ut in (as it has done) its
claim for help from Government; but, without entering into argument
respecting this, might we not safely put it to every wise and rightly
judging Presbyterian, whether it is not better to waive this claim of
theirs, than to perplex the progress of Christianity, by offering to
the heathen Australians, at the same time, and by the same temporal
authority, the Bible, which speaks of _one_ Church, and the choice
between _two_ churches? And lastly, whatever unhappy scruples and
divisions among Christians have arisen respecting episcopacy, surely,
if men had a truly christian spirit within them, they would quietly
consent to the instruction of the natives being placed in the hands of
a Church which they cannot deny to be scriptural, and of a ministry,
which for 1500 years from Christ's birth no sect of men ever thought of
denying to be the only apostolical ministry. It is indeed a strange
spectacle which our Christianity must offer to the eyes of those that
are really desirous of becoming converts. Either we "bite and devour one
another," or else we quietly set aside our Lord's commands and prayers
for our union, and contentedly agree to divide ourselves into as many
parties, sects, or denominations, as we please; and having done so, we
go and inoculate our heathen converts with our own love of separation.
St. Paul was shocked at hearing of divisions in the Church of Corinth,
but enlightened statesmen of the nineteenth century appear to be shocked
at the idea of allowing Christianity to be offered to the heathens
without its unhappy divisions! What, it may be asked with all reverence,
would have been the success of the Apostles in evangelizing the Gentile
world, if the gospel of Christ had been offered to the heathens of that
age, under the same disadvantages with which men of the present age
prefer to clog and impede their missionary efforts? Can we wonder, under
these circumstances, at the slow progress of the gospel? Is it not
rather wonderful that it should make any progress at all? If the world
is reluctant to believe in Christ's mission, would not His own words,
(John xvii. 21,) suggest to us our miserable divisions as a chief cause
of this?

[73] Against one of these missions Dr. Lang gives a sneer, and
it may be a deserved one, though certainly expressed in unbecoming
language; but the attentive reader of Dr. Lang's amusing work on New
South Wales will soon learn not to place too muc