APPOINTMENTS. Rev. L. G. Gaines for six months Missionary Agent in the Synods of Ohio, Cincinnati and Indiana. Mr. L. R. Morrison for five months to the Presbytery of Shiloh, Tenn. Rev. A. L. Watts for one year to Red House and Gilead, N.C. RE-APPOINTMENTS. Rev. W. F. Houston for nine months to Washington, Margaretta Furnace, and Wrightsville, Pa. Rev. T. Root for one year to Bellefonte and vicinity, Jackson county, Ala." Mr. J. S. Galloway for four months to Somerset and vicinity, Perry county, Ohio. LETTERS RECEIVED S. C. J.M'Rea, N.C. J. W. Martin, N.Y. W. NEW AUXILIARIES. Second church, Mt. Morris, N.Y., Wash From the 20th of June to the 20th of July. Sharon, Ill., Hopewell, I., Shoal Creek, Account of Cash received by the Board of Missions of the General Assembly of Franklin, Ohio, auxiliary society per Rev. A. O. Patterson, Lawrenceville, NJ. monthly concert collections for 1830, per G. H. Brown, Mercer, Pa. Presbyterian congregation per A. Patterson, Treasurer, $0.50 50 00 3.00 5 00 15 00 6 00 40 00 15 00 33 50 25 Mahoning congregation, Columbia co. Pa. by Gen. D. Montgomery, of Rev. J. Milroy, D.D. per M. Allen, Esq. Philadelphia, monthly collection 2d Presb.church, Southwark,per Mr. Bastrond, 24 00 donation from a member of 6th Presb. ch. per Rev. Mr. Winchester, 5 00 do. Mr. Wm. F. Geddes, Princess Anne, Md. annual subscription of R. M. Laird, collection in congregation per do. Palestine, Illinois, auxiliary society per Rev. J. C. Harrison, donation from A. G. Logan per do. Pennsylvania Run, Ky. auxiliary society per Rev. A. O. Patterson, 5 84 5 00 5 00 1 50 50 3 50 Springfield, Erie co Pa. auxiliary society per Rev. E. Hart, 10 00 Shelbyville, Ky. auxiliary society, in part, per Rev. A. Hamilton, 17 00 Sevenmile, Ohio, auxiliary society per Rev. A. O. Patterson, 3 00 Turff, Ohio, donation from Rees Lloyd, Esq. 2 00 1 50 Washington, Indiana, auxiliary society, per Rev. J. C. Harrison, 1.00 Tuscumbia, Alabama, per Mr. J. M. Arnell, West Mendon, N. Y. monthly concert collection by C. Allen, per Rev. G. G. Sill, 8 50 NOTE--In the June number of the Reporter, the sum of $137 is acknowledged as having been received from the Presbytery of Steubenville, O. It should have been from the auxiliary society of Steubenville, by A. J. M'Dowell, Esq. Treasurer, per Rev. C. C. Beatty. EDITED BY WILLIAM NEILL, CORRESPONDING SECRETARY. truths from which it had been diverted. which the most lively sentiment is that Prayer supposes a tranquil heart, in of holy love to God, and gratitude for his mercies; a heart accustomed to spiritual enjoyments-timid, delicate, watchfulalways guarded against sinful impressions -always attentive to abstain from every thing which can abate its delightful intercourse with the Lord. This is what the spirit of prayer requires. As the General Agent of the Board of || and the recollection of those eternal Education has not yet been able to take the Editorial charge of the Education Register, we beg leave to call the attention of our readers to the following extract from Massillon's discourse, entitled “The Spirit of the Ministry." We earnestly request that these forcible and luminous remarks of Massillon, may be read by all who are either in or looking forward to the ministry. 2. The Spirit of our Ministry is a Spirit of Mourning. And they brought him to Jerusalem to We are those ambassadors of peace, whom the prophet speaks, who ought to weep bitterly, because the ways of righteousness lie waste; hardly any one walks in the way which conducts to life; the covenant has become unprofitable; & the Lord seems to have cast away his people. "The ambassadors of peace W-shall weep bitterly. The high ways lie waste; the way-faring man ceaseth; he 1. A Spirit of Prayer. hath broken the covenant, he hath dePrayer is the ornament of the minis-spised the cities, he regardeth no man. try, the most essential duty of a minister, Yes, my brethren, we ought to be men the soul of all his functions. Without of grief; and to mourn incessantly, beprayer he is no longer of any use in the tween the porch and the altar,† for the ministry-of any service to Christians. scandals which dishonor the Church, and He plants, but God does not give the in- expose it to the derision of the wicked. crease; he preaches, but his words are Samuel, after the fall of Saul, retired as sounding brass; he recites the praises and passed the rest of his days in lamentof the Lord, but his heart does not join in ing the unhappy destiny of that prince. them, and he honors God but with his Jesus Christ, the chief shepherd and the lips. In one word, without prayer, a model for others, seeing Jerusalem hardminister is without soul and without life,ened in blindness, and upon the point of all whose labors in the vineyard of the ruin, wept over it; and he could not reLord are but like the mechanical move-frain his tears at the sight of Lazarus ments of an inanimate machine. It is then prayer alone which constitutes the strength and success of his different services; and he ceases to be acceptable to God or useful to man, as soon as he ceases to pray. In prayer consists all his consolation; and his functions become to him like the yoke of a hireling-like hard, burdensome, and painful tasks, if prayer neither alleviates their burden, solaces their pains, nor consoles him for the little success attending them. Now prayer supposes a pure spirit, a spirit free from those vain and dangerous images which pollute the soul, or obscure its light; it supposes a mind replete with spiritual ideas, and familiarized to medi tation on divine truth-a mind which departs from its proper employment, when it is necessay to turn its attention to the perplexing and unprofitable cares of the world, and which easily resumes, when again quitting these cares, the thought when dead, because in him he discovered the image of a soul spiritually dead. Our compassion, should be excited by the miseries and vices of our fellow men; er towards them. Indeed, my brethren, we ought to have the feelings of a mothwhilst there are sinners upon earth, sorrow and mourning will be the lot of faithful ministers. mourning with the vain cares and unNow, can you unite this spirit of profitable amusements of the world? I ask you, what is the object of men of the world in all their occupations? Pleasure. You cannot therefore associate with such men without being either witnesses, or approvers, or accomplices of their pleanesses, can a minister of Christ familiarsures. Though you should be but witize his eyes to objects which ought to pierce his heart? Can he amuse him *Isaiah xxxiii. 7, 8. Joel ii. 17, self with them? The primitive Doctors of the church forbad Christians the sight of gladiators, believing that the disciples of the mild and charitable Jesus could not innocently feed their eyes with the blood and death of those unfortunate persons, and derive a cruel pleasure from a sight which ought to inspire them with horror, and make them deplore the lot and the eternal ruin of those unhappy victims. 3 The Spirit of our Ministry is a Spirit of Labor. The church of which we are ministers, is a vine-a field—a harvest—an edifice, which is building and which should grow || every day-a holy warfare;-these are all terms which suppose care and fatigue, they are all symbols of labor and application. A minister is placed in the church, like the first man in the terrestrial paradise, "to dress it and to keep it." He is accountable for his time to the people of his charge. All, therefore, that he employs in vain and useless intercourse with others, except for necessary relaxation; all the days, all the moments which he suffers to be lost in the uselessness of worldly society-in amusements and dissipation, are days and moments which ought to have been devoted to the salvation of his fellow men; and for which they will demand an account of him before the tribunal of Jesus Christ. By ordination he becomes a public minister; the people acquire a real right over his person, his leisure, his occupations, his talents. These are consecrated goods which form, as it were, the patrimony of the people; he is but the depositary of them, and can no longer dispose of them according to his own inclination. As soon then as he abandons the employment connected with his office, he proves himself unworthy of it; he ceases to be a minister, from the moment that he ceases to be laborious; and he passes, in indolence, or in vain amusements, always improper and often dangerous, that time which ought to be devoted to the salvation of his people. An indolent and worldly minded minister is, therefore, the most useless and the most unoccupied man upon earth; he alone, all whose moments are so precious, whose duties are so serious and so numerous, whose cares ought to increase as the vices of men multiply-he alone has no employment among men; passes his days in a continual void-in a circle of frivolous inutilities; and that life which ought to be the most occupied, the most loaded with duties, the most respected, becomes the most empty and the most despicable life that is seen in the world. Genesis ii, 13. I am sensible that great zeal and firmness are necessary to enable us to break the bonds of flesh and blood; and to innerdict ourselves almost all intercourse with a world with which we are connected by so many ties; and to which our own inclinations draw us. But this furnishes me with a fourth reflection, as a new proof of the truth of which I wish to convince you. 4. I say then, in the fourth place, that the Spirit of our Ministry is a Spirit of Zeal and Firmness. It is our duty to exhort, to correct, to reprove, "in season and out of season. We ought to bear our testimony boldly against public sins and abuses. The face of a Christian minister ought not to blush for the ignominy, which indulgences, unbecoming his character, never fail to produce; he bears, written upon his forehead, with much more majesty than the High Priest of the law, "the doctrine and the truth;" he ought to know no one according to the flesh. He who, by the imposition of hands, has been set apart to the holy ministry, should manifest an heroic disposition, which elevates him above his own weakness,— which infuses into him noble, great, generous sentiments, and such as are worthy his elevated calling,-which raises him above fears, hopes, reputation, and opprobrium, and above every thing which influences the conduct of other men. Admitting that, when you first go to mingle with worldly scenes, you may intend not to be seduced from the path of duty; admitting that you at first possess sincerity, firmness, and courage; you will soon deviate from them. Those ideas of zeal and firmness against vice, with which you enter into the world, will soon grow weaker; intimacy with the world will soon make them appear to you unsocial and erroneous; to them will succeed ideas more pleasant, more agreeable to man, more according to the common manner of thinking; what appeared zeal and duty, you will regard as excessive and imprudent severity; and what appeared virtue and ministerial prudence you will consider as unnecssary singulariity. Nothing enervates that firmness becoming the ministerial character like associating freely with men of the world. We enter, by little and little, and without perceiving it ourselves, into their prejudices, and adopt the excuses and vain reasonings to which they have recourse to justify their errors; by associating with them we cease to think them so culpable; we even become almost apologists for their effeminacy, their idleness, their luxury, their ambition, their passions; we accustom ourselves, like the world, to give to those vices softer names, will of the Lord. for divine things, which simply the ap- Now, my brethren, a serious consideration of these things could not fil to make the most pious distrustful of themselves, and sensible of their need of continual assistance from God. What a life of prayer, of retirement, of circumspection, of faith, of rigorous government of the passions, is necessary to prepare us for such services? A minister of religion ought not to indulge himself in any thing which he cannot carry to the sanctuary, any thing which would be unbecoming in that place. He certainly ought not then to carry thither dispositions, affections, and desires which are common and worldly. It is necessary that the fire of divine love should purify his heart and raise it from a common to a holy and elevated state; in a word, as nothing is greater and more sublime than his functions, so nothing ought to be purer and more sublime than his piety. Will you then think of going from an assembly of pleasure to the house of God? Will you go to invoke a blessing from God, with the same mouth with which you have just pronounced vain and trifling words? Will you attempt to administer Christian, ordinances with a mind filled with frivolous and indecent images? Instead of elevating your minds and hearts on high, will you suffer them to dwell upon the mean objects of the world?upon objects unworthy of occupying the attention of a wise man, at any time, and much more of diverting a minister of Christ from an attention to the sacred duties of his office? Now, judge whether it is possible to unite dissipated and worldly manners with the conduct becoming such a great and dignified office. Knowledge is not to be considered as one of those rare gifts which God distributes to whom he will, and with which all are not favoured; it is an essential-an absolutely necessary talent for the ministry. The Apostle, having enumerated the different gifts which God bestowed upon the rising churches, and remarked that some were prophets, others had the gift of tongues, and others the power of healing diseases, and working other miracles, adds that many were established as "Pastors and Teachers," (He does not separate these two titles, But further, a worldly, and dissipated because one is a necessary attendant up-life is inconsistent not only with that piety on the other.) Now, nothing is more which we ought to possess when officiatfatal to a taste for useful knowledge than ing at the holy altar, but also with that a familiar intercourse with the scenes of grave and edifying conduct which is nethe world. Order, retirement, and re- cessary to prepare us for all the functions collection are necessary for study; con. of the ministry, and without which we tinual dissipation and interruption relax cannot expect success. If, my brethren, the fervor of the mind and destroy all you associate freely with men of the relish for close application. world, with what propriety can you speak of avoiding the world,-of the dangers to which people are there exposed,-of the necessity of prayer, and recollection, and watchfulness,-of the eye which must be plucked out, when it becomes an occasion of offence,-of the account which we must render for every 6. In the last place, the Spirit of the Ministry is a Spirit of Piety. By this spirit of piety I mean not only good morals, but that purity of heart, that tenderness of conscience, that taste *Malachi ii. 7. †Ephesians iv. 11. idle word,—and of all those mortifying || and entered again into the clouds of the maxims so foreign from your manners, firmament; its ministry was finished, and and so unknown to the world? With its appearance ceased with its ministry. what an air of coldness and dryness must Therefore, my brethren, as you exyou appear? The holy truths of Salva-pect ere long to enter upon the public tion come but with regret, and with an duties of the ministry, be on your guard air of constraint, from a mouth accus-against a taste for the world and its contomed to frivolous and worldly conver-cerns. If you still cherish this fatal sation. To imitate the Apostle, in taste, be certain that this is a leaven preaching Christ crucified with success, which, if not destroyed, will one day corwe must, like him, be attached to the rupt the whole lump; and which will occross of Christ; to affect the heart, there casion your ruin. If this taste is so powermust be expressions which proceed from ful that you despair of ever subjecta heart that is itself affected. Without ing it to a sense of duty, take the world this you will be in the Christian pulpit, for your portion, before a holy engagelike those mercenary declaimers, who ment shall oblige you to separate from it formerly made a parade of their elo- for ever. Do not add to the damages of quence, in the public schools of Rome a worldly life the crime of appearing and Athens, upon vague and indifferent there with a sacred character, which subjects, which intersted neither the ought wholly to remove you from it; its hearers nor the speakers; you will make seductions will be dangerous, even if the of the ministry of the word a vain exer- calling to which you may devote yourcise of parade and ostentation,-a spec-selves should make it your duty to aptacle for the world; and not a serious instruction for sinners; you will seek the applauses of your hearers, rather than their conversion,-your own glory rather than that of Jesus Christ,-yourselves rather than the salvation of your fellow men. pear there; judge then of the safety which you can promise yourselves, if you associate with the world in opposition to the commands of God, and against the rules of the holy profession which you have chosen. Anien. The readers of the Education Register are respectfully informed that it has not been in the power of the Corres These consequences of a worldly life. may make you tremble; but they are inevitable; an intercourse with the world sooner or later leads to them. And besides, do you consider as nothing the stumbling block which, by such a life, you will throw in the way of your fellow men, and the grief which you will occa-ponding Secretary, to attend to the edsion to good people? What! Shall you be continually seen in the midst of the pleasures and vanities of the world, and will the world, in favor of you alone, not take offence at this? And will you not, by such conduct, greatly afflict your brethren who are faithful, and all those who are friends to the cause of truth and righteousness? But our functions themselves, you will say, necessarily draw us into an intercourse with men of the world. True, but we shall rarely be there when we are there only on this account. When we have no object but to conduct souls to Christ, we shall show ourselves only to point out to them the way. The moment they have found it, and can go without us, we shall conceal ourselves, become eclipsed, and enter again into the darkness and safety of retirement. Like that star which conducted the Magi to Christ, and which was a type of pastors; it showed itself as far as Bethlehem, whither it was to conduct those Sages of the East; but the moment they found, acknowledged, and adored the infant Saviour, it disappeared, became eclipsed, itorial department for the months of July and August, having only entered on the duties of his office on the 28th instant. It may also be proper to say, as the present No. closes the year, that some important changes in the form and character of the work, are now under consideration. JOHN BRECKINRIDGE. Philad. Aug. 1, 1831. |