The attainment of this spirit of amity and concord ought to be a distinct object of effort, and especially in times like ours, when there is no hostile pressure driving Christian people together, but when our great social differences are free to produce a certain inevitable divergence and to check the flow of our sympathy, and when there are deep clefts of opinion, growing deeper every day, and seeming to part off Christians into camps which have little understanding of, and less sympathy with, one another.  Even the strong individualism, which it is the glory of true Christian faith to foster in character, and which some forms of Christian fellowship do distinctly promote, works harm in this matter; and those who pride themselves on belonging to ‘Free churches,’ and standing apart from creed-bound and clergy-led communities, are specially called upon to see to it that they keep this exhortation, and cultivate ’the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.’

It should not be necessary to insist that the closest mutual concord amongst all believers is but an imperfect manifestation, as all manifestations in life of the deepest principles must be, of the true oneness which binds together in the most sacred unity, and should bind together in closest friendship, all partakers of the one life.  And assuredly the more that one life flows into our spirits, the less power will all the enemies of Christian concord have over us.  It is the Christ in us which makes us kindred with all others in whom He is.  It is self, in some form or other, that separates us from the possessors of like precious faith.  When the tide is out, the little rock-pools on the shore lie separated by stretches of slimy weeds, but the great sea, when it rushes up, buries the divisions, and unites them all.  Our Christian unity is unity in Christ, and the only sure way ‘to be of the same mind one toward another’ is, that ’the mind which was in Christ Jesus be in us also.’

II.  The divisive power of selfish ambition.

’Set not your mind on high things, but condescend to things that are lowly.’  The contrast here drawn between the high and the lowly makes it probable that the latter as well as the former is to be taken as referring to ‘things’ rather than persons.  The margin of the Revised Version gives the literal rendering of the word translated ‘condescend.’  ‘To be carried away with,’ is metaphorically equivalent to surrendering one’s self to; and the two clauses present two sides of one disposition, which seeks not for personal advancement or conspicuous work which may minister to self-gratulation, but contentedly fills the lowly sphere, and ’the humblest duties on herself doth lay.’  We need not pause to point out that such an ideal is dead against the fashionable maxims of this generation.  Personal ambition is glorified as an element in progress, and to a world which believes in such a proverb as ‘devil take the hindmost,’ these two exhortations can