CHRISTIAN UNITY.
[To rim EDITOR Or THE " SPECTATOR."1 Szp.—A good deal of confusion and consequent error on the subject of Christian Unity seems to have arisen from the mis- rendering and misreading of our Lord's words in the allegory of the Good Shepherd (St. John x. 11). There is a clear dis- tinction between the two words He employs. He speaks of "other sheep not of this fold " (iek8) whom He would gather in till there should be " one flock " (a-4.H. The Revised Version gives the true translation. The erroneous rendering fold, on which some are for ever harping, seems to give colour to their idea of the absorption of all other Christian com- munities into one—their own. This is the delusion of the Church of Rome and of those among ourselves who seem to share it. Now the number of Nonconformists in the English. speaking world is estimated at seventy millions, the number of Anglicans et twenty-three millions. How can they expect twenty-three millions to absorb (supposing it were desirable) seventy millions? As Professor Lindsay says, "The only hope of reunion is in the federation of the Churches." Bishop Davenant'e Ad peter/mm communionem inter evangelicas ecclesias restaurandam adhortatio is well worth study. Bishop Jeremy Taylor, we know, proposed that the Apostles' Creed should be the only bond of union. After all, we must expect in minor matters some differences of opinion, yet quite con- sistent with mutual forbearance and charity; "forbearing one another in love," " endeavouring to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace." If Charles V. found it impossible to make two of his timepieces always keep together, need we be surprised to find some variations in so complex a subject as man? There is such a thing as a family likeness among individual members of the same family
" facies non omnibus una, Nee diverse. tamen."
There is, let us thankfully acknowledge It, notwithstanding our unhappy divisions, a certain degree of Christian unity among sincere Christians. We sing, e.g., one another's hymns. They are the common property of Churches as divided as the Church of Rome and the Church of Scotland. I will end with a simple illustration. An army is composed of several regiments varying in date, in uniform, in traditions, and other particulars, yet all associated in one and the same army, and animated by the same loyalty and devotion to their head. Why should it not be so with a really Catholic ChurchT—I am,
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