Christians hate
one another!'

While for the young, oh, my friends, what a scandal, again, to them!
If you had seen (as I have) pious parents destroying in their own
childrens' minds all faith, all reverence for holy things, by mixing
themselves up in religious controversies, and indulging by their own
firesides in fierce denunciations of men no worse than themselves;--
if you will watch (as you may) young people taking refuge, some in
utter frivolity, saying, 'What am I to believe? When religionists
have settled what religion is, it will be time enough for me to
think of it: meanwhile, let me eat and drink, for to-morrow I
die;'--and others, the children of strong Protestant parents, taking
refuge in the apostate Church of Rome, and saying, 'If Englishmen do
not know what to believe, Rome does; if I cannot find certainty in
Protestantism, I can in Popery;'--if you will consider honestly and
earnestly these sad tragedies, you will look on it as a sacred duty
to the children whom God has given you, to keep aloof as much as
possible from all those points on which Christians differ, and make
your children feel from their earliest years that there are points,
and those the great, vital root points, on which all more or less
agree, which many members of the Romish Church have held, and, I
doubt not, now hold, as firmly as Protestants,--adoption by one
common Father, justification by the blood of one common Saviour,
sanctification by one common Holy Spirit.

And believe me, my friends, that just in proportion as you delight
in, and live by, these great doctrines, all controversies will
become less and less important in your eyes. The more you value the
living body of Christianity, the less you will think of its
temporary garments; the more you feel the power of God's Spirit, the
less scrupulous will you be about the peculiar form in which He may
manifest Himself. Personal trust in Christ Jesus, personal love to
Christ Jesus, personal belief that He and He only, is governing this
poor diseased and confused world; that He is really fighting against
all evil in it; that He really rules all nations, and fashions the
hearts of all of them, and understands all their works, and has
appointed them their times and the bounds of their habitation, if
haply they may feel after Him and find Him: personal and living
belief that the just and loving Lord Christ reigneth, be the peoples
never so unquiet;--this, this will keep your mi