the leading promoters of the Broad Church are awake to this fact and participate in the general desire to part company with this class of noisy combatants for reform. There is revealed, too, in this movement, the loss of confidence in intellectual culture and in literary addresses from the pulpit, as a means of making men better. It is a movement averse to rationalism, in the interest of religious affections. It discovers, moreover, not only a respect for the Church as a distinct