has been a Shylock, cutting
his pound of flesh from the gilded youth of Corinth.

Yet there has been a great change. Another story besides the tale of
sin is written on these countenances. "But ye are washed, but ye are
sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by
the Spirit of our God." Listen, they are singing; it is the fortieth
Psalm: "He took me from the fearful pit and from the miry clay." What
pathos they throw into the words, what joy overspreads their faces!
They know themselves to be monuments of free grace and dying love.

134. The Services.--But suppose them now all gathered; how does their
worship proceed? There was this difference between their services and
most of ours, that instead of one man conducting them--offering their
prayers, preaching, and giving out the psalms--all the men present were
at liberty to contribute their part. There may have been a leader or
chairman; but one member might read a portion of Scripture, another
offer prayer, a third deliver an address, a fourth raise a hymn, and so
on. Nor does there seem to have been any fixed order in which the
different parts of the service occurred; any member might rise and lead
away the company into praise or prayer or meditation, as he felt
prompted.

135. This peculiarity was due to another great difference between them
and us. The members were endowed with very extraordinary gifts. Some
of them had the power of working miracles, such as the healing of the
sick. Others possessed a strange gift called the gift of tongues. It
is not quite clear what it was; but it seems to have been a kind of
tranced utterance, in which the speaker poured out an impassioned
rhapsody by which his religious feeling received both expression and
exaltation. Some of those who possessed this gift were not able to
tell others the meaning of what they were saying, while others had this
additional power; and there were those who, though not speaking with
tongues themselves, were able to interpret what the inspired speakers
were saying. Then again, there were members who possessed the gift of
prophecy--a very valuable endowment. It was not the power of
predicting future events, but a gift of impassioned eloquence, the
effects of which were sometimes marvelous: when an unbeliever entered
the assembly and listened to the prophets, he was seized with
uncontrollable emotion, the sins of his past life rose up before him,
and, falli