Discourses on Public Occasions (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1851. Excerpt: ... SERMON VII. LOVE ONE ANOTHER. Preached in the Free Assembly Hall, Edinburgh, July 11, 1843, at the opening of the commemoration of the Bicentenary of the Westminster Assembly. John xiii. 34. 'A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another.' We are now assembled in very peculiar circumstances--circumstances at once solemnising and delightful. We are met to do honour to the character and the deeds of men of other years. The disposition to commemorate past events, whether of public or private interest, springs from an original law of our nature, a law which certainly admits of being, and has actually been grossly abused, but which is, nevertheless, good in itself, and capable of being turned to valuable account. Subjects of great and permanent utility are thus held forth to view, and hindered from passing into oblivion. The very act of reminiscence calls into operation, and consequently improves by exercising, some of the higher moral sentiments of the heart. And, even if there were no other advantage, we might well feel prompted to such an undertaking, when we reflect that it tends so forcibly to remind us of the lapse of time--of the steady progression of those quickly-revolving cycles which are hastening on the secrets of futurity to their complete and final development; and, by bringing us to contemplate what has been happily styled 'the funeral procession of centuries, ' to lead us to reflect at once on 'the landbreadth of our own earthly concerns, ' and on 'the vast gulf of duration beyond.' Strongly, therefore, do we feel that, in responding to the present call in providence, instead of lending countenance to the pernicious principle that 'the church hath power to decree rites and ceremonies, ' we are only following the approved example of h...