Have it Thy way, dear Lord;
For long I sought but mine,
Yet craved Thy help and blessing in a walk
That neither came from nor yet led to Thee.
But years have rolled around,
And softening, chastening time has crushed
The impetuous self that ever sought its own;
And now the deepest longing of my heart Says, "
But Thy way.-have it Thy way,
Dear Lord."

Have it Thy way, dear Lord.
Be Thou the Author and the Finisher
Of all my works and walks and ways,
The inspiration of my every thought;
And let it ever be, Not I,
But Christ within, without-
No hope, nor aim, but Thou its single source,
Its origin and end. Thou canst but bless
Thine own ; and so I pray, " Have it Thy way,
Dear Lord."

An Incident in the Life of Jehoshaphat. (2 Chron. 20:1-30.)

A Strange element of weakness mars the otherwise fine character of Jehoshaphat-a weakness yielded to, and thus proving a most effectual barrier to blessing. Beginning his reign with evident purpose of heart to walk in God's ways, he solidified the kingdom of Judah, and strengthened it both materially and spiritually. He sent out Levites and priests who instructed the people out of the law. He "waxed great exceedingly; and he built in Judah castles, and cities of store. And he had much business in the cities of Judah:and the men of war, mighty men of valor were in Jerusalem." The fear of God was upon the surrounding nations preventing them from attacking the king. Thus, though shorn of the glory of Solomon's day, when all Israel was one, it was again true there was '' neither adversary, nor evil occurrent."

With all quiet within and without, with no need to tempt him, Jehoshaphat joined affinity with Ahab, and opened the door for all the entangling alliances which were so disastrous during and after his reign; for to this union may be traced largely the subsequent idolatry of the royal house of Judah, while the murderess Athaliah and the vengeance of Jehu were alike inflictions for and results of this mixture of darkness with light.

He must go with king Ahab to war in face of the solemn warning of the only prophet who could or dared tell the truth-a prophet whom he himself had called for-and was only kept from the doom of the wicked king of Israel through God's mercy, reminding us of Lot's escape from Sodom. Later enterprises of a similar character were engaged in, showing that the root of weakness was never fully judged; and so this otherwise good and devoted king left a very crooked path for his successors to walk in.

For this reason too the matter before us is only an incident in his life. It did not give character to the whole, but stands out in contrast with a great part of it.

There can be no doubt that the combined attack of Moab and Ammon was a distinct chastening for his connection with Ahab. Until that time, the fear of God hindered the enmity of these nations. On his return from the campaign to Ramoth-gilead, he met with a solemn reproof from Jehu the son of Hanani, " Shouldest thou help the ungodly, and love them that hate the Lord ? therefore is wrath upon thee from before the Lord." (Chap. 19:2.) There is at the same time a word of approval for the measure of uprightness found in him, which, with continued faithfulness in the internal affairs of the kingdom, foreshadowed tender dealing even in the affliction. But nothing can avert that chastisement. How in all this we see the character of God manifest ! He must reprove unfaithfulness, but He is " not unrighteous to forget your work and labor of love, which ye have showed toward His name." (Heb. 6:10.) He does not love to write bitter things against us; He does love to record the good He can find. His holiness compels Him to send chastening, that we might be partakers of that holiness; but His love is ever ready to come to the succor of His people when chastened.

So the enemy comes in like a flood, and if Jehoshaphat wants war, he shall have it to the full. It was his own choosing. If we are in grievous trial, brought upon us through our unfaithfulness, let us not be surprised, still less let us complain. Let us rather learn from the man before us, for now he reads us a precious lesson.

" It came to pass after this also, that the children of Moab, and the children of Ammon, and with them others besides the Ammonites, came against Jehoshaphat to battle." Moab and Ammon were the children of Lot's shame, marking the depth to which a child of God may fall who forsakes the separate place marked out by grace for faith. Their names describe and interpret them. Moab-"seed of a father;" Ben-Ammi "son of my people." They represent the fruits of self, acting upon and occupied with itself. An intenser self-or flesh, which is the same-is the result. So if Lot was a neutral, a trifler and loiterer in the enemy's country, these his offspring are the pronounced enemies, with nothing but evil in them. "An Ammonite or Moabite shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord; even to their tenth generation shall they not enter into the congregation of the Lord forever." (Deut. 23:3.) If Jehoshaphat had acted as a neutral, he must feel the power of the fruits of neutralism. If we step aside and hold intercourse with God's enemies, we must feel the power of those " fleshly lusts which war against the soul; " of that "carnal mind which is enmity against God." Moab and Ammon then seem to represent more than mere outward enmity; they were related to Israel. So in our own history, there are spiritual foes outside of ourselves, and others as it were related to us-fruits of our own folly and unbelief. It is these who come up to overwhelm us when we have departed from that path of separation which is the only path of peace or power.

There were others joined with these, as Satan knows how and when to marshal his forces and to league even opposing interests against his one object of hatred. So that Jehoshaphat might have said, "They have consulted together with one consent :they are confederate against Thee:the tabernacles of Edom and the Ishmaelites; of Moab and the Hagarenes:Gebal and Ammon and Amalek:they have holpen the children of Lot." (Ps. 83:5-8.) Our enemies rarely come single handed. The Corinthian saints were beset not merely by the pride of party strife, but by a carnality of walk and a looseness of doctrine that were simply appalling.

No wonder that in the face of such a host Jehoshaphat was filled with fear. But that fear drove him where prosperity it seems could not hold him, into the presence of God. "He set himself to seek the Lord, and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah." " Pride goeth before destruction," and faith is seen in fear. " Noah moved with fear prepared an ark." It is no sign of faith to see one unexercised by the presence of spiritual foes, especially if brought upon him as a result of his own course. "Blessed is the man that feareth always." One of the saddest signs of the day is this lack of fear. The powers of darkness have well-nigh overwhelmed the professing church, but where is that fasting and seeking the Lord which we see in Jehoshaphat ? In place of that how often is the reverse seen-human expedients and self-complacency.

Gathered together and humbled before Him the men of Judah lay the whole case before God. They tell Him of His absolute power as Creator (5:6.) They remind Him of His covenant relationship with Israel and how He gave them the land (5:7.) They remind Him of the sanctuary where His name had been placed, and of the promise of "help from the sanctuary" in the "day of trouble," (10:8, 9.) The fact of the present attack is then laid before Him, and the prayer closes with these words-owning their helplessness, but holding fast to His power:-"We have no might against this great company that cometh against us:neither know we what to do:but our eyes are upon Thee." (5:12.)

How beautiful is this attitude of confessed weakness and ignorance! "All Judah stood before the Lord, with their little ones and their wives, and their children." Utterly weak they are, but who' dare touch them ? They know not what to do, where to go ; but their cause is in other hands. "Be not afraid or dismayed by reason of this great multitude,"- they get an answer from God Himself through His servant-"for the battle is not yours but God's." They have but to go to meet the foe, and stand still and see God work for them, as at the Red Sea. And is not the same path of victory open for us? If in utter weakness, and ignorance of what to do, we but cast ourselves in complete self-abandonment upon God, how soon would we learn that He would undertake for us. He would meet our enemies and we would need but to "stand still and see the salvation of the Lord with us."

Do we believe these things? Will we act upon them ? Will you, child of God, well-nigh overwhelmed by the enemy, with no strength and at a loss which way to turn-will you, in confessed weakness, let God's power work for you ? Will you, feeble company of God's saints, that seem a target for Satan, with weakness within and scoffs without-will you stand before God and let your weakness speak for you? Oh! what a place of power is this ! Creature-resources are swept aside and the living God goes before His people. No wonder that a band of singers is put in the forefront of the battle. "When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of strange language; Judah was his sanctuary and Israel his dominion. The sea saw it and fled:Jordan was driven back. The mountains skipped like rams, the little hills like lambs. What ailed thee, O thou sea, that thou fleddest? thou Jordan that thou wast driven back ?Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob." (Ps. 114:)

God Himself-"The Lord is a man of war"-was the One who was to fight their battle and win their victory. In the majestic sixty-eighth psalm, we have very much the same ring of victory that we can well believe sounded in the hearts of Jehoshaphat's host. "Let God arise, let His enemies be scattered; let them also that hate Him flee before Him . Sing unto God, sing praises to His name:extol Him that rideth upon the heavens by His name Jah, and rejoice before Him. . . Kings of armies did flee apace:and she that tarried at home divided the spoil. . . . The singers went before, the players on instruments followed after."

Two subjects formed the theme of the praises of the people-"the beauty of holiness," and "His
mercy endureth forever." The first celebrates what God is ; the second His acts toward His people. The beauty of holiness-in God it all centered:glimpses of it might be seen in His servants but its fulness and symmetry could only be found in Himself For us who know Him in His Son; who do not see His "back parts" as even Moses was only privileged to do; but who behold "the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ"-for us how much this beauty of holiness should mean. So too " His mercy endureth forever" means so much more for us than it could possibly for that company. For them it was a refrain that could be placed after the mention of each act of His power, from creation to the victories that put them in possession of their land. (Ps. 136:) For us it more particularly means the celebration of that redemption which found us lost, away from God and will not cease to act until we are placed in glory with Christ. Oh! how much does that mean for us-" His mercy endureth forever!" This then is the song with which we face the enemy, and in anticipation celebrate a victory yet to be won; in reality however already won-the person and the work of Christ. "We are more than conquerors through Him that loved us."

Is this the spirit in which we go forth for the conflicts which are pressed upon us ? Then victory is ours. How simple this is; to the world so simple as to be foolish; but to faith a blessed secret of power.

Let us remember that a sense of helplessness and ignorance preceded the song of praise. There was the renunciation of self-no thought of turning to Ahab's house or elsewhere. "Give us help from
trouble, for vain is the help of man." " Our eyes are upon Thee."

How complete the victory was! The patched up truce between hostile tribes was forgotten; and the hidden evil that lurked in all their hearts, ("hateful and hating one another ") turned their swords against one another, and God's people had only to see their enemies slaughtered without lifting an arm themselves. They only followed after to take the spoils. For such victories mean great spoil. If we are brought to the end of our strength and cast upon God and thus go to meet our enemy, we have won a victory that will yield great results; we will have indeed rich spoil. The experience gained, the reality of God's presence, the blessedness of depending upon Him-these and many other results will make our place of victory a valley of Berachah indeed-a valley of blessing. Fresh praises will burst from our hearts. We will settle clown to a quiet which none can disturb; it will be " He " that " giveth quietness."

Let us remember then, if we are utterly weak, if we know not which way to turn-these things, so far from depressing us, should, if used aright, give us confidence of victory. If they but lead us unto God it will be said of us that we were "out of weakness made strong."

The action of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, held at Washington during the latter part of May, is of such importance that it well merits a notice in these pages. For the question raised was not one which affected the denomination as such, but the whole professing church. It was a question touching the very foundations of Christianity, and therefore the importance of the answer to that question reached out beyond the bounds of the denomination.

It should be a matter of unfeigned and hearty thanksgiving that so clear, unequivocal and decisive a result should have been reached. It was a contest where were ranged on the one side learning, influence, wealth and the prestige of a victory in the Presbytery of New York; on the other side was the conviction that the Word of God was more precious than the best man had to offer, and its integrity, all-sufficiency, and infallibility must be maintained at all costs.

The question came before the General Assembly in the form of an appeal from the minority of the Presbytery where Dr. Briggs had been tried and acquitted, largely with the help of those who, though differing from him, would for the sake of peace, retain him in the church. A very significant feature was the effort of Dr. Briggs to get the assembly to refuse to entertain this appeal. And this point was argued with all the subtlety of a lawyer. The reasons urged were purely technical, and even the adherents of the professor would be forced to admit that he did it merely to gain time. If the appeal were thrown out and the case sent back to the Synod, another year would be gained in which to sow diligently the seeds of infidelity broadcast in the church. But what can be said for the uprightness of one who would thus seek as a man of the world, while admitting the facts of the case-that he held and taught the doctrines as charged-to deliberately prevent, on technical ground, a decision being reached on them? But there was a determination on the part of many that this state of things should continue no longer; and while desiring to be perfectly fair to Professor Briggs they would yield no longer to delay. So the case was brought up for trial

Professor Briggs was charged with holding and teaching doctrines contrary to the standards of the Presbyterian Church and (what is far more important) to the word of God. These doctrines may be grouped under three general heads.

I. As to the Scriptures:he denied the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch ; that David wrote many of the psalms ascribed to him, or Isaiah the latter part of the prophecy called by his name. In short, he tore apart, mutilated and remodeled according to his own theory the greater part of the Old Testament. History, ordinances and commandments were in this way altered to suit his theory and the dates of the Mosaic writings, which according to him Moses never saw, changed to the time of Ezra.

Growing out of this mutilation of the form of Scripture was a denial of its verbal inspiration. Indeed this was a necessary conclusion from such premises. For his theory of authorship was formed on supposed conflicting statements in the books-one or both of which must have been incorrect. The Bible according to him was not infallible in all things -only, as the Romanists claim for the Pope, in matters of faith and practice. The jots and tittles were full of blemishes and errors, according to him; and Christ's words, that the Scriptures cannot be broken, were virtually contradicted.
It is needless to dwell on the effect of all this. It is infidelity pure and simple, no matter how concealed for the time by a seeming piety and desire for the truth. It begins with taking away the foundations of the faith, by denying that" all Scripture is given by inspiration of God." The evil done by the holders of such views cannot be estimated. Christ said of Moses, "He wrote of Me," these men say he did not-some one else wrote. Christ said, "but if ye believe not his writings how shall ye believe my words? "-a question which might well be pressed home upon those who in the pride of higher criticism are fast becoming deniers of Christ; for it will come to that.

II The second doctrine was that which co-ordinated the Bible, reason and the Church as fountains of divine authority. Some men found God through the Bible and the doctrines of grace; others, differently constituted found him through the church, its authority and ordinances; (Cardinal Newman was given as an illustration of this class;) and others found God neither through the Bible nor through the church but through reason. Christ is left out. His words '' No man can come unto the Father but by Me," are not true. "Canst thou by searching find out God? " is answered in the affirmative, and indeed every landmark of Christianity is removed.

If Cardinal Newman found true peace in his soul it was through the Word of God, even if dimly seen, and not through the authority of the church of Rome. And so with every other man. We can readily understand how one who begins by invalidating Scripture can go on to associate with it, as of equal authority, the professing church and man's finite reason.

III. The third doctrine was that of progressive sanctification after death. Professor Briggs held that at death the work of sanctification, begun by regeneration, went on until it was completed at the resurrection. The close resemblance to the Roman Catholic doctrine of purgatory strikes one. Coupled with it he has, by misinterpreting the passage which speaks of Christ preaching to the spirits in prison, given some general idea that such men as Paul are now employed in the work of enlightening those who die not fully sanctified, and this work goes on to the resurrection ! We must ask, Does this man call such teaching Christianity? Where is the all-sufficient completely finished work of Christ? Where the blessed truth of regeneration, with its impartation of a pure -a divine life? Where the death of the old man by the cross? Ah where are any of the soul-emancipating truths if such teaching-a mere refined and cultured heathenism with some Christian names-is to be substituted for the Word of God? We readily admit that knowledge will increase and that there will be growth and progress to all eternity, but that is not what is meant by this teaching.

It was then for the assembly to decide whether one who held and taught such doctrines could be considered a Christian minister, a safe guide from those who contemplated entering the ministry. By an overwhelming vote they decided that he could not; and he was declared suspended. Let all who love God's truth rejoice that in days of looseness and worldliness there remains firmness enough to stand thus; that neither fears of disruption, nor the impressiveness of learning and wealth could make men forget their loyalty to Christ and His Word.

But, the question forces itself upon us,-if we have the inspired Word of God what are we going to do with it? Shall not the answer be, We will not merely stand for it, but we will search it as never before. We will test it and draw from its inexhaustible resources things new and old ? We will let its light shine and let it speak for itself before the world. Above all we will let it rule us. The Lord grant that those who have been faithful to stand for it, and all His dear people, may be able to give some such answer.

'' With joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation."(Is. 12:3.)

The verse preceding reads, "Behold, God is my salvation:I will trust, and not be afraid; for the Lord Jehovah is become my strength and song; He also is become my salvation;" then it is added, " therefore with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation."

This is a good word for faith to start out upon. The "wells of salvation" are the Scriptures, clearly, since in the Scripture water is often used as a symbol of the Word of God.

This is a millennial song, this twelfth chapter of Isaiah. "All things of God " in heaven and on earth. The glory of God shall cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. As in the days of Israel's journey from Egypt to Canaan the cloud covered them, and the mount of transfiguration the cloud covered them, so in millennial days will the cloud of glory cover the earth. See Is. 4:5-"And the Lord will create upon every dwelling-place of Mount Zion, and upon her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a naming fire by night; for upon all the glory shall be a defense"-["for from above, the glory shall be for a defense." marg.]

'' And this shall be a tabernacle for a shadow in the day-time from the heat, and for a place of refuge, and for a covert from storm and from rain." The marginal reading makes it clearer, and is the correct reading, no doubt.

And this is still more clearly seen when traced as looked at in connection with the deliverance out of Egypt. See Ex. 8:22, 23-"And Moses stretched out his hand toward heaven; and there was a darkness in all the land of Egypt three days:they saw not one another, neither rose any from his place for three days; but all the children of Israel had light in their dwellings."

Now to the Egyptians, this was a darkness which they could not light up. Ordinarily they could light up their darkness. For seventy-two hours, day or night, they were bound by this spell of darkness-no man moved out of his place; but the children of Israel had light in their dwellings. What, then, do you suppose was the character of this light in the houses of the Hebrews ? Was it any thing which they had produced by their own means ? I think not; but a miraculous light,-a light which God gave, in contrast with the darkness given to the Egyptians. (Comp. Ex. 14:19, 20.) The Egyptians had a darkness which they could not light up, and the Hebrews had a light which they could not put out. Thank God! and at the appointed hour, and at the given word; this light led each family out of their dwellings into their proper places in the ranks of that wonderful procession of many miles in length.

Nor was it a mob, without order and arrangement, that came up "five in a rank," in battle-array, out of the land of Egypt. Six hundred thousand soldiers and their accompanying families, with flocks and herds-a mighty host-humanly speaking, an unmanageable multitude-were led without disorder through the Red Sea, and safely brought to the other shore to sing their song of deliverance.

And this is not a parable, but a matter of history; -typical as to practical lessons for us, no doubt, but real, actual facts of history, the "higher critics" to the contrary notwithstanding. Israel in their Egyptian bondage was a reality. Moses, under God, was their deliverer-a real and a true man, and a man of God in all that this word comprehends.

If any part of this can be gainsaid, then all of it can be gainsaid, and the whole book may be cast away as a deception and a fraud; for Christ and His apostles give their most absolute sanction to Moses and the prophets; and if Christ and His apostles are rejected, we have no revelation of God, and are thrown back into absolute atheism-no God. And can we consent to this ? By no means, thank God! For all that the higher critics can say is, that they don't know! while we can say that was not like the man in the ninth of John, when his eyes were opened, he could say, "One thing I know"! And the testimony of one man who does know is to be received, while the know-nothings are not received.

It reminds one of the man who was brought before a justice for stealing, and one witness was brought who testified that he saw the theft. "But," said the defendant, '' I can bring a dozen men who will say they did not see me." So it is with these wise men, these learned professors of agnosticism – know-nothingism; their wisdom proves their folly, and this, again, substantiates the Word of God. For God has said, "I will confound the wisdom of the wise, and bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent."

Taking them on their own ground, they have no revelation of God,-hence, no knowledge of God, and no God. While the simplest and weakest believer in all the world can understand how it is and why it is that these wise (?) don't know. They have thrown away the key of knowledge-Christ, inasmuch as they reject God's testimony about His Son through Moses and the prophets, since Moses and the prophets testify of Him. They stand or fall together. But, thank God! they stand, while the wise men go down, like the fire and brimstone upon Sodom, to be engulfed in the flame which their own wisdom has kindled. They do not like to think of hell now. Will they like it any better when they get there ? They prefer great happiness in judging God's Word now ? Will they be as happy when God's Word judges them for this contempt of Moses and the prophets ?

But what a contrast to all this human emptiness is the fullness of God's precious Word, those wells that never run dry. "With joy,"-when the poor wise man and his day have passed,-with joy shall we drink of those wells. Let it be so even now. Those wells are open, and while Philistines may try to choke them, let it be our joy to open them, and to drink deeply ourselves and give also to the thirsting multitudes about us. C. E. H.

One more precious fact,-"We know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall sec Him as He is." (i Jno. 3:2.)What a destiny! to be like Him, – in the full image of the heavenly Man in glory-holy, pure, incorruptible!

We are now accepted in the Beloved,-the whole value of His person and work reckoned to us; reckoned dead with Him, and risen in Him, one with Him. But actually and everlastingly to be like Him! Do not our souls long for this ? and can we not say, "As for me, I will behold Thy face in righteousness; I shall be satisfied when I awake with Thy likeness "? But, oh, most wondrous fact, is not this the language of Christ Himself ? So really we are one with Him that His own resurrection was but the first-fruits. And it will be when His body, the Church, raised from the dust, or changed in a moment, and the millions of the redeemed meet Him in His own likeness, then shall He see of the travail of His soul and be satisfied; sweetly shall we share His joy.

" He and I, in that bright glory one deep joy shall share :
Mine, to be forever with Him; His, that I am there."

From eternity has He looked forward to that moment, now so near, when the bride shall be presented to Himself; and when it comes, do we not hear Him up there in the heavens saying, '' Rise up, My love, My fair one, and come away. For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone, . . Arise, My love, My fair one, and come away" ? And again:"Thou art all fair, My love; there is no spot in thee." (Song 2:10-13.) The Holy Ghost must use the sweetest poetry to express the heart of Christ.

(Continued from p. 148.)

We see glories and humilities in our Redeemer:we do indeed; for we need each. The One who sat on the well in Sychar is He who now sits on high in heaven. He that ascended is He that descended. Dignities and condescensions are with Him;-a seat at the right hand of God, and yet a stooping to wash the feet of His saints here. What a combination ! No abatement of His honors, though suiting Himself to our poverty:nothing wanting that can serve us, though glorious and stainless and complete in Himself.

Selfishness is wearied by trespass and importunity. " He will not rise because he is his friend; but because of his importunity, he will rise and give him as much as he needeth." Thus it is with man, or selfishness; it is otherwise with God, or love; for God in Isaiah 7:is the contradiction of man in Luke 11:

It is the unbelief that would not draw on Him, that refused to ask a "blessing, and get it with a seal and a witness that wearied God,-not importunity, but, as I may say, the absence of it. And all this divine blessedness and excellency, which is thus seen in the Jehovah of the house of David in Isaiah 7:reappears in the Lord Jesus Christ of the evangelists, and in His different dealing with weak faith and full faith.

All these things that we are able to discover bespeak His perfections; but how small a part of them do we reach!

We are aware in how many different ways our fellow-disciples try and tempt us, as, no doubt, we do them. We see, or fancy we see, some bad quality in them, and we find it hard to go on in further company with them. And yet in all this, or in much of it, the fault may be with ourselves, mistaking a want of conformity, of taste or judgment, with ourselves for something to be condemned in them.

But the Lord could not be thus mistaken; and yet He was never "overcome of evil," but was ever "overcoming evil with good,"-the evil that was in them with the good that was in Himself. Vanity, ill-temper, indifference about others and carefulness about themselves, ignorance after painstaking to instruct, were of the things in them which He had to suffer continually. His walk with them, in its way and measure, was a day of provocation, as the forty years in the wilderness had been. Israel again tempted the Lord, I may say, but again proved Him. Blessed to tell it!-they provoked Him, but by this they proved Him. He suffered, but He took it patiently. He never gave them up. He warned and taught, rebuked and condemned "them, but never gave them up. Nay, at the end of their walk together He is nearer to them than ever.

Perfect and excellent this is, and comforting to us. The Lord's dealing with the conscience never touches His heart. We lose nothing by His rebukes. And He who does not withdraw His heart from us when He is dealing with our conscience is quick to restore our souls, that the conscience, so to express it, may be enabled soon to leave his school, and the heart find its happy freedom in His presence again. As expressed in that hymn, which some of us know,-

" Still sweet 'tis to discover,
If clouds have dimmed my sight,
When passed, Eternal Lover,
Toward me, as e'er, Thou art bright."

And I would further notice, that in the characters which in the course of His ministry He is called to take up (it may be for only an occasion, or a passing moment), we see the same perfection, the same moral glory, as in the path He treads daily. As, for instance, that of a Judge, as in Matt. 23:, and that of an Advocate or Pleader in Matt. 22:But I only suggest this:the theme is too abundant. Every step, word, and action carries with it a ray of this glory; and the eye of God had more to fill it in the life of Jesus than it would have had in an eternity of Adam's innocency. It was in the midst of our moral ruin Jesus walked; and from such a region as that He has sent up to the throne on high a richer sacrifice of sweet-smelling savor than Eden, and the Adam of Eden, had it continued unsoiled forever, would or could have rendered. Time made no change in the Lord. Kindred instances of grace and character in Him, before and after His resurrection, give us possession of this truth, which is of such importance to us. We know what He is this moment and what He will be forever from what he has already been-in character as in nature-in relationship to us as well as in Himself-"the same yesterday, and to-day, and forever." The very mention of this is blessed. Sometimes we may be grieved at changes, sometimes we may desire them. In different ways we all prove the fickle, uncertain nature of that which constitutes human life. Not only circumstances, which are changeful to a proverb, but associations, friendships, affections, characters, continually undergo variations which surprise and sadden us. We are hurried from stage to stage of life; but unchilled affections and . unsullied principles are rarely borne along with us, either in ourselves or our companions. But Jesus was the same after His resurrection as He had been before, though late events had put Him and His disciples at a greater distance than companions had ever known or could ever know. They had betrayed their unfaithful hearts, forsaking Him and fleeing in the hour of His weakness and need; while He for their sakes had gone through death-such a death as never could have been borne by another, as would have crushed the creature itself. They were still but poor feeble Galileans,-He was glorified with all power in heaven and on earth.

But these things worked no change; "nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature," as the apostle speaks, could do that. Love defies them all, and He returns to them the Jesus whom they had known before. He is their companion in labor after His resurrection,-nay, after His ascension, as He had been in the days of His ministry and sojourn with them. This we learn in the last verse of St. Mark. On the sea, in the day of Matt. 14:, they thought that they saw a spirit, and cried out for fear; but the Lord gave them to know that it was He Himself that was there, near to them, and in grace, though in divine strength and sovereignty over nature. And so in Luke 24:, or after He was risen, He takes the honeycomb and the fish, and eats before them, that with like certainty and ease of heart they might know that it was He Himself. And He would have them handle Him, and see; telling them that a spirit had not flesh and bones as they might then prove that He had.

In John 3:He led a slow-hearted Rabbi into the light and way of truth, bearing with him in all patient grace. And thus did He again in Luke 24:, after that He was risen, with the two slow-hearted ones who were finding their way home to Emmaus.

In Mark 4:He allayed the fears of His people ere He rebuked their unbelief. He said to the winds and the waves, "Peace:be still," before He said to the disciples, "How is it that ye have no faith?" and thus did He as the risen One in John 21:He sits and dines with Peter in full and free fellowship, as without a breach in the spirit, ere He challenges him and awakens his conscience by the words, "Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou Me ? "

The risen Jesus who appeared to Mary Magdalene, the evangelist takes care to tell us, was He who in other days had cast seven devils out of her-and she herself knew the voice that then called her by her name, as a voice that her ear had long been familiar with. What identity between the humbled and the glorified One,-the Healer of sinners and the Lord of the world to come! How all tell us that, in character as in divine personal glory, He that descended is the same also that ascended! John, too, in company with his risen Lord, is recognized as the one who had leaned on His bosom at the supper. " I am Jesus," was the answer from the ascended place-the very highest place in heaven-the right hand of the throne of the majesty there, when Saul of Tarsus demanded, "Who art Thou, Lord ? " (Acts 9:) And all this is so individual and personal in its application to us. It is our own very selves that are interested in this. Peter, for himself, knows his Master, the same to him before and after the resurrection. In Matt. 16:the Lord rebukes him, but shortly after takes him up to the hill with Him with as full freedom of heart as if nothing had happened. And so with the same Peter,-in John 21:he is again rebuked. He had been busy, as was his way, meddling with what was beyond him. " Lord, what shall this man do ? " says he, looking at John,-and his Master has again to rebuke him-"What is that to thee ? " But again, as in the face of this rebuke, sharp and peremptory as it was, the Lord immediately afterward has him, together with John, in His train, or in His company up to heaven. It was a rebuked Peter who had once gone with the Lord to the holy mount; and it is a rebuked Peter, the same rebuked Peter, who now goes with the Lord to heaven,-or, if we please, to the hill of glory, the mount of transfiguration, a second time.* * Some seem to judge that it was deep love in Peter to John that led him to ask the Lord about him.; I deny that.*

Full indeed of strong consolation is all this. This is Jesus our Lord,-the same yesterday, to-day, and forever,-the same in the day of His ministry, after His resurrection, now in the ascended heavens, and so forever; and as He sustains the same character, and approves Himself by the same grace after as before the resurrection, so does He redeem all His pledges left with His disciples.

Whether it be on His own lips or on the lips of His angels, it is still now as then-since He rose as before He suffered, "Fear not:" He had spoken to His disciples before of giving them His peace, and we find He does this afterward in the most emphatic manner. He pronounces peace upon them in the day of John 20:; and having done so, shows them His hands and His side; where, as in symbolic language, they might read their title to a peace wrought out and purchased for them by Himself,-His peace, entirely His own, as procured only by Himself, and now theirs by indefeasible, unchangeable title.

In earlier days the Lord said to them, "Because I live, ye shall live also;" and now in risen days, in the days of the risen Man, in possession of victorious life, He imparts that life to them in the most full and perfect measure of it, breathing on them, and saying, " Receive ye the Holy Ghost."

The world was not to see Him again, as He had also said to them; but they were to see Him. And so it comes to pass. He was seen of them for forty days, and He spake to them of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. But this was all in secret:the world has not seen Him since the hour of Calvary, nor will they till they see Him in judgment. J. G. B.

(To be continued.)

Whenever we get into trial, we may feel confident that, with the trial, there is an issue, and all we need is, a broken will, and a single eye to see it.

(1 Sam. 30:) The most faithful servants of God have not been perfect. Moses, the meekest man in all the earth, "spake unadvisedly with his lips." Peter, a truly devoted man, learned from bitter experience that he could put "no confidence in the flesh." David is, in some respects, the most beautiful and striking type we have of Christ in the Old Testament, both in his rejection and his elevation to the throne. In all the time of his persecution by king Saul, he exhibited both a forbearance toward his enemy and a faith in God which are very beautiful. Again and again he refused to take his case in his own hands, but committed all to the One who had called and anointed him.

It is therefore specially painful to see the faith of such an .one fail, and to hear him say, in his heart, '' I shall now perish one day by the hand of Saul :there is nothing better for me than that I should speedily escape into the land of the Philistines." How prone are God's people to leave His land, the place of His appointment ! A famine drove Abraham into Egypt, where he learned that the path of sight, apparently easier than that of faith, ends in sorrow and shame. Isaac doubtless would have gone the same way, had he not been restrained by a distinct word. Since that day the road from the land into Egypt has been much traveled by the Lord's people, who, under stress of circumstances, have thought to get relief, away from God's path-a sad mistake. No matter what the trial may be, it is light if we remain in God's place with a good conscience, compared with the sorrow and chastening which accompany departure from Him. Naomi is a striking example of this. " I went out full, and the Lord hath brought me home again empty." Ah! how slow we arc to realize that perfect love has chosen our path, and that perfect wisdom knows exactly what is best for us.

It was in the face of distinct preservation from the king, and indeed of strange, if but temporary melting on his part, that David made the unbelieving remark we have quoted above. "Then said Saul, 'I have sinned; return, my son David; for I will no more do thee harm ; because my soul was precious in thine eyes this day :behold, I have played the fool, and have erred exceedingly.'" (i Sam. 26:21.) If he wanted to walk by sight, here seemed to be a relenting on the part of the king which would for a time, at least, insure him quietness; but unbelief is without reason and once indulged will lead us on in a path farther and farther from that which counts on God alone. And so he finds himself in the land of his and God's enemies whom he had oftentimes met and overcome in battle, but to whom he now goes for protection. Le us not be too severe with him; let us rather remember our own inconsistencies in this very respect, and how they have led us to adopt courses for ourselves which we have condemned in others.

Humanly speaking, it was a wise move on his part, but he had left the place which God had chosen for him, and substituted as a protector, king Achish, of Gath-his name signifying, " truly a man,"-for the living God. And this was the very man who at the beginning of his rejection had refused shelter to David; before whom he had feigned himself a madman, until he rose to the dignity of dependence upon God, and went to the cave of Adullam-his true place.

Now he is back again in the same place, and in what strange inconsistencies is he involved. An enemy to God's enemies he must fight them, but with the courage to do that he at the same time uses deception and fears to acknowledge it to Achish. Strangest of all, he is found in the Philistine army ready to go up to Apheh to take part in battle against king Saul, the Lord's anointed. He who had refused to lift up his hand against the king of Israel is actually now found in the ranks of the enemy, and but for the mercy of God would have been found in that clay of Israel's sorrow and humiliation fighting against the very people over whom he had been anointed king, or what would have been also a blot upon his good faith, he would have turned against the Philistines in the day of battle. God does not want His servants to be traitors. He would never have them in such compromising positions that such a thing would be possible.

But the disgrace of fighting in the enemy's ranks is prevented by the Philistines, and, with a vigorous protest of faithfulness to their cause, David is compelled to retire. God in mercy would not let His servant go further in this path of unbelief.

And now begins the chastening which is to bring him back to the simplicity of his confidence in God. He came to Ziklag, the place where his family and possessions were, only to find the city a mass of smoking ruins, and those whom he loved carried away captive. If he can be willing to go with the enemy, another enemy can come upon him and spoil him. It was no doubt a bitter moment for David. His little all had vanished. "Then David and the people that were with him lifted up their voice and wept until they had no more power to weep." Ah! now he is beginning to taste the bitterness of being without the protection of God. As a homeless wanderer, pursued like a partridge upon the mountains, despised by the Nabals, who dwelt at ease in the land, he had never known the like of this. But now, under the protection of the king of Gath, and with a city of his own, he learns that without God's shelter he is exposed indeed. In the first shock of disappointment he can only weep:all seems lost. Perhaps we may know from experience something of his gloom. We have been hoarding for many a day to get a little about us, to make a comfortable home it maybe, and it is all taken from us. Perhaps it is bereavement that comes, and in the bitterness of the grief all seems to be against us. He is aroused from the lethargy of his grief by the anger of his faithful followers. Those who had been with him in the cave of Adullam, and shared without a murmur, so far as we know, his perils and trials, now speak of stoning him. His troubles accumulate. But this is God's way to bring him back to Himself. And at last we read that he no longer will place himself under human protection-it has sadly failed him. When all things are against him, David's faith comes back,-he turns to the One who had never failed, and from whom he had sadly departed. "But David encouraged himself in the Lord his God." Ah! blessed is the trial, no matter how heavy,-precious the disappointment, no matter how bitter, that can result thus! He is back now to God; and that, for him and for us all, means back in the place of blessing. Better, far better, to be in the midst of the black ruins of Ziklag, surrounded by a threatening mob, than in the ranks of the Philistines fighting against God's beloved people.

Have we, beloved brethren, in any way known what bitter disappointment means ? and have we in the midst of it turned to the One who has smitten us, and encouraged ourselves in Him ? Then, like David, we can say, "It is good for me that I have been afflicted; for before I was afflicted I went astray, but now have I kept Thy word."

And how encouraging this is to all who are borne down with great sorrow. Never can it be so great, the disappointment can be never so keen, but we can find relief in God-in the very one who has sent the sorrow upon us. This faith in God, springing up among the ruins of all he had, was a precious and a beautiful thing. It marked a great turning-point in his life.

Nor does it stop here. His next step is, to inquire what can be done. Notice, he does not rush after the enemy who had done the mischief. He first inquires of God in the appointed way, and finds out what must be done. His restless self-confidence has disappeared, his soul is again like a weaned child. God shall now be his guide. Is not this a beautiful lesson? "Shall I pursue after this troop? shall I overtake them ?" Ah! he is in the right path now; and if he does not move rapidly, he goes surely. Would that we could learn to imitate him! for our efforts to undo the results of our own folly and unbelief are often but a fresh going on in the path which brought the chastening upon us. And this will end only in fresh disappointment. "Be still, and know that I am God " is the word we need to hear, and to let the hand that has smitten us lead us in the plain path that He alone knows. This is most needful, and one of the surest signs that disappointment and sorrow have been blessed to us is, to see this spirit of dependence on God.

And this brings us to the place of victory. This nerves them, weak as they may be, and, with some left behind, to press on after the enemy, to overtake them, and to recover that which had been lost. They arc now, too, in a state to enjoy their recovered possessions. They will not be a snare to them. When God takes a thing out of our hands to teach us a lesson we need to learn, He can, after we have learned that lesson, put the thing back in our hands. This He often, not always, does. But faith is now in its right place, and can appreciate recovered blessings, receiving them now from God.

But there is more to see. Only a portion of the men had the strength and energy to follow David over the brook Besor, to overtake and vanquish the spoilers. What about those who " tarried at home "? Pride and selfishness might say that they should not share in the fruits of the victory; but one who had been truly restored in his soul, like David,-who knew what his own failure had been, and how all was due to God alone, would permit no such selfishness. Those who remained at home were to share in the victory. This is true largeness of heart, and always marks one who has learned in God's school. Others may want to stint those with less faith and energy; he will rejoice to give them what he has gained. It is always comparatively few who do the active work of recovering truth, for instance; but it would be niggardly indeed to deprive any of God's people of the fullest enjoyment of what has been won. We need to remember this. If God has in mercy restored to us any truths of His Word, we owe it to the whole Church to impart it to as many as will receive it. "Feed the flock of God,"-not part of it, but all,- any who will share with us what we have won back from the spoiler, not hampered in our ministry by the fact that "he followeth not with us."

Thus, out of the ruins of Ziklag, and out of the ruins of his testimony, David rises to a brighter faith step by step,-dependence, looking for guidance, energy to pursue the enemy, and largeness of heart to share the spoil with all. So did Gideon in his victory.

The next notice we have of David's movements is, the childlike inquiry, " Shall I go up into any of the cities of Judah ?" He had left them, inquiring of his own heart only; he will only go back as God may guide. And how fitting it is that he should be sent back to Hebron-"communion "! It is ever back to this that God would call us. He would never have us leave the place of communion; and if we do, He would call us back, and we can thank Him well if He gets us back at the cost of disappointment and sorrow.

No one would think of bringing a lighted candle to add brightness to the sun at mid-day ; and yet the man who would do so might well be accounted wise, in comparison with him who attempts to assist God by his bustling officiousness.

(Continued from page 153.)

Having, then, seen in these first few verses the purpose of the book and the stand-point of the writer, we may accompany him in the details of his search. First he repeats, what is of the greatest importance for us to remember(5:12), "I, the preacher, was king over Israel in Jerusalem."He would not have us forget that, should he fail in his search for perfect satisfaction, it will not be because he is not fully qualified both by his abilities and his position to succeed. But Infidelity, and its kinsman Rationalism, raise a joyful shout over this verse; for to disconnect the books of the Bible from the writers, whose name they tear, is a long step toward overthrowing the authority of those books altogether. If the believer's long-settled confidence can be proved vain in one point, and that so important a point, there is good"hope"of eventually overthrowing it altogether. So, with extravagant protestations of loyalty to the Scriptures, they, Joab like, "kiss" and "stab" simultaneously, wonderfully manifesting in word and work that dual form of the evil one, who, our Lord tells us, was both "liar and murderer from the beginning." And many thousand professing Christians are like Amasa of old, their ear is well pleased with the fair sound of "Art thou in health, my brother?" and they too take"no heed to the sword "in the inquirer's hand. Judas too, in his day, illustrates strongly that same diabolical compound of "deceit and violence," only the enemy finds no unwary Amasa in Jesus the Lord.

" Betrayest thou the Son of man with a kiss" tears the vail from him at once ; and in the same way the feeblest believer who abides in Him, is led of that same spirit; and "good words and fair speeches " do not deceive, nor can betrayal be hidden behind the warmest protestations of affection.

But to return:"How could,"cries this sapient infidelity, which to-day has given itself the modest name of "Higher Criticism,"-"how could Solomon say, ' I was king,' when he never ceased to be that? " Ah ! one fears if that same Lord were to speak once more as of old, He would again say, "O fools and blind !" For is it not meet that the writer who is about to give recital of his experiences should first tell us what his position was at the very time of those experiences ? That at the very time of all these exercises, disappointments, and groanings, he was still the highest monarch on earth, king over an undivided Israel, in Jerusalem, with all the resources and glories that accompany this high station, preeminently fitting him to speak with authority, and compelling us to listen with the profoundest respect and attention.

Yes, this glorious monarch "gives his heart "-1:e., applies himself with singleness of purpose "to seek and search out by wisdom concerning all things that are done under heaven." No path that gives the slightest promise of leading to happiness shall be untrodden;-no pleasure shall be denied, no toil be shirked, that shall give any hope of satisfaction or rest. " This sore travail hath God given to the sons of men to be exercised therewith." That is, the heart of man hungers and thirsts, and he must search till he does find something to satisfy, and, if, alas ! he fail to find it in "time," if he only drinks here of waters whereof he "that drinks shall thirst again," eternity shall find him thirsting still, and crying for one drop of water to cool his tongue. But then with what bitter despair Ecclesiastes records all these searchings ! "I have seen all the works that are done under the sun, and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit," or rather, "pursuit of the wind." Exactly seven times he uses this term, "pursuit of the wind," expressing perfect, complete, despairing failure in his quest. He finds things all wrong, but he has no power of righting them; "that which is crooked cannot be made straight, and that which is wanting cannot be numbered." But perhaps we may get the secret of his failure in his next words. He takes a companion or counselor in his search. Again exactly seven times he takes counsel with this companion, "his own heart." "I communed with my own heart." That is the level of the book ; the writer's resources are all within himself ; no light from without save that which nature gives ; no taking hold on another, no hand clasped by another. He and his heart are alone. Ah! that is dangerous, as well as dreary work to take counsel with one's own heart. "Fool" and "lawless one" come to their foolish and wicked conclusions there (Ps. 14:10:); and what else than " folly" could be expected in hearkening to that which is '' deceitful above all things"-what else than lawlessness in taking counsel with that which is "desperately wicked "?

Take not, then, for thy counselor "thine own heart," when divine love has placed infinite wisdom and knowledge at the disposal of lowly faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, "who of God is made unto us
wisdom," and "in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge."

But does our Preacher find the rest he desires in the path of his own wisdom ? Not at all. " For in much wisdom is much grief, and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow." " Grief and sorrow " ever growing, ever increasing, the further he treads that attractive and comparatively elevated path of human wisdom. Nor has Solomon been a lonely traveler along that road. Thousands of the more refined of Adam's sons have chosen it ; but none have gone beyond "the king," and none have discovered any thing in it, but added '' grief and sorrow"-sorrowful groan! But the youngest of God's family has his feet too on a path of " knowledge," and he may press along that path without the slightest fear of "grief or sorrow" resulting from added knowledge. Nay, a new song shall be in his mouth, "Grace and peace shall be multiplied through the knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord." (2 Pet. 1:2.) Blessed contrast! "Sorrow and grief " multiplied through growth in human wisdom:"Grace and peace " multiplied through growth in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord !

My beloved reader, I pray you, meditate a little on this striking and precious contrast. Here is Solomon in all his glory, with a brighter halo of human wisdom round his head than ever had any of the children of men. Turn to i Kings 4:29-"And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the sea-shore. And Solomon's wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the east country and all the wisdom of Egypt. For he was wiser than all men,-than Ethan the Ezrahite, and Heman and Chalcol and Darda the sons of Mahol:and his fame was in all nations round about. And he spake three thousand proverbs, and his songs were a thousand and five. And he spake of trees- from the cedar-tree that is in Lebanon, even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall:he spake also of beasts, and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes. And there came all people to hear the wisdom of Solomon, from all kings of the earth, which had heard of his wisdom." Is it not a magnificent ascription of abounding wisdom ? What field has it not capacity to explore ? Philosophy in its depths- poetry in its beauties-botany and zoology in their wonders. Do we envy him ? Then listen to what his poor heart was groaning all that time. " In much wisdom is much grief, and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow"! Now turn to our portion above the sun-"the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord:" infinitely higher, deeper, lovelier, and more wondrous than the fields explored by Solomon, in constant unfoldings of riches of wisdom; and each new unfolding bringing its own sweet measure of "grace and peace." Have not the lines fallen to us in pleasant places ? Have we not a goodly heritage ? Take the feeblest of the saints of God of to-day, and had Solomon in all his glory a lot like one of these ? F. C. J.

(To be continued.)

" Take heed" !"Everyman's work shall be tried.

We are laborers together
In the harvest-field for God;
Some may plow and some may harrow,
All may sow the blessed Word;
'Tis the precious seed that springeth,
And a plenteous harvest bringeth,-
'Tis our only weapon:this the Spirit's Word.

He that planteth, he that watereth,
Work together, e'en as one;
The reward shall be according
To the work that each hath" done.
Let us labor till the reaping,
For the judgment's surely creeping
On poor souls that through' our efforts might be won.

Through the Spirit's noiseless labor
God is building living stones ;
Let us be His willing helpers,
For our work He gladly owns:
We may give out many a warning-,-
We can tell of that glad morning
When forever this poor world shall cease its groans.

Let us faint not, nor be weary,
The foundation well is laid,
And we've only to be careful
To build "precious things," He said.
Let us work, then, not for hire,
But with love-constrained desire,
That the Master's last command may be obeyed.

(Don't forget the closet, brethren,-
Here is where so many fail !
Need we wonder if we're heavy,
Or our hearts begin to quail ?)
Let us pray, then, without ceasing,-
Look to God for the increasing;
Thus, on Him depending, we can never fail.

Then, if courage seem to fail us
With the smallness of our gain,
Just remember, God works with us,-
This will soothe all needless pain,
And the glorious harvest-morning
Will reveal (His crown adorning,)
Souls of those we never thought to meet again.

H. McD.

It has been long held by farmers that the neighborhood of barberry bushes produces rust in wheat, and science has recently established this opinion-has shown that the well-known orange-red spots so common on the leaves of the barberry, caused by a fungus, develop minute secondary seeds, which appear on the wheat in the shape of rust. A barberry hedge was recently planted on one of the railway embankments in the Cote-d'-Or, in France, when immediately the crops of wheat, rye, and barley in the neighborhood became infested with rust- which was unknown before in the district. The railway company's own commissioners, after investigating the case, admitted that the account of the origin of the disease given by the farmers was correct, and considered them entitled to compensation. So, also, a species of blight on the pear-tree is closely connected with a glutinous parasite which grows on the juniper.

Analogous to this natural fact is the spiritual one, that "evil communications corrupt good manners." We have a tendency to become like those with whom we associate; and if our friends are tainted with special evil practices, we lie very much at their mercy, if not to ruin us, yet to make us unhappy and sin-stained-to rob us of self-respect, and cloud us with perplexity. Christians are not altogether exempt from the common failing of falling into worldly and not scriptural estimates of men and things-of being misled by the customs of society, and adopting the peculiar conventional code of morality followed by the multitude among whom they live. Instead of giving examples of a higher standard of morality, they descend to the level of the average rate. The evils of the world cleave to them; their very Christianity is infected with worldliness, and thus becomes stunted, diseased, and uninfluential. ("The True Vine," by Hugh McMillan.)

AN EXPOSITION OF REVELATION IV.-XXII.

PART VII. (Chap. 19:5-22:) THE CONSUMMATION.

Closing Testimonies.(Chap. 22:6-21.)

The series of visions is thus completed. What remains is the emphasizing of its authority for the soul, with all that belongs to Him whose revelation it is, and who is Himself coming speedily. Thus the angel now affirms that "these words are faithful and true :" necessarily so, because of Him whose words they are. " The Lord God of the spirits of the prophets hath sent His angel to show unto His servants things which must soon come to pass." Here we return to the announcement of the first chapter. The book is, above all, a practical book. It is not for theorists or dreamers, but for servants,-words which are to be kept, and to have application to their service in the Church and in the world.

The things themselves were soon to come to pass. In fact, the history of the Church, as the opening epistles depict it, could be found imaged, as we see, in the condition of existing assemblies. The seeds of the future already existed, and were silently growing up, even with the growth (externally) of Christianity itself. As to the visions following the epistles also, from the sixth chapter on, we have acknowledged the partial truth of what is known as the historical fulfillment of these. It is admitted that there has been an anticipative fulfillment in Christian times of that which has definite application to the time of the end, although it is the last only that has been, in general, dwelt upon in these pages.

Historicalists will not be satisfied with such an admission, and refusing on their side (as they mostly do) the general bearing of the introductory epistles upon the history of the Church at large, insist upon such affirmations as the present as entirely conclusive that the historical interpretation is the only true one. In fact, the view which has been here followed brings nearest to those in the apostles' days the things announced, as well as makes the whole book far more fruitful and important for the guidance of servants. For how many generations must they have waited before the seals and trumpets would speak to these ? And when they did, how much of guidance would they furnish for practical walk? The application of Babylon the great to Romanism is fully accepted, and that of Jezebel in the same way insisted on, so that as to the errors of popery, we are as protestant as any, if in the " beasts " of the thirteenth chapter we find something beyond this. But nothing of this could have been intelligible to the saints of the early centuries, while the fulfillment of Ephesus, Smyrna, and even Pergamos, would soon be of the first importance.

"The Lord God of the spirits of the prophets"-the reading now generally admitted to be right-emphasizes for us the presence of the living God as what was for these the constant realization, in all the shifting scenes of human history. And so it is for those whose spirit is in harmony with them. God in past history, God in the events happening under our eyes, His judgment therefore of every tiling, while controlling every thing, for His own glory and for the blessing of His people.-in this respect how blessed to be guided by those wondrous revelations ! While the future, to be learnt from the same infallible teaching, is not only that which animates our hopes, but is necessary for the judgment of the present, no less. All lines lead on to the full end, there where the full light gives the manifestation of all.

"And behold, I come quickly." This is for the heart:future as long as we are down here ; and yet to govern the present. ''Blessed is he that keepeth the words of the prophecy of this book."

Here we are warned of the mistakes that may be made by the holiest of men in the most fervent occupation with heavenly things. John falls at the angel's feet to worship him ; but the angel refuses it, claiming no higher title than to be a fellow-servant with John himself, with his brethren the prophets, and with those also who keep the words of this book. And he adds, "Worship God:"-worship, that is, no creature.

Unlike Daniel's prophecies, the words of the prophecy of this book are not to be sealed up, for the time is near. To the Christian, brought face to face with the coming of the Lord, the end is always near. What time might actually elapse was another question. In fact, some eighteen centuries have elapsed since this was written :but while Daniel was taught to look on through a vista of many generations to the end before him, Christians, taught to be always in an attitude of expectation, have before them no such necessary interval, and are brought into the full light now, though unbelief and wrong teaching may obscure it. But nothing in this way is under a vail, save the moment whose concealment is meant to encourage expectation. How good for us, and fruitful such concealment, may be measured by the goodness and fruitfulness of the expectation itself.

The solemn words are just ready to be uttered which proclaim the close of the day of grace to those who have refused grace. It is just ready to be said, " Let him that doeth unrighteously do unrighteously still ; and let the filthy make himself filthy still ; and let him that is righteous do righteousness still ; and he that is holy, let him be sanctified still." And when this applies is shown clearly in the next words, " Behold, I come quickly, and My reward with Me, to render to every one as his work shall be :I, the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last." The last affirmation here shows the irrevocable character of this judgment. He sums up in Himself all wisdom, all power:"none can stay His hand, or say unto Him, What doest Thou ? "

The way of life and the way of death are now put in contrast :" Blessed are they that wash their robes, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city." Here is the condition of blessing stated according to the character of Revelation, in terms that have been used before. Our robes must be washed in the blood of the Lamb, as those of the redeemed multitude in the vision under the seals, in order to be arrayed in the white garments that are granted to the Lamb's wife. A very old corruption in this text is that exhibited in the common version, "Blessed are they that do His commandments;" but which is the true reading ought to be apparent at once. It is not by keeping commandments than any one can acquire a right to the tree of life. On the other hand, condemnation is for committed evil :"without are dogs, and sorcerers, and fornicators, and murderers, and idolaters, and every one that loveth and maketh a lie."

Again it is repeated, "I, Jesus, have sent Mine angel to testify these things unto you in the assemblies; " and then He declares Himself in the two relations among men in which the book has spoken of Him :" I am the Root and the Offspring of David "-the Jewish relation, the divine incarnate King of Israel,-"the bright and Morning Star,"-the object of expectation for the Christian. But immediately He is named-or rather names Himself in this way, the heart of the Bride, moved by the Spirit, awakes:"And the Spirit and the Bride say, ' Come !' " But because it is yet the day of grace, and the Bride is still open to receive accessions it is added, "And let him that heareth say, 'Come!'" And if one answer, " Ah, but my heart is yet unsatisfied," it is further said, " And let him that is athirst come ; he that will, let him take the water of life freely."

Blessed is this testimony. The precious gifts of God are not restricted in proportion to their preciousness, but the reverse. In nature, sunlight, fresh air, the water-brooks, things the most necessary, are on that account bestowed freely upon all. And in the spiritual realm there is no barrier to reception of the best gifts, save that which the soul makes for itself. Not only so, but men are urged to come,-to take,-to look,-with no uncertainty of result for those who do so. The stream that makes glad the city of God is poured out for the satisfaction of all who thirst, and will but stoop to drink of it. This is the closing testimony of the gospel in this book, and that with which it is associated adds amazingly to its solemnity.

There is now another warning, neither to add to, nor to take from the words of the prophecy of this book. Scripture has many similar admonitions, but here the penalty is an unutterably solemn one. To him that adds, God shall add the plagues that are written in this book. From him who takes away, God shall take away his part from the tree of life and from the holy city. Yet men are now not scrupulous at least to take away many of the words of Scripture, and of Revelation among the rest. Every word is claimed here by the Lord Himself for God ; and if this is not a claim for verbal inspiration, what is it ? As manifestly the closing book of New-Testament scripture, what may we not infer as to the verbal inspiration of other parts? And what shall be the woe of those who dare presumptuously to meddle with that which is the authoritative communication of the mind of God to man? Is it not being done? and by those who own that somewhere at least-and they cannot pretend to know exactly the limit,-Scripture contains the Word of God ?

This announcement of penalty is Christ's own word :"He who testifieth these things saith, ' Surely, I come quickly.' " Is it not when His Word is being thus dealt with that we may more than ever expect Himself? When the testimony of Scripture is being invalidated and denied, is it not then that we may most expect the Faithful and True Witness to testify in person ? And especially when this arises in the most unlocked for places, and Church-teachers laboriously work out a theology of unbelief ?

And the promise abides as the hope of the Church, although it be true that the Bridegroom has tarried, and the virgins have slept ! That-true or false-a cry has been raised, " Behold, the Bridegroom cometh !" is notorious. That many have stirred and taken up the old attitude of expectancy is also true. All these things should surely be significant also. But whatever one's head may say,-whatever the doctrine we have received and hold as to the coming of our Lord and Master,-the heart of the truly faithful must surely say with the apostle here, "Even so, come, Lord Jesus."

It is the only response that answers to the assurance of His love on His departure to the Father:"In My Father's house are many mansions ; if it were not so, I would have told you ; I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go, I will come again, and receive you unto My self, that where I am, ye may be also."
The Lord's coming-the parousia-is just the " presence " of the Lord Himself. Nothing short of this could satisfy the hearts of those who looked up after Him, as He ascended with His hands spread in blessing over them ; and were reassured by the angels' voices, that this same Jesus would come again. Just in proportion as we too have learnt by the Spirit the power of the love of Jesus, we too shall be satisfied with this, and with this alone. May we learn more deeply what is this cry of the Spirit and the Bride :"Amen, come, Lord Jesus." F. W. G.

Death is not the normal condition of the child of God. Life-in all its manifestations, both in this world and elsewhere-is what God gives. "He is not the God of the dead, but of the living." "In Him we live and move and have our being." He is the "living God," and death in itself means only separation from Him. So we read, "By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin." It is the dark accompanying shadow of sin. "The wages of sin is death."

We need not remind the reader that the death spoken of in the scriptures quoted is something more than bodily dissolution ; nor of the blessed fact, as we shall see later, that, for the child of God, the sting has been taken from death and the victory from the grave. We are simply premising this fact-that death is an abnormal thing, an interloper, if we may so speak, into God's fair creation where He pronounced all "very good; " and that now for the child of God it is not the final goal toward which he is tending, nor is the state of the blessed dead that in which they will spend eternity.

The " blessed hope " of the believer is not to spend a long and useful life in this world, then to lie peacefully down in the grave, and as to his soul, to be in heaven happy forever;-

"An honored life, a peaceful end, And heaven to crown it all."

Nowhere in the New Testament is death mentioned as the hope of the child of God, or as the inevitable close of his earthly course. He may have a desire to depart and be with Christ, as being far better than his present surroundings; he may be both confident and willing to be absent from the body and present with the Lord. But death is not what he looks forward to; rather life, life untrammeled, in its fullness. True he meditates much upon death, but it is the death of his Substitute, who "abolished death, and brought life and incorruptibility to light through the gospel." He looks back at Calvary, and sees death, his death, as he deserved to undergo it, borne by Christ; and now he looks, not at the tomb, but "steadfastly up into heaven " through the vail, which has been rent in twain. He waits, not for death, but for the Lord, who liveth, and was dead, and is alive for evermore, who will come in person and take all His redeemed ones up away from even bodily death. '' We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, .in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump." Even the semblance of death shall not be tasted. This is the "blessed hope " (not an uncertain thing, but, as being future, something to be looked forward to) which the child of God is privileged now to enjoy.

"But," it is said, "Christians do die." Certainly, and as long as the time of Christ's patience and the long-suffering of God wait, they will continue to do so. But how soon all this may change! Who can say when the Lord will come for His own ? His own words are, " Surely I come quickly." If the adverb at the beginning of that brief sentence establishes the certainty of His coming, so the one at the close impresses us with the nearness of that coming. Not another saint may fall asleep, not another day may pass, before the "shout" shall be heard, and we shall be "clothed upon with our house which is from heaven."

And what a blessed hope this is! Can we conceive of any thing which could be added to it which would really increase its brightness ? If we know this to be true, let it be our aim to let our lives feel the power and manifest it.
But it is of this intermediate state that we would now speak, in the hope that a repetition of truths familiar perhaps to all, may soothe some grief-burdened heart, for the Lord has sorrowing people here, and few have lived on into maturity some years who have not felt the pang of parting from dear ones, and yearned for true comfort. How good it is that in the precious Word of God we have the amplest comfort. He who is "the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort " meeting the mourner, and ready here to "wipe away all tears" for faith, as He will actually do it in the day of His power.

"Absent from the body" gives us the negative side, upon which we will first dwell a little. The body is the mortal, and the only mortal, part of man:'' your mortal body " reminds us of the word to Adam, "Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return." He was dust as to his body, not as to the spirit which God breathed into him, and which made man a "living soul." Until sin came in, there was no hint that the body was mortal, and it would never have come under the power of death had man continued unfallen. Sin, and death by sin, is the order, reminding us of the terrible folly of man in departing from the living God,-a folly which God has overruled in grace, and brought in by redemption greater blessings than we lost in Eden. So when we speak of a mortal body, we are reminded of the sin that made the body mortal. This is the connection in the words quoted- "Let not sin reign in your mortal body." (Rom. 6:12.) To be absent, then, from the mortal body means to be absent from the presence of sin. Here we have one of the greatest blessings brought by death. To be sure, even now faith should so enter into the reality of Christ's death that we should "reckon ourselves to be dead indeed unto sin." But when a child of God is absent from the body, he no longer reckons himself to be dead to sin; he literally is, and so is away from its presence. Apart from Christ's death, by which He "put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself," it is needless to say that the death of the child of God would give no deliverance. Through grace, the believer may and should enjoy deliverance from the power of sin in this life. But who is there who must not say with James, "In many things, we all offend "? and with Paul "buffet the body and bring it into subjection,"-by the Spirit mortify its deeds? But at death this is all changed. The body is left, and no longer needs to be watched and kept in subjection. The old nature which lurked in that body, "the flesh,'' named from its dwelling-place, is laid aside too, and the spirit is at length perfectly free from the power and the presence of sin. To the one who longs for likeness to God, to be absolutely conformed to the image of His Son, what joy does death bring! The world may look upon it with horror, but the believer can say, as one did, "How have I dreaded as an enemy this smiling friend! "

No more sin, no desire, or the least motion toward it; that is what the believer gets at death. As the shorter catechism says, "The souls of believers are at death made perfect in holiness;" and while we desire no creed to mold our faith, it is well to recognize the faith of those who wrote that sentence.

But absence from the body suggests other thoughts. The body is our link with this world-a world full of groans and sorrows. If the saint is to "rejoice in the Lord always," he is also sorrowing. God's fair world has become a place of signs. "The whole creation groaneth;" we, who have received the first-fruits of the Spirit, groan too. Unless we blind our eyes and harden our hearts, there is enough misery here to make the heart ache from sheer pity. Then our individual sorrows-and the heart knoweth its own bitterness,-all these things are voiced in that word, " We that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened." To be absent from the body means to be free from these sorrows. It means to be free from the surroundings of earth and earth's circumstances.

But those who are absent from the body have left its infirmities and pains behind. It is sad to see the limitations which hamper so many-a frail body, oft-recurring pain and sickness, and the infirmities of old; age. To leave the body is to leave all these infirmities and pains; and while we should and do get good out of such trials, what a relief it is to be beyond the need and so beyond the fact of having them!

But we have been only looking at the negative side of death-at what we leave. We come now to dwell upon the positive side-at what we reach. It is summed up in one word-"Present with the Lord." That means every thing. '' In Thy presence is full-of joy." Death is a gloomy thing to those here, but to the one who departs it is fullness of joy. Stephen met death by stoning,-that was the earth-side view. He looked up into heaven and '' saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God." That was the heaven-side view. "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit"-he is "absent from the body and at home with the Lord." What an exchange! the blessedness of the Lord's presence for the cursings and stones of the Jews. No wonder that he could say, "Lord, lay not this sin to their charge."

Do we know Christ ? Then we know something of the blessedness of being with Him. Redemption, as made known by the Spirit, fills the heart with peace and joy. With Christ, its fullness will be more deeply known. The person of the Lord, as known now, is most precious. With Him, He becomes better known, and therefore more deeply loved. The limits here are removed there, and the whole time is taken up with Him. If one hour of communion here is so sweet that the savor of it lingers, what shall we say of that uninterrupted fellowship with the Son-learning the depths of His love, the wonders of His grace ? If it seems a sort of blank to us, does not that tell how little we enjoy Him here ? Little wonder was it that Paul, whose whole heart went out in love to Christ, and his whole life in service, could say, "Having a desire to depart and be with, Christ, which is better." How such words as those silence at once the suggestion that death is unconsciousness, a sleep of the soul. Would it be far better for Paul, who enjoyed Christ as he did, in the midst of trial, to become unconscious, to be practically extinct ? Never. It was far better to die, because he would then be with the One he loved, and away from all else, at leisure to enjoy Him as he sought to enjoy Him here.

And now, as we realize the blessed portion of those that are asleep, can we not give God thanks that they are with the Lord, in heaven, for He is there and they are with Him ? As bereaved we mourn, but we arc not to sorrow "as others who have no hope." We can look at death and say, "O death, where is thy sting ?" Christ has taken away the sting, which is sin. We can look at the grave and say, "O grave, where is thy victory?" Christ has won the victory, and by His resurrection has left us an open grave with the way out. May not all God's sorrowing people learn to rejoice at the blessing which the sleeping saints enjoy ? And would not this spirit of joy and praise be as a tonic to enable them to pick up afresh the duties of this life, and to go on, with firmness and progress, in the path appointed. And it is only a very little while. The Lord Himself will soon come. There will be no more mourning then; but now is the time of trial and of opportunity, to suffer and to do for Him, who suffered and did so much for us.

" When the weary ones we love
Enter on their rest above;
When their words of love and cheer
Fall no longer on our ear;
Hush! be every murmur dumb,
It is only 'till He come.' "

(Continued from page 116.)

And this is just the purpose of the whole book, to furnish such striking contrasts whereby the "new" is set off in its glories against the dark background of the "old," – rest against labor, hope against despair, song against groan ; and so the third verse puts this very explicitly, – "What profit hath a man of all his labor which he taketh under the sun ? " The wisest and the greatest of men is seeking for an answer to this question. And this verse is too important in its bearing on the whole book to permit our passing it without looking at that significant word "profit" a little closer. And here one feels the advantage of those helps that a gracious God has put into our hands in these days of special attack upon His revelation, whereby even the unlearned may, by a little diligence, arrive at the exact shade of meaning of a word. The word "profit," then, is, in the Hebrew, yihrohn, and is found in this exact form only in this book, where it is translated "profit," as here, or "excellency," as in chap. 2:13. The Septuagint translates it into a Greek one, meaning "advantage," or perhaps more literally, "that which remains over and above." In Eph. 3:20 it is rendered "exceeding abundantly above." Hence, we gather that our word intends to convey to it the question, "After life is over, after man has given his labor, his time, his powers, and his talents, what has he received in exchange that shall satisfy him for all that he has lost ? Do the pleasures obtained during life fully compensate for what is spent in obtaining them ? do they satisfy ? and do they remain to him as "profit" over and above that expenditure? In a word, what "under the sun " can satisfy the longing, thirsting, hungering heart of man, so that he can say, '' My heart is filled to overflowing, its restless longings are stilled, I have found a food that satisfies its hunger, a water that quenches its thirst " ? A question all-important, surely, and it will be well worth listening to the experience of this seeker, who is filled far above his fellows for finding this satisfactory good, if it can be found "under the sun."

First, then, the preacher, like a good workman, takes account of what material he has to work with. " Have I," he says, " any thing that others have not had, or can I hope to find any thing that has not been before?" At once he is struck with that "law of circuit" that is stamped on every thing:generation follows generation; but no new earth, that remains ever the same; the sun wheels ceaselessly in its one course; the winds circle from point to point, but whirl about to their starting-place; the waters, too, follow the same law, and keep up one unbroken circuit. Where can rest be found in such a scene ? Whilst there is unceasing change, nothing is new; it is but a repetition of what has been before, and which again soon passes, leaving the heart empty and hungry still. Again, then, let us use this dark background to throw forward another scene. See, even now, "above the sun" Him who is the Head and perfect Exponent of the creation called the new. Is there any law of constant unsatisfying circuit in Him? Nay, indeed, every sight we get of Him is new; each revelation of Himself perfectly satisfies, and yet awakens appetite for further views of Himself.

"No pause, no change those pleasures
Shall ever seek to know;
The drought that lulls our thirsting
But wakes that thirst anew."

Or, again, look at that blessed ''law of circuit" spoken of in another way by one who has indeed been enlightened by a light "above the sun " in every sense of the word, in 2 Cor. 9:It is not the circling of winds or waters, but of " grace " direct from the blessed God Himself. Mark the perfection stamped upon it both by its being a complete circle-never ending, but returning to its Source,-and by the numerical stamp of perfection upon it in its seven distinct parts (or movements) as shown by the sevenfold recurrence of the word "all," or "every,"(both coming from the same Greek word.

1. "God is able to make all grace abound unto you :" there is an inexhaustible source. We may come and come and come again, and never find that fountain lowered by all our drafts upon it. Sooner, far sooner, should the ocean be emptied by a tea-cup than infinite "power" and "love" impoverished by all that all His saints could draw from Him. All grace.

2. "That ye always." There is no moment when this circle of blessing need stop flowing. It is ever available. No moment-by day or night; in the quiet of the closet or in the activities of the day's duties; when in communion with friends or in the company of foes; when that grace is not available. At all times.

3. "Having all sufficiency"-perfect competence to meet just the present emergency. A sufficiency, let us mark, absolutely independent of nature's resources,-a sufficiency beautifully illustrated by '' unlearned and ignorant" Peter and John in the presence of the learned Sanhedrim. Let us rejoice and praise God as we trace these three glorious links in this endless chain of blessing. All sufficiency.

4. " In all things " (or "in every way "). It is no matter from what side the demand may come, this precious grace is there to meet it. Is it to deal with another troubled anxious soul, where human wisdom avails nothing ? Divine wisdom and tact shall be supplied. Courage if danger presents itself, or "all long-suffering with joyfulness" if affliction tear the heart. In all things.

5. " May abound to every good work." Now filled to the brim, and still connected with an inexhaustible supply, the vessel must overflow, and that on every side:no effort, no toil, no weariness, no drawing by mechanical means from a deep well; but the grace-filled heart, abiding (and that is the only condition) in complete dependence upon its God, naturally overflows on every side-to all good work.

6. " Being enriched in every tiling" (we omit the parenthesis, although full of its own divine beauty,) (or, " in every way.") This is in some sort a repetition of No. 5, but goes as far beyond it as the word " enriched" is fuller than the word "sufficient." The latter fills the vessel, as we have said, up to the brim; the former adds another drop, and over it flows. In view of these "exceeding great and precious promises," we may say,-

"Oh wherefore should we do ourselves this wrong
Or others, that we are not always strong?"

since we may be enriched in all things.

7. " To all bountifulness." This stream of grace is never to stagnate, or it will lose all its character of blessing, as the manna hoarded for a second day "bred worms, and stank." Thus every single Christian becomes a living channel of blessing to all around, and the circle is now completed, by once more returning to the point whence it started,- "Which causeth through us thanksgiving to God," and closes with no weary wail of "All things are full of labor," but joyful songs resound on every side, and at every motion of this circle of blessing ascend "thanksgiving to God." For just exactly the same full measure is seen in the thanksgiving ascending at the end as in the grace descending in the beginning. There it "abounded," filling the vessel full till it overflowed in the same measure, " abounding" in blessing to others who needed, and these forthwith pass on the stream in "abounding" thanksgiving to God. The apostle himself, as if he could not suffer himself to be excluded from the circle of blessing, adds his own note at the close with "Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift." And shall we not too, dear brother or sister now reading these lines, let our feeble voice be heard in this sweet harmony of praise ? Has not this contrast between the new song and the old groan, again we may ask, great value? F. C. J.

( To be continued.)

(Continued from p. 133.)

The Lord was ''poor, yet making many rich,"- "having nothing, and yet possessing all things." These high and wondrous conditions were exhibited in Him in ways that were and must have been peculiar-altogether His own. He would receive ministry from some godly women out of their substance, and yet minister to the need of all around Him out of the treasures of the fullness of the earth. He would feed thousands in desert places, and yet be Himself a hungered, waiting for the return of His disciples with victuals from a neighboring village. This is "having nothing, and yet possessing all things." But while thus poor, both needy and exposed, nothing that in the least savored of meanness is ever seen attaching to His condition. He never begs, though He have not a penny; for when He wanted to see one (not to use it for Himself), He had to ask to be shown it. He never runs away, though exposed, and His life jeopardized, as we speak, in the place where He was. He withdraws Himself, or passes by as hidden. And thus, again I may say, nothing mean, nothing unbecoming full personal dignity attaches to Him, though poverty and exposure were His lot every day.

Blessed and beautiful! Who could preserve under our eye such an object,-so perfect, so unblemished, so exquisitely, delicately pure, in all the minute and most ordinary details of human life ? Paul does not give us this. None could give it to us but Jesus, the God-Man. The peculiarities of His virtues in the midst of the ordinariness of His circumstances tell us of His person. It must be a peculiar person, it must be the divine Man, if I may so express Him, that could give us such peculiarities in such commonplace conditions. Paul does not give us any thing like it, again I say. There was great dignity and moral elevation about him, I know. If any one may be received as exhibiting that, let us agree that it was he. But his path is not that of Jesus;-he is in danger of his life, and he uses his nephew to protect him. Again, his friends let him down the wall of the town in a basket. I do not say he begs or asks for it, but he acknowledges money sent to him. I say not how Paul avowed himself a Pharisee in the mixed assembly in order to shelter himself, or how he spake evil of the high-priest that was judging him. Such conduct was morally wrong; and I am speaking here only of such cases as were (though not morally wrong,) below the full personal and moral dignity that marks the way of Christ. Nor is the flight into Egypt, as it is called, an exception in this characteristic of the Lord; for that journey was taken to fulfill prophecy, and under the authority of a divine oracle.

But all this is really, not only moral glory, but it is a moral wonder :marvelous how the pen that was held by a human hand could ever have delineated such beauties. We are to account for it, as has been observed before and by others, only by its being a truth a living reality. We are shut up to that blessed necessity. Still further, as we go on with this blessed truth, it is written, " Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man." Our words should prove themselves as thus, always with grace, by ministering good to others-"grace to the hearers." This, however, will often be in the pungency of admonition or rebuke; and at times with decision or severity, even with indignation and zeal; and thus they will be "seasoned with salt," as the Scripture speaks. And having these fine qualities- being gracious and yet salted, they will bear witness that we know how to answer every man.
Among all other forms of it, the Lord Jesus illustrated this form of moral perfectness. He knew how to answer every man, as with words which were always to his soul's profit, whether men would hear or whether they would forbear; but at times seasoned, -nay, seasoned highly, with salt.

Thus, in answering inquiries, he did not so much purpose to satisfy them, as to reach the conscience or the condition of the inquirer.

In His silence, or refusal to answer at all, when He stood before the Jew or the Gentile at the end, before either the priests or Pilate or Herod, we can trace the same perfect fitness as we do in His words or answers; witnessing to God that at least One among the sons of men knew "a time to keep silence and a time to speak."

Great variety in His very tone and manner also presents itself in all this; and all this variety, minute as it was as well as great, was part of this fragrance before God. Sometimes His word was gentle, sometimes peremptory; sometimes he reasons, sometimes he rebukes at once, and sometimes conducts calm reasoning up to the heated point of solemn condemnation ; for it is the moral of the occasion He always weighs.

Matt. 15:has struck me as a chapter in which this perfection, in much of its various beauty and excellency, may be seen. In the course of it, the Lord is called to answer the Pharisees, the multitude, the poor afflicted stranger from the coasts of Tyre, and His own disciples, again and again, in their different exposure of either their stupidity or their selfishness; and we may notice His different style of rebuke and of reasoning,-of calm, patient teaching, and of faithful, wise, and gracious training of the soul:and we cannot but feel how fitting all this variety was to the place or occasion that called it forth. And such was the beauty and the fitness of His neither teaching nor learning, in Luke 2:, but only hearing and asking questions. To have taught then would not have been in season, a child as He was in the midst of His elders. To have learnt would not have been in full fidelity to the light, the eminent and bright light, which He knew He carried in Himself; for we may surely say of Him, "He was wiser than the ancients, and had more understanding than His teachers." I do not mean as God, but as One "filled with wisdom," as was then said of Him. But He knew, in the perfection of grace, how to use this fullness of wisdom, and He is therefore not presented to us by the evangelist in the midst of the doctors in the temple at the age of twelve either teaching or learning; but it is simply said of Him that He was hearing and asking questions. Strong in spirit, filled with wisdom, and the grace of God upon Him, is the description of Him then, as He grew up in tender years; and when a man, conversing in the world, His speech was always with grace, seasoned with salt, as of one who knew how to answer every man. What perfection and beauty suited to the different seasons of childhood and manhood! And further. We find Him, besides this, also in various other conditions. At times He is slighted and scorned, watched and hated by adversaries, retiring, as it were to save His life from their attempts and purposes. At times He is weak, followed only by the poorest of the people; wearied, too, and hungry and athirst, debtor to the service of some loving women, who felt as though they owed Him every thing. At times He is compassionating the multitude in all gentleness, or commanding with His disciples in their repasts or in their journeying, conversing with them as a man would with His friends. At times He is in strength and honor before us, doing wonders, letting out some rays of glory; and though in His person and circumstances nothing and nobody in the world-a carpenter's son, without learning or fortune, yet making a greater stir among men, and that, too, at times in the thoughts of the ruling ones on earth, than man ever made.
Childhood and manhood, and human life in all its variousness, thus give Him to us. Would that the heart could hold Him! There is a perfection in some of the minute features that tell of the divine hand that was delineating them. Awkward work would any penman, unkept, unguided by the Spirit, have made of certain occasions where these strokes and touches are seen. As when the Lord wanted to comment on the current money of the land, He asked to be shown it, and does not find it about Himself. Indeed, we may be sure He carried none of it. Thus the moral beauties of the action flowed from the moral perfection of His condition within.

He asked His disciples, in the hour of Gethsemane, to watch with Him; but He did not ask them to pray for Him. He would claim sympathy. He prized it in the hour of weakness and pressure, and would have the hearts of His companions bound to Him then. Such a desire was of the moral glory that formed the. human perfection that was in Him ; but while He felt this and did this, He could not ask them to stand as in the divine presence on His behalf. He would have them give themselves to Him, but He could not seek them to give themselves to God for Him. Thus He asked them, again I say, to watch with Him, but He did not ask them to pray for Him. When, shortly or immediately afterward, He linked praying and watching together, it was of themselves and for themselves He spoke, saying, " Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation." Paul could say to his fellow-saints, "Ye also helping together by prayer to God for us:pray for us, for we trust we have a good conscience." But such was not the language of Jesus. I need not say, it could not have been; but the pen that writes for us such a life and delineates for us such a character is held by the Spirit of God. None other than the Spirit could write thus.

He did good, and lent, hoping for nothing again. He gave, and His left hand did not know what His right hand was doing. Never, in one single instance, as I believe, did He claim either the person or the service of those whom He restored and delivered. He never made the deliverance He wrought a title to service. Jesus loved and healed and saved, looking for nothing again. He would not let Legion, the Gadarene, be with Him; the child at the foot of the mount He delivered back to His father; the daughter of Jairus He left in the bosom of her family; the widow's son at Nain He restores to His mother. He claims none of them. Does Christ give in order that He may receive again ? Does He not (perfect Master!) illustrate His own principle-"Do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again"? The nature of grace is, to impart to others, not to enrich itself:and He came that in Him and His ways it might shine in all the exceeding riches and glory that belong to it. He found servants in this world, but He did not first heal them and then claim them. He called them and endowed them. They were the fruit of the energy of His Spirit, and of affections kindled in hearts constrained by His love. And sending them forth, He said to them, "Freely ye have received, freely give." Surely there is something beyond human conception in the delineation of such a character. One repeats that thought again and again. And very happy is it to add that it is in the very simplest forms this moral glory of the Lord shines forth at times,-such forms as are at once intelligible to all the perceptions and sympathies of the heart. Thus He never refused the feeblest faith, though He accepted and answered, and that too with delight, the approaches and demands of the boldest.

The strong faith which drew upon Him, without ceremony or apology, in full, immediate assurance was ever welcome to Him; while the timid soul that approached Him as one that was ashamed, and would excuse itself, was encouraged and blessed. His lips at once bore away from the heart of the poor leper the one only thing that hung over that heart as a cloud. '' Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean," said he. " I will:be thou clean," said Jesus. But immediately afterward the same lips uttered the fullness of the heart, when the clear, unquestioning faith of the Gentile centurion was witnessed, and when the bold, earnest faith of a family in Israel broke up the roof of the house where He was, that they might let down their sick one before Him.

When a weak faith appealed to the Lord, He granted the blessing it sought, but He rebuked the seeker. But even this rebuke is full of comfort to us; for it seems to say, "Why did you not make freer fuller, happier use of Me ? " Did we value the Giver as we do the gift,-the heart of Christ as well as His hand, this rebuke of weak faith would be just as welcome as the answer to it.

And if little faith be thus reproved, strong faith must be grateful. And therefore we have reason to know what a fine sight was under the eye of the Lord when, in that case already looked at, they broke up the roof of the house in order to reach Him. It was indeed, right sure I am, a grand spectacle for the eye of the divine and bounteous Jesus. His heart was entered by that action as surely as the house in Capernaum was entered by it. J. G. B.

( To be continued.)

(continued from page 84.)

How many hands have contributed to make up Scripture is a thing with which Scripture itself does not concern itself or occupy us. Of the writers of most of the historical books we have no real knowledge ; and if Moses compiled Genesis from existing records, such as are referred to in some of the later books, there would be nothing at all in this to stumble us. We are only concerned to know that where Moses is credited, in either Old or New Testament, with writing or speaking, – this, with all the rest, is absolutely true and trustworthy. But this is entirely contrary to Prof. Driver's canon, without which he thinks no satisfactory conclusions can be reached as to the Old Testament. Traditions, modified and colored by the historian, and interspersed with speeches fictitious to whatever extent one may desire, – this is what he conceives it to be.

The facts upon which the document-theory is founded are, as I have said, interesting where they are facts. Often they are not. The linguistic argument (or that from characteristic words.) has been well refuted by Vos,* and his book is accessible to all who desire it. *"Mosaic Origin of the Pentateuchal Codes." By Geerhardus Vos, N. Y.* The argument from discrepancies may be found, in part, there also. The few specimens already given from Driver are as forcible as most, and the readers of the present book can be at little loss to answer them. It is not difficult to see that the order of creation in the second chapter of Genesis is, so far as the plants and beasts are concerned, not an order at all ; that the specification of pairs of living creatures in God's first communication to Noah is in no wise inconsistent with an after-specification of sevens for beasts that were clean ; that Rebekah, just like one of ourselves, might easily have had a double motive for sending Jacob to Laban; while Esau's having been in Edom before Jacob's return to Canaan would not in the least affect the question of a later and final return thither. The double naming of Bethel and of Israel, glanced at in our notes (vol. 1:, p. 99) has a special significance, of which the higher criticism in general, being of the earth earthy, takes no account.

For any detailed reply to criticisms of this sort it would be impossible to find room here. The facility with which they can be made is as ensnaring to those who would gain a cheap reputation as it is condemnatory of the whole. There is probably no book that could not be cut up after the same fashion, and the smaller the fragments the more readily can it be done. A single verse, thus, in a section pronounced " Elohistic," if it has the name of Jehovah, proves itself to be from a " Jehovistic " source; and we have such dissections as this of Gen. 30:from Prof. Driver, where verses 1-3a, 6, 8, 17-20a, 20c-23, are given as Elohistic, so called from the use in it of " Elohim " (God), while the rest, including a fragment from the middle of the 20th verse, is Jehovistic !

Such attempts practiced upon any other book would find speedy and scornful relegation to the limbo of conceits that perish in their birth. Only the wondrous life of the book itself seems as if it kept alive the very enemies that seek its destruction. The interests that are involved beget an interest in the attack upon them ; and in a world which has held the cross, the carnal mind still shows itself as enmity against God. As has been said, no detail can be ventured upon here,-and in truth the detail would be terribly wearisome; but we may look a little at the broad features of what is proposed to us as the Bible of the future, so far as it affects what we have already had before us.
We are to have no longer a Pentateuch, nor any books of Moses. Moses' part in the laws of Israel is an undefined and ever-vanishing quantity. The extreme party of critics cannot, of course, allow Israel to be any exception to the law of development which ordains man to have struggled on and up from the level of his ape-like ancestors unaided by any revelation of God. Prof. Toy, of Harvard, outlines the " History of the Religion of Israel " after this manner :-

"A comparatively large law-book was written (Deuteronomy, about B.C. 622); and this, in accordance with the ideas of the times, which demanded the authority of ancient sages and lawgivers, was ascribed to Moses . . . After various law-books had been written, they were all gathered up, sifted, and edited about the time of Ezra (B.C. 450), as one book. This is substantially our present Law (Tom), or Pentateuch, (pp. 6, 7.)

' 'Nations do not easily change their gods; it is not likely that Moses could or would introduce a new deity. But as the Israelites believed that he had made some great change, it may be that through his means the worship of Yahwe [Jehovah] became more general- became, in fact, in a real sense, the national worship. This would not necessarily mean that no other deities were worshiped …. Still less would it mean that there was only one God,-that is, that all other pretended gods were nothing. This is what we believe, and what the later Israelites (about the time of the exile and on) believed; but David, and generations after him, thought that Kemnosh and Dagon and the rest were real gods, only not the gods of Israel. Exactly what Moses' belief was we do not know. (p. 24.)

"If we cannot suppose that the Pentateuch is correct history, then we do not know precisely what Moses did for his people . . . From all that we do know, we are led to believe that what Moses did was rather to organize the people, and give them an impulse in religion, than to frame any code of laws, or make any great change in their institutions."* *Quoted from Dr. Armstrong's "Nature and Revelation."*

The Harvard professor goes on to tell us that " we " know now that God did not give Israel the law at Sinai; but so long as we refuse that, he will allow us to believe that " the people, or a part of them, may have stayed there awhile." Moses' part in it all, he tells us, matters very little.

This is, of course, more than "down-grade:" it is near the bottom of the descent. Dr. Driver does not mean to land there. We do not always see where the road ends, and the mercy of God may prevent such a catastrophe; but there is, in fact, no practicable halting-place short of this. Between Dr. Toy and orthodoxy there is every degree of errancy, and the voices of the critics are not a little confused.

It is contended that they are becoming more harmonious; and this, no doubt, is true and to be expected. The stream would naturally wear for itself channels, within which it would he henceforth confined. Some errors would be too manifest to be upheld, and others be found inconsistent with the purpose they were used for. This unification of the critics, while it will enable their arguments to be more concisely dealt with, does not imply any bettering of their position from the Scripture stand-point:the fact is the reverse; the tendency of error is to gravitate, and consistency necessitates ever a more complete departure from the truth. Thus Kuenen and Wellhausen, who are not badly represented by Prof. Toy, give us the latest phase of the documentary hypothesis. And it is striking enough to find how largely Driver builds to-day upon their foundations.

Yet it is plain that even for him the distinction between Jehovistic and Elohistic documents, with which these criticisms began, is fading away, so that he has often had to consider the question, " Is it probable that there should have been two narratives of the patriarchal and Mosaic ages, independent, yet largely resembling each other, and that these narratives should have been combined together into a single whole at a relatively early period of the history of Israel? " He answers, indeed, though with some hesitancy, that he believes it to be a fact that there were, " and that in some part, even if not so frequently as some critics have supposed, the independent sources used by the compiler are still more or less clearly discernible."

The period of this compilation he gives as " approximately, in the eighth century B.C.," or about Hezekiah's time! But that only carries us a few steps in the construction of the Pentateuch.

Deuteronomy comes next, which critics believe to be the "book of the law" found by Hilkiah in Josiah's day; but "how much earlier than B.C. 621 it may be is more difficult to determine. The supposition that Hilkiah himself was concerned in the composition of it is not probable; for a book compiled by the high-priest could hardly fail "-God, of course, being left out,-"to emphasize the interests of the priestly body at Jerusalem, which Deuteronomy does not do. …. It is probable its composition is not later than the reign of Manasseh."

The real "priestly" narrative-which does, of course, look sharply after their interests,-came later still. It is supposed to have added largely to Genesis, considerably to Exodus, including all about the special priesthood, the entire book of Leviticus, and much of Numbers. It belongs " approximately, to the time of the Babylonish captivity "! And now, with Ezra's revision, the Pentateuch is complete.

But we must take notice, if we are to do justice to Dr. Driver's position, that he allows that there was a certain indefinable amount of tradition long before, and even, as we see, some written documents. The aggregate amount of these it is very hard to determine.

"Although, therefore, the Priests' Code assumed finally the shape in which we have it in the age subsequent to Ezekiel, it rests ultimately upon an ancient traditional basis, and many of the institutions prominent in it are recognized in various stages of their growth, by the earlier pre-exile literature, by Deuteronomy and by Ezekiel. The laws of P [the priestly code], even when they included later elements, were still referred to Moses,-no doubt because, in its basis and origin, Hebrew legislation was actually derived from him, and was only modified gradually."

This is how, it seems, the positive statements that "Moses spake" and "the Lord said to Moses" are to be interpreted. The issue is naturally such a romance as the following:-

"The institution which was among the last to reach a settled state, appears to have been the priesthood. Till the age of Deuteronomy "-which, we must remember, was that of Manasseh-" the right of exercising priestly offices must have been enjoyed by every member of the tribe of Levi; but this right on the part of the tribe generally is evidently not incompatible with the pre-eminence of a particular family (that of Aaron :cf. Deut. 10:6), which in the line of Zadok held the chief rank at the Central Sanctuary. After the abolition of the high places by Josiah, however, the central priesthood refused to acknowledge the right which (according to the law of Deuteronomy) the Levitical priests of the high places must have possessed. The action of the central priesthood was indorsed by Ezekiel (44:6 ff.):the priesthood, he declared, was, for the future, to be confined to the descendants of Zadok; the priests of the high places (or their descendants) were condemned by him to discharge subordinate offices, as menials in attendance upon the worshipers. As it proved, however, the event did not altogether accord with Ezekiel's declaration; the descendants of Ithamar succeeded in maintaining their right to officiate as priests by the side of the sons of Zadok (1 Chron. 24:4, etc.), but the action of the central priesthood under Josiah, and the sanction given to it by Ezekiel, combined, if not to create, yet to accentuate the distinction of ' priests ' and ' Levites.' It is possible that those parts of P which emphasize this distinction (Num. 1:-4:, etc.) are of later origin than the rest, and date from a time when-probably after a struggle with some of the disestablished Levitical priests-it was generally accepted." * * Driver, Intro. pp. 146, 147.*

Think of a poor soul trying to read between the lines of his Bible after this fashion ! or rather, of the revised one; for the present one, thank God, he cannot. Moses is thus "modified;" and God, who cannot be "modified," is left out,-except He is to be supposed to sanction this fraudulent speaking in His name! What is needed, to judge it all, is indeed rather conscience than learning, and here, it is comforting to think, the " babes " will not fare the worst.

Even the Pentateuch is not to be suffered to remain, and Moses being no longer credited with its authorship, the book of Joshua can be added to it, and the Pentateuch becomes a Hexateuch. Here too they can find a Jehovist and an Elohist, a priestly writer and a Deuteronomist. But it is no great wonder if, according to the old belief, Joshua himself were the writer,-that one so long in companionship with Moses, and familiar with the books of the law, should use similar expressions, and write to some extent in the same style. That the writer was, in fact, a contemporary of the conquest is shown by his use of " we," and by his statement that Rahab was still dwelling in Israel (chap. 5:1, 6; 6:25). Of course this can be as easily declared a fraud as the constant language of the Pentateuch itself. This can be denied also with equal ease,-and with this advantage, that we have the whole character of God against it.

But that the first five books are a real Pentateuch, we are able now to produce the structure of the Bible itself in proof. The five books of the Psalms are molded on the Mosaic five, so that the Jews have named them ' The Pentateuch of David.' And that this is not a mere fancy of the Jews, but the real key to the spiritual meaning that pervades them, will be manifest the more the more deeply we look into them:we cannot, of course, enter here upon the proof.

Again:taking away from the Kethubim the historical and prophetical books, we have a didactic series of five, at the head of which the Psalms are found; Job, Solomon's Song, Ecclesiastes, Proverbs, completing another Pentateuch.

The Prophets, taking the minor twelve as one book (as was done of old), and Lamentations as an appendix to Jeremiah, fall, then, into another series of five-another Pentateuch. Nay, the historical books, as we have seen, fall into still another pentateuchal series; while the books of the New Testament easily divide into a similar one of Gospels, Acts, Pauline Epistles, Catholic Epistles, and Revelation. Thus the Pentateuch is the basis and model of the whole of Scripture.

Nor is this merely a form:on the contrary, the form but clothes and manifests the spirit that dwells in it. The spiritual meaning which the higher criticism ignores and would destroy, and which the apostle teaches us to find in the fullest way in the Old-Testament history,-which gives us the Now Testament in the Old, prophecy in history, the divine seal everywhere upon its perfection,-confirms all this, and glorifies it. According to it, Joshua is not a continuation of the first series, but the beginning of a second. It is a true Genesis of the after-history, and spiritually a new beginning, Deuteronomy having carried us beyond the wilderness, and, in principle, to the judgment-seat of Christ.

The numerical structure, of which this pentateuchal one is only a part, is indeed the key to the true higher criticism; only that one would not employ a term which implies the subjecting of the Word of God to the mere mind of fallen man. Faith's part it is to learn humbly from God, when once it realizes that it has to do with Him. While at the same time it purges the eye, not blinds it,-opens, not sets aside the understanding. Scripture itself, as the destructive criticism understands it, is not any more that which displays the Mind of all other mind, than is Nature under the withering blight of Darwinian evolution. " God in every thing" means wisdom in every thing. God thrust into the distance means the glorious Sun dwindled to a petty star. However much you may argue about its being in itself as bright as ever, it has no longer power to prevent the earth becoming a lifeless mass, whirled senselessly in a frozen orbit. The very law to which you may still vaunt its subjection is that which now surely condemns it to eternal darkness.

Against all this, the pentateuchal structure of the Bible utters emphatic protest. It is no mere arbitrary thing, but, like all that is divine, has a voice for us,-a voice which is of infinite sweetness and comfort also. For this number 5, which, as I have shown elsewhere,* is the rest-note of music, as well as the measure of its expansion, is that in which, as we have seen, man in his frailty is found in relation to the Almighty God. "*Spiritual Law in the Natural World," p. 76.* And while this implies responsibility on his part, and ways of divine government which may be to His creature "Dark with excessive bright,'' and may give him exercise most needful, and fill him with apprehension too, yet it is that in which alone all blessing is, and to which Christ, in the wondrous mystery of His person, gives only adequate expression. Not only the divine seal is thus put upon all Scripture, but Christ is Himself that seal, from first to last the one Name that Scripture utters,- the assurance to us of an infinite joy with which we may face the history of the past, the mystery of the future. The book is in the hands of the Lamb slain ; it is His; He is its interpreter and fulfillment both. With the chorus of the ages we say and sing, Worthy art Thou to take it! F. W. G.
(PAGES 113-140 MISSING)

My heart is bounding onward,
Home to the land I love;
Its distant vales and mountains
My wishful passions move:
Fain would my thirsting spirit
Its living freshness breathe,
And wearied steps find resting
Its hallowed shades beneath.

No soil of nature's evil,
No touch of man's rude hand,
Shall e'er disturb around us
That bright and peaceful land.
The charms that woo our senses
Shall be as pure as fair;
For all, while stealing o'er us,
Shall tell of Jesus there.

What light, when all its beaming
Shall own Him as its Sun !
What music, when its breathing
Shall bear His name along !
No pause, no change, those pleasures
Shall ever seek to know:
The drought that lulls our thirsting
But wakes that thirst anew.

F. G. Bellett.

THE SPRING OF 1533.

(History of the Reformation. – Time of Calvin. Vol. in., p. 360.)

"When the day arrived, many persons went out of the city and quietly directed their steps toward D'Adda's garden, situated in a place called Pre L' Eveque, because the bishop had a house there. A table had been prepared in a room or in the open air. The believers, as they arrived, took their seats in silence on the rude benches, not without fear that the priests would get information of the furtive meeting. Guerin sat down in front of the table. Just at the moment (we are told)when the ceremony was to begin, the sun rose and illuminated with his first rays a scene more imposing in its simplicity than the mountains capped with everlasting snow, above which the star of day was beginning his course. The pious Guerin stood up, and after a prayer distributed the bread and wine, and all together praised the Lord. The communicants quitted D'Adda's garden full of gratitude toward God."

Geneva was soon to be a center of light; but first a storm of persecution, to close the long night of the tyranny of Rome, was to baptize the little flock.

It was as much a miracle to call Matthew from the receipt of custom as to cure the paralytic. If the latter needed power to deliver him from the grasp of disease, no less did the former need it to set him free from the clutch of covetousness which held him fast at the money-table. But divine power is sufficient for all things, and He who set free the paralytic awakens a new life in Matthew.

And are not these two occurrences put together (Matt. 9:) to teach us the fullness of divine blessing? Our need is completely met; this we see in the paralytic. We are given power to walk in the path of obedience; and this is made plain in Matthew's case. Our Lord does not stop at half-way measures, nor should we. If our need is met, it should be our care to see that His will for us is accomplished. But, as we said, this last is as much a miracle as the first. The drawing of His love is as much divine as the putting forth of manifest power. Let it be ours to prove the reality of this, and thus provide a feast for Him who has called us to Himself.

"Lord, Thou hast drawn me after Thee;
Now let me run, and never tire."

"Because thou servedst not the Lord thy God with joyfulness and with gladness of heart for the abundance of all things:therefore thou shalt serve thine enemies which the Lord shall send against thee, in hunger and in thirst, and in nakedness and in want of all things." (Deut. 28:47, 48.)

In Thy presence is fullness of joy," and all true service is done in God's presence; therefore in all service there is joy. Such, at least, is God's thought. It is not meant by this that there are no sorrows connected with it, no pain for nature. Paul wrote to the church at Corinth in the carrying out of the service committed to him "out of much affliction and anguish of heart . . . with many tears." (2 Cor. 2:4.) But there was the rejoicing of a good conscience, and the comfortable assurance of God's good pleasure. Such service as that to which he alludes, too, is rather the exception. The main work in the Church of God, as in the family, is not discipline, but edification; and in our personal life the same is true. The morbid person may look within, and seek to bring a clean thing out of an unclean; the child of God, on the contrary, looks up at Christ, and at the things which are above, and in the joy of the possession of those things he can freely turn from other attractions.

God's mind for Israel was to enter upon their inheritance, and possess it, to eat of the fruit of it, and to rejoice before Him for all the good He had given them. The enemy was to be driven out, but they were not to be always fighting. And so with ourselves. Fight we must, but only that we may thrust out the enemy who would hinder our enjoyment of those things which are ours. Then we lay aside the sword for the plowshare, and in the development of our inheritance, in the gathering of its varied products, we will find ample employment and abundant joy.

Is joy low ? Something must be the matter, for this is not "the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning" us. "Thou hast put gladness in my heart, more than in the time that their corn and their wine increased." (Ps. 4:7.) But there must be a reason for the joy, and it is in the abundance of all that has been given us. Israel failed to enter upon this abundance, and so her joy failed. She did not take in her whole territory, so soon lost what she had. How many of us, in like manner, are content with but a small part of what is ours, find but little joy in that, and so soon lose even that joy. Our service becomes duty. "Ye said also, 'Behold, what a weariness is it!'" (Mal. 1:13.) And in the dull routine of private prayer, Scripture reading, and attendance upon meetings, there has been but little to refresh the heart. We are only speaking of what is possible, each must ask himself in what measure it is true of him.

We sometimes hear a desire expressed for a revival among God's people, and surely that is well. But what is a revival ? Is it not simply the re-possession of what is ours ? The book of Judges is a history of declension and revival, and when the revival came it was shown by the regaining of territory, the enjoyment of fruit which the enemy had taken. So with us, a revival would be shown not necessarily in the first place by increased numbers, or any such supposed accompaniments, but by an enlarged apprehension of the Word of God as for us, and greater joy in that apprehension. This indeed would attract others to us.

Our blessed God does not wish forced service. What joy can be compared with finding that in His Word we have Him speaking to us, that in prayer we are speaking directly to Himself, that in our meeting together we are sharing the precious things which are our common possession, or unitedly praising the "Giver of all good "? If Israel in the feast of harvest, and of ingathering, was to rejoice before the Lord, "because the Lord thy God shall bless thee in all thine increase, and in all the works of thine hands, therefore thou shalt surely rejoice" (Deut. 16:15), how much more should we, whose blessings are eternal, rejoice before Him !

It is from such joy that true service springs. The gospel flows forth like cool waters to a thirsty soul, from a full fountain; ministry to saints, in all places, becomes the natural communication of what has refreshed us, taking the place of that idle gossip, that fault-finding, which but too often mars the happiness of God's dear people.

On the other hand, what a sad picture we have of the opposite of this joyful service. God has not been delighted in, and the abundance which He has provided is changed for the hunger and nakedness of captivity. It reminds us of Laodicea, where this state of poverty exists while the unfortunate one is unconscious of it. And what is Laodicea? Self-sufficiency. God is not rejoiced in, the abundance of His things is not known, and the poor blind one, proud in and of his poverty, is of all men most miserable.

Beloved, let us not rest satisfied unless we are rejoicing in the abundance of God's inheritance. If we have lost that joy through worldliness or carelessness let us awake; let not the enemy any longer cheat us into thinking it is all well, but let us begin afresh to apprehend those "unsearchable riches of Christ," which lie all about us in God's Word.

"Overcome evil with good." (Rom. 12:21.)

In the sevenfold picture of the church's history in Rev. 2:and 3:, we have a sevenfold promise to the " overcomer," and at the close of the book, after describing the eternal state, again the promise is given, '' He that overcometh shall inherit these things." We are in a race which only ends when we take our seats on high; in a warfare, a " good fight," which ceases when we leave this scene. Blessed is it to know that we "run, not as uncertainly," that the end is sure, though there be conflict on the way. We follow a Victor, One who has conquered for us, and this nerves us for the conflict, gives patience in all toil. Still, it is well to remember that there is a conflict, a race, and that grace, while making the end sure, has not obliterated the wilderness.

We can look at this overcoming, however, not as the final outcome of our life, but also as that which should characterize each day of that life. Taken as a whole, the life of each believer is a victory; in some in a very small degree; but taken in detail the lives of many show more defeat than victory, and in all there are some points where defeat comes in. It is rather at the details than at the final outcome we would look now, remembering, however, that details make up the total, and that "saved as by fire," and " an abundant entrance " are in contrast.

The conflict is with evil, and not mere impersonal evil, but the evil one and his emissaries. His devices are manifold, suited to those whom he assaults; and hidden that he may the better ensnare,-"the wiles of the devil." We meet evil in ourselves, our circumstances, our brethren, and in the world. The question is, How are we to overcome it ?

And the first answer must be, to know it as evil. Light shone into Paul's heart when (Rom. 7:) he distinguished between himself and sin that dwelt in him. This did not enable him to overcome it, it seemed to make the conflict more desperate, but he saw sin, knew it was that and what to expect of it. We must learn to call things by their right names, to recognize them, to judge them.

We do not fight evil for the sake of fighting. "Abstain, hold off from, fleshly lusts which war against the soul." It when evil has usurped some of our inheritance, our portion, as believers that we are to thrust it out. With Edom Israel would have no conflict, God would judge it in His time; but with the inhabitants of the land the case was different. They were occupying what belonged to Israel, and therefore must be expelled. So with us. With the flesh, the sinful nature as such, we are to have no conflict, knowing that sentence has been passed upon it on the cross, and that in a little while it will be obliterated, when "this mortal shall put on immortality."

But when this flesh, used of Satan, would intrude into our spiritual life, occupy our time, demand our attention, interfere with communion and service, and dim our conception of the portion that is ours in Christ,-then we must overcome the intruder and cast him out, or, like Israel, the good land will soon be out of our hands, and we will be driven to dwell in caves.

It is well to remark here that no compromises were to be made with the enemy in the land. "Ye shall make no league with the inhabitants." Led by Joshua, victorious Israel marched through the length and breadth of the land:this was victory in general. But when we come to individual history, we find the enemy unsubdued in many places, or if subdued, not exterminated, but made tributary. But who ever made evil tributary to good ? Apparently we may, but for a season only. Pride may thus be made to "ape humility." Emulation may seem to incite to as diligent service as zeal, but in a little while it will be manifest that the pride and the emulation have gained control of ourselves ; our tributaries have become our masters. There can be no compromise. Extermination is needful. Just here was the kernel of all Israel's failure, as a glance at the book of Judges will show, and a glance nearer home will doubtless show the same thing. Rome may make tributaries of the very sins it professes to forgive, but Rome is only a shining example of that of which we speak.

Conflict, then, there must be, and that until the foe is completely conquered. But how are we to fight? If we use Satan's weapons, we are not fighting God's battle. " The weapons of our warfare are
not carnal, but mighty through God." The short verse at the head of this paper tells us how. '' Overcome evil with good." The one thing Israel had to do with the land they conquered was to occupy it. Mere victory over the foe was but a negative advantage, preliminary to that practical appropriation of the land to their own use, which God had designed. So important was this that God made the extirpation of the enemy to be as gradual as their power to occupy the land. "And the Lord thy God will put out those nations before thee little by little :thou mayest not consume them at once, lest the beasts of the field increase upon thee." (Deut. 7:22.) The empty house of Matt. 12:is a solemn explanation of this. Our life is a positive thing; it must not only be not evil, but actually good.

And this is what our verse teaches us. Good will overcome evil. To him that hath shall be given. Our possessions well cultivated, fully occupied, and we will encroach on and drive out the next evil, in order that we may gain more of our inheritance. It is the good that we want, and we are to be only so far occupied with the evil as to see how far it hinders us, to judge it, and in the energy of faith overcome it by good. How does the farmer rid his field of weeds and briars ? Not by plowing and harrowing, for this would but sow a fresh crop of weeds, and by tearing the briar roots apart, cause two to grow where there had been but one before. He puts the field in wheat, fertilizing well, and sows thickly in grass. As a result, the wheat and grass give the weeds no room for growth, and they soon disappear. Let us learn from this, in our individual life and in relation to one another. We know evil is there. We do not shut our eyes to it, but we know it can be overcome in one way only-by the substitution of something better.

Is not this God's way ? What is the gospel of His grace but the overcoming of evil with good ? The law made the offense to abound. Grace came in and drove sin off the field. "The kindness and love of God our Savior toward man appeared," and that by the power of the Holy Spirit, subdued those who were "hateful and hating one another." The message of love to rebellious sinners was His '' soft answer which turneth away wrath." May we be imitators of God as dear children.

Sorrow over sin and folly there will be, firm judgment of evil and straightforward obedience; but this only confirms our truth; for these are in themselves powerless to overcome evil, they but prepare the way for the good.

It is most important to remember this in our relationships,-the family, the assembly, and even in the world. "Husbands, love your wives" is but one of the exhortations which press this principle and which if all followed, would make home what it should be, a foretaste of heaven. How many an assembly of God's people is kept feeble by a constant spirit of criticism. The good is forgotten, neglected, and instead of "taking forth the precious from the vile," the process is reversed, and the vile is taken. We need to "strengthen the things that remain, that are ready to die." Love is the only power by which evil can be overcome. Most of the failings in our brethren could be overcome in this way, while they are only multiplied when we attempt to pluck them out by the roots. The same could be said of worldliness in dress, habits, or conversation. Often it is mere emptiness, which can be filled with the precious things of Christ, to the joy of the person who would resent as impertinence any attempt at setting him right.

But what is good ? We answer simply, Christ in grace, known and loved. This embraces everything
-His word, His work, His person, His Church, -everything that concerns Him. Fix the center, and we can have as many circles about it as we may, they will all harmoniously be gathered about that center. It is this occupation with good, with Him who is perfect goodness, that is the secret of power and of joy. Oh, dear brethren, let us begin afresh with Him ? It is grace alone which gives power, and we would have firmness too; for love can be most firm when it is necessary. But it is love, and is manifest as that. May He whose perfect goodness in patience is dealing with all our waywardness teach us the full meaning of this, " Overcome evil with good."

"Many of the most beautiful things in nature are so delicate in their structure that to touch them almost means to destroy them. Man could not pretend to imitate these works of beauty, they are so frail that they for the most part escape even his notice. Yet God builds this beauty, and delights to put it everywhere, to show us His beauty, and His tenderness as well. The delicate little flower, the wing of the butterfly, crushed by the rude hand of a boy, were made by the almighty God, who takes thought of them.

And so in spiritual things, there are characters so frail that the touch of man seems to mar them. The new-born sold, with its desires after God, its love for Christ, its almost inarticulate prayers and praises, is surely more beautiful in His sight than the fairest flower of earth. And yet by our cold criticism, our rigid exactness, may we not crush the beauty out of this flower ? Let us learn to be more tender with one another. Let not our rude touch mar God's beautiful work. May we rather be imitators of Him, and learn to develop rather than to dwarf that which is of Him.

For how does He deal with us ? How has He built us up ? By gentleness. Our love to Him, our joy, the early fruits of the Spirit, have been watched and nourished; our coldness has been borne with, and so He has gently led us on. Oh, to learn to do likewise in all our dealings with God's lambs !

This was the question asked of the writer by a lady as he pointed her to the precious and familiar passage in Heb. 10:-"For by one offering He hath perfected forever them that are sanctified." Through the teaching of her "church," she was in the habit of praying daily for pardon, though a professed believer on the Lord Jesus Christ. It was to show her the finished work of Christ that the above passage was referred to, and it evidently arrested her attention. '' But who are the sanctified? " Here it seemed as though a loop-hole for unbelief was about to open. Did not "sanctify" mean "to make holy"? and who could lay claim to that ? But how perfect God's Word is! She was simply referred to the thirteenth chapter of the same epistle,- "Wherefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people with His own blood, suffered without the gate." (Heb. 13:12.) There could be no gainsaying this. The answer was so plain that she was obliged to receive it. Sanctified by His blood; set apart to God according to the value of that offering. Those, then, who are sanctified are those who have an interest in that blood, and those are sinners who believe. This is the sanctification spoken of in Hebrews, where the object is to occupy the soul entirely with Christ, to the exclusion of form, priest, and all else that unbelief would put between the soul and its Savior.

"The following hymn was composed by Madame A. Bouringnon, and translated by John Wesley. It was likely written more than a hundred and fifty years ago. It breathes a spirit of real and entire consecration to Christ. It is transcribed with the hope that it may, with the Lord's blessing, aid in promoting the same spirit in those who have greater light, so that they too may be able to say, " Lo, we have left all, and have followed Thee,."-R. H.]

Come, Savior Jesus, from above,
Assist me with Thy heavenly grace;
Empty my heart of earthly love,
And for Thyself prepare the place.

Oh, let Thy sacred presence fill,
And set my longing spirit free,
Which pants to have no other will,
But day and night to feast on Thee.

While in this region here below,
No other good will I pursue;
I'll bid this world of noise and show,
With all its glittering snares, adieu.

That path with humble speed I'll seek,
In which my Savior's footsteps shine;
Nor will I hear, nor will I speak,
Of any other love but Thine.

Henceforth may no profane delight
Divide this consecrated soul;
Possess it, Thou, who hast the right,
As Lord and Master of the whole.

Wealth, honor, pleasure, and what else
This short enduring world can give,-
Tempt as ye will, my soul repels,
To Christ alone resolved to live.

Thee I can love, and Thee alone,
With pure delight and inward bliss;
To know Thou takest me for Thine own-
Oh, what a happiness is this !

Nothing on earth do I desire,
But Thy pure love within my breast;
This, only this, will I require,
And freely give up all the rest.

(Continued from p. 65.)

Renouncing Egypt is not idleness, nor is the breaking of a box of ointment on the head of Christ waste; though we thus see that a certain kind of reckoning among the children of men, and even at times(and that too frequent)among the saints of God, would charge these things as such. Advantages in life are surrendered, opportunities of worldly promise are not used, because the heart has understood the path of companionship with a rejected Lord.

But this is "idleness" and "waste," many will say:the advantages might have been retained by the possessor, or the opportunities might have been sought and reached, and then used for the Lord. But such persons know not. Station, and the human, earthly influence that attaches to it, is commended by them, and treated almost as "a gift to be used for profit and edification and blessing." But a rejected Christ -a Christ cast out by men, if known spiritually by the soul, would teach another lesson.

This station in life, these worldly advantages, these opportunities so commended, are the very Egypt which Moses renounced. He refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter.

The treasures of Egypt were not riches in his esteem, because he could not use them for the Lord. And he went outside of them, and the Lord met him there, and used him afterward, not to accredit Egypt and its treasures, but to deliver His people out of it.

I follow this a little here, for it is, I feel, important to us.

All this renunciation, however, must be made in the understanding and faith of a rejected Lord; it will otherwise want all its fine and genuine and proper character. If it be made on a mere religious principle, as that of working out a righteousness or a title for ourselves, it may well be said to be something worse than idleness or waste. It then betrays an advantage which Satan has got over us, rather than any advantage we have got over the world. But if it be indeed made in the faith and love of a rejected Master, and in the sense and intelligence of His relation to this present evil world, it is worship.

To serve man at the expense of God's truth and principles is not Christianity, though persons who do so will be called "benefactors." Christianity considers the glory of God as well as the blessing of man; but as far as we lose sight of this, so far shall we be tempted to call many things waste and idleness which are really holy, intelligent, consistent, and devoted service to Jesus. Indeed, it is so. The Lord's vindication of the woman who poured her treasure on the head of Jesus tells me so. (Matt. 26:) We are to own God's glory in what we do, though man may refuse to sanction what does not advance the good order of the world, or provide for the good of our neighbor. But Jesus would know God's claims in this self-seeking world, while He recognized (very surely, as we may know) His neighbor's claim upon Himself.

He knew when to cast away and when to keep. " Let her alone," He said of the woman who had been upbraided for breaking the box of spikenard on Him; "she hath wrought a good work on Me." But after feeding the multitudes, He would say, '' Gather up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost."

This was observing the divine rule, "There is a time to keep and a time to cast away." If the prodigal service of the heart or hand in worship be no waste, the very crumbs of human food are sacred, and must not be cast away. He who vindicated the spending of three hundred pence on one of these occasions, on the other would not let the fragments of five loaves be left on the ground. In His eyes, such fragments were sacred. They were the food of life, the herb of the field, which God had given to man for his life. And life is a sacred thing. God is the God of the living. "To you it shall be for meat," God has said of it, and therefore Jesus would hallow it. "The tree of the field is man's life," the law had said, and accordingly had thus prescribed to them that were under the law-"When thou shalt besiege a city a long time, in making war against it to take it, thou shalt not destroy the trees thereof by forcing an ax against them; for thou mayest eat of them, and thou shalt not cut them down to employ them in the siege; only the trees that thou knowest are not trees for meat, thou shalt destroy and cut them down." (Deut. 20:) It would have been waste, it would have been profaneness, to have thus abused the food of life, which was God's gift; and Jesus in like purity, in the perfectness of God's living ordinance, would not let the fragments lie on the ground. '' Gather up the fragments that remain," He said, "that nothing be lost."

These are but small incidents; but all the circumstances of human life, as He passes through them, change as they may, or be they as minute as they may, are thus adorned by something of the moral glory that was ever brightening the path of His sacred, wearied feet. The eye of man was incapable
of tracking it; but to God it was all incense, a sacrifice of sweet savor, a sacrifice of rest, the meat-offering of the sanctuary.

But again. The Lord did not judge of persons in relation to Himself, – a common fault with us all. We naturally judge of others according as they treat ourselves, and we make our interest in them the measure of their character and worth. But this was not the Lord. God is a God of knowledge, and by Him actions are weighed. He understands every action fully. In all its moral meaning He understands it, and according to that He weighs it. And, as the image of the God of knowledge, we see our Lord Jesus Christ, in the days of His ministry here, again and again. I may refer to Luke 11:There was the air of courtesy and good feeling toward Him in the Pharisee that invited Him to dine. But the Lord was "the God of knowledge," and as such He weighed this action in its full moral character.

The honey of courtesy, which is the best ingredient in social life in this world, should not pervert His taste or judgment. He approved things that are excellent. The civility which invited Him to dinner was not to determine the judgment of Him who carried the weights and measures of the sanctuary of God. It is the God of knowledge that this civility has on this occasion to confront, and it does not stand, it will not do. Oh how the tracing of this may rebuke us ! The invitation covered a purpose. As soon as the Lord entered the house, the host acts the Pharisee, and not the host. He marvels that his guest had not washed before dinner. And the character he thus assumes at the beginning shows itself in full force at the end. And the Lord deals with the whole scene accordingly, for He weighed it as the God of knowledge. Some may say that the courtesy He had received might have kept Him silent. But He could not look on this man simply as in relation to Himself. He was not to be flattered out of a just judgment. He exposes and rebukes, and the end of the scene justifies Him. " And as He said these things unto them, the scribes and Pharisees began to urge Him vehemently, and to provoke Him to speak of many things, laying wait for Him, and seeking to catch something out of His mouth, that they might accuse Him."

Very different, however, was His way in the house of another Pharisee, who in like manner had asked Him to dine. (See Luke 7:) For Simon had no covered purpose in the invitation. Quite otherwise. He seemed to act the Pharisee too, silently accusing the poor sinner of the city, and his Guest for admitting her approach. But appearances are not the ground of righteous judgments. Often the very same words, on different lips, have a very different mind in them. And therefore the Lord, the perfect weigh-master according to God, though He may rebuke Simon, and expose him to himself, knows him by name, and leaves his house as a guest should leave it. He distinguishes the Pharisee of Luke 7:from the Pharisee of Luke 11:, though be dined with both of them. So we may look at the Lord with Peter in Matt. 16:Peter expresses fond and considerate attachment to his Master:"This be far from Thee, Lord; this shall not be unto Thee." But Jesus judged Peter's words only in their moral place. Hard indeed we find it to do this when we are personally gratified. "Get thee behind Me, Satan," was not the answer which a merely amiable nature would have suggested to such words. But again, I say, our Lord did not listen to Peter's words simply as they expressed personal kindness and good-will to Himself. He judged them, He weighed them, as in the presence of God, and at once found that the enemy had moved them; for he that can transform himself into an angel of light is very often lurking in words of courtesy and kindness. And in the same way the Lord dealt with Thomas in Jno. 20:Thomas had just worshiped Him. "My Lord and my God," he had said. But Jesus was not to be drawn from the high moral elevation that He filled, and from whence he heard and saw every thing, even by words like these. They were genuine words,-words of a mind which, enlightened of God, had repented toward the risen Savior, and, instead of doubting any longer, worshiped. But Thomas had stood out as long as he could; he had exceeded. They had all been unbelieving as to the resurrection, but he had insisted that he would be still in unbelief till sense and sight came to deliver him. All this had been his moral condition ; and Jesus has this before Him, and puts Thomas in his right moral place, as He had put Peter. '' Thomas, because thou hast seen Me, thou hast believed. Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed." Our hearts in such cases as these would have been taken by surprise. They could not have kept their ground in the face of these assaults which the good-will of Peter and the worship of Thomas would have made upon them. But our perfect Master stood for God and His truth, and not for Himself. The ark of old was not to be flattered. Israel may honor it, and bring it down to the battle, telling it, as it were, that now in its presence all must be well with them. But this will not do for the God of Israel. Israel falls before the Philistines, though the ark be thus in the battle; and Peter and Thomas shall be rebuked, though Jesus, still the God of Israel, be honored by them. J. G. B.

(To be continued.)

*From the Introduction to Joshua, in the second volume of The Numerical Bible.*

We have now reached a place from which it will be most convenient to review the pretensions of what assumes to be the " higher" criticism; lofty enough indeed in these, and manifesting abundantly the spirit of the latter days,-days which Scripture characterizes with sufficient plainness. To its advocates, that it should manifest this will not even be a reproach; for nothing is more the boast of these latter times than the scientific spirit, and here is but in their eyes the scientific spirit in religion:where should it be more needful ? The spirit of science being to-day evolutionist, the higher criticism will be found to be little else than Darwinism (morals and all) in another sphere,-a sphere which, so much the more important as it is, craves the more for it an earnest examination.

It is the well-known characteristic of Darwinism, that it substitutes a theory of the how for the why, with the effect of removing the appearance of design from nature. What appears like design may be but a consequence of the mode or conditions of production,-a consequence, not a cause; and the universe be the result of the operation of natural laws, apart from all supernatural superintendence or interference. As Huxley says. "For the notion that every organism has been created as it is, and launched straight at a purpose, Mr. Darwin substitutes the conception of something which may be fairly termed a method of trial and error. Organisms vary incessantly; of these variations, the few meet with surrounding conditions which suit them, and thrive; the many are unsuited and become extinguished." It is on account of this elimination of design out of the world that skeptics and materialists range themselves so unanimously under the leadership of Darwin; and this they proclaim a distinguished merit of his scheme. Others have, of course, taken it up who can by no means be classed with these, and thus it has received various modifications. But the original vice of the thing manifests itself through all, as far as possible from the spirit of Scripture, the attempt, which we have even been told is "the duty of the man of science, to push back the Great First Cause in time as far as possible." The beauty and blessedness of Scripture consists in its persistent effort to bring God nigh.

It is certainly a bold and subtle plan of the enemy to import in this sense the scientific spirit into Scripture itself, to fix our minds upon theories of its production which are proclaimed incapable of damage to our faith because merely that, until we find that unawares we have indeed "pushed back" God far into the distance. The "higher" criticism, as distinct from that of textual integrity, concerns itself, it is said, only with questions of "authorship, etc."*-where the "etc." will be found much the most important part-of the Bible books. * Sanday:"The Oracles of God," p. 30.* "Its conclusions," says Prof. Driver, "affect not the fact of revelation, but only its form.

They help to determine the stages through which it passed, the different phases which it assumed, and the process by which the record of it was built up. They do not touch either the authority or the inspiration of the scriptures of the Old Testament. They imply no change in respect to the divine attributes revealed in the Old Testament, no change in the lessons of human duty to be derived from it, no change as to the general position (apart from the interpretation of particular passages) that the Old Testament points forward prophetically to Christ" (Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament." Preface, p. 11:).
Harmless as it thus looks, it is an admitted fact that the patchwork theory which the higher criticism accepts was born of infidelity, cradled in rationalism, and is to this day claimed rightly by professors of it such as Kuenen, for whom " the Israelitish religion is one of the principal religions,- nothing less, but also nothing more:" a "manifestation of the religious spirit of mankind." The babe has been stolen, taught a somewhat different accent, smuggled in among Christians, and passed off as Christian; but though made to appear lamb-like, its voice is still the dragon's. Even as interpreted by Dr. Driver, it can contradict Christ to the face, as where, in His application of the hundred and tenth psalm to Himself He avers that "David in spirit calls Him Lord," while the higher criticism says, " This psalm, though it may be ancient, can hardly have been composed by David"(Introduction, p. 362). But indeed, everywhere it contradicts Christ, who says, and just of these Old-Testament books, "Scripture cannot be broken" (Jno. 10:35), while these men are continually, to their own satisfaction, proving that it can, and their system could not be maintained apart from this.

The very criteria by which they distinguish the different documents that make up, for instance, the book of Genesis, involve the idea of contradictory statements, too inconsistent to be from one hand. Thus the order of creation in the second narrative (chap. 2:4-6, seq.) is said to be "evidently opposed to the order indicated in chap. 1:"(p. 7). True, the editor who, in their conception of the matter, put them together, did not see it, and thus has left (happily for them) the seams of his patchwork visible, when once the critical eye rests upon it. So the narrative of the deluge, where in one document " of every clean beast seven are to be taken into the ark, while in 6:19 (cf. 7:15) two of every sort, without distinction, are prescribed."(p. 7). Again:"The section 27:46-28:9 differs appreciably in style from 27:1-45, and at the same time exhibits Rebekah as influenced by a different motive in suggesting Jacob's departure from Canaan,-not to escape his brother's anger, but to procure a wife agreeable to his parents' wishes. Further, we find two explanations of the origin of the name 'Bethel;' two of 'Israel:' 32:3, 33:16, Esau is described as already resident in Edom, while 36:6, seq., his migration thither is attributed to causes which could only have come into operation after Jacob's return to Canaan."(p. 8.).

" Scripture cannot be broken "?-why, here it is broken ! All these are plainly given as statements contradictory of one another; for that is the only reason why one writer should not be supposed to have written them all. It is easier to suppose an editor who put them together not perceiving the contradiction between them, although strangely too, as none of these statements lie very far apart. But Scripture can, then, be broken:and "if we are forced to answer" how the Lord could make such mistakes as these, Dr. Sanday tells us piously " that the explanation must lie in the fact that He of whom we are speaking is not only God, but Man. The error of statement would belong in some way to the humanity and not to the divinity "! (Oracles, p. 10)

Can, then, He who for Christians is the Great Teacher, and who claims to he in some sense the only one (Matt. 23:8) lead us astray? To prove the possibility, Dr. San-day stamps the expression He uses, " He maketh the sun to rise" as "imperfect science" (!) and to those who, timidly enough, "maintain that questions relating to the authorship of the Old Testament touch more nearly the subject-matter of Revelation," he puts the question, "Are these distinctions valid? Are they valid enough to be insisted upon so strongly as they must be if the arguments based upon them are to hold good ? "
He answers for himself:"I greatly doubt it;" and by and by undertakes to read us a lecture on humility:"In regard to these questions, I think we shall do better to ponder the words of the psalm,-' Lord, I am not high-minded; I have no proud looks. I do not exercise myself on great matters which are too high for me " (!!)

So Scripture is broken, and we must not be so haughty as to defend it. Dr. Sanday, with all the scientists of the day, have expunged the word "sunrise" from their dictionary, and of course never use it. Scripture, even in its most positive assertions may mislead us ; only let us talk piously:"I should be loth to believe "-notice, my reader, it is Dr. Sanday who would be " loth to believe that our Lord accommodated His language to current notions, knowing them to be false. I prefer to think, as it has been happily worded, that He ' condescended not to know.' "

Piously, however, or impiously, it is the same thing in result:Scripture has passed out of our hands. Even the author we have quoted confesses, as to these changes in men's thoughts about it, that "it must be admitted frankly that they involve a loss. … In old days, it was very much as with the Jews in the time of our Lord. When any question arose of doctrine or practice, all that was needed was to turn the pages of Scripture until one came to a place which bore upon the point at issue. This was at once applied just as it stood, without hesitation and without misgiving."* Dr. Sanday owns that this, according to their view, is gone, although he is not so candid as he seems, when he tells us how far it is gone. *Oracles, p. 76.* It is not merely that "the inquirer feels bound, not only to take the passage along with its context," which was always true, nor even "also to ask, Who was the author? when did he write? and with what stage in the history of revelation is the particular utterance connected?"-questions, some of them, which have no likelihood of being ever answered,-the much deeper question is now, Is the utterance true? and instead of our becoming as "babes" to have divine things revealed to us, we must be learned men, and that to no ordinary extent, in order to pass judgment upon the mingled truth and error presented in Scripture ! By and by, Dr. Sanday hopes, with the help of specialists who are devoting themselves to this, we shall have an annotated-really, a purged-Bible, which will make things easier for simple souls. Practically, thus, another great principle that our Lord announces is taken from us. Scripture becomes like a morass-with firm footing, indeed, somewhere, if I could only find it; but, alas! without help, I cannot even know what is firm from what is treacherous ! We are not to be delivered from the necessity of faith:"I, like them,"-the intelligent among his audience-" must take a great deal upon trust," * says Dr. San-day ; but it is trust in the competency of the critics! * Oracles," p. 7.* The "open Bible" of which we have boasted is to be taken from us, and that more completely than by Romanism itself.

As to the historical books of the Old Testament, with which we are now concerned, they are, according to this view, "in many parts," (how many, we have no means of knowing, it would seem,) "traditions, in which the original representation has been insensibly modified, and sometimes (especially in the later books,) colored by the associations of the age in which the author recording it lived." No wonder, then, " (2) that some freedom was used by ancient historians in placing speeches or discourses in the mouths of historical characters. In some cases, no doubt, such speeches agreed substantially with what was actually said; but often they merely develop at length, in the style and manner of the narrator, what was handed down only as a compendious report, or what was deemed to be consonant with the temper and aim of a given character on a particular occasion. No satisfactory conclusions with respect to the Old Testament will be arrived at without due account being taken of these two principles "!* *Driver, "Introduction, pref. 13:n.*
"Scripture cannot be broken"!-how far have we got away from this! Perhaps, however, the Lord never said that. Perhaps it is some chronicler of a tradition, piecing and patching some musty manuscripts, who put that sentence into His mouth ? They were very little careful about such things, those old historians. Man had not developed, at that age of the world, into the moral being that he is today. The criticism of the New Testament is steadily progressing. Volter, Visher, Weizacker, Pfleiderer, hailing from authoritative German universities, have shown us, but a short time since, the composite character of the Apocalypse. Steck has done the same for the epistle to the Galatians, and has proved, to his own satisfaction, that neither this nor Corinthians nor Romans is of Pauline origin. Voller has found later still that Romans is made up of no less than seven different epistles; Spitta, only the year before last, that the Acts is of two accounts, put together by a " redactor."* *Prof. Jacobus, in The Hartford Seminary Record.* All these are Germans, are professors, or at least students, of colleges, and of course, competent men! Is it not safer to withdraw, while there is yet time to do so with honor, from the extreme position of verbal inspiration which all these and a host of others so determinedly attack ? Is it not more reverent to believe that the Lord did not vouch for this, which, after all, these learned men cannot accept as fact?

Well, what is left us? It is impossible just yet to know. We shall, of course, have the criticisms left; but even the value of these is doubtful. Certainly, " to the poor," their gospel cannot be preached. With all their wisdom, they cannot distinguish a stone from bread, and know nothing of the need of the human heart,-of the sickening sense of having only uncertainty when the future is to be faced,-of the awful silence in the soul when what was held for the voice of God has died out of it. Is there no possibility of distinguishing what is really that from every merely human voice whatever? Drs. Sanday, Driver, and many of their fellows agree that He has spoken; but it is something in the air, which has not shaped itself in definite words:the words are human! Yes, and is there no possibility that He who became man, in His desire to be with us,-if that is among the things left still,-can speak definitely in a human voice? Oh, if I must yet "take a great deal upon trust," may I not trust this wondrous book, which, like the Unchangeable in whose name it speaks, is the Past in a living Present, rather than all the opinions of all the critics in the world? Can they reconstruct this life pervading it, which their dissections in vain search after? Can they give me, with all their wisdom, another Bible, or add a book to it, even? No, they cannot; and by that fact, Scripture is shown more authoritative than its would-be judges. I may have here to "take a great deal upon trust," but it is a trust which heart and conscience approve, and which gives rest and satisfaction to them. It has the witness of centuries to it, and of adoring multitudes in every century, who in every circumstance have found faith in the Bible the one thing sufficing them. Are these modern critics more to be believed than the living Christ this book has given me ? No, says my highest reason ;-no, ten thousand times :it is here I trust alone,-with the faith of a little child, if you will,- trust and rest here.

But we need not be afraid of their arguments. As with evolution in its other branches, the facts which the higher criticism produces-so long as they are facts,-are always interesting, and can be read with profit in the light of the "why." The "why"-the design-reveals the heart of the designer; and where the " how," if it can be ascertained, and while it is connected with this, may illustrate the wisdom of the designer, the purpose in it exhibits him in his whole moral character. If there be no design, the mere "how" of accomplishment is utterly trivial. If the apparent footprint in the sand be not human, and my solitude is to find no relief, how much to me is it to learn how winds and waves have mocked me? But think of men being frenzied with delight in being able to show that what seems mind in all around is not that, and that chance really rules in all the law and order that exist! This most certain truth that chance is nowhere makes every fact at once of interest:they are real foot-prints that are round about me,-and not of a human comforter, but a divine! F. W. G.

(To be continued.)

What's this poor world to me,
Jesus, my Lord ?
I'm ever missing Thee,
Jesus, my Lord.
I long Thy face to see,
And evermore to be,
Joy of my heart, with Thee,
Jesus, my Lord.

Oh, it would be sad indeed,
Jesus, my Lord,
And oft my heart would bleed,
Jesus, my Lord,
But that Thy footprints dear,
Mark all the desert drear,
Through which I journey here,
Jesus, my Lord !

Bright shines the star of hope,
Jesus, my Lord.
Lighting the pathway up,
Jesus, my Lord.
Soon shall the glorious day
Chase all the night away,
Then Thou shalt have full sway,
Jesus, my Lord.

Sovereign Thou shalt be owned,
Jesus, the Lord.
Once in derision crowned,
Jesus, the Lord.
God's hand shall crown Thy brow,
Then every knee shall bow,
Every tongue own that Thou
Only art Lord.

Though time shall cease to be,
As saith Thy Word,
Still through eternity
Thou wilt be Lord;
And while its ages roll,
Life of my ransomed soul,
My being all control,
Jesus, my Lord. H. McD.

"He that giveth, let him do it with simplicity." (Rom. 12:8.)

Giving is one of the highest privileges the believer enjoys. But its very nature is such that it offers to our adversary the devil an excellent opportunity to excite in the giver pride and a feeling of superiority; hence we find the above and many similar exhortations.

Did we but bear in mind that we are only '' stewards of the manifold grace of God," pride could gain no foothold. It is His bounty which we are privileged to dispense,-His "manifold grace," whether "carnal things" or spiritual things.

When one gives thus-as a steward, not only is he "blessed in his deed," but the recipients are put in mind that what they have received has come from God, and to Him first their thanks are due. So the apostle writes concerning the help supplied the poor saints at Jerusalem, " For the administration of this service not only supplieth the want of the saints, but is abundant also by many thanksgivings unto God."

A beautiful example of the way God would have us give is found in the law concerning the reaping of the harvest, laid down in Lev. 19:9, 10 and Deut. 24:19-22,-"And when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not wholly reap the corners of thy field, neither shalt thou gather the gleanings of thy harvest. And thou shalt not glean thy vineyard, neither shalt thou gather every grape of thy vineyard; thou shalt leave them for the poor and stranger:I am the Lord your God." " When thou cuttest down thine harvest in thy field, and hast forgot a sheaf in the field, thou shalt not go again to fetch it; it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow; that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hands," etc.

The wisdom of this law is so apparent, that one is led to exclaim with the prophet, '' This also cometh forth from the Lord of Hosts, which is wonderful in counsel and excellent in working." Let us look for a moment at some of the numerous advantages of this simple method of giving. In the first place, the habit of leaving the gleanings of vineyard, olive-yard, and field for the poor, the fatherless, and the widow would be a potent guard against the tendency to become grasping and penurious-that covetousness which is so common to human nature. On the other hand, the temptation to be proud of being generous would be much less than if the gleanings were first gathered by the owner of the field and then given to the poor. Again, the distribution of labor would be more equal:the giver would not be overworked by having to go over his fields a second time. Even as the apostle says in 2 Cor. 8:13,-"For I mean not that other men be eased and ye be burdened."

On the part of the recipients, industry and thrift would be encouraged rather than indolence and dependence, quite in accord with the scripture in 2 Thess. 3:10-"That if any would not work, neither should he eat."

Then, too, they would be spared needless humiliation on account of their poverty; for poverty in itself is not a reproach, though it is often keenly felt to be such on account of the condescending manner in which help is given. Our Lord Himself has been called "the poorest of men;" and His disciples, as they walked with Him through the corn-fields on the Sabbath, and plucked of the corn to satisfy their hunger, were taking advantage of a similar gracious provision of the law. (Deut. 23:25.) Then, again, the thoughts of the gleaners would naturally be occupied first and most with Him who had given the increase, for the very fruits of the earth which they were engaged in gathering bear witness of Him, as it is written, "He left not Himself without witness in that He gave us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness." And so their thanksgiving would be rendered first to Him, afterward to the owner of the field, who had not forgotten the law of his God.

So much for the law and its workings in temporal things :is it not equally instructive and applicable concerning our ministry in spiritual things ?

Among God's children there are those who have taken possession of a goodly portion of the land, and have broad acres of rich grain-fields, olive-yards, and vineyards. In other words, those who are well instructed in the Word of God, who have abundance of food for themselves and others. There are also those who are poor, who have never perhaps gotten beyond the '' first principles of the doctrine of Christ."

"The poor shall never cease out of the land," says Jehovah, so there will always be those who have need of just such ministry as these spiritually rich believers have to offer. And it is well that it is so, for the very poverty of these needy ones calls forth the spiritual activities of those who by the grace of God are richer, demands the exercise of their various gifts and keeps them from becoming selfish and careless of the interests of other saints. The Lord would never have His people forget their need one of another. It is written, "Woe unto them that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there be no place, that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth."

There are fields enough for all the saints in the good land our God has given us; the land is '' wide and quiet and peaceable," and those who are of God's mind will rejoice to see "the poor " come into possession of fields they can call their own.

Ruth the gleaner did not remain a gleaner. After a short season of gleaning she became joint-owner of all the fields of Boaz !

We have often been grieved to hear young believers remark, "I do enjoy listening to a good address, but when I read the Bible for myself I can't get any thing out of it."

And we have often replied, mentally, You have never learned how to glean, and perhaps it is because those who have ministered to you carefully gleaned their fields themselves, and then gave you out of their abundance; instead of leading you straight to the fields where the reapers are at work, and instructing you, as Boaz did Ruth, " Let thine eyes be on the fields that they do reap, and go thou after them."

Had you but been in the fields, you would know where the grain grows, and how it is gathered, and you would not be so helpless.

In plainer language, if he who desires to teach another some truth or line of truth from the Scriptures, is content to lead his pupil on slowly, from text to text, in the Word, giving him time to find each for himself, and see its bearing on the subject in hand, progress may seem slow, and the teacher may not be able to manifest how much he knows about the subject, but the benefit the pupil receives is great and lasting. It may take days, perhaps weeks, to teach him a single lesson; but once learned, it is well learned. He can take you to the Scriptures and give you from them a reason for the hope that is in him. He has been in the fields at work, and the next lesson will be easier to teach him.

Moreover, what he has thus gleaned will be precious in his sight, as the fruit of his own labor. He will measure it as Ruth did, and though it be only "about an ephah of barley," he will, like Ruth, carry it home with him, and after being sufficed therewith himself, will no doubt give of his treasure to some one else, even as Ruth '' brought forth and gave to her (Naomi) that she had reserved after she was sufficed." She was first sufficed, for "the husbandman that laboreth must be first partaker of the fruits."

When believers are thus taught they are not apt to get their eyes upon the teacher instead of the truth
taught. Their eyes have been upon the field, the Scriptures, and it is their worth and perfection they learn to appreciate.

Such simplicity of teaching is also an excellent guard to the instructor against teaching any thing that cannot be clearly established by the Word of God.

The one thus taught also learns to more readily detect false doctrine, to be suspicious of any teaching for which he is not given Scripture, and to "prove all things," and "hold fast that which is good." Thus, little by little, he increases "in wisdom and stature," and ere long has fields of his own where he may reap and others glean.

Many a young untaught believer upon first hearing some deeply instructed saint open the Scriptures to others, is quite discouraged, and thinks there is not the least hope of his ever gaining such a knowledge of the Word of God. But if this same teacher sits patiently down with him, and leads him to the same fields whence he has acquired all his wealth, and gives him a few lessons in gleaning, he takes fresh courage, his interest is aroused, he sees what possibilities of wealth are before him, and goes earnestly to work. In giving with simplicity, as in every thing else, our Lord Jesus has left us a perfect example. Of Him it is written, '' For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might be rich."

One can but marvel at such a strange thing as that. We would suppose that if a rich man wanted to make others rich he must surely do it while he himself was rich, and not first become poor ! But not so, From the beginning of the world God had been giving to men as One who was rich and able indeed to give ; but not thus were their hearts won, not thus were they made rich toward God. Not until He came "who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men," did God accomplish His desire. As a poor Man He walked among men and made many rich indeed. He came to minister, but He came as a poor Man. Nevertheless all the resources of heaven were at His command when man's need called them forth. He could heal the sick, raise the dead, feed the multitudes, and all as a poor Man who had "not where to lay His head."
Dearly beloved, would to God we better knew how to give with "the simplicity that is in Christ Jesus." Always '' poor in spirit," that we may be in sympathy with those whom we seek to help, and yet '' filled with all the fullness of God." "Full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, able also to admonish one another."

So should we be according to the scripture, '' Approving ourselves as the ministers of God … as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things." G. M. R.

" The land was not able to bear them"-Abraham and Lot. " Go from us; thou are mightier than we," said the Philistines to Isaac. " The land wherein they were strangers could not hold them, because of their cattle "-Esau and Jacob.

Why should that land which held without being burdened the teaming populations of David and Solomon's time be unable to support two men ? Doubtless, they did not do much in the way of cultivating the soil, and its natural yield of grass might be exhausted by the numerous number of cattle they kept. This is said to be so in the case of Jacob and Esau, and intimated in that of Abraham and Lot. But spiritually the meaning for us is plain. Abraham was the man of faith; Lot, the man of sight. Jacob, with all his follies, prized the birthright of God's blessing, while Esau despised the one and really did not care for the other. With Isaac the case is plain. There was, then, nothing in heart common between these men, and so their ways of necessity parted.

So it is to-day. The spiritual and carnal Christian can no more walk together than could Abraham and Lot. There will be abundant opportunity for this heart-divergence to crop out. One cause is as good as another. "How can two walk together except they be agreed ? " Here is the root of much schism among Christians. Some are spiritual and some walk as men.

Nor can the flesh and spirit be welded together, whether it be the rough self-will of Esau, or the professed obedience of the Philistine. One must give place to the other :which shall be master ?

But the land, thank God, will bear all who have the heart to live on it. Its hills and valleys will yield the " finest of the wheat," its very rocks give honey. If there are partings and separations, let us be sure the cause is in ourselves, not in the Christian position.

The Lord give us one heart to prove the fertility of the land He has given us to sustain all His people.