2 Cor. vi. 14 — 18. Be ye not unequally yoked together loith unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness ? and what communion hath light with dark- ness ? and what concord hath Christ zvith Belial ? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel ? and what agree- ment hath the temple of God with idols ? for ye are the temple of the living God ; as God. hath said, I will dwell in them, and loalk in them ; and I will he their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the un- clean thing ; and I will receive you, and loill be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Jlmighty.
A MINISTER never appears, to young people especially, in so forbidding an aspect, as when he is circumscribing men's intercourse with the world, and marking with precision the spirit that characterizes the true Christian in relation to the things of time and sense. Many on such an occasion are ready to account him an enemy to their happiness, and to censure him as a promoter of gloom and melancholy. But where do we find the Apostle pouring out such copious streams of love, as in the chapter before us ? So accumulated were the expressions of his regard, that he thought it almost necessary to apologize for the more than ordinary effusions of his heart : "■ O ye Corinthians, our mouth is open unto you, our heart is enlarged." Yet in that very frame of mind did he give the directions in our text. As a parent in his dying hour would most tenderly guard his children against the temptations which were most hkely to draw them aside from the paths of virtue and happiness, so does the Apostle on this occasion instruct and caution his Corinthian converts : and with a measure of the same spirit we would now proceed to the consideration of the subject before us.
That we may bring it before you with the greater perspicuity, we shall shew.