'Of later Christian origin. A tradition which cannot be traced to Christ or his :apostles, and which is without snpport in the New Testament, car.not claim any ·countenance from this text. Alas ! how Christians have become the servants of men -and of prescribed usage! • As the Jews have overlaid and burdened their religion with a huge mass of Talmudic and Kabbalistic traditions, so have the Greek and Latin Churches all but rnined their Christianity by admitting ecclesiastical tradition to a place alongside of Holy Writ in the rule of faith. II. PosrTH'ELY. The traditions which the Corinthians were exhorted to keep were the instructions which the apostle, under the guidance of the Spirit of Christ, had himself delivered t-0 the saints; and they had authority, not by coming down from remote antiquity and passing through many hands, but by coming directly from one whom the Lord had fitted and appointed to found Churches, and to set their affairs in order according to his mind and will. The directions specially referred to here had regard to the fellowship of believers and the worship rendered in the assembly of God. He had taught that the assembly was the true temple, wherein the Holy Spirit dwelt, and this temple was to be full of praise. The believers were to come together, not so much to pray for salvation, as to worship God their Saviour, and give thanks for the remission of 8ins and the hope of glory. Then the teaching about the Lord's Supper came in, for it is the centre and crowning act of Christian worship; and this had been ordained at Corinth by St. Paul. "I received of the Lorci that which also I delivered [ordained] to you." So the apostle, while commanding the adherence of the Corinthians to his directions, took the opportunity to give more explicit instruction, and correct some abuses which had already crept into the Church. 1. The separation of the sexes, which sacerdotalism desires, was to be ignored in this service. Alike during the time of praying and prophesying, and during tho Eucharistic Supper, men and women were to mingle together, because in Jesus Christ "there is neither male nor female." And yet a distinction between the sexes, in the interest of purity and modesty, was to be duly marked. 2. The precious feast of unity and love ought not to be marred by party spirit or by selfishness and excess. Irreverence and greediness might appear at feasts in the precincts of the heathen temples; but in the holy temple of God his redeemed should have discern:nent of the Lord's body, and a grave fraternal remembrance of him. "Let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of that cnp."-F.
Vers. 18, 19.- Words of evil omen. In o. good English dictionary, the term "schismat1c" is thus explained: "One who separates from a Church from difference of opinion." The Bible makes no reference to an individual schismatic; nor does it apply the word "schism" to separation from the Church. "Heresy'' is defined iu the dictionary as "the taking a:i.d holding of an opinion contrary to the usual belief, especially in theology." Such, no doubt, is according to ecclesiastical usage; but the Scripture means by a "heresy" a sect or faction, not apart from but within the Church: "Heresies [factious] among you." I. A scmsM IS A REl-lT IN THE MIDST OF THE CHURCH, marring the enjoyment and expression of its essential unity. If a pieco of undressed cloth wero put to an old garment, a schism would occur. Not that the garment would fall into two parts, but that it would show an unseemly rent. A division of opinion amo11g the people who heard our Saviour is called a schism ; and the same word is used to denote the discord in the crowd when St. Paul appeared before the council at Jerusalem. The only Church of all those to which St. Paul wrote, which had schisms within it of such seriousness as to give him anxiety and call for animadversion, was tho Uhurch at Corinth; but by these he did not mean the action of partied breaking off from tho primitive Church in that city, and furming rival Churches or separnto denominations. They were parties iu the Chnrch dissenting or differing from one another. This wii.l appear the more clearly if we mnrk the remedies which the apostle prescribed, viz.: 1. 'l'o speak the same thing, and be perfectly joined to)?ether in tho same mind a11,l the same judgment. 'fo speak the same thing-was to exalt lhe one p;reat Name of the Lord Jesus, and not to tako party names, saying, "I am of Paul; i am of Apollos," And to be perfectly joined in the same mind-the mind of Christ, and the same judg- ment-thc judgment of his Spirit, while it never precluded activity of investigation 390 TIIE FIRST EPISTLE '1'0 THE CORINTHIANS. [ea. xr. 1-34.