that days or weeks of sickness precede the dying hour, so that the warning is ample; still deathbed repentances are not always sincere; there is required, renewed life and unrenovated health, that holy conduct may prove the sincerity of your discipleship. Besides, to grapple with disease, is work sufficiently arduous without having a Saviour then to seek. And, moreover, when pain and sickness are wasting your strength, how precious are the sayings of Christ, if you can bring them to remembrance, and how delightful the manifestations of his love, with whose voice you have for years been familiar, and in whose affectionate heart there is good reason to believe you have long had a place. Still further to convince you that delay in answering the question in the text, would be extreme infatuation, let me suppose a case yet stronger, and the most favorable to the delaying sinner that we can imagine. Could 1 promise you length of days, ensure the absence of all disease, and the perfect use of all your faculties, unimpaired, to the last hour of life, it would, notwithstanding this fair prospect before you, be wise to decide at once, whether or not you shall become one of Christ's disciples. Convictions now excited, may pass away and never more return. Desires put off may never recur, so as to ripen into effective resolutions. Agrippaalmost persuaded to be a Christian-never became one; because he did not cherish present convictions. Felix trembled as Paul was reasoning of temperance, righteousness, and judgment to come, and at that moment he felt very powerfully the claims of religion; but, alas! he did not at once yield to their force; and when he said, "Go thy

way for this time, when I have a more convenient season I will call for thee," his delay was fatal.Oh then! my dear readers, to the important enquiry in the text, "Will ye also be his disciples?" methinks you are now convinced that it is your duty to give a decided and an immediate answer. Let me hope, that under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, it will be affirmative also. It must be so, unless you are prepared to neglect an imperative duty-to sacrifice your eternal interests-and to brave the misery of hell itself!

A CATECHISM OF NEW TESTAMENT PRINCIPLES.

RESPECTING THE CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT OF THE CHURCHES OF CHRIST.

(Continued from December 1842. Page 282.)

44. On these principles, what can the apostle have designed under the figurative words, "gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble," in his account of the materials which might be placed on the foundation he mentions?

He certainly means individual men and women, under the twofold classification of those whom the fire of God's judgment would leave unharmed as incombustible, or consume as combustible. Cor. iii. 12.

1

45. If the pastor of the church be a faithful servant of Christ, but from ignorance, or human fallibility, admit to church communion those who

can not abide the trial of the day of judgment, what will be the consequence?

"If any man's work shall be burned up, he shall suffer loss, but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire." 1 Cor. iii. 15.

46. But what shall be the punishment of those ministers who intentionally defile the temple of God by knowingly admitting to the communion of the church those who are destitute of Christian principle?

"If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.” 1 Cor. iii. 17.

47. What are the qualifications for church fellowship?

"As

The knowledge and belief of the truth. many as received Him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name. John i. 12. "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." John viii. 32.

48. How can we be ascertained of the real Christian character of those who wish to join themselves to the company of the faithful?

"We

"Hereby do we know that we know him, if we keep his commandments." 1 John ii. 3. know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren." 1 John iii. 14. "Hereby we know that we are of the truth." 1 John iii. 19.

49. Is it altogether incongruous that persons of completely opposite views and character, be joined together in church fellowship with each other?

Yes. "What fellowship hath righteousness

with unrighteousness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God." 2 Cor. vi. 14, 15, 16. 50. Are enlightened and believing individuals under particular obligations to unite in church fellowship?

Yes. "Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also." Matt. x. 32. "With the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation." Rom. x. 20. "Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them." Eph. v. 11.

51. Are there any especial duties of the members of a Christian church, which unconverted men are incapaciated from duly performing?

Yes. There is no one act of Christian obedience which an unconverted man, as such can perform. It is essential to the right performance of one duty of believers, (that of eating and drinking in remembrance of the death of Christ,) that it be done discerning the Lord's body." 1 Cor. xi. 29. But this is an act of spiritual consciousness, and therefore far removed above the capability of unregenerate men.

HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF THE CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH AT BOCKING, ESSEX. FROM THE CONGREGATIONAL MAGAZINE.

(Continued from Page 86.

MEMOIR OF THE REV. JOSEPH PITTS. THE Rev. Joseph Pitts was the second Pastor of the church at Bocking. He was a son of the

person of that name, who, in early life, sustained a captivity of fifteen years in the north of Africa, and who, on his return, published an entertaining and well-known account of his bondage, and of the people among whom he had resided.*

The elder Mr. Pitts had been accustomed to attend a meeting-house at Exeter, and with that regard to the consolation of individuals which is a striking and amiable feature of dissenting worship, the minister was sometimes used to pray for the poor captive in the public service; it is said that Mr. Pitts entered the meeting-house on his return, while the pastor was so engaged, and thus had the singular gratification of hearing the prayers which were offered for himself as a wretched outcast, who could scarcely be expected ever to set his foot on his native shore.

His son, Mr. Joseph Pitts, the subject of this sketch, was born at Exeter, 1702. He was educated for the ministry in the Fund Board Academy, London, and under the tuition of Dr. Ridgeley and Mr. Eames. Whilst he was a student, he appears to have united with the Independent church of which the Rev. Thomas Bradbury was pastor. In the year 1729, Mr. Pitts accepted an invitation to the pastoral office. Here he became known as a zealous adherent to the doctrines which had distinguished the early nonconformists, but of which some of the younger ministers of that day were beginning to be ashamed. Such was his reputation, that the founder of the church at Bocking, though he never saw Mr.

A true and faithful Account of the Religion and Manners of the Mahometans; in which is a particular relation of their Pilgrimage to Mecca, &c. By Joseph Pitts, of Exon. 1717.