Eight months ago, I came to Scotland the most miserable of men, and now stand here one of the happiest on this side " the glory." My life since boyhood has been passed in foreign lands, where, immersed in the cares and pleasures of this world, unable to understand the ways of God about original sin, and uncertain as to the truths of Christianity, I lived entirely without God, and drank at all the fountains where the world finds pleasure, only to find them, as Solomon did long ago, to be "vanity and vexation of spirit."

I had gold enough to satisfy me, and there was absolutely nothing on earth I cared for. I was . weary of my life, and now conscience, lulled hitherto almost to sleep, woke up with this terrible truth, "You knew your duty, and you did it not." I feared this would ring in my ears through a lost eternity, for I never doubted the immortality of the soul, or imagined, with some modern philosophers, that men are irresponsible descendants of monkeys. These strivings of conscience I now believe to have been the gracious work of the Holy Spirit in answer to the prayers of many real Christians, who constantly pleaded with God for me.

You will wonder, dear Christian friends, why in my wretchedness I did not at once come to Him who gives rest to the weary. Ah, I was where the world with all its boasted knowledge is (Jno. 17:) -I "knew Him not"!

I was told that God was love, yet saw the whole earth full of misery:-a child but a few days old, for example, suffering intensely through the faults of its parents. "Surely," I thought, "if God were love, this world would not be the scene of suffering which I see it is." And besides, I had been taught that Christianity was intended by God to regenerate the whole world, and fill it with peace and joy. I had sad proof before me every where that it had totally failed so to do.

I had read in "Gibbon" what Christians were in the primitive days-a separate, peculiar people, devoted to God, having no home here, rejoicing to die and get away to Christ, or waiting for Him to come for them. " What a contrast," thought I, " with the Christendom of today!"

I had stood in the churches of South America, amid thousands of kneeling Christians (so called) most assiduous in performing their religious duties, yet knew that the whole population were sunk in the most complete moral depravity, the priests being the worst of the community. Their religion was evidently an empty form, which had totally failed to improve them. How could this corrupted Christianity be that which God had intended for the regenerating of the world?

Coming to Protestant lands, I found all manner of sects detesting one another, yet all professing to be Christians. " Surely," I thought, "if the Bible were from God, there could not be this disparity of belief and form, and disunion among those professing to be taught by it." I saw also that, though there was an almost universal profession of Christianity and church-going, etc., practically men and women lived as though the world, not God,-time, not eternity,-were the aim and object in life. These professing Christians were almost entirely occupied with those worldly things all of which I had found to be "vanity and vexation of spirit." In these sad circumstances, what else could I think but that this so-called Christianity was almost as great a farce in Protestant Scotland as in Romish Peru; that, far from regenerating mankind, as I had been taught it would, it had itself become corrupt and worldly, and had most completely failed to purify the people, and separate them from the world to God. How could it be from God? Such was my thought.

Still conscience said," However these things may be, 'you knew your duty, and did it not.'"

My deliverance began by learning that the gradual conversion of the world during this age was an entirely human invention, totally opposed to the statements of the New Testament, which invariably represents the true Church of Christ as " sheep among wolves "–a " little flock," while " the whole world lieth in wickedness;" that the good seed, though sown by the Son of Man Himself, would yield but very little fruit; that the devil would be allowed to render the most part of it unproductive, and to sow tares among the wheat, to leaven the whole of professing Christendom with his false doctrine; that Christ did not pray for the world, but for the little flock which believes on Him; that the mystery of iniquity was already at work in Paul's day, and would continue till the open manifestation of the wicked one-" the man of sin;" in fact, I saw that these days in which we live are called by the Holy Ghost (Gal. 1:4)," This present evil age" (it is aion-a period of time, not kosmos-world); and that the devil is " the god of this age [aion] " (2 Cor. 4:4), and will continue to be so until its close.

Beloved friends, these terrible truths, themselves astounding and inexplicable to us, settled the whole difficulty for me. It was exactly what I had found this present scene to be-the devil's age. That being- the fact, I must not look during this period for the immediate righteous government of God manifested on the earth. God is silent now, though (Ps. 1:) the foundations of the earth are out of course. The devil being captain of the ship called " This present evil world," she must go on to destruction at that "great and terrible day of the Lord" when our blessed Lord will come to bind up Satan, and execute righteous judgment on those who have rejected His grace.

If the question, " Why is all this?" be asked, we answer, At the tomb of Lazarus, the Judge of living and dead groaned within Himself and wept, not about Lazarus, whom He was going to raise from the dead, but on account of this scene of ruin and death. This gives perfect rest to the heart. We can then say that, though not understanding God's ways, we know God's heart.

When God's spirit opened my eyes to see that, the Bible told me exactly the true state of things around and within me-that this age, with its corrupted Christianity, is the devil's work, and that I was a guilty and lost sinner, I had no more doubt that it was divine; I believed in the love of God who had given His only begotten Son to die for the guilty and the lost, for enemies, and thus entered into rest.

The infinite God has spoken, let finite man lend an attentive ear. And oh, what a message of love and grace has reached a guilty world, and brought by such a Messenger! (See Jno. 1:) The Lamb of God! what a name for the almighty Creator of all things-Jehovah's Fellow! What so gentle, so innocent, as a Lamb? Then, whence came this wondrous Messenger? From "the bosom of the Father." Oh, beloved, what words of love are these
-Lamb! Bosom! Father! What word in our language like "bosom"? A little child hides its face in its mother's bosom, and knows no fear. Then "Father!" What word so suggestive of perfect confidence and rest? And when the meek and lowly Man of Nazareth was to be baptized by the Spirit for His work here below, what form did that Spirit assume? The fiery tongues of Pentecost? Nay, upon the gentle Lamb of God descended the Spirit like a gentle dove, and the Father's voice was heard saying, " This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." Oh, beloved, would not these words alone show us the heart of our blessed God? Lamb, bosom, Father, dove, have to my ear a melody divine-a melody which, in the riches of His grace, God blessed by the Spirit to the salvation of my soul.

But more, what message did this heavenly Stranger bring? "GRACE and truth came by
Jesus Christ."The whole truth that I am a lost ruined sinner, totally unable to help myself; and then the only thing suitable for such an one, grace -free, undeserved favor. The law said, " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God;" Grace says, God loves you. How do we know it? The law demands, but grace gives. He has given us His only-begotten Son. Oh, beloved, how is it possible to distrust such a God, or not to love our blessed Kinsman-Redeemer, who has given us Himself and all that He has, washed in whose blood we stand before our God and Father, accepted in the Beloved, loved as Jesus is loved, one with Him ; and best of all, to be with Him forever, being even now seated in Him in heavenly places, and soon to be conformed to His image, in body as well as soul, and sit with Him on His throne. (Rev. 3:21.) Meantime, the King is not yet upon His throne as the acknowledged Lord of all, but, seated at God's right hand, awaits the day known to God alone, when He shall come to meet us in the air, and take us to His Father's house.

At present, His kingdom exists in a mystery (Matt. 13:), and necessarily so, seeing that the rightful King has been rejected, and that a usurper, the devil, is practically "the god of this age." Oh, how sad to think that so many professing Christians should be nestling down in the devil's world, as if it were well with them, and, like the Gadarenes of old, not desirous that Jesus should come to drive the devil away!

All this inexplicable scene of sorrow and suffering is an anomaly which will be terminated when the earth's rightful King has come. Meanwhile, let us remember that we are espoused as a chaste virgin to Christ. Shall we make ourselves at home among the murderers and despisers of our Lord? We are pilgrims and strangers here, our citizenship being in heaven. God has no earthly people now, these being the times of the Gentiles; but when the saints have been taken up to the Father's house (Jno. 14:3) God's earthly people, the Jews, will be restored, put in grace under the new covenant, and under the reign of the true seed of David, shall blossom and bud, and fill the face of the world with fruit.

We who believe in a risen Christ, who is gone into heaven, are a heavenly people, and our hope is heavenly; for " from thence we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change our vile body, that it shall be fashioned like unto His glorious body." For that day we wait; for that day Paul and his dear Philippians, and all the ransomed saints of God who have "fallen asleep in Jesus," are still waiting in heaven; and for that day our blessed Master also waits upon His Father's throne. (Rev. 3:21; Heb. 10:13.)

Oh, beloved, as we often sing, "this world is a wilderness wide;" and it is so to us mainly because He whom our soul loveth is not here. Is it not the one great desire of our hearts to see that meek and lowly Man of Nazareth, who sat by Sychar's well, who wept human yet divine tears over human sorrows, who " loved us and gave Himself for us," and who has left us those lovely words (Jno. 14:3), "I will come again, and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also"? "Even so, come, Lord Jesus."