the same office, there would be no more a body : if all were an eye, or an ear, it must soon cease to exist, for want of such powers as the other parts of the body supply. There is nothing in the body either superfluous or defective. It needs no addition : in truth, it admits of no addition : and if it suffer defalcation, the whole is injured and deformed : for there is no part that can say to any other, " I have no need of thee." In this respect, therefore, all are honourable before God, and all have reason to discharge with pleasure the office assigned to them.]
But it is the other part of our subject that demands our more particular attention. I observe, therefore, that this union is also, II. Internal and spiritual —
It is surely a remarkable expression which the Apostle uses in my text : " We are all made to drink into one Spirit." What can be the meaning of this ? What its force ? I apprehend, that if we accurately investigate the influence of the soul upon the human frame, we shall find a strict parallel between that and the influence of the Spirit of God upon the members of Christ's mystical body. Bearing this in mind, I would observe, that the expression in my text imports,
1. A participation of the same vital energies — [One soul pervades the whole body, and operates alike in
every part ; calling into activity the eye, the ear, the hand, the foot, and working by all according to their respective capacities. So, whether it be a king upon his throne, or a beggar on a dunghill, if he be truly alive to God, he is quickened by the same Spirit ; the whole Church being, in its collective capacity, " the body of Christ, the fulness of Him that filleth all in alP." Without his aid we can do nothing *= : but by him the weakest is made strong, and is " enabled to do all things" that are required at his hands'".]
2. An accordance in the same divine principles — [As one power animates, so one mind directs, the whole
man : there is no schism in the body in relation to its actings, ever}' part harmoniously concurring in the object proposed. So, especially, in all important matters, are all the members of Christ's mystical body agreed. In subordinate points there
»> Eph. i. 23. ^ John xv. 5. <» Phil. iv. 13.