rusions!--Since the
resurrection of Christ, we think we may almost defy any to produce an
instance of bloody squabbling, or like outrageous contention, in the
choice of a pastor, where none but the visible members of Christ's
mystical body, adult, and blameless in their lives, were admitted to act
in the choice. But if at any called popular elections, the power was
sinfully betrayed into the hands of such baptized persons, as in
ignorance and loose practice equalled, if not transcended, _heathen men
and publicans_; into the hand of those who, to please a superior, to
obtain a paltry bribe, or a flagon of wine, were readily determined in
their vote for a minister; let the prostitutes of Jesus' ordinance
answer for the unhappy consequences of their conduct. If they so
enormously broke through the hedge of the divine law, no wonder a
serpent bit them. But who has forgot what angry contentions, what
necessity of a military guard at ordinations, the lodging of the power
of elections in patrons or heritors, _as such_, has of late occasioned?

To deprive the Christian people of their privilege in choosing their
pastor, and give it to others upon worldly accounts, is the grossest
absurdity. It overturns the nature of Christ's spiritual kingdom,
founding a claim to her privileges on worldly character and property. It
gives those blessed lips the lie, which said, _"My kingdom is not of
this world."_ It counteracts the nature of the church, as a voluntary
society; thrusting men into a momentous relation to her, without, nay
contrary to, her consent. It settles the ministerial office upon a very
rotten foundation: for how hard is it to believe the man is a minister
of a Christian congregation, who never consented to his being such! to
believe he has a pastoral mission from Christ, for whom providence would
never open a regular door of entrance to the office; but he was obliged
to be thrust in by the window, _as a thief and a robber_! If he comes
unsent, how can I expect edification by his ministry, when God has
declared, _such shall not profit his people at all_? It implies the most
unnatural cruelty. If the law of nature allow me the choice of my
physician, my servant, my guide, my master, how absurd to deny me the
choice of a physician, a servant, a guide, to my soul; and to give it to
another, merely because he has some more money, has a certain _piece of
ground_, which I have not! How do these qualify him, or entitle him to
pro