Note 26 — VII. THE DRAW-NET.

“They [this and the parable of the tares] convey, too, the same further lesson, that this fact [the actual intermixture of evil in the visible Church] does not justify self-willed departure from the fellowship of the Church, and impatient leaping over or breaking through the nets, as here it has often been called; but the Lord’s separation is patiently to be waited for, which shall surely arrive at the end of the present age.”—Dr. Trench, Notes on the Parables, p. 133. This is a style far too loose for a critical exposition of Scripture. If the actual presence of tolerated impurity within the Church does not justify a “self-willed” departure from her communion, does it justify a departure that is not self-willed, but a solemn separation in order to carry out the will of the Lord? The assumption that the separation of the English Nonconformists was “self-willed,” of course begs the whole question.[26]