time, and some who, by attachment to
the Arian and Socinian system, are in a progress to infidelity, cry it
down as a human device or piece of craft. This need not, however,
occasion any great surprise: the spirit of the world savoreth not the
things that be of God, and the enemies of the truth naturally wish to
have full scope to propagate their delusions. But it is matter of regret
that the preaching of the gospel is, by many who attend upon it, too
little regarded as an ordinance of Christ. And some of the professed
friends of gospel doctrine so far mistake the nature and institution of
preaching, as to engage in it without any other call than their own
abundant zeal, and even to plead that all should do so who find
themselves qualified. To show that such a sentiment and practice have no
warrant from the word of God, the following observations are offered.

I. The preaching of the gospel is an ordinance that Christ hath
appointed for the gathering and edification of his Church; and, being a
matter of positive institution, all that belongs to the administration
of it can be learned only from the rules and approved examples recorded
in the New Testament. It is not like those duties that are incumbent
upon all, according to the opportunities they have in providence for the
performance of them, and which, without any express commandment, could
be urged upon Christians by the common principles of moral obligation,
such as to teach and admonish one another. And because the obligation to
such moral duties depends not upon positive institution, it must equally
extend to all, and no person whatever can be free from it. But it is
otherwise as to the preaching of the gospel, which is a positive
institution of Christ; for it is a duty enjoined upon some only; yea,
some are even absolutely prohibited from intermeddling in it, 1 Cor.
xiv. 34; 1 Tim. ii. 12: and this could not be the case if it were a
matter of common moral obligation. All arguments therefore taken from
general principles, to prove the obligation that Christians are under to
exert themselves for promoting the cause of religion, are to no purpose
here, as they do not prove that the preaching of the gospel is one of
those means that all are warranted to use.

II. There is an instituted ministry of the ordinances of Christ unto his
Church, by such ministers and office-bearers as he hath appointed. And
the preaching of the gospel is frequently referred to as a princip