minds. They see this thing is beautiful, and that is in the Fathers,
and a third is expedient, and a fourth pious; but of their connection
one with another, their hidden essence and their life, and the bearing
of external matters upon each and upon all, they have no perception or
even suspicion. They do not look at things as part of a whole, and
often will sacrifice the most important and precious portions of their
creed, or make irremediable concessions in word or in deed, from mere
simplicity and want of apprehension.'

We have heard of grown-up Baptists asked to become, and actually
becoming, godfathers and godmothers to Episcopalian babies! What
terrible confusion is here! A point is thought to be of sufficient
importance to justify separation on account of it from the whole
Christian Church, and yet not to be of importance enough to debar the
separatist from taking part in a ceremony whose sole significance is
that it gives the lie direct to the point of separation.

But we all of us--Churchmen and Dissenters alike--select our opinions
far too much in the same fashion as ladies are reported, I dare say
quite falsely, to do their afternoon's shopping--this thing because
it is so pretty, and that thing because it is so cheap. We pick and
choose, take and leave, approbate and reprobate in a breath. A
familiar anecdote is never out of place: An English captain, anxious
to conciliate a savage king, sent him on shore, for his own royal
wear, an entire dress suit. His majesty was graciously pleased to
accept the gift, and as it never occurred to the royal mind that he
could, by any possibility, wear all the things himself, with kingly
generosity he distributed what he did not want amongst his Court. This
done, he sent for the donor to thank him in person. As the captain
walked up the beach, his majesty advanced to meet him, looking every