and the warnings directed against
disorder, insubordination, changeableness, discord, and division;
considering the emphatic words of the Apostle, laid down by him as a
general principle, and illustrated in detail, "Let every man abide in
the same calling wherein he was called"; considering, in a word, that
change is really the characteristic of error, and unalterableness the
attribute of truth, of holiness, of Almighty God Him self, we consider
that when Private Judgment moves in the direction of innovation, it may
well be regarded at first with suspicion and treated with severity. Nay,
we confess even a satisfaction, when a penalty is attached to the
expression of new doctrines, or to a change of communion. We repeat it,
if any men have strong feelings, they should pay for them; if they think
it a duty to unsettle things established, they show their earnestness by
being willing to suffer. We shall be the last to complain of this kind
of persecution, even though directed against what we consider the cause
of truth. Such disadvantages do no harm to that cause in the event, but
they bring home to a man's mind his own responsibility; they are a
memento to him of a great moral law, and warn him that his private
judgment, if not a duty, is a sin.

An act of private judgment is, in its very idea, an act of individual
responsibility; this is a consideration which will come with especial
force on a conscientious mind, when it is to have so fearful an issue as
a change of religion. A religious man will say to himself, "If I am in
error at present, I am in error by a disposition of Providence, which
has placed me where I am; if I change into an error, this is my own
act. It is much less fearful to be born at disadvantage, than to place
myself at disadvantage."

And if the voice of men in general is to weigh at all in a matter of
this kind, it does but corroborate these instinctive feelings. A convert
is undeniably in favor with no party; he is looked at with distrust,
contempt, and aversion by all. His former friends think him a good
riddance, and his new friends are cold and strange; and as to the
impartial public, their very first impulse is to impute the change to
some eccentricity of character, or fickleness of mind, or tender
attachment, or private interest. Their utmost praise is the reluctant
confession that "doubtless he is very sincere." Churchmen and
Dissenters, men of Rome and men of the Kirk, are equally subject to