TRACTS FOR THE TIMES.
ON DISSENT WITHOUT REASON IN CONSCIENCE.
"As one mass doth contain the good ore and base alloy; as one floor the corn and the chaff; as one field the wheat and the tares; as one net the choice fish and the refuse; as one fold the sheep and the goats; as one tree the living and dry branches; so doth the Visible Church enfold the true universal Church, called the Church mystical and invisible. And for this reason, and because presumptively every member of the Visible Church doth pass for a member of the invisible, (the time of distinction and separation being not yet come,) because this Visible Church, in its profession of truth, in its sacrifices of devotion, in its practice of service and duty of God, doth communicate with the invisible, therefore commonly the titles and attributes of one are imparted to the other."—Altered from Barrow on the Unity of the Church, vol. vii. p. 631.
It is often asked, "Why should not a man attend both the Church and Meeting, if he derives benefit from both?" And again, "Why should not a man be a Dissenter, though he have nothing particular to object against the Church, if he is not violent in his opposition to the Church?" The following remarks, in answer to these questions, were written by a clergyman for the use of his parishioners.
Many of you have made remarks to me on the subject of Dissent, when I have been visiting you in your cottages; and the substance of these remarks has apparently been, that it was of very little importance, whether a man belonged to the Church or dissented from it, because the difference is after all but small between Churchmen and Dissenters. You have thus spoken (as it would seem) sometimes with a view of drawing out my opinions, sometimes as a sort of defence or apology for your own, sometimes in
