ation in the abstract, and
the territory on which it lies the _orbis terrarum_, or the World. For,
unless the illustration be fanciful, the object which I am contemplating
is like the impression of a seal upon the wax; which rounds off and gives
form to the greater portion of the soft material, and presents something
definite to the eye, and preoccupies the space against any second figure,
so that we overlook and leave out of our thoughts the jagged outline or
unmeaning lumps outside of it, intent upon the harmonious circle which
fills the imagination within it.

3.

Now, before going on to speak of the education, and the standards of
education, which the Civilized World, as I may now call it, has enjoined
and requires, I wish to draw your attention, Gentlemen, to the
circumstance that this same _orbis terrarum_, which has been the seat of
Civilization, will be found, on the whole, to be the seat also of that
supernatural society and system which our Maker has given us directly from
Himself, the Christian Polity. The natural and divine associations are not
indeed exactly coincident, nor ever have been. As the territory of
Civilization has varied with itself in different ages, while on the whole
it has been the same, so, in like manner, Christianity has fallen partly
outside Civilization, and Civilization partly outside Christianity; but,
on the whole, the two have occupied one and the same _orbis terrarum_.
Often indeed they have even moved _pari passu_, and at all times there has
been found the most intimate connexion between them. Christianity waited
till the _orbis terrarum_ attained its most perfect form before it
appeared; and it soon coalesced, and has ever since co-operated, and often
seemed identical, with the Civilization which is its companion.

There are certain analogies, too, which hold between Civilization and
Christianity. As Civilization does not cover the whole earth, neither does
Christianity; but there is nothing else like the one, and nothing else
like the other. Each is the only thing of its kind. Again, there are, as I
have already said, large outlying portions of the world in a certain sense
cultivated and educated, which, if they could exist together in one, would
go far to constitute a second _orbis terrarum_, the home of a second
distinct civilization; but every one of these is civilized on its own
principle and idea, or at least they are separated from each other, and
have not run toge