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 A SE/RMON 
 
 Preached in St. Paul's CHutcH, on Sunday 
 Mominq, August 20. 
 
 BY 
 
 D. FITZGERALD, A.B., T.C.D. 
 
 TTSJBLOaSED BY BEaiTEST. 
 
 CHARLOTTETOWN : 
 "patriot*' book and job printing rooms. 
 
 jPvU^MUmfpeinee' 
 
 •:,£■■ ;i£i*i2£di 
 
^»f^ 
 
 P^V- \] 
 
 
 
 anl 
 
'•i , '■:> •' : . -'f^- 
 
 l"< 
 
 THE OLD PATHS. 
 
 " Thus saith the Lord, stand ije in the waijs, 
 and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the 
 good way, and walk therein, and "ye shall find 
 rest for your sonls."--.Ter. vi: 16. 
 
 ->OCK- 
 
 The foundation of that religion, brethren, which 
 we profess, and which our church, in its Protestant 
 and Reformed character, has taught for centuries, 
 in all simplicity and godly sincerity, is Jesus 
 Christ, who is also the way of life. He is the 
 Head of the Church, and its chief corner-stone, 
 its Foundation and its Rock. What he did, and 
 taught, is our guide. His precepts and teaching 
 we have on the testimony of those who recorded 
 his acts, and were eye-witnesses of his miracles. 
 When these men were removed from their labors 
 they left us in writing what they had heard or 
 learned at the lips of their divine master, which 
 writing is a sufficient guide to direct our steps in 
 the way we ought to walk. Now, these men, in 
 their writings, which were penned under the 
 inspiration of the Spirit of God, and given to the 
 church as a complete revelation of the mind and 
 will of God, never acknowledged any other object 
 of adoration than God, never admitted any other 
 mediator than Christ, never spoke of any other 
 expiatory sacrifice for sin than that of his death 
 on the cross, and never preached any other mode 
 of justification than through faith in Him who 
 was the Lamb of God — the Redeemer of the 
 World In their writings we read of no altars at 
 
2 THE OLD PATHS. 
 
 the Supper of the Lord ; no confessions to a Priest 
 to obtain the pardon of sin ; no images in places 
 of religious worship ; no universal bishop, who 
 was to bear sway in the church and over the 
 world ; no queen of heaven ; no invocation of 
 saints ; no purgatorial sufferings, nor of any pom- 
 pous ceremonies or gorgeous rituals being prac- 
 tised or exhibited in the primitive church, whose 
 greatest ornaments were simplicity of doctrine, and 
 sanctity of life. It is true we read in these writings 
 of errors and corruptions that were to arise in the 
 church, and be a source of sorrow to its members. 
 These have existed from the days of the Apostles, 
 
 ! and crept into the teaching and practice of the 
 church ; but the Apostles told us we were to ex- 
 
 ; pect them ; tliey have warned us of them, and 
 guarded us against them. The ministers of Christ 
 in those days repeatedly exhorted their brethren 
 to take heed to themselves with regard to deceit- 
 ful teacOiers, who were striving to draw away 
 
 ' their souls from the truth and freedom of the 
 gospel, and the simplicity of Christ. They ceased 
 not, knowing the evils that would arise, to urge 
 the members of their respective churches " to 
 prove ?11 things, and hold fast that which was 
 good ; " to " contend earnestly for the faith once 
 delivered to the saints," and " not to be moved 
 away from the hope of the gospel." And if 
 it was the duty of Christians, in the days of 
 the Apostles, to be on their guard against the 
 introduction of unscriptural doctrines and erro- 
 neous practices into the church, contrary to the 
 teaching of Chi'ist and his disciples ; it is no 
 less our duty to guard against the introduction of 
 error, to resist the encroachment of practices con- 
 trary to the teaching of the church and the word 
 of God, and not to allow ourselves, through love 
 f\i ntwaUxr indiffprpripp to or iffnorance of the 
 
.'■IH'rAT 
 
 of 
 
 the 
 
 urge 
 "to 
 
 THE OLD PATHS. 3 
 
 case with many in our day, to be carried away, 
 by the subtle teaching of men, from the "truth as it 
 is in Jesus," to the detriment of our souls and the 
 ruin of the church, inov/ 'uii ituiirKi r.n ;-r;i}»i:'ii. 
 
 It can be shewn, from the records of Ecclesias- 
 tical history, that almost every one of the corrup- 
 tions which have prevailed in the Christian Church, 
 and which the Apostles warned their hearers 
 against, have more or less been opposed at their 
 first introduction, and that this opposition had 
 been, for centuries, ineffectual in preventing the 
 greater part of the christian world from becoming 
 degenerate and corrupt. It can be shewn that, 
 for fully seven hundred years, the greater part of 
 Saxon England was indebted to the exertions of 
 the British clergy for its conversion to Christianity, 
 and not to Augustine and his followers ; so that 
 England was not under obligation to Rome, either 
 originalk/ or chiefly^ for the light of the gospel, 
 which for that period of time she received and 
 enjoyed. True it is, that from that date, down to 
 the time of the Reformation, error after error, 
 both in doctrine and practice, found its way into 
 the British church, through the teaching of Rom- 
 ish ecclesiastics, contrarv to the doctrine of Christ 
 and his Apostles, and the practice of the primitive 
 church. The venerable Bede, who flourished at 
 the close of the seventh century, and who may be 
 regarded as the connecting-link between primitive 
 Christianity and the corruptions of the Romish 
 church in Britain, speaks ])lainly of the abuses 
 which were existing in iiis day, the irreligion and 
 immorality practised in monasteries, the ungodly 
 lives of some of the Bisho[)s, and the general evils 
 that were fast spreadirjg throughout the land. 
 
 It might be interesting to vshew, did time per- 
 mit, the rise and pi'ogress of the corruptions of 
 Christianity which^ for a period of one thousand 
 
TJHK OL.U JfATHS. 
 
 
 destroyed the peace and happiness of the kingdom, 
 till at length, it became necessary, lest the very 
 semblance of Christianity should have disappeared, 
 to banish from the church such doctrines and 
 practices as neither the word of God, nor the early 
 christians sanctioned, and to restore things as they 
 were at tho beginning ; for it must ever be borne 
 in mind that the work entrusted to our Refonners 
 and Martyrs, at the time of the Reformation, was 
 not to destroy, but to bring to light those truths 
 which had been so long hidden and buried under 
 the accmnuhited rubbish of human tradition. 
 The principle on which oiu' pious ancestors sepa- 
 rated from the Romish church was not that they 
 had discovered new views of Scripture doctrine, 
 as some erroneous teachers in our day claim to 
 have arrived at, but that they desired to return 
 to the primiti\ (' confession, and to maintain and 
 inculcate th(^ \iews held by the A[)ostles, as set 
 f^'th in their own Avritings, which writings Avere 
 handed down as a sacred deposit to the church, to 
 be used for its benefit, under the guidance and 
 direction of the Spirit of God. The great object 
 of our Reformers was, as Bishop Jewel observed, 
 '' to approach as much as they possibly could to 
 the Church of the Apostles and ancient Catholic 
 Bishops and Fathers ; " and, as another testified, 
 
 > ■' to depart no further from the Church of Rome 
 than she had departed from the primitive church." 
 
 ''^And so anxious and careful were they that preach- 
 ers should not put forward their particular fancies, ^ 
 and thus fall into the other extreme, that the 
 Upper House of Convocation, in the year 1571, 
 directed that they " should in the first place be 
 careful not to teach anything in their sermons, to 
 be religiously held and believed by the people, 
 except that which is agreeable to the doctrine of 
 the Old and New Testaments, and which has been 
 deduced from the same by the Catholic Fathers 
 
 
^dom, 
 every 
 eared, 
 3 and 
 ! early 
 9 they 
 borne 
 •nners 
 1, was 
 truths 
 under 
 lition. 
 
 sepa- 
 : they 
 strine, 
 dm to 
 return 
 n and 
 us set 
 s were 
 ['ch, to 
 ce and 
 object 
 ;erved, 
 uld to 
 itholic 
 stifled, 
 
 Rome 
 lurch." 
 )reach- 
 ancies, 
 at the 
 
 1571, 
 ice be 
 ons, to 
 jeople, 
 rine of 
 ,s been 
 fathers 
 
 THE OLD PATHS. 
 
 '\ 
 
 dill')*; >\ 
 
 1 1 , 
 
 I ; ' > \ ;•• 
 
 I ; 1 1: 
 
 , • > i f ' 
 
 ! !/l ) 
 
 and ancient Bishops." And on the re-establish- 
 ment of the Protestant religion in England, on the 
 accession of Queen Elizabeth, the first Act of her 
 reign, was to declare that no person having author- 
 ity under the Crown " to reform or correct errors, 
 heresies, abuses, or enormities, by virtue of that 
 Act, should in any wise have authority or power 
 to order, determine, or adjudge to be heresy, but 
 only such as had been determined, ordered, or 
 adjudged to be heresy by the authority of the 
 Canonical Scriptures, or by the First Four Gen- 
 eral Councils." It can be shewn that the peculiar 
 doctrines and practices of Rome, which distin- 
 guish her from other churches, and which our 
 Reformed Church of England got rid of at the 
 Reformation, are all more or less of heathen origin, 
 or have been adopted in imitation of heathen cus- 
 toms, rites, or ceremonies : such as Purgatory ; 
 the Pope's Supremacy ; the Celibacy of the Clergy ; 
 the different orders of Friars, Monks and Nuns ; 
 Confessions to a Priest, and enjoined penances to 
 obtain absolution ; Abstinence from certain meats, 
 and other religious and penitential austerities ; 
 the sar:nfice of the Mass, with its pompous ritual 
 and gorgeous ceremonial ; the use of holy water ; 
 offering of incense ; blessing of candles ; the 
 carrying of lighted tapers ; lighting candles in the 
 day time ; worship of images ; invocation of 
 saints ; prayers for the dead ; festivals in honor 
 of saints ; procession of Priests and boys clothed 
 in white, with crosses and banners ; proclamation 
 of Jubilees, and granting of indulgences ; erection 
 of altars, and of magnificent temples, and the form 
 of their construction ; bowing to the east ; adora- 
 tion of relics ; placing of statues or images on the 
 altar ; mixing water with the wine ; use of beads 
 and rosaries ; wearing of crosses and charms ; 
 pilgrimages to holv places ; extreme unction, etc. 
 
b THE OLD PATHS. 
 
 eral errors and departures from ])rimitive teaching 
 and practice were introduced into the Church, 
 and made articles of faith ; for they were nearly 
 all brought in within the sj)ace of one thousand 
 years, i.e.^ from t\m time when Gregory the Roman 
 r on tiff advised Augustine, whom he sent into 
 England, " to accommodate the ceremonies of the 
 Christian worship, as much as possible, to those 
 of the heathen, that the people might not be much 
 startled at the change ; " down to the time when 
 the supremacy of the Pope was rejected by the 
 people of England, and the Reformers of our 
 national faith banished Romish novelties from the 
 worship of God. 
 
 It was not what Rome admitted, in common with 
 us, that the Reformers rejected, but the additions 
 which she made, contrary to the word of God, 
 and the custom of the primitive church ; for in- 
 stance, Rome admits, with us, the authority of the 
 First Four General Councils ; but she adas other 
 Councils, which the Christian church does not 
 recognize, because they are not General, and their 
 decrees are contrary to the Word of God. She 
 admits the Bible to be the Word of God ; but she 
 adds, as of equal authority with that word, the 
 Aprocryphal b(^oks, and human tradition. She 
 admits that God is to be adored with a supreme 
 worship ; but she adds, on the authority of tra- 
 dition, that religious worship must be paid to the 
 Virgin Mar}^, and the saints. She admits Christ 
 as a Mediato]' between God and Man ; but she 
 adds other mediators, and authorizes prayer to be 
 made to them for the efficacy of their intercession. 
 She admits the atonement of Christ, offered on 
 the cross ; but she adds the sacrifice of the mass, 
 offered on the altar by the Priest ; every time, 
 he, by the saying of a few words, changes the 
 substance of a piece of bread into the very body, 
 aouL and divinity of the Saviour. She admits the 
 
t 
 
 aching 
 
 hurcli, 
 
 nearly 
 
 Jiisand 
 
 Ionian 
 
 into 
 
 of the 
 
 those 
 
 much 
 
 when 
 
 by the 
 
 )f our 
 
 )ni the 
 
 n with 
 Iditiom 
 f God, 
 for in- 
 of the 
 other 
 QS not 
 i their 
 i;i She 
 >ut she 
 d, the 
 »•!> She 
 iprenie 
 )f tra- 
 to the 
 Christ 
 ut she 
 L' to be 
 ession. 
 red on 
 mass, 
 time, 
 es the 
 body, 
 its the 
 
 real humanity of the Lord Jesus Christ ; but she 
 adds the immacuhite conception of tlie Virgin 
 Mary. She admits that God forgives sins ; but 
 she adds that he lias given authority to his church, 
 i.e. the Priests, to hear the confession of the sinner, 
 and to give absolution to the penitent. She 
 admits that God is the bestower of grace and 
 mercy ; but she adds that he has left in his church 
 a " Spiritual Treasury," containing the accumu- 
 lated merits of departed saints, to be dispensed 
 at her will and pleasure. She admits that the 
 merits and sufferings of Christ are infinite ; but 
 she adds that it is necessary for the sinner also to 
 suffer, and make satisfaction for his sins ; that 
 man ma}' not only be saved by his good works, 
 but do more than enough, so that the surplus of 
 his good deeds may be handed over, and applied 
 to the benefit of those who have not performed 
 the required quantity. She admits the existence 
 of Heaven and Hell, and the doctrines of future 
 rewards and punishments ; but she adds the exis- 
 tence of a third place, which she calls Purgatory, 
 where sins unforgiven here may be atoned for 
 there. She admits that Christ instituted two Sac- 
 ramento ; but she adds five more of her own, and 
 declares that their validity, or the benefit to be 
 derived from their use, depends upon the intention 
 of the officiating Priest, so that no one can ever 
 know whether he has received a Sa'. anient or not, 
 or derived any benefit from its use. She admits 
 that God can pardon, as well as inflict punishment 
 for sin committed against him ; l^iit she adds vhat 
 he has given to her alone the power of remitting 
 in this life the punishment deserved, and of deliv- 
 ering souls out of purgatory, i.e of shortening the 
 period of their punishment hereafter. Now it is 
 these several additions which our church has dis- 
 carded, for they are human inventions, having no 
 authority from ih^ Word of God. These are not 
 
$i . THE OLD PATHS. 
 
 I 
 
 the " old paths," but novelties fondly invented of 
 men, for their own gains, self-exaltation, and the 
 extension of their power. These are innovations in 
 doctrine and practice, which ungodly and irre- 
 ligious men brought into the church ; but which 
 our Reformers, out of love to God, and the souls 
 of their fellow-creatures, succeeded in removing, 
 though at the loss of their own lives — for it was 
 for denying the supremacy of the Pope, and the 
 doctrines of purgatory, auricular confession, tran- 
 substantiation, and such like, that they were burnt 
 at the stake. r - , 
 
 Some of the chief errors that crept into the 
 church, such as the sacerdotal character of the 
 Priesthood, the sacrificial character of the Lord*s 
 Supper, and the erection of Jewish or Pagan Altars, 
 were manifestly a departure from the " old paths," 
 and did more than any thing else to unchristian- 
 ize it, and do away with its New Testament 
 character. It is a matter of history that the in- 
 troduction of sacerdotal priests, altars, and sacri- 
 fices may be traced to Juda'sm and Paganism : — 
 " The Jewish Prieats were appointed by God for 
 the express purpose of offering sacrijice, in the | 
 name and on the behalf of the people ; they alone I 
 were allowed to make oblation and burn incense I 
 before the Lord ; and it was through them that ] 
 the people were to approach Him, that their ser- \ 
 vice might be acceptable. A very great portion 
 of the Jewish religion consisted in the perform- 
 ance of certain ceremonial rites, most of which 
 could only be performed by the Priests, or through 
 their mediation and assistance ; they were to make 
 intercession and aioneinent for offenders ; they, in 
 short, were the mediators between God and Man. 
 And among the Pagans, whose institutions appear 
 to have been, in great measure, corrupt imitations 
 of those of the Patriarchal religion, we find, in 
 
"Vi.-^CH 
 
 '!'»![ I 
 
 THE OLD PATHS. 
 
 •M';,;)*--'.!';!; 
 
 1- ; 1 1 1 i 
 
 ated of 
 nd the 
 -ions in 
 d irre- 
 
 which 
 e souls 
 loving, 
 
 it was 
 nd the 
 tran- 
 5 burnt 
 
 nto the 
 of the 
 
 Lord*s 
 Altars, 
 paths," 
 ristian- 
 tament 
 the in- 
 i sacri- 
 ism : — 
 jod for 
 in the 
 Y alone 
 incense 
 m that 
 eir ser- 
 portion 
 srform- 
 
 which 
 hrough 
 omake 
 ley, in 
 1 Man. 
 appear 
 tations 
 [ind, in 
 
 not exclusively, the offerers of sacrifices, in behalf 
 of the state, and of individuals ; they were inter- 
 cessors, making supplication and atonement for 
 others, and acting as mediators between Man and 
 the object of his worship." Now, on the contrary, 
 in the christian church, Christ being the only 
 High Priest of his people, their mediator and in- 
 tercessor before the throne, and having, in his own 
 body, on the tree, made an atonement for their 
 sins, he did not appoint his ministering servants 
 as Priests, to offer sacrifices, and to intercede in 
 their behalf, for this he himself does ; but he ap- 
 pointed them to preach the gospel, to instruct, 
 exhort, admonish, and spiritually govern the flock 
 over whom he placed them. It is not through the 
 mediation of an earthly priest that we are admit- 
 ted to offer our supplication before 'God, but 
 through that of an heavenly one — even Jesus, 
 the Son of God, our great High Priest, who has 
 passed into the heavens. '^ Having, therefore," 
 says the apostle, " boldness to enter into the 
 holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living 
 way, which he hath consecrated for us, and having 
 an High Priest over the house of God ; let us draw 
 near with a true heart, in full assurance of faith, 
 having our hearts sprinkled from an evil con- 
 science, and our bodies washed with pure water." 
 The essential character of the Jewish priests was 
 their offering sacrifices, and making atonement 
 and intercession for the people ; whereas the special 
 office of the christian minister, the minister of the 
 new and better covenant, the minister of that 
 church of which Christ Jesus is the alone High 
 Priest, mediator, and atoning sacrifice for sin, is 
 to impart religious instruction, and administer 
 rites which, in their very nature, are totally dif- 
 ferent from that of sacrifice. It is the office of the 
 christian minister to bring sinners, not to himself, 
 
not to hini, but to Christ ; and to persuade them 
 to look, not to him, but to Christ alone as their 
 mediator and advocate. This precludes the idea 
 of the minister regarding himself as a mediator 
 between the sinner and his Saviour, and gives him 
 no authority for imagining that he has power to 
 hear confessions and to grant absolutions. ; r. 
 
 The contrast in this point between the Christian 
 religion and all others, i.e. with regard to the 
 character of those who are its appointed teachers 
 and servants, is one of the most powerful eviden- 
 ces of its divine origin; for if the Christian religion 
 were like other systems of religion, either Jewish 
 or Pagan, it would have its sacrificing priests, who 
 would act as intercessors and mediators for the 
 people ; but the founder of the Christian religion 
 being himself the Sacrificing Priest, and the only 
 Mediator between God and the sinner, did not 
 give to others those powers and privileges which 
 exclusively belonged to himself; therefore, when 
 he established his religion on the earth, which was 
 to supersede all other forms of religion that went 
 before, he caused no altar to be erected whereon 
 his ministers were to offer sacrifices, for he was 
 himself the altar ; he appointed no priest to act 
 as mediator, or to make an atonement for the 
 people, for he was himself the Priest, the Mediator 
 and the Atoning sacrifice ; and he gave no direc- 
 tions for sacrifices to be continued after his decease, 
 for he offered up his own body on the cross, " once 
 for all," for the sins of men, no more to be repeated. 
 
 Before the Reformation the Priest professed, 
 like the » Jewish, to offer sacrifice, the unbloody 
 sacrifice of the mass, i.e. the body and blood of 
 Christ presented on the altar, to propitiate God 
 towards himself and his congregation ; the efiicac}' 
 of that sacrifice was made to depend on the inten- 
 tion of the priest, not on the sincerity or faith of 
 the communicant ; he, assuming the character of 
 
them 
 their 
 
 idea 
 liator 
 
 him 
 er to 
 
 THE OLD PATHS. 
 
 
 . 
 
 a mediator, prayed not ivith but for the people, in 
 a tongue unknown to them, and in an inaudible 
 voice. The Priest undertook to reconcile trans- 
 ji^ressons to God, by prescribing penances, to be 
 performed by them, in order to their obtaining Im 
 absolution ; and pretended to transfer to their 
 account the merits of the saints ; but, at the 
 Reformation, this most deadly error was removed, 
 the Saviour was assigned his own proper place, 
 and his ministering servants theirs ; Christ, the 
 alone Mediator between God and Man, and the 
 Great High Priest of his people ; and his ministers 
 the preachers of his word, and the administers of • 
 his sacraments. The late Archbishop of Dublin, 
 from whose clear and logical writings I have taken 
 some of these remarks, has well observed : " that 
 those corruptions of Christianity, which arise from 
 the mixing up of Judaisiii with it, are, for one 
 reason, likely to be more lasting than most others, 
 and to be oftener revived." '' Christians," says he, 
 " acknowledge that the Mosaic Dispensation came 
 from God. And that, and also the Christian Dis- 
 pensation, are contained in the \^olume which we 
 call the Bible. Now, any one who regards the 
 Bible as one book, containing divine instructions, 
 without having formed very clear notions of what 
 does and does not belong to each Dispensation, 
 will of course fall into the greatest confusion of 
 thought. He will be like a man who should 
 have received from his father, at various times, a 
 great number of letters, containing directions as 
 to his conduct, from the time when he was a little 
 child just able to read, till he was a grown man ; 
 and who should lay by these letters with care and 
 reverence, but in a confused heap, and should take 
 up any one of them at random, and read it with- 
 out reference to its date^ whenever he needed his 
 father's instructions how^ to act. Accordingly, 
 maijy crrjiicjus notions, wholly or partly drawn 
 
1 1 
 
 r^ 
 
 12 THE OLD PATHS. 
 
 from Judaism, have again and again founcj their 
 way into the Christian Church." The introduc- 
 tion of sacerdotal priests, altars, and sacrifices, he 
 mentions as some of those corruptions which are 
 likely, from time to time, to be received and re- 
 vived, owing to this method of taking instructions 
 from the Scriptures. Is there not, I would ask, 
 an effort being made in our day receive these 
 very doctvines again into the church ? Is there 
 not a party within her sacred battlements, who 
 are striving to bring back again those corruptions 
 • of Christianity, those Jewish and Pagan doctrines, 
 which have been repudiated by our Reformers, 
 and the compilers of our articles, as things un- 
 known in the christian church in the days of the 
 Apostles ? Is not the sacerdotal character of the 
 Priesthood, and the sacrificial character of the Sac- 
 rament of the Lord's Supper, openly taught in 
 some of our places of worship, and by men calling 
 themselves ministers of the Church of England ? 
 Are not the doctrines of confession to a Priest, and 
 the necessity of receiving absolution from him, in 
 order to be forgiven of God, openly declared? 
 Are not prayers for the dead, and the invocation 
 of saints, and the sacrifice of Christ's body on the 
 altar, offered up for the benefit of absent wor- 
 shippers, publicly asserted, and made topics of cor- 
 respondence in the newspapers ? Are not books 
 and tracts circulated among the young, and re- 
 ceived into our houses, which teach these very 
 doctrines, and advocate practices which have 
 caused the Bishop of Montreal, the other day, to 
 withdraw his license from a clergyman in his own 
 Diocese ; and yet those who circulate these books 
 tell us that they contain the doctrines of the 
 Church of England? What, brethren, are we 
 doing to check the revival of these corruptions 
 J among ourselves, or how are we striving to stem 
 
THIS KJijU I'ATllS. 
 
 Id 
 
 i 
 
 I 
 
 young people read these books ; yea, we go with 
 them, or we allow them to go, to places where 
 these doctrines are taught, and openly advocated ; 
 and still we call ourselves members of the Re- 
 formed Church of England ; descendants of men 
 who bled and died for the upholding of those 
 truths we are either indifferent about, or are 
 ashamed to maintain. This is not conduct worthy 
 of a disciple of that Master who taught his follow- 
 ers a pure gospel, and gave them a simple ritual. 
 This is not treading in the '' old paths," or walk- 
 ing in the good old ways of a pure branch of the 
 Church of Christ. This is not keeping intact the 
 truth committed to our trust. This is not con- 
 tending earnestly for the faith once delivered to 
 the saints. This is not helping to hand down to 
 others the sound doctrines we received from our 
 martyred sires. This is not acting up either to the 
 letter or the spirit of the teaching of our Church, 
 nor following the example of her most worthy sons. 
 mJhe truths, brethren, for which the Reformers 
 contended had their hearty support, and they 
 equally demand ours. The principles they died 
 to maintain in all their integrity, and to hand . 
 down unimpaired to their posterity, are no less, 
 important to-day than they were then. Truth is 
 not local or temporary. Christian principles em- 
 brace all time, and can never become obsolete. 
 Th(i way in which we ought to walk and please 
 God Is the same as that marked out for the guid- 
 ance of the early christians. The paths that we 
 must tread, in order to secure the safety and hap- 
 piness of our souls, are the same that our fore- 
 fathers trod in. The entire sufficiency of Scrip- 
 ture, as the alone rule of faith and practice which 
 they affirmed, we must affirm. The right of pri- 
 vate judgment, unshackled by deference to Fathers, 
 or Councils, or Synods, or Popes, which they 
 asserted, we must assert. Justification by Faith,^ 
 
i!i 
 
 14 THE OLD PATHS. 
 
 )j :r;.v/ «)■:» fW .H-i> . >;/l<M.K! 'i<;.:!jj !>>iJ.r»: ':Ai:^(rj(\ '^tH\<^/ 
 
 as " the article of a standing or a falling church,'* 
 which they held, we must hold. The folly and 
 impiety of the worship of saints, which they main- 
 tained, we must maintain. The vanity of any 
 confidence placed in other mediators, save the 
 man Christ Jesus, which they declared, we must 
 declare ; and the invalidity of confession to any \ 
 priest, save our Great High Priest, Jesus, the Son 
 of God, who has passed into the heavens, which 
 they proclaimed, we must proclaim, would we be 
 their faithful descendants, and worthy members of 
 that church which they restored to its primitive 
 purity, or walk in those " old paths " which they 
 walked in, and secured to their souls peace on 
 earth, and an entrance into the mansions of the 
 just. Oh, brethren, our souls must be sustained, 
 both in duty and in trial, by the truths and pro- 
 mises of that word which sustained the hearts of 
 our brethren in former ages, not by the rubbish 
 of human inventions, the novelties of Romanism, 
 or the corruptions of Christianity. Like those who 
 have gone before us, and have entered into their 
 rest, we must live "by the faith of the Son of God, 
 who loved us and gave himself for us." Would we 
 obtain the forgiveness of our sins, it must be ac- 
 cording to the good old way of confessing them to 
 Him who died to redeem us, and whose blood 
 alone cleanseth from all sin ; not by confessing 
 them to a poor sinful mortal like ourselves, who 
 will find it quite enough to do to obtain forgive- 
 ness for himself, without pretending that he can 
 grant it unto others. There are few doctrines 
 more ruinous to the peace and prosperity of the 
 church ; more opposed to the teaching of Christ 
 and his Apostles, and the practice of the primitive 
 church ; more detrimental to purity of heart, and 
 spirituality of life, and more derogatory to the 
 honor and dignity of the Saviour than that which 
 
 .1! 
 
 ■i 
 
J^TITJ 
 
 THE OLD PATHS. 
 
 urch;^ 
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 main- 
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 ;^e the 
 
 must 
 any 
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 we be 
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 thev 
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 their 
 ►f God, 
 iild we 
 be ac- 
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 ctrines 
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 [mitive 
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 to the 
 which 
 
 ,, , ^^ 15 
 
 '* • 
 
 1 r . . , 
 
 order to obtain forgiveness of sins committed 
 against God. Is it not enough to come to Him, 
 " who forgiveth all iniquity," and obtain what 
 he alone can give, without the intercession of an- 
 other ? Is not the Saviour sufficient, and properly 
 qualified for his work, and able to " save, even 
 unto the uttemiost, all that come unto God by 
 him," without our going to a mortal man to help 
 us ? He says : "Come unto me and I will give 
 you rest " ; not go to a priest and confess your 
 sins to him. Independent of the direct teaching 
 of Scripture against such a practice, what is the 
 use of going to a priest ? He cannot forgive a 
 sinner, unless he repents ; and if he does repent, 
 God forgives him ; of what use, then, is the priest's 
 forgiveness ? If confession to a priest is intended to 
 supersede confession to God, it is indeed a gi^eat evil; 
 and if it is not so intended, it is perfectly useless ; 
 for our being forgiven depends on the nature of 
 our confession to God, as penitent or otherwise. 
 Those are hard driven for authority in support 
 of this doctrine who ])nng forward that passage 
 in St. James, where he tells his brethren to confess 
 their faults one to another ; for this passage, while 
 it encourages a mutual acknowleds^ment of faults, 
 one to another, and places all parties on a level, 
 it by no means sanctions confession of sin to a 
 priest, in order to obtain his absolution. The only 
 instance in Scripture, where confession of sin to a 
 Priest is spoken of, makes rather against than for 
 this practice, for the unfortunate man who made 
 it derived no benefit whatever from his confes- 
 sion. Yea, rather remorse, for on the acknow- 
 ledgment of his guilt, and receiving no consolation 
 from his ghostly advisers, he went and hanged 
 himself The '' old paths," brethren, are still the 
 safest to walk in, notwithstanding the variety, and 
 the attractiveness, that is to be found in the new 
 
ID THE OLU I'ATHH. 
 
 •il 
 
 which some love to walk. The good old way is 
 the way of Scriptural truth, which was preached 
 .by the Apostle Paul, when he declared to both 
 Jew and Gentile the necessity of " repentance to- 
 toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus 
 Christ ; " and that which the Saviour marked out 
 to his followers, when he said : "I am the way, 
 and the truth, and the life ; no man cometh unto 
 the Father but by me." It is the way of faith in 
 the Lord Jesus Christ, and love which is the fruit 
 and effect of faith ; faith in Jesus, in his three- 
 fold office of Prophet, Priest, and King. 
 
 This way is as old as the Reformation ; as old 
 as Christianity, and the teaching of the Apostles ; 
 as old as the Mosaic dispensation ; as old as the 
 days of Abraham ; as old as the times of Noah and 
 of Enoch; as old as the everlasting hills, when 
 Adam, being made upright, went forth in inno- 
 cence, with a heart full of faith and love toward 
 God. This way is a good way, for it leads to 
 One who is good — that is God, — and it secures 
 good to our souls, even rest and peace and quiet- 
 ness for ever ; rest from the anguish of guilt, and 
 the terrors of an accusing conscience ; rest from 
 the bondage of sin, and the oppression of the 
 enemy ; rest from inward fear, and outward dis- 
 quietude; rest from temptation, and suffering 
 and danger ; rest from the eternal consequences 
 of sin ; and rest with God for ever. 
 
 May our feet ever be found in the " old paths," 
 eschewing, on the one hand all that is evil and 
 contrary to the word of God ; and following, on 
 the other hand, all that is good^and "agreeable 
 to the same " ; so that, when we come to the close 
 of life, we may enter into that " rest which remain- 
 eth for the people of God." 
 
 And to Him, through whom alone the rest is oh- 
 tainedj toith the Father cmd the Holy Ghost, be all 
 
 JJ ♦jI^.j J A -. 
 
^v.