Eli enjoyed the greatest privilege in Israel-the place of greatest nearness to God, and occupation with His service. As high-priest, all the hallowed associations of the sanctuary, its sacrifices and other worship, were matters of daily even hourly familiarity with him. Nor does it seem that this was lost upon him :a real attachment to the things of God, and in a sense a zeal for His glory are marked in him, together with a submission to His will under government. Nor was the privilege for Eli alone; his family shared with him in the nearness, the hallowed occupation with the things of the sanctuary. Had there been a state of heart in Hophni and Phinehas answering to the place of outward nearness which they occupied, they would have been men of marked and intelligent piety. But, alas! outward privileges do not change the heart, natural descent does not mean regeneration. Israel as a nation are proofs of this:descended from Abraham, the man of faith, they have shown by the hardness of their hearts that they are not children of Abraham. It is just as true for the sons of godly parents as for those utterly ignorant of God, that " Ye must be born again." Without this, outward blessing only proves a curse. Occupied with holy things, these men instead of being elevated, degrade those things. They made the Lord's offering to be abhorred. Those whose worship they should have guided, they degraded, and all this with the knowledge of their father Eli.

Look on the other hand at Hannah. A woman, and so representative of the feeble ; barren and despised, how could she, in the eyes of Israelites, to whom a barren womb was as a curse, glorify God ? All seems to be against her according to nature; but this only drives her to one unfailing refuge. Even at the tabernacle and in its worship she could find comfort in prayer and tears, rather than in praise, and Eli the priest of God, who should "have compassion on the ignorant," fails to understand her. Alas ! his eyes, so long closed to his sons' waywardness, fail to discern the difference between one of a sorrowful spirit and those who had been debauched by the priests. He is severe where nothing but sympathy is called for. He can admonish an outsider, where none is
needed, while in his own house all manner of evil is allowed. There is nothing sadder in Eli than this evidence of loss of discernment and of power. His own weakness at home has made him incompetent to deal with matters in connection with God's house. He is not alone in this. The apostle in giving the requirements for one to be a ruler in God's house writes, " One that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity; (for if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the Church of God)." (i Tim. 3:4, 5.) Doubtless, many cases of mistaken discipline, needless severity, and want of wisdom in general, may be directly traced to the fact that Elis are trying to do in God's house what they have failed to do in their own, and, like the one of whom we are speaking, only manifest their lack of wisdom and of power. Surely this is a most pungent truth for parents to consider. How unspeakably solemn is Eli's position, a wearer of high-priestly robes, with two ungodly sons. How incongruous ! But it may be said, Eli rebuked his sons. Yes, and allowed them to go on in their sins. His very rebuke only hardened them, for it showed that with full knowledge of their course he allowed them to continue in the priests' office. How different was this from Phinehas in the time of Baal Peor! No rebuke is sufficient to arrest the flood-tide of evil, and he stands forth with his spear, not to speak, but to act,-to act for God at whatever cost, and blessing follows. Surely, parents should admonish and instruct their children, but words alone, unaccompanied by power, are of no avail. How did these sons of Eli grow to manhood with such habits ? Was it carelessness on the part of their father, a spirit of indulging his children, another name for self-indulgence? Parents are told to bring up their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, and these two words mean all that is needful spiritual food and spiritual correction, administered in power. If parents seek in dependence upon God to carry out this instruction with reference to their children, surely God will give His blessing. Eli is forced to hear the doom pronounced upon his house, because of his own unfaithfulness. " His own sons made themselves vile and he restrained them not." It does not say, "he admonished them not," but "he restrained them not." He did not come in with that authority given to him from God, _given to every parent to restrain, yes, by force if necessary, his children. Eli had much in him to commend, doubtless ; but he seems to be one of those easygoing people who will not sacrifice ease to duty, who do not hearken to the wholesome words in Proverbs, "Chasten thy son while there is hope, and let not thy soul spare for his crying." The Revised Version renders the latter clause, " And set not thine heart on his destruction." This surely is done by those who for the sake of sparing the tears caused by wholesome chastening will allow self-will in the child, which will surely bring it to destruction. With the example of Eli before them, let no parent excuse himself for carelessness in the training of his children. He will reap what he has sown, and the after sorrows will far, far outweigh all the present pain of being firm and faithful with those whom God has placed under his care. For proper correction and discipline at the right time and in the right spirit does not take up the larger part of the parent's intercourse with his children, nor color the whole life. Correction is the exception, not the rule :a uniform firmness, tempered with love, is far better than oft-repeated chastisement.

But let us return to Hannah. Her child is one given in direct answer to prayer, and before its birth it is dedicated to God. He is to be a Nazarite-one separate unto God from much even that passes for good. Let us notice the one point which makes the great difference between Hannah and Eli. Hannah is communion with God about her child. She asks him from God, she dedicates him to God. The sanctuary is to be his home. But it might be said, Children ought to be happy, not tied down or made religious. Wait until they get older before putting a yoke upon them. Hannah's way with Samuel is the answer. She might say to any who objected to her giving up her son to God, "In His presence is fullness of joy, at His right hand are pleasures for evermore." Can there be greater joy for children, as for all, than to know God ? It is Satan who would keep parents from thus fully dedicating their children to God, and from acting upon it. Like Pharaoh, he would allow the parents to go on pilgrimage, provided the children are left behind in Egypt. It is just here that great mistakes are made. Under the pretext of allowing for youth, and childish pleasures, associations, habits, and practices are allowed which are of the world. What is the result? The children grow up in the world. The bodily food that is good enough for the parent suffices for the child :so the spiritual food is good alike for both. Milk for babes indeed, but milk does not mean poison. It means elementary instruction in the same truths upon which the parent feeds. The question might he asked, Are harmless sports, etc., to be forbidden ? Surely not; yet there is a way of enjoying these, and at the same time taking them from a Father's hand, that will make the child a worshiper. How important, then, to begin where Hannah did. The child belongs to God :it shall be brought up for Him :it shall be a Nazarite. God answered her faith. Her son was all that she expected him to be-all that she asked for him. It is needful to notice this precious fact:God does hear believing prayer for children, He does honor the faith that honors Him. But this includes the practical carrying out of the dedication. Hannah carries Samuel up to the Lord's house. It was not enough that in her affliction she vowed to do so; she accomplished her vow. Many parents are constant, and in a sense believing, in their prayers for their children; yet when action is needed-practical separation unto God, they fail. Some may say, Children are not converted, have not the tastes of the new man, and therefore it would make them legal to require them to act upon principles a Christian alone can understand. To this it is enough to reply, first, Who can say how early in life a child may be regenerated and the new man require proper food ? Secondly, the Word is the appointed means to this end, and should therefore be freely, persistently, and faithfully used. Thirdly, the children of believers have a responsibility for walk apart from the question of their new birth. All this is intimated in two points in the child-history of Samuel :he was weaned, and yearly his mother brought him a little coat, when she came up to the Lord's house to offer sacrifice. The weaning would seem to teach that breaking of the will without which little or nothing can be done for the child. Its desires are curbed, its wishes are checked effectually, begetting a subdued spirit before unknown. How needful it is that children should be taught to surrender their wills ! Obedience, absolute, immediate, and cheerful, is the first lesson to teach them. Once effectually learned, it stays with the child through life:partially learned, it crops up again and again in acts and ways of willfulness. But who can truly command obedience but the one who is obedient ? Only those themselves as weaned children in God's presence can expect the subject spirit in their own children. How can children honor those who do not command it by their lives? This obedience need not be unintelligent. Of course, a reason cannot be given for every command, and children must be taught to obey unquestioningly. But conscience should also be instructed, so that as the children grow, they may learn to obey, not with eye-service merely, but from principle.

(To be continued.)

A correction.-In the answer to Q. 5, February number, let"Greek"and"Hebrew" change places, and for "Cleopas"read"Cleophas." Both"Alpheus"and "Cleophas" are probably Greek forms of the same Aramaic word, but " Alpheus " is nearer the original.

Q. 9.-"In the tenth chapter of John, what is 'the fold,' and who is ' the porter' ?"-R. H.

Ans.-A fold is the inclosure, or house, where the sheep are kept. Judaism was that fold when Christ, the true Shepherd, came. Others-false teachers, self-seekers-had come; but the sheep did not hear them; they never entered by the door-the way of God's appointment and His approval. Such were the scribes, Pharisees, and doctors of the law. The porter did not recognize them, neither did the sheep. The porter is the one in charge of the door, and would seem to be God Himself-" He that keepeth Israel." At our Lord's baptism, He said, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased;" thus opening wide the door for Him, who entered in, and whose voice the sheep heard, and followed Him. " He calleth His own sheep by name, and leadeth them out,"-out of Judaism, into Christianity, where there is no more fold, but where the '' other sheep " (5:16) hear His voice (the Gentiles brought to Him), and there is one flock (not " fold "-see S. F.) and one Shepherd. Some have spoken of John the Baptist as the porter:such he was in some sense, because he gave utterance to God's thoughts about His Son; but it would seem that he was but the under-porter, to do the bidding of the Higher One.

Q. 10.-"Some inquiries on the Spirit.-It is said that Pentecost is the only baptism of the Spirit,-that then the Church being formed, that no after-reception of it is the same. Does not Acts 10:44, 45; 10:15, 16 show otherwise the expressions 'fell' 'poured out,' 'baptized with,' being used as to it ?

"Is it right to use the distinction 'came upon' and 'dwelt in' as distinguishing Old and New-Testament times ? Is it not rather (1) the fact of His abiding presence instead of transient visits, (2) and that He formed the one body instead of coming upon and filling individuals. John the Baptist was filled with the Holy Ghost from the womb. So the prophets-' the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify,' etc."-B. G. G.

Ans.-Does not Pentecost mark the beginning of the dispensation, when the Holy Ghost was sent down from heaven ? and may not the similar expressions in Acts 10:and 11:referred to above be because Gentiles were involved for the first time. There is but one descent of the Spirit; but surely every Christian is individually baptized by the Spirit into the one body, and sealed when he believes. The work of the Holy Spirit in Old-Testament times seems to have been rather official than personal,- fitting men, even unconverted men, as Saul, for some special service or testimony. (1 Sam. 10:) Still we have too the personal work, as in David's case (Ps. 51:)-"Take not Thy Holy Spirit from me," where also the transient nature of His presence is intimated. The characteristic thought about the Holy Spirit in the New Testament (epistles) seems to be that He is sent down after the Lord entered glory,-He is the witness of a glorified Christ, uniting us to Him as Head of His Church, and so to one another as members of His body.

Will A. T. kindly send the paper referred to in his question, before an answer is attempted ?

Once I prayed-
[I knew not what I said,]
"Show me myself, O Lord."
Alas ! I did not dread
The hideous sight,
[Which now I shudder to behold,]
Because I knew not self aright.

And I was led,
In answer to my prayer,
As step by step, to see
My wretched heart laid bare.
Then I prayed,
"Stay, Lord, I cannot bear the sight! "
And pityingly His hand was stayed.

Now I pray-
[I know the prayer is right,]
" Show me Thyself, O Lord.
Be to my soul the bright
And Morning Star,
To shine upon the grave of self,
And lead my heart from earth afar."

Oh, to behold
None other, Lord, than Thee.
E'en in Thine own, to seek
For that which looks like Thee.
Transfixed by Thy glorious beauty, Lord,
We'll learn to sing Thy praise, and thus
Forget to weep and sigh.

H. McD.

"There are no two people alike" is an expression we often hear ; which in one sense is quite true. In another sense we are all alike, for " as in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man." (Prov. 27:19.)Our hearts are all alike. We naturally love self amazingly. We may put it down emphatically, " The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth enviously." (Jas. 4:5.)"For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing." (Rom. 7:18.)

If we could only keep in memory the truth as to what "the flesh" in us is, Christian fellowship might be maintained where it otherwise is so often marred; for we would, as a matter of course, turn from it completely to Christ Jesus, in whose face we would thankfully behold every believer. But, alas! we too often " look one another in the face " (2 Kings 14:8), and as a consequence, become occupied with the blemishes there.

If we would but remember when we do so, that we are but receiving the answer to our own face, "as in water," would we not be ashamed? Paul says, "I knew a man in Christ. … Of such an one will I glory:yet of myself I will not glory, but in mine infirmities." (2 Cor. 12:2, 5.) As a "man in Christ," the thought would ever be present, "by the grace of God I am what I am." (i Cor. 15:10.) Consequently, "by the grace of God" we each are what we are ; though as "in Christ" there is absolute perfection, yet in ourselves there are ''infirmities." In other words, there is that in each one of us which ought to cause shame and self-abhorrence rather than self-satisfaction or self-righteousness. Can we look at our past, and say, "I am pleased with it"? Would we dare to look at our present, and say, "I am satisfied"? And yet do we not forget this when we mark the "infirmities" of others? Of course, this is short of "wickedness." I am but speaking now of that in our nature which makes the diversity between us, and calls for forbearance. We hear Christians talking of the bad traits of character in others, and then closing with the remark, "I could not do such a thing;" or, " I cannot see how such an one can do so-and-so; now I do so-and-so." Is not this the unwise thing of which the apostle speaks ? " For we dare not make ourselves of the number, or compare ourselves with some that commend themselves; but they, measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves among themselves, are not wise." (2 Cor. 10:12.)

Can there be real Christian fellowship where such thoughts and words are indulged ?

But, beloved, the "virtues" of Christ are to be seen in all who are His, and " by the grace of God" they are what they are. Then let us cease this busied effort of digging up evil, as it is the work of the "ungodly." (Prov. 16:27.) It is an unholy practice, which we can easily fall into if not "sanctified by the truth"-preserved. (Jno. 17:17-19.)

We are to recognize the fact that there are human weaknesses in all, and ought we not rather to pray for the needed grace to overcome these infirmities, and so " provoke unto love and to good works?

It is a painful fact that Christians often cannot live together? Why is this? Is it not because they are not grounded and established in the truth we are considering? I am sure it is. Is it not frequently also a painful fact that Christians are not in fellowship together very long before these "little foxes which spoil the vines" appear and endanger the "little flock"?

And is there no remedy ? Yes, the remedy is twofold. I believe, before any real abiding soul-progress can be made, true "repentance toward God" as to our natural condition is absolutely essential. In other words, to abhor self as Job did (Job 42:5, 6). This can only be by getting a good view of ourselves as in God's holy presence,-by believing the truth as to our condition already referred to. Second, faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ sufficient to draw upon the grace needful for daily piety.

Our infirmities remind us of our natural condition, and consequently humble us, and thus serve the purpose of exalting Christ in us, as we must lean on Him or fail miserably.

Let us, beloved, turn away from occupation with the blemishes in others; and when tempted to be so engaged, let the remembrance of our own nature bring the blush of shame to our face, and the grace of Christ prostrate us before Him-the absolutely spotless One, in whom alone we "stand " or can alone hope to be "holden up."

"Let brotherly love continue." (Heb. 13:1:)

[NOTE.-It is to be remembered that the writer is referring, not to the wickedness of the flesh In the believer, but its weakness. All true fellowship is based upon righteousness-"in the light"-and righteousness cannot turn away from sin in a brother. The sin must be dealt with, in all gentleness and love, and wisdom, but it cannot be ignored.

What is most to be deplored is the lack of power to deal with evil. It is perhaps easy to speak of this, easier than to manifest that power. Where one is walking with God, he can and will rebuke sin and in so doing not offend, save the incorrigible, but commend himself to every man's conscience in the sight of God. It should be owned with sorrow that fellowship is a thing easily marred, and the writer notes the spirit of criticism as the cause. But we must remember too that neglect of evil only allows it to increase, and meddling with evil without power also spreads it. The only remedy is to be cast upon God, to be much alone with Him and thus have His mind. We shall then be able to act in faithfulness and to verify that sure word which says, "faithful are the wounds of a friend." Let it be seen that there is no selfishness, no party spirit, at the bottom of the rebuke or the discipline, but a true desire for God's honor, and His blessing will go with us. How many have had occasion to bless God for the faithful dealing of a fellow-Christian, or even of a whole assembly. But let us remember, we are to walk with God if we are to act for Him.-ed.]

"Be ye also enlarged. Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers," (2 Cor. 6:13, 14.)

These two exhortations, or rather two parts of one exhortation, occur together as quoted above. Indeed, the second is but explanatory of the first, and taking the two together, we have, as always in the perfect Book, an evenly balanced presentation of truth.

We live in a day of great broadness, so called. Men professing to hold to the divinity of our blessed Lord can be associated in benevolent work with those who deny it. Within the bounds of the same denominational communion can be found those who teach that death means annihilation to the wicked, those holding to their final restoration to blessing, and those who profess to believe that eternal punishment is indeed what Scripture calls it -" everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord." These persons remain together, tolerate one another's views, and seem to think it an exhibition of brotherly love, and largeness of heart. There are to-day men who deny the infallible inspiration of God's Word, holding chairs in institutions devoted to instructing young men for the ministry, while the large part of the same denomination hold that the Bible is God's Word. Yet
apparently no violence is done to conscience, and but few voices are raised in opposition to this blending of light and darkness.

Opposed to all such laxity, falsely called " largeness," but in reality treason to God, His Son, His Spirit, His Word, is the simple statement of Scripture. " Be ye also enlarged. Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers." Largeness is needed, broad views which take in the whole scope of divine truth; but it must be the broadness of God, not man, nor Satan ; and what blasphemer will link God's holy name with the infidelity creeping into and fast destroying the churches of to-day?

Heaven, God's home, is described for us negatively in the main. There is no temple in it, no need for the sun or moon; " There shall in no wise enter into it any thing that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lie." No more sea, no more curse, no more sighing, tears, or death. That blessed home, our home too, is described by what it excludes, (not, of course, that it is a negative state, but that the presence of the things excluded would only bring misery,) and thus room is given for the full enjoyment of those blessings ours even now in anticipation, as made known by the Spirit. Would any one think for a moment that heaven is a narrow, constrained place? Nay, it is indeed a "wealthy place." The exclusion of evil, evil persons, evil principles, gives room for the full enjoyment of the liberty of the glory of the children of God. And what is the child of God now if not a heavenly person ? Then let the exclusiveness of heaven be true of him here. But it is objected that the rigid application of exclusiveness will separate from God's own children. To this it is enough to answer that if they adopt doctrines and practices contrary to the truth of God, they separate themselves; and if we would not go with them in that separation, we must hold fast what we have. It is needless, however, to dwell longer upon this aspect of the truth, admitted by most, at least, who have a true desire to honor Him who suffered all reproach and dishonor for us. Let us apply the same principle to the daily walk and intercourse of the Christian. If we are to have true largeness of heart, we must keep ourselves unspotted from the world. Lot settled down in Sodom, and lost all power to help that people, or to enjoy communion. He had taken what might be called a liberal step; but, so far from enlargement, nothing but straitness resulted, and wretched failure. Abraham holds himself aloof, and his heart is so enlarged that he can not only enter into God's thoughts about himself, but into that pity and long-suffering which for the time found expression in his interceding prayer for the doomed city. It was so with Israel as a nation; separate, they had power, blessing, enlargement; mixed with the nations about them, they grew smaller and smaller, until God's eye alone could trace them. In this very chapter, the apostle speaks of his own enlargement, and does so in connection with statements which seem to be paradoxical:"As unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold we live; as chastened, and not killed ; as sorrowful, yet alway rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things." To the natural mind, these opposites are not only incapable of being harmonized, but constraint, unrest, and narrowness would result. Faith, however, sees in the outward straitness the hindrance of that which would only bring into bondage-the flesh. As to his condition, the apostle could glory in infirmities, that the power of Christ might rest upon him. Let us learn this lesson too. And as to our associations-whether social, commercial, or ecclesiastical,-if we carry out the principles we have been considering, we will find true enlargement. We will be in a place where God can show what a Father He is, and share with us His thoughts, which are never narrow. In a day like this, when the tendency is toward union at the expense of truth, let us be on our guard. Let us not fear true unity, which is of God, but learn His heart and ways in separation from that which is not of Him.

No thought is here intended that would cast suspicion upon any, or disparage that love which would unite all God's own. But let us have Him, not His people, before us, and true enlargement will follow.

"And this is the Father's will which hath sent Me, that of all which He hath given Me, I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day."

" And this is the will of Him that sent Me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on Him, may have everlasting life; and I will raise him up at the last day."

"No man can come to Me, except the Father which hath sent Me draw him; and I will raise him up at the last day."

"Whoso eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise Him up at the last day." (Jno. 6:39, 40, 44, 54.)

We have in these verses four distinct truths, differing from each other, often indeed considered by man to be utterly irreconcilable, yet all converging to one common end-resurrection at the last day. That goal of high blessing, because of God's glory, is the meeting-point where at last, if not before, all that seems contradictory in the great scheme of redemption will be forever harmonized. Then, to principalities and powers, to the world will God manifest the perfection of His wisdom, power, and grace. But we know that now these precious truths should be made manifest by the Church
(Eph. 3:9, 10), not only to those in the heavenly places, but to all men as well. And if these things are to be manifested by the Church, they must also be understood by the Church. Let us, then, seek to gather some of the wondrous truths taught in these four verses.

First, we have the truth of God's sovereign, absolute election. Here the whole mass of His chosen people are viewed as one-"all which He has given Me." The integrity of this mass is preserved ; nothing is lost from it. It is to be raised up, in glory, and presented before God in the completeness in which it was given to the Son. How entirely is man set aside here ! Before the foundation of the world-ere even sin had brought in ruin-we have this wondrous transaction ; a gift to the Son, intrusted to Him, in the assurance that at whatever cost, whatever risk, no portion of that gift, not the most insignificant, should be lost. Sin, and death by sin, are contemplated as in the future, but spite of sin, through death, beyond the fitful rage of Satan's power, and man's rebellion, that gift is preserved, "raised up at the last day," when He to whom this gift was made will say, " Behold, I and the children which God hath given Me." Compared with the certainty of this accomplishment how puny are Satan's mightiest efforts weakest when they seemed strongest, overthrown at the moment when they seemed to have overthrown God's Son ! how powerless is sin to set aside this purpose-"the eternal purpose which He purposed in Himself"!-sin, black, horrible as it is, working death, bringing in hopeless ruin as far as man is concerned, making an awful gulf impossible for man to cross and regain lost access to God in Eden, erecting barriers mountain high,-how all this is swept aside by the irresistible purpose of God, as the twigs hanging to the grass on the river's bank are borne away by the mighty flood of waters ! Far be the thought to despise Satan's power; he is a roaring lion, mighty and terrible to helpless man ; or to have low views of the exceeding sinfulness of sin. But are these to be compared to God ? Is Satan stronger than He ? can sin thwart His purpose ? Through whom is this will accomplished ? Through our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Upon Him hangs the fulfillment of this purpose-"I will raise it up at the last day." How certain is the accomplishment of all this. Even now, in anticipation of it, we can triumph. The great doctrine of Election is feared by most-opposed by many well-meaning Christians. But is not God sovereign ? Has He left to chance the momentous issues of eternity ? All Scriptures answer, No. Is not the dread of, the opposition to, this doctrine to be found in the fact that it takes every thing so completely out of man's hands, and puts it in God's? Man is set aside-he is not even, in the verse we are considering, looked at as an individual :" I shall raise it up again at the last day." Not that individuals are not contemplated in election. "He hath chosen us in Him"-but all thought of human cooperation in election is set aside. But there can be no ground for fear of this most precious and wondrous truth. If it brings out man's helplessness, it only the more clearly manifests God's love and goodness, giving new grounds for praise and adoration. Let it be remembered, however, that election is in Christ. Nowhere is it hinted that God chose men to be lost. The horrible doctrine of reprobation has no place in Scripture, and is utterly opposed to the comforting and God glorifying truth of election. . Nor again let it be thought that this is a truth for the unsaved. It could only confuse and stumble them.

Our next verse give us the manward side. The same will, the same end, but not the sovereign gift of the Father to the Son, but the free and simple acceptance of Christ by all who will. Notice the universality of the truth:every one, not the elect; not certain classes, but every one. Still, it is individual, each for himself. Notice, too, the simplicity :" that seeth the Son and believeth on Him." No works, no moral fitness required, no feelings called for. The eye is turned away from self,-no good to be gotten from that defiled source,-to the Son of God incarnate, who came down from heaven to give life to the world. It is faith which sees Christ,-the faith of a sinner taking as a sinner the gifts held out by the Saviour,-eternal life. "He that believeth on the Son, hath everlasting life." The last day he can now look forward to with confidence as the time when it shall be fully seen what that little act of faith meant, when he looked away to Jesus and lived. But what does he see, as he looks on to the last day ? That God's electing love has brought him there. Here there is no collision between these precious truths. He came as a sinner, lost, guilty, helpless ; he saw Christ, he believed on Him, he received life, and now, wondrous to tell, he sees that he was chosen before the foundation of the world.

Our third verse links these two truths together:" No man can come to Me, except the Father which hath sent Me draw him; and I will raise him up at the last day." Faith is the gift of God (Eph. 2:8); so is repentance (Acts 5:31). Had we been left to ourselves we would never have come to Christ. " The carnal mind is enmity against God." Not all the manifestations of love, nor all the terrors of wrath could have drawn one sinner, were he left to his own will. The fullest gospel, the clearest expositions of truth, are alike powerless unless accompanied by the mighty workings of the Holy Spirit of God. And yet we must be careful to note that this is not something mechanical. Man's reason, conscience, and will are left free, but actuated by divine grace and power, he is drawn, persuaded to believe and be saved. Boasting is excluded. We can no more boast of our faith than of our works-all is of grace.

" 'Twas the same love that spread the feast
That sweetly forced us in,
Else we had still refused to taste,
And perished in our sin."

Blessed be the God of all grace !
This drawing, too, culminates at the same blessed end, -"I will raise him up at the last day." From the first moment when convinced of sin, and the anxious cry, "What must I do to be saved!" on till the trembling soul rested on Christ, was the work of God's Spirit. Having been drawn to Christ, the believer is still drawn after Him till He will find himself in glory, drawn there by the same power which first awakened him. Beloved reader, is there not in all this something which appeals to our heartfelt gratitude, our adoring love ?

But this paper would be incomplete without a consideration of the last verse quoted at the beginning:" Whoso eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day." In the first verse we have a display of God's sovereign electing grace, "before the foundation of the world." In the second, we have the Person of the Son of God presented as the object of faith, and eternal life result of believing. Next, is shown the drawing of the Father through the Spirit, making it plain that faith is the gift of God. Now, we have in the last place, the work of Christ as the ground upon which God's sovereign love in election and calling can act toward guilty sinners. " Whoso eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood." His flesh and His blood were offered as food for the sinner when He laid down His life on the cross. This is the answer to their unbelieving question, "How can this Man give us His flesh to eat?" In incarnation He was alone, with life in Himself, but the work not yet accomplished by which that life could be imparted to others, save in anticipation. But when He said, "It is finished," when His blood was shed, He was indeed food for the dying sinner. His flesh and blood then speak to us of His death on the cross, which removed every obstacle, satisfied every claim of justice, and forever swept away every barrier to eternal love flowing forth in all its fullness. The eating and drinking are strong expressions for the faith which appropriates that sacrifice. But what a view does the cross of our blessed Lord give us of the amazing love of God ! At what a cost have we obtained eternal life !-through the death of the Lord of life. Vile, guilty, undone, with nothing to commend us to God, we see Him giving His only begotten Son for us. " The last day " was for us a day of terror, of judgment, of eternal woe ; now, on the ground of that death, we hear our Lord, saying, "I will raise him up at the last day." It is a day of joy, of glory, of full manifestation as the sons of God..

Thus are these four great truths linked together by the person of the Lord, and the glory in resurrection fruit of God's electing love and on the ground of Christ's accomplished work, received by faith alone. How beautifully harmonious is God's Word !

"The commandment is holy, just, and good;" we I may expect to find, therefore, even in those ordinances which relate to ceremonial matters, a spirit of righteousness,-indeed it could not be otherwise, proceeding from one whose whole being is characterized by strict justice. When we look at the various ordinances which relate to every-day life, we are struck with this even-handed justice manifested. Judges were to be impartial,-not respecting the rich, nor leaning to the side of the poor because he was poor. The rights of private property were strictly guarded. The person of the slave was protected ; the wages of the hireling guaranteed. True, it was the law, and could make nothing perfect, dealing, as it did, with man in his natural state ; indeed, many things were allowed which a full standard of holiness applied to the new man would not permit. Moses, "for the hardness of your hearts," permitted, under certain restrictions, divorce and a plurality of wives. Still, even here, the natural lawlessness and selfishness of man were curbed by the spirit of justice and fairness in the ordinance which regulated his conduct in these matters. Living, as we do, under grace, we do not have to turn to the law either for salvation or as a rule of life. But that does not close the law to us as containing principles of holiness for all time,-principles that we do well to examine and in the power of grace to act upon.

In Rom. 8:, we are told there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus, and that by the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus we are set free from the law of sin and death,-a law whose chains were only the more tightly riveted when we endeavored to loose them by keeping the commandments (Rom. 7:). We are thus set free-a blessed deliverance!-but for what purpose? "That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the 'Spirit." That is, the righteous requirements of the law-what was contemplated in it-the principle of it, might be carried out in us who are no longer in any particular under its rule, and who are therefore free to show what grace can do. This is most important. We are not under law; are we therefore lawless? " God forbid !" says Rom. 6:What greater proof of the utter and hopeless corruption of our natural hearts could we have than that grace which has pardoned should be used as an excuse to go on in the very bondage from which it has freed us? But, thank God ! as born of Him, we do delight in His will, and long to be conformed to the image of His blessed Son. We abhor that sin which has left its defiling trail upon our whole nature, and we long for the time when we shall be freed from its hateful presence. Therefore, so far from desiring to live on in lawlessness because he is under grace, the saved soul yearns for practical holiness, and God has most fully provided for that yearning by the same grace which saved us. Still there remains, as we well know, " sin in our mortal body," which we are not to obey, "members which are upon the earth," which are to be mortified. And it is by the Word used and applied by the Spirit, that we are to do this. We see, therefore, the connection between, the law, as in God's Word, and our walk. Would that we were more under the power of that Word !

"Thou shall not have in thy bag divers weights-a great and a small. Thou shalt not have in thy house divers measures-a great and a small. But thou shalt have a perfect and just weight, a perfect and just measure shalt thou have:that thy days may be lengthened in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. For all that do such things, and all that do unrighteously, are an abomination unto the Lord thy God." (Deut. 25:13-16.) "Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judgment, in mete-yard, in weight, or in measure. Just balances, just weights, a just ephah, and a just hin shall ye have :I am the Lord your God, which brought you out of the land of Egypt. Therefore shall ye observe all My statutes, and all My judgments, and do them :I am the Lord." (Lev. 19:35-37)

In the first of these passages we have the results of obedience given as the motive-"that thy days maybe lengthened in the land ; " in the second, we have redemption, and the nature of God, as the reason for obedience. Grace and government alike constrain us to please God. Before passing to the spiritual application of these laws, may we not pause and look at them in their letter? Is there not great reproach brought upon the name of Christ by some of those who bear it, through their unfair dealings-in buying and selling, and the ordinary transactions in every-day life? It may be in very little things that this dishonesty is seen ; but every unfair advantage Christians may take, no matter how small, is deeply grieving to the Holy Spirit. There is no need to specify:each one's conscience will tell him whether or not he is in every particular walking honestly as in the day. When Abraham wanted a tomb for the burial of Sarah, he would buy it for as much money as it was worth, – " current money with the merchant." So David bought the threshing-floor of Oman for the full price. Having One who has said, "I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee," we need have no fear, need take no unfair advantage of any one.

But this subject has many spiritual applications, which should strongly appeal to our conscience. The standard is the shekel of the sanctuary, and the One who acts according to that standard is God Himself. The atonement " money (Ex. 30:13-15) was according to this standard :not what they might deem sufficient, but what God declared was the ransom for their souls. And for each there was the same price ; the rich paid no more, the poor no less. We have been bought with a price – " the precious blood of Christ." Not part of the debt we owed has been paid, but all – to the very last farthing. The wrath which fell upon the spotless Substitute was just as real, just as full, as that which would have sunk us forever into the lake of fire had we come under its awful power. There were no "divers weights "here – no lightening of the punishment because of the dignity of the Substitute. Blessed be God ! Christ bore our sins, – not part of them, but all. This gives true peace of conscience, because it meets God's justice. For each one, too, the price is the same. All need the precious blood of Christ, – the moral man needs it as much as the vilest sinner. One weight- the blood of Christ, one measure – the glory of God; and we, who had been weighed and found wanting – had been measured and fallen short, are now, through infinite grace, "complete in Him," "perfected forever."

But if the shekel of the sanctuary has been used in atonement, so that through Christ we stand before God according to its full weight, none the less is our personal consecration measured by that same shekel. Lev. 27:3 shows that the dedication of devoted persons was measured according to this standard, – not what they might think sufficient, but the fall weight of God's estimation.

Num. 7:13, etc., weighs all the gifts of the princes by the same holy standard. Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5:) wanted to have their gifts to God measured by a smaller standard, so that it would seem to be all they had. When we would have a less holy standard applied to all our consecration, all our giving up for God, we are unconsciously using some other standard.

When we have two standards of living-one public, the other private, we are using" divers weights and measures, which are an abomination to the Lord." (Prov. 20:10.) Of course, there is the hypocrite, who has entirely lying weights in his bag, his private life completely the denial of his public profession. But even where there is truth, is there not often a great difference between our heart-life, our thoughts, and our outward walk ? Thoughts which are permitted to live unrebuked in our hearts, we would be shocked to give utterance to. That is having two weights-one for thoughts, another for words. Every honest person can enlarge much on this subject.

When Peter was at Antioch, before certain folk came down from Jerusalem, he went in and ate with certain Gentile Christians; after those from Jerusalem came, he withdrew himself. (Gal. 2:12-14.)Here he had divers weights for divers people. And he is not the only one who has acted thus. How is it with us? Before earnest Christians can we speak freely of the things of Christ, only to find ourselves speaking just as freely of the things of the world before the unsaved ! Let us be careful. It is in the sanctuary alone that we will learn that unchanging standard to be used before all alike, with, of course, the "meekness of wisdom." We only suggest what can be followed out in many directions.

Further, we are not to have in our bag two weights, one for our brother, heavy and exact, and another less weighty for ourselves. " Let him that is without sin among you cast the first stone," said our Lord to those who had a weight, heavy indeed, for the wretched woman found in sin, but none for themselves. He only applies to them the same weight, and how differently they act. Instead of clamoring for her death, they are glad to escape from the testing of those balances which found them, as well as her, wanting. The hardest judge is one who fails to judge himself. Oh, the fault-finding, back-biting, unkind estimates of our brethren ! all because we use divers weights and measures. Our brother fails, and we strictly call him to account, we, it may be do the same, thing and never think of it. Brethren, let us stop this, this spirit of fault-finding, of criticism. Let us first always judge ourselves, cast out the beam out of our own eye and then shall we see clearly to cast out the mote out of our brother's eye. When we have been dealt with in grace, are we to treat our brother differently? But you say, he must confess his fault:and so perhaps he will when you pour coals of fire on his head, and when he sees that you are moved, not by self-interest, but are yourself walking humbly with your God. Beloved, do we not well to take heed to these things? If when Israel made the ephah small (what they sold) and the shekel great (the price paid for it) God withdrew blessing, does He not act in the same way toward us? Rather do we not ourselves hinder those blessings He would give us ?

FRAGMENTS I. It was by faith (Heb. 11:) that David slew Goliath;- and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith-in the least things as in the greatest. We are not called upon to slay Goliath, but we need the power that slew him to overcome self, sin, and Satan every day. The one who slew him was little in his own eyes,-but more than that, he was little in the eyes of others too. (i Sam. 17:28.) So God was with him and delivered him.

2. "When thou wast little in thine own sight," Samuel said to Saul, (i Sam. 15:17.) These words have a sadly solemn sound. That time was past,-pride had ensued, and destruction was about to follow. From littleness, he was lifted up to a throne:from pride, he descended swiftly to death and judgment. Still the judgment did not come at once. God is slow to anger, and so the kingdom of Saul, with its burden of pretentious religiousness (without power)-pride, envy, and persecution (type of Jerusalem under the Pharisees and of the world,) continued long ; but there was no repentance, and the judgment was the more awful at last.

3. God deals in a similar way with His own-not for destruction, but for edification. We [trespass on His long-suffering in self-complacency; and when the chastening blow comes, time is required for the stupefied senses to understand what it means, and to discern how far we had drifted. The one who says, "I cannot see why I should suffer this" confesses, not only that he has been drifting, but also that he has not yet recovered himself- is not restored. When the Lord smote Uzzah, David was stunned, and went home displeased, and God waited patiently for the breaking-down time. How great is His mercy ! Self-satisfaction may lead us on for a time when things are not right with God, (and God is patient,) but the end must come.

4. David was blest of God, but that only brought him into trouble with men. His kin rebuked him (Eliab, his eldest brother); Saul envied him, and the enemies of Israel watched to destroy him ; Satan raised storms to overwhelm him. So "all they that live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution," and "because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you." But if it is so serious a thing to belong to God in Satan's world, then we must have on the whole armor of God that we may be able to stand, and we must lay fast hold of the love of God that we may see, above circumstances and men and Satan, the hand of God. For whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth. We must hasten to submit to Him. We need to hold the truth in the heart, and to love it, to escape the power of Satan.

5. What a warning-lesson we have in this, that David, who had slain Goliath, was nearly slain himself long after by a less famous giant, and had to be rescued from peril and shame by his men! Years of court-life had gradually sapped his early vigor and simplicity, and when the "evil day" came, he was not able "to stand." The Lord that delivered him out of the paw of the lion and out of the paw of the bear was not with him ; and this had to be learned by failure. The power and the wisdom and the goodness was not in David.

6. In the fortieth psalm, the language of the One who won the mightiest victory, is that of utter dependence and meekness. " I waited patiently for the Lord, and He inclined unto me, and heard my cry. He brought me up also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings." This was the spirit of Jesus,-"I waited patiently on Jehovah, and He inclined unto me, and heard my cry." No claim -perfect lowliness. And so the psalm ends as an example to us-"But I am poor and needy, yet the Lord thinketh upon me. Thou art my help and my deliverer." It ends in this way because His own are still in this world, in suffering. We have been called to the fellowship of God's Son. May we feel that we are poor and needy. Let it be sufficient that "the Lord thinketh upon us." If the Lord of glory was poor and needy, let all pride be put to shame.

7. This psalm and the next one (40:and 41:) end the first book-the Genesis of the Psalms. It is the true Joseph who speaks-the One who knew the power that delivered from the pit, but passed on and died-in weakness, in the midst of His brethren. He has left us the song of victory, but a path of sorrow and weakness and prayer, with inward joy and peace, awaiting the deliverance to come. So in the end of the gospels-the Genesis of the New Testament, the true Joseph departs from the midst of His brethren, in weakness, publicly (by the cross), while in the power of resurrection and sweet promise and assurance to them in secret, corresponding to Joseph's assuring words to his brethren that Egypt knew nothing of.

May we seek no lifting up and luxury here, but cultivate willingness to suffer-count it all joy. How unwilling often to endure in little things, because the love of Christ has not filled us and given us victory ! We forget what this world is, and who we are, and what the cross means, and the great recompense of the reward (Heb. 10:35). "Blessed the man that endureth temptation; for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love Him." (Jas. 1:12.) E. S. L.

2.–MAN AS HE WAS AND AS HE IS.

"Lo, this only have I found, that God hath made man upright; but they have sought out many inventions." (Eccles. 7:29.)

Let us now, in the light of God's infallible Word, see what the answer, in part at least, to the question, " What is man ?" is. It is well, at the beginning of our study, to get right views of Scripture teaching as to man, for these will go with us all through. Wrong views of man will distort our views of all other truth, for truth is a whole ; it hangs together-or, rather, fits together-like a wonderful piece of machinery. If one part is out of order, the whole is affected. So with Scripture doctrine,-a faulty or wrong view of man's condition will give a correspondingly incorrect one of Christ's work. Wrong thoughts as to man's nature, his constitution- materialistic thoughts, for instance,-affect in the gravest manner-rather, deny altogether-the solemn truths as to future existence. Satan here, as everywhere else, is seeking to introduce the "little leaven that leavens the whole lump." He is aiming at the person and work of the Son of God, at the destruction of men.

Man was God's crown on creation:all that preceded was to prepare the earth for his habitation. When the time | came for his creation, there is, as it were, a pause-a consultation :" Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness" (Gen. 1:26), thus distinguishing him from every other creature. But this pause, this break, only prepares for the more marked difference between man and all other creatures. The earth brings them forth, but "God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul." (Gen. 2:7.) Other creatures were living souls, but man only had his life breathed into him from God. This prepares us to expect the difference which is brought out in the other scriptures. But, first, it would be well to see how man's constitution is described in Scripture:"I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." (i Thess. 5:23.) Here we see he is a threefold being, composed of spirit, soul, and body. God is a Spirit:the angels are ministering spirits. Man, then, is, as to his spirit, akin to God and the angels, who are called the sons of God (Job 38:7). God is the God of the spirits of all flesh (Num. 16:22); He is the Father of spirits (Heb. 12:9). It is as having-rather, as being-a spirit that man is called the offspring of God; as in Paul's speech at Athens (Acts 17:28, 29), where the contrast with the body is insisted on. So, in our Lord's genealogy in Luke, Adam is the son of God. But what does this teach? The spirit is doubtless immortal,-"Neither can they die any more, for they are equal unto the angels." This immortality is entirely apart from any question of eternal life. Whatever his future, man will exist forever- must do so, because he was created in the image of God, is the offspring of God, is like the angels. The spirit is also the seat of the judgment-the mind; it is the man himself really :"What man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him?" (i Cor. 2:2:)

But man has a soul as well as spirit. This includes his affections and feelings, and may be controlled by the spirit or, as in the beasts, by the body; for, in his body, man resembles the beasts,-" Man that is in honor and understandeth not (whose spirit does not control) is like the beasts that perish." (Ps. 49:20.) It is his body which makes man an inhabitant of the earth, and which fits him to be such, which also distinguishes him from the angels, _"Thou madest him a little lower than the angels." (Ps. 8:5.)
Having seen in some measure his constitution, we come back to man as he was. He was created in the image, after the likeness, of God,-that is, he resembled Him. We have seen this resemblance in constitution; but there was, in a measure, a moral likeness as well- such a resemblance as the creature can bear to the Creator. This was negative rather than positive. God is righteous:man was innocent. His righteousness is a positive, inherent characteristic. Man's moral character was rather negative; it consisted rather in the absence of evil than in the presence of good. Not that there was no excellence in him :surely, he was, as a creature, perfect; but it was creature-goodness, creature-perfection. His mind, his spirit, was mature,-capable of discernment and judgment, as we see from his giving names (doubtless names which described them,) to all the beasts. He was also capable of understanding and enjoying communion with God, as we see from the very charge given to him. His soul, his affections, had full scope for exercise both toward his help-meet-"bone of his bone"-and toward Him whose perfect goodness spoke everywhere; while, as to his body, he was a stranger to sickness, suffering, and death. It was a vehicle in which he could give exercise to the faculties of his mind and soul as an immortal being, yet an inhabitant of the earth. In dignity, he was lord over all; he had dominion over all. Such, in some degree, was man. Of the simplicity, happiness, moral elevation of that state we know but little. All was good, and God's benediction rested over all.

We come now to the second part of our subject. Man as he is. In passing to this we cross a narrow but deep and dark gulf. So deep that none can ever cross back ; that gulf is the fall. We have seen that man's innocence was negative – perhaps untried would be a better word,-that his goodness was that of the creature; hence unstable. He was like the angels, many of whom have fallen and thus shown what creature excellency is. Man was innocent, but untried:as yet there was a possibility of sinning. He was kept, as far as one with freedom of will could be kept, from all tendencies to evil. He was placed in Eden, the garden of the Lord, surrounded by all that spoke of wisdom, goodness, and care. He had occupation for his hands. He was in immediate communication with God on whose power and strength he could have drawn had he so desired. Every thing was on his side, in his favor, in the test that followed. Only one command was given, and the temptation was presented by the serpent (Satan allowed to take the form of a creature beneath man, and not of an angel of light), and that temptation of such a character that it might have been repelled at once-a temptation to doubt the good-and love of the One who had surrounded them with every blessing. The woman, man's helpmeet, listens to the tempter, and is beguiled-type of the danger of allowing the affections and feelings to lead-while the man with open eyes follows her, thus deliberately severing the link which bound him to God. His eyes are opened, conscience speaks, and man knows his true condition. He knows also his relationship to God, for he hides from Him at once. He receives the sentence now. Sin has come, and death by sin. Man was alienated from God, the breach was as complete as it was impossible to recover his former condition. The driving out from Eden was the natural result, and man has been there ever since, outside that happy place-the cherubim of justice ever between him and the tree of life. Such was the fall, and man is now just what the fall left him.

Let us now look at this condition. A positive factor has been added-sin. This is no mere absence of good, but a positive state-a state of lawlessness (i Jno. 3:4, where the correct translation would be, "sin is lawlessness"), where under the guise of being his own master, man is the servant, the slave of sin. His constitution has not changed, he is still spirit, soul, and body, but his nature has changed. What was once good, in subjection to God, is now alienated from Him; and this is seen in the whole man.
His spirit, his mind, is now the "mind of the flesh" (that which links him with the beasts, giving its name to the whole fallen nature), and as such it is "enmity against God, for it is not subject to the law of God, neither in-indeed can be." (Rom. 8:7.) The desires of the flesh and the mind are in direct and irreconcilable opposition to the will of God. (Eph. 2:3.) Man has not lost his reason, his faculties are clear, his judgment in exercise. We have but to notice the mental activity about us :activity devoted, not to God, but to self-interest, by men of science, by so-called philosophers, and even theologians, men with unquestioned powers of intellect devoting their faculties to Satan,-we have but to notice this to see that man has not lost his reason by the fall,- that it is by wisdom that the world knew not God. (i Cor. 1:21.) True it is that his reasoning faculties have become warped, and doubtless cramped and dwarfed by the fall, still they are there.

The same is seen in the soul, the affections are there, but they are "vile affections" (Rom. 1:); even true love centering on the creature, and leading man ofttimes to hate the One who is the source of all love. This is one of the saddest proofs of the fall, that the gentler qualities, amiability and the like, when tested, are found to be not inconsistent with deadliest hatred and determined rejection of Christ. The rich young man in Luke is a sad example of this. God is left out, and the world fills the heart, and His presence there would be an intrusion. This is why in the law the state of man is tested and shown by the command, "Thou shall love the Lord thy God with all thy heart." He must be the sole, not merely the chief object of the affections. He must control all else. Man's affections are completely alienated, and he sees in God one to dread, one to doubt, but never one to love.

Finally sin has entered in and death by sin. The body, once but the link with earth, and which would lead man to realize his dependence upon God, has now become the fruitful field from which spring disease and deformity and death. Death has stamped it for its own, so that its name is now "mortal body." (Rom. 8:2:)

This then is the nature which man now has-a sinful nature-which pervades and gives character to his whole being. Sin is no partial thing, reaching to some of the faculties and leaving others untainted ; it is a complete perversion of the whole man.

This too is the nature transmitted from father to son, as we read, "Adam begat a son in his own likeness, after his own image." (Gen. 5:3:) Such a state may well be termed death, in which there is no motion toward God whatever. But as in physical death corruption follows, so also from this state of alienation from God all forms of actual disobedience in thought, word, and deed flow. Man is born in sin, " shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me" (Ps. 51:5) ; and we see it as soon it can manifest itself. "They go astray as soon as they be born, speaking lies." (Ps. 58:3.)

Here we have the distinction between sin and sins-a truth familiar to many, and important for all to understand. Sin is the nature, or rather what controls the nature; sins are the manifestations of that nature. Sin is the root from which spring the fruits, sins. Man is guilty before God, not because he has a sinful nature (that he inherited), but because he has sinned.

Hence it would not be right to say that infants are guilty-that they are under the wrath of God, or that they will be punished. There is no question that they are born in sin, and have a depraved nature. Having this, they of course need regeneration-the impartation of eternal life in Christ, secured by His death and resurrection; but it is entirely foreign to scripture to speak of them as under wrath, still more so to speak of them, or any one but himself, as being guilty of Adam's sin. Adam stood for himself, sinned for himself. Man inherits the nature, the condition, but not the guilt. "The soul that sinneth it shall die." (See the whole connection, Ezek. 18:1-4, etc.) Therefore man cannot repent of Adam's sin, but of his own sins, though the sin of Eden is our common shame, because the sin of our common father.

Such being man's condition, and such being the fruits of it, wrath is that which awaits him for "all ungodliness and unrighteousness," "indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man that doeth evil " (Rom. 2:8, 9.),-a wrath still withheld in long-suffering mercy, but none the less sure to come. It remains but to add the universality of this condition- and of the fact that all have sinned. "All have sinned and come (do come) short of the glory of God." (Rom. 3:9-19, 23.) Man's responsibility is measured by the light he has enjoyed ; the Gentile is not judged by the law-the heathen by the light of Scripture.

Such, then, imperfectly given, is the state of man. How should such knowledge affect us? In the newly awakened soul a sense of guilt, corresponding in some measure to the true standing, will be pressed by the Holy Spirit. In the Christian, a sense of the utter corruption and helplessness of his nature will lead him, first to cry out, "O wretched man that I am!" and then, thankfully seeing the way of escape through the One who has passed through death and is risen now, to learn to reckon himself to be " dead indeed unto sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus." (Rom. 6:2:) Let us ever remember what an awful thing sin is.

Driving along the road with a companion the writer remarked the great number of spider's web son the grass along the road-side. His companion replied, "Yes, the dew brings them out," which was in fact the case:they were made visible by the dew which lay upon them. How simple yet true a picture of our way in this world ! Our path is beset with snares, on the. right and the left. Satan spreads his nets at every step to catch the unwary. But the dew brings them out.

Israel had to gather the manna when the dew was yet upon the ground. The reviving, refreshing influences of the Holy Spirit are thus typified. It is in communion with God, enjoying the guidance and comfort of the Holy Spirit, in the Word of God, that we are enabled to detect the snares of Satan, and so to avoid them. How often do young Christians ask the question, "Is there any harm in this or that habit, or association?" How often, alas ! do they step into what is nothing but a snare of Satan! How can they avoid these snares ? Simply by letting the dew bring them out-abiding in communion with God, the Holy Spirit ministering the Word to them and the snares are detected. Many apparently harmless things will then be seen to be snares.

May we thus let the Holy Spirit be our detective, and as we press on our way see the traps of the enemy and say, "we are not ignorant of his devices."

Hezekiah began by cleansing the temple of those defilements which had been allowed to accumulate during the reign of Ahaz. In other words, he attended first to those matters for which he was more directly responsible, offering sin-offerings, and sharing with Judah the joy of restored worship at the altar and in the house of Jehovah. It is well to remember that we must be right personally before we can help others. We must remove any thing from the house of God which would bring reproach upon Him before we can, as it were, throw open the doors to the rest of His people. There must at least be the earnest purpose to do this,-its perfect accomplishment should be our desire, however feeble we may be. This cleansing and these offerings, suddenly done, bring great joy to Hezekiah and Judah,-a joy they long to share with all Israel. Let us mark this :true purging of ourselves, followed by truly entering into Christ's sacrifice, brings a joy deep and full,-a joy, too, which makes us long that all God's people might share it with us. There is nothing selfish about true communion; he who has his head upon the Lord's bosom longs that others may have theirs there too. An exclusiveness which rests satisfied with a few only knowing and enjoying the good things of Christ, we may be sure is not according to God, however correct as to the letter it may be.

There is no such exclusiveness with Hezekiah and the men of Judah. It is to the passover, the memorial of their redemption, and answering to the Lord's supper for us, that he would invite them. Let us notice his letter. It is a call, first of all, back to God. "If thou wilt return, return to Me." (Jer. 2:1:) No passover, no Jerusalem-worship will answer unless there is first the turning unto the living God. Of what use would it be if all the people of God were together, without a single exception, and yet not with God ? That would be Rome's unity, tending to foster pride, not to glorify God. It is a mercy saints are kept apart outwardly unless there is truly a return to God. The outward divisions only speak of hearts divided from Him. They are to be mourned over, but let us ever remember that heart-work must come before true union outwardly can take place. Hezekiah's letter speaks of all this. It is gracious, but faithful. It does not gloss over the sad condition of Israel, while at the same time it assures them of blessing if they return-blessing reaching even to those who had been carried into captivity.

Let us notice one thing just here. There is no suggestion of any compromise as to the question of Israel's separation from the kingdom of Judah which had taken place years before. Israel had turned their backs upon God's house, and His order ; to these they were now invited to return. Had he been willing to do so, Hezekiah could doubtless have secured a much more general response. Had he proposed a common basis of union at Samaria, or, dropping both Samaria and Jerusalem, had he been willing to select some third city as their place of worship and meeting. Jerusalem too unpleasantly reminded them of their departure therefrom, so Hezekiah's message of love is treated with scorn and mockery. To-day, God's center is open for the return to it of all His people. But how is the loving invitation to return to the simplicity of knowing Christ alone received ? With scorn and mockery. The feeble few who dare to issue such an invitation to their brethren are called self-righteous, and their enjoyment of the presence and power of the Spirit is mocked at. On the other hand, every compromise, every union, alliance, society, is gladly recognized, and its appearance hailed as a fresh indication of energy and faith. Why is this? The call back to God's center reminds us of our departure therefrom, is humbling to our pride, and is therefore refused. Union and league foster pride, and are therefore indorsed. Doubtless there is real earnestness and zeal, but that is in spite of, not by means of, these leagues.
A few, not all, respond to Hezekiah's invitation, and are received by their brethren at Jerusalem. It was humbling to them thus to return, but how blessed to be once more on ground where God had put His name,-to worship Him, not " according to the dictates of their conscience," but according to the dictates of His Word.

It was humbling enough for all-Judah as well as Israel-to keep that passover. It was in the second month, not the first, and so reminded them of their uncleanness, their lack of readiness to keep it at the time appointed. Like those who were unclean in the wilderness, (Num. 9:10, ii) they came in under a special provision. Here is where all of us are. If in His mercy the Lord has recovered us, and gathered us around His table, is it not as it were in the second month ? Are we not reminded that the freshness and fervor of Pentecost are gone, that centuries of failure and wandering have come in ? None can exalt himself above the other in these things:we must all be very quiet, very lowly. Grace, and only grace, has been at work.

But there is more. Some of these people had not cleansed themselves aright for the passover, and yet had eaten it. Strictly, they would have been excluded, or, having partaken unworthily, would have been judged. But here grace again interposes. Hezekiah recognizes the purpose of their hearts to return unto the Lord ; and though many things were not as they should be, he prays, "The good Lord pardon every one that prepareth his heart to seek God, the Lord God of his fathers, though he be not cleansed according to the purification of the sanctuary." His prayer is answered, and in peace and joy the people keep the feast seven days. Indeed, in the energy of their newly found joy, they keep seven days more. There is much for us to learn here. Righteousness is needful; but righteousness without pity, without considering past history and present circumstances, will fail of its own object. There may be many things in our brethren we could wish were different, many things in their past lives we could wish cleared up ; but can we not, spite of these things, recognize the desire and purpose of their hearts, and take them upon that.

Might we not expect much blessing and great joy did we thus imitate Hezekiah ? First, he gets right himself. Second, he invites his brethren to God's center. Thirdly, he seeks to prevent sorrow coming in through their imperfections.

Let us learn from him. But let us remember he gave up no principle. He would welcome to Jerusalem ; he would go nowhere else. In a day of declension like this, we cannot be too eager to recall God's beloved people to Himself; but if we are on His ground, let us remember that word, " Let them return unto thee, but return not thou unto them." In the application of these principles there may be, and doubtless will be, difficulty. But that does not affect the principles. Only let there be hearts overflowing with love, and subdued into godly fear, and we will ever be guided aright.

There is but one society for the Christian to recognize, and to which he can really belong according to the mind of God. That society is the Church of God-the whole body of believers.

We find in i Cor. 14:an example of a Church-meeting, met together in a meeting open to any to take part, ed of the Spirit; excluding, therefore, the thought of official person conducting a service, or of a chairman fading a meeting. A servant of the Lord may preach to any who come to hear, and is then conductor of a meeting in a sense, as Peter at Pentecost, or Paul in the school of Tyrannus; but a Church-meeting for worship and ministry was open to all. The many members were recognized, and the Spirit indwelling each. Now thus meeting together, no society is formed. We would meet together in such a case simply as a certain number out of the whole Church in that place, in His name, taking no other; and when we close the meeting, and return to our homes, no new society has been formed, any more than would a few Christians meeting in a hotel-parlor for prayer form a new society by so doing. And whenever Christians assemble in a Church-meeting, to take the Lord's supper, or for any other object, it should never be done as a society, distinguished from other Christians.

As to ordinations and appointments, the Lord prepares and sends forth and guides and governs evangelists and pastors and teachers (Eph. 4:); and as to elders, who were appointed as bishops or overseers (Acts 20:28), the appointment was by apostolic authority (Acts 14:23), which does not now exist. To those who do this service of oversight we should be subject, but the Church never undertook to appoint them. Even deacons, selected on one occasion by the Church at Jerusalem, were "appointed " by the apostles, and even the selecting was by apostolic permission (Acts 6:3).

Power-authority-is from above, down; not the other way,-not to be usurped by us as we deem expedient.

Christians, therefore, all belong to a society already made by the Spirit, and with ministry provided for as already shown.

We should be led by the Spirit at all times, and so led to assemble together,-and simply in the name of Jesus- no other is needed; and we are commanded to put away from among ourselves any wicked person. Nothing is left to the will of man-nothing in which the way is not marked out plainly for us by the Word. What a liberty we have thus from self-imposed burdens and human regulations!-truly, the liberty of the Spirit in reality. The ignoring of this-of these two things-the
presence of the Spirit of God in each believer, and that He guides us by the Word, and that we must do nothing but what that Word enjoins, has led to confusion in the Church.

The same principles bear upon service. All that can be done by societies can be clone in fellowship with other fellow-workers, and with all the aid that such labor in common truly affords, simply as members of the one body of Christ-Christ the Lord as Chief, the Spirit of God as the power and unity. Thus two and two can go forth, or several brothers and sisters together can hold a meeting at a street-corner, or in-doors, and with the sweet and uplifting thought that they have entered into no compact but the one that united them forever to the Lord and to all His own when they first believed. How great is our salvation ! and how glorious the Church to which we all belong! how close the tie that forever binds us together, while varied the opportunities and many the members of the one body!

If the special object be to reach young men, what better way than to welcome them in the family circle and in the Church-meetings? but if a room of public resort-a reading-room is called for, opportunity is thus given for a work of faith. Let any one be so led, and others would be certainly led to help him by the same Spirit. And not only would all be done in harmony with the truth-no new society formed, but the exercise of heart, of faith, all the mingled blessings that accompany such testings would result. The soul would realize more the direct dealings with God that accompany the path of pure faith and individual accountability to God. And help given would be more in the love of the Spirit, and less from human obligations. So also as to special meetings and work to draw out and develop younger brothers and sisters in the churches (as Endeavor societies)-all could
be fully accomplished upon the principles of Scripture, and no new society formed.

If some members of a family were to make a society and compact apart from the rest, the breach would be felt at once. We Christians are all one family. Sadly divided we are, still the way remains open for the individual who would be faithful to the Lord and to His Word-for himself to adhere to the truth, and his reward will be great. (Rev. 2:, 3:)

The path of obedience and simplicity is one of obscurity, but it has with it the blessing which obedience brings. There is little show before men, but He "who is holy and who is true" says, "I know thy works." (Rev. 3:7, 8.) He commends the one who keeps His word and does not deny His name.

"And if a man strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned except he strive lawfully." Let it be fixed in the heart that we should not do any thing except we have directions for it in the Bible, and we will not "join" any society. We are already joined to the Lord, and to one another as the body of Christ, the Church (Eph. 1:22), by the Spirit, who came from heaven to abide in us at that Pentecost of the second of Acts. By the Spirit we are all baptized into the one body, (i Cor. 6:17 and 12:12, 13, compared with Acts 1:5 and 2:i, 4 and Eph. 1:22.) God has placed every one of the members in the body "as it hath pleased Him." (i Cor. 12:18.) It is a perfect body -a complete society, and every member fitted in his place by the wisdom of God, to act just as and where they are placed by the power and liberty and wisdom of the Spirit. "One is your Master, even Christ, and all ye are brethren." Any earthly chief, and the bonds of a society, are, however well meant, but something between the soul and Christ-a denial of the perfection we have in the commandments of the Word, and the unction of the Spirit, and the Lordship of Christ. Nevertheless, may we be forbearing toward those who differ from us, and give thanks to God for good works any where, and maintain love to all saints.

If we say we hold the truth, let us commend the truth by love and good works. It is well if we are walking in the way of obedience, for "every one that hath forsaken houses or brethren or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands for My name's sake shall receive a hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life; but many that are first shall be last, and the last shall be first." E. S. L.

AN EXPOSITION OF REVELATION IV.-XXII.

PART V.-Continued. THE VIALS OF WRATH.(CHAP, 15:, 16:)

The Vials of Wrath. (Chap, 16:)

The vials of wrath are now poured out upon the earth at the bidding of a great voice from the temple. The wrath of God is no mere ebullition of passion that carries away the subject of it. It waits the word from the sanctuary ; and at length that eventful word is spoken. Completing the divine judgments, the range of the vials is not narrower than that of the prophetic earth, and in this, differ from the trumpet-series which otherwise they much resemble. Another resemblance which is significant is to the plagues of Egypt, which were at once a testimony to the world and for the deliverance of Israel. Israel is here also in her last crisis of trouble, and waiting for deliverance, for which these judgments, no doubt, prepare the way, though that which alone accomplishes it, the coming of the Lord Himself, is not plainly included.

The first vial is poured out distinctively, in contrast with the sea and rivers, etc., upon the earth, like the first trumpet-judgment; but the effect is different:an evil and grievous sore breaks out upon those that have the mark of the beast, and that worship his image. In Egypt such a plague routed their wise men so that they could not stand before Moses. According to the natural meaning of such a figure, it would speak of inward corruption which is made now to appear outwardly in what is painful, loathsome, and disfiguring; those who had accepted the beast's mark being thus otherwise marked and branded with what is a sign of their moral condition. As the apostle shows (Rom. 1:) idolatry is itself the sign of corruption which would degrade God into creature semblance in order to give free rein to its lusts. Here it is openly the worship of the image of him whom Scripture stamps as the "beast," which those branded with his mark give themselves up to. The excesses of the French revolution, when God was dethroned to make way for a prostitute on the altar of Notre Dame, if they be not, as some have thought them, the fulfillment of this vial, may yet sufficiently picture to us how it may be fulfilled in a time of trouble such as never was before, and, thank God, such as never will be afterward.

The second vial is poured out on the sea, and the sea becomes like the blood of a dead man, and every living soul dies in the sea. Here we have the second trumpet in its effect upon the sea, but without the limitation there. And there seems a difference also, in that the blood is as of a dead man. It cannot be that it is merely dead blood, for all blood shed becomes that almost at once, and the sea turned into blood would by itself suggest death without the addition. Would it not rather seem to be, that the blood of a dead man, while it is indeed dead blood, is also that which has not been shed ? Life has not been violently taken, but lost though disease or natural decay. Thus in the law that which had died of itself was forbidden as food, because it spoke of internal corruption, as the life still vigorous when the blood was shed did not. If this thought be the true one, then the state imaged under the second vial is not that of strife and bloodshed among the nations, but of professed spiritual life gone, which the addition, " Every living soul died in the sea," affirms as complete. Life there might be in hunted and outlawed men, no longer recognized as part of the nations ; but the mass was dead. This seems to me the only thought that gives consistently the full force of the expressions.
The third vial is poured out upon the rivers and fountains of waters, the sphere affected by the third trumpet ; but in the trumpet they are made bitter, now they become blood, which, as owned to be the judgment of God upon persecutors, seems clearly to speak of bloodshed :they are given blood to drink. Where naturally there should be only sources of refreshment, as perhaps in family life, there are found instead strife and the hand of violence. The angel of the waters may be in this case the representative of that tender care of the Creator over the creature-life, which in this case comes to be against the persecutor and applauds His judgments ; as the altar does, upon which the lives of the martyrs have been poured out to God.

This seems to consist well with what has been given as the interpretation of the second seal.

The fourth angel pours his vial upon the sun, and it scorches men with its heat ; but they only blaspheme "God's name, and repent not. Here, as often, the head of civil authority seems to be represented ; and Napoleon's career has been taken as in the historical application the fulfillment of it. In him after the immorality, apostasy, and bloodshed of that memorable revolution, imperial power blazed out in a destructive fierceness, that might well be symbolized as scorching heat. There was splendor enough, but it was not "a pleasant sight to behold the sun:" the nation over which he ruled was oppressed with "glory," and soon manifested how its vitality had been exhausted by its hot-house growth. His career was brief ; and briefer still in proportion to its intensity will be the closing despotism, which will be followed by the kingdom of the Son of Man, and the display of a true glory unseen by the world before. Then shall that be fulfilled which is written:"the Sun shall not smite thee by day," and how great will be the joy of this that is added, " thy Sun shall no more go down ; . . . the Lord shall be thine everlasting Light." (Is. 60:20.)

The fifth vial is poured out, and the meteoric blaze is passed. Poured on the throne of the beast, darkness spreads over his kingdom. It is the foreshadow of that final withdrawal of light, the "outer darkness" of that awful time, when they who have so often bidden God withdraw from them will be taken at their word. But who out of hell can tell what that will be ? The sun has ascribed to it by the science of the day more than ever was before clone ; but who at any time could have said to the glowing sun, Depart from me:I desire darkness? Yet this is what they say to God.

Nor does the darkness work repentance:"They gnawed their tongues for pain, and blasphemed the God of heaven, because of their pains and sores, and repented not of their deeds." Such is the hardening character of sin ; and such is the impotence of judgment in itself to break the heart and subdue the soul to God.

So far, spite of the general character of the vials, they seem to have to do almost entirely with the beast and his followers; and these are, as we know, the principal enemies of Israel, and the boldest in defiance of God, at the time of the end. Nevertheless there are other adversaries besides those of the new risen empire of the west. The king of the north or of Greece is evidently in opposition at the close to the " king in the land of Israel, who is the viceroy of the beast in Judea. (Dan. 11:) This king of Greece also, if mighty, is so " not by his own power." (Dan. 8:24.) There is behind him, in fact, a mightier prince, who in Ezek. 38:-xxxix, comes clearly into view as head of many eastern nations, Gog, of the land of Magog, the prince of Rosh, Meshech and Tubal; Persia, Cush and Phut with the house of Togarmah, (Armenia,) being confederate with him. This is not the place to look at the people to whom all these names refer. Magog, the first of them, by common consent, stands for the Scythians, who, "mixed with the Medes," says Fausset, "became the Sarmatians, whence sprang the Russians." Rosh is thus by more than sound connected with Russia, as Meshech and Tubal may have given their names, but slightly changed, to Moscow and Tobolsk. The connection with Persia and Armenia, and with Greece no less, is easily intelligible at the present day.

Here are powers, then, outside the revived Roman empire, which we find in relation with Israel at the time of the end, and which will find their place in the valley of Jehoshaphat ("Jehovah's judgment") in the day when the Lord sits there to judge all the nations round about. (Joel 3:12.) Accordingly now, under the sixth vial, the way is prepared for this, and the gathering is accomplished. The sixth vial is poured out upon "the great river Euphrates," the effect being that the water is dried up," that the ways of the kings of the east may be prepared." The Euphrates is the scene also of the sixth trumpet, which would seem to give but a previous incursion of the same
powers that are contemplated here, the door being now set widely open for them by the drying up of the river, the boundary of the Roman empire in the past. In the trumpet there was but an inroad upon the empire ; now there is much more than this :it is the gathering for the great day of God Almighty !

Accordingly all the powers of evil are at work :three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet; for they are the spirits of demons, working miracles, who go forth unto the kings of the whole world, to gather them together unto the war of the great day of God Almighty ! . . . And they gathered them together unto the place which is called in Hebrew Har-Magedon."

The frogs are creatures of slime and of the night, blatant, impudent impotents, cheap orators, who can yet gather men for serious work. Here, those brought together little know whom they go to meet; but this is the common history of men revealed in its true character. The cross has shown it to us on the one side ; the conflict of the last days shows it on the other. The vail of the world is removed, and it is seen here what influences carry them :the dragon, the spirit of a wisdom which, being, "earthly," is "sensual, devilish" (Jas, 3:15,); the "beast," the influence of power, which apostate from God is bestial (Ps. 49:20,); the "false prophet," the inspiration of hopes that are not of God:so the mass are led.

Har-magedon is the "mount of slaughter." We read of Megiddo in the Old Testament as a " valley," not a mountain ; whether it refers to this or no, the phrase seems equivalent to the " mountain of the slain," a mountain of heaped up corpses. To this, ignorant of what is before them, they are gathered.

A note of urgent warning is interjected here:no need of declaring the Speaker! "Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame." It is to the world Christ's coming will be that of a thief; for " in such an hour as ye think not, the Son of Man cometh." "Blessed is he that watcheth " is, as we see by the closing words, a solemn warning to the heedless. Who will be ready at this time to hear ? In any case, wisdom will utter its voice ; and none shall go out to meet unwarned the doom of the rebellious. Good it is to find just in this place, whether heeded or not, the pleading of mercy. Not the less terrible on that account the doom that comes.

And now the seventh angel pours his vial into the air. Of "the power of the air" Satan is the prince (Eph. 2:2), and all Satan's realm is shaken. A great voice breaks out of the throne, saying, It is done; and there are lightnings, and voices, and thunders,- the "voices " showing the lightnings and thunders between which they come to be no mere natural tempest, but divinely guided judgment. There is an unparalleled convulsion ; and the great city (Babylon or, as it is applied here, Rome) is divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations generally fall. It is added as to a special object of the divine judgment,-"And Babylon the great was remembered before God, to give unto her the cup of wine of the fierceness of His wrath." This is in brief what is given presently in detail. Babylon has only once before been named in Revelation ; but the two following chapters treat of it in full.

Then "every island fled away :" as I suppose, there is no isolation of any from the storm; "and the mountains were not found :" no power so great but it is humbled and brought low. " And a great hail, every stone about a talent weight, fell down from God out of heaven upon men :and men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail ; for the plague thereof was exceeding great." In the hail the effect of God's withdrawal from men is seen in judgment. The source of light and heat are one; and for the soul God is the source :the hail speaks not of mere withdrawal, but of this becoming a pitiless storm of judgment which subdues all, except, alas ! the heart of man which, while his anguish owns the power from which he suffers, remains in its hard impenitency the witness and justification of the wrath it has brought down. F. W. G.

(To be continued.)

DR. SANDAY’S LECTURES ON "THE ORACLES OF GOD."

2. The Human Element in the Bible,

Dr. Sanday's text for his second lecture is 2 Cor. 4:7- "We have this treasure in earthen vessels."His application of it is not at all that which the apostle makes, but a sad perversion. As a specimen of unfair handling of Scripture, it deserves to be looked at; for in just this way is the Bible continually made to sanction principles which it disowns and condemns utterly.

For what purpose does a "professor of exegesis" use the apostle's words ? Clearly to advocate the possibility of mistake in the inspired writings. This is the first great effort of his whole book. Nor are we raising question of his motives at all in saying this. No doubt, he would tell us, that the mistakes being in Scripture, his desire is, to show how we may have faith in it nevertheless; nay, even, -strange and impossible as the thing may look,-how that faith may be cleared and strengthened by the recognition. But is this in the least what the apostle means ?

Is his subject "The Mistakes of Moses," or his own mistakes ? We have only to read the passage to find that he is speaking of very different things. I give it in another version somewhat more literal than the common one.

"But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the sur-passingness of the power may be of God, and not of us:every way afflicted, but not straitened; seeing no apparent issue, but our way not entirely shut up; persecuted, but not abandoned ; cast down, but not destroyed; always bearing about in our body the dying of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be manifested in our body:for we who live are alway delivered unto death on account of Jesus, that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh."

Here is the earthen vessel-a humanity capable of suffering, of inward trial and perplexity, of depression and fear; but unfailingly sustained by more than human strength. Death working upon the human frame made only more evident the divine life which had been enkindled, and which the hand of persecution could not touch. What has this to do with mistakes in Scripture ? Where does any inspired writer own such, apologize for them, or intimate indeed that it was a matter of thanksgiving that he had been left to write error for truth,-that the God of truth is better served by a certain mixture of falsehood than He would be by unerring truth itself ? Is not the whole doctrine of the Word the reverse of this ?

We have now, however, to consider the human element in the Bible, and in this shall follow Dr. Sanday’s point by point. By this means the real contention will be better seen, and the truth as a whole find more complete development. He says,-

" This we may start with, that there is a human element even in the Bible; and the tendency of the last fifty or a hundred years of investigation is, to make it appear that this human element is larger than had been supposed. The freedom of the human agent made use of in the Bible was less restricted than those who argued from an antecedent view of what was to be expected in a divine revelation would have imagined it to be. That is the first point."

This is all vague enough, even to the "fifty or" twice fifty "years of investigation;" and does not sufficiently accredit the well-known father of The " higher criticism," the infidel physician, Astruc, whose view was published in 1753. The child, a weakling at its birth, waited fifty years for adoption, which it received at length at the hands of the extreme rationalists of Germany. With them it grew rapidly, was taught by degrees a more Christian mode of speech, and now can figure as if of Christian parentage. But this is not the case ; and it is important to remember that it is not the case:for who can believe that God inspired an infidel to give the direction to Christian thought after this manner? Certainly no "investigation" of any believing kind had any thing to do with it, but the suggestion of an enemy, which the infatuation of restless minds too little under the control of the Word has admitted, to the dishonor of Christ and their own undoing.

The "human element" is indeed everywhere in Scripture ; true :nor is "the freedom of human agents'" in the least " restricted" by their being " moved by the Holy Ghost." If God uses His creatures for His blessed purposes, His delight is, to lead them freely, and in accordance with the nature He has bestowed on them. To enlighten their minds, to enkindle their hearts, to reveal to them His truth, is surely in no wise to take away from them any "freedom" which is worthy of the name; not even if this be carried so far as to make error on their part impossible in the communication of His mind to men. Is God less free because He cannot do evil or be in error ? and shall man be less free the more he is raised up to God ?

"That is the first point," continues Dr. Sanday; "but the second, which seems to me to be equally clear, is, that, in spite of the enlarged scope which is thus given to human thought and human action, the divine element which lies behind it is not less real and not less divine."

Why should it be ? The enlargement of man's faculties, the clearing of his spiritual sight,-all that which makes him the more joyfully subject to God, the more fully in communion with Him,-all this must needs imply the operation of God in it to be proportionately full and mighty. That is, if the freedom meant be what is rightly to be called freedom. "Freedom" to make mistakes and go astray,-the freedom of the blind to fall into the ditch,- we shall only call such when it is demonstrated for us.

" The third point is, that we make a mistake in attempting to draw a hard and fast line between the two elements. The part which comes from man and the part which comes from God ran into and blend with each other. We think of them best, not as acting separately, but as acting together. And this intimate and organic union only serves to bring home the message which God has condescended to bring home to man with greater force and greater reality."

All true, from the point of view which we have indicated, by which the "higher criticism," however, is entirely annulled and set aside. For suppose there be in what we receive as Scripture but one demonstrable error, can we think of the divine element being in "intimate and organic union" with the human in this case? Are we not bound, if there be error, "to draw a hard and fast line" here, and to say, the error is human merely ? But then, indeed, it is impossible to tell just where the line is to be drawn ; because it is impossible to say what is the extent of the error, and into what region it may not intrude. If history, chronology, cosmogony, authenticity of the books, etc., be all more or less open to it, why not the more important "things unseen"? Especially as the Saviour's own words must at the start be given up, and we must allow that Scripture can be broken, and many a "jot and tittle pass from the law" without fulfillment! The sting is in the tail, however, and very cautiously and darkly as the professor expresses himself, it is yet to be discerned in his final proposition :-

"Lastly, I think it will be seen that the application which we in turn make of that message may need to be somewhat modified. We may find our view of the motive forces in religion somewhat altered."

Just so; but let not any timid one get alarmed. Dr. Sanday is pretty sure there is no cause; and he, if not in this special line much of an authority, has access to the specialistic workroom where these surprises are manufactured for us, and he does-

-" not think for a moment that we should find them less powerful or less effectual than they have been."

Very comforting, no doubt ; and the age is accustoming us to have " motive forces " altered, and all for good ! Seriously, does our kindly teacher imagine that he can destroy our faith in what for us at least have been Christ's own teachings, and with a smile seat himself in the empty seat?

But the language is too dark for us to attempt to interpret without anticipating what is to be brought out afterward, or exposing one's self to the suspicion of mere false accusation. It is evident, however, that it is not the power of the " motive forces " that we need to be assured of merely,-" forces " we suppose will be effective,-but rather their quality,-that is, the line in which they will be found effective. Our "view" of them may be somewhat altered. All seems very doubtful, spite of the tone of assurance that is maintained. But there is no need for doubt. Must not the "application" be altered of a text which has once been proved so largely fallible, nay, deceptive ? Shall we not take leave to apply it, as we think reasonable? and where we think well, "apply" it to some idiosyncrasy of the writer-his little enlightenment, the manners of the age, and what not beside ? And of the "motive forces" it will be easily seen how many may work, indeed, and be effective, which another view of inspiration would entirely shut out. It would spoil much good reasoning to accept absolutely such assertions as that of the apostle, that " the things that I speak unto you are the commandments of the Lord."

In what follows, the history of the doctrine of inspiration is taken up, briefly enough, but in a way which seems really to prejudice the question rather than fairly meet it. What avails it to remind us that some have thought the Masoretic vowel points of the Hebrew text to be inspired ? or that " less instructed " Protestants have " pinned their faith " to their respective versions ? Nor is it right to mix up the question of the integrity of the text as transmitted to us with the much more important and very different one of original inspiration. Granting the last to be complete, the errors that have crept into manuscripts are comparatively trivial, mere motes and specks in the sunrays. Refusing its perfection is to bring in twilight obscurity at once.

Again, Dr. Sanday, after his manner, in a few easy words about the "conflict," as he is pleased to call it, between the Bible and Natural Science, awards the victory, as a thing of course, to the latter. While he joins together " Galileo, Newton, Darwin," as representing three stages of this successful conflict. But neither of the first two ever was, or intended to be, in opposition to Scripture, as the last was and meant to be. And evolution remains to-day, in spite of the wide adherence to it, a plausible guess, and nothing more. It was put forth to show how species might have originated without special creation. But specific creation according to plan, accounts for everything at least as well. The only necessary evolution is that of the plan in the Creator's mind. And Mr. Wallace, who at the same time with Mr. Darwin, originated the idea, still contends that as to man, evolution cannot account for him. Here what is most sufficient if is the simplest thought.

He returns to the internal evidence :-

" Neither, again, were the biblical writers exempted from some, at least, of the general characteristics of their contemporaries:they shared the literary peculiarities of men of their own nationality and station:they were not supernaturally raised above the level of knowledge to which their contemporaries had attained in matters of science. Even in the things of religion it is becoming every day clearer that there is a growth and progression running through the New Testament as well as the Old. No one generation reached the limits of truth all at once:there was a gradual withdrawing of the vail at different times and in different portions."

As to language and literary peculiarities, it is no defect to the Word of God that it should not speak with the tongue of the learned. As to science, I suppose the first chapter of Genesis is yet superior to its Assyrian representative, and may fairly challenge comparison with any other account of creation, perhaps not excepting Haeckel's. And as for the progressive character of revelation, that is fully declared in Revelation itself. While it makes only the more miraculous, for those that have eyes to see, the way in which even the history of those past generations shines in the light of the complete declaration with type and prophecy and manifold anticipation of that full-orbed glory which had not yet dawned. So that Genesis locks hands with the Apocalypse, and Scripture is rounded off into a luminous cycle, the orbit of truth obedient to the divine voice from which it came. Surely, for him who knows this, the inspiration of Scripture has a witness which no consent of all the graduates of all man's colleges could give it, and which can be affected by none of the demurrers of a science born but yesterday, and which has scarcely yet attained intelligible speech.

All this Dr. Sanday omits in his estimate of Scripture-inspiration. Can he be ignorant of it ? It is evidence of the complete permeation of the human element by the divine, of which we may say, adopting the words of the evangelist, that if it could be fully written out, we may well suppose that the world could not contain the books that should be written. F. W. G.

(To be continued.)

There are three fruit-bearing trees, much esteemed and cultivated by the inhabitants of Palestine, which are fruitful in instructing us who possess and peruse the New Testament. They are the olive-tree, the fig-tree, and the vine. It was these of which Jothan made mention in his parable to the men of Shechem, which furnish parabolic teaching about Gentiles, Israel, and Christians. Privilege, profession, fruit-fulness, such are the topics in illustration of which these trees are severally introduced.

1. The olive-tree furnishes special instruction for Gentiles, as such, in the way of dispensational teaching. We meet with it once in this manner in Rom. 11:, where a word of warning is given to those who are not of the race of Israel. Promises belonged to Israel as the children of Abraham. (Rom. 9:4.) To the covenants of promise Gentiles were strangers. (Eph. 2:12.) Promises there were, as has been remarked, about Gentiles, but not to them. To Abraham they were made and to his seed. (Gal. 3:16.) Israel, on the ground of their lineage " after the flesh," looked for the fulfillment and enjoyment of them. John the Baptist had warned them how mistaken they would find themselves, if they trusted in this matter to natural birth without being born of God. God could of the stones around them raise up children to Abraham. The warning was in vain, as far as the nation was concerned. For they rejected the One to whom the promises made to Abraham were confirmed- that One was Christ, the patriarch's seed. God, therefore, has cast them off, nationally, for a time, and is now dealing with Gentiles. It is of this dispensational change that Paul writes in Rom. 11:, and, to illustrate it in a manner within the comprehension of his readers, he makes use of the simile of an olive-tree, with which those in Italy would be familiar. From this tree, a good olive-tree, some of the branches have been broken off, that is all the nation of Israel, except the remnant according to the election of grace, who remain branches in the olive-tree, where they, had always been.

Into this same tree other branches have been grafted, taken from a wild olive-tree, one which had never been brought under culture. Now these are the Gentiles, with whom God is at present dealing in sovereign goodness, brought thus outwardly into connection with Abraham, "the root of promise – the root, to carry out the figure, of the olive-tree. Before the cross God was dealing with Israel as the elect nation, but not directly with the Gentiles. Privileges belonged to the former, in which the latter had no part. The Syrophoenician woman had to acknowledge that. She felt it, and she owned it. After the cross a new feature in God's dealings with man was displayed. The privileges which had marked Israel as God's special people on earth they enjoyed no longer, for they continued in unbelief. The aged Simeon had declared that the child he held in his arms would be "a light for revelation of the Gentiles," to bring them out of the obscurity in which they had hitherto been dispensationally, as those with whom God could prominently deal in goodness; and Paul teaches us this took place when Israel for a time, as a nation, was cast off.

Advantages, then, Gentiles now possess such as they never had before the cross. The root of promise has not changed. The olive-tree has not been cut down, but some branches have been broken off, and branches from a wild olive-tree have been grafted in on the principle of faith. As grafted in they partake of the "root and fatness of the olive tree." Privileges are theirs, as brought into direct association with the root of promise, Abraham, the father of the faithful. What flows from the root, therefore, they share in ; "of the root and fatness of the olive-tree" they partake, being, as Gentiles, grafted in by faith into the line of promise on earth.

Now this is not salvation, for they might be " cut off." It is not church position, for church position is new both to Jews as well as to Gentiles who enjoy it. But here it is, Gentiles coming in to share the privileges on earth as those who, as faithful among the Jews, had never lost them. We say on earth, for the simile of the tree teaches us, that the position thus illustrated is one enjoyed on earth.

Would, then, the Gentiles continue in this privileged place ? That depended upon them. " If thou continue in goodness." Have they? One must surely admit they have not. Excision, therefore, must take place. And, if the natural branches abide not in unbelief, they shall be grafted into their own olive-tree. The good olive-tree is Israel, the root is Abraham; and the advantages Gentiles as such possess they can lose by unfaithfulness, for they stand in that place only by faith. God is now visiting the Gentiles (Acts 15:14), and the outward result of this is what we term Christendom. Privileges those possess who are part of Christendom, but these privileges entail responsibility. Could the Gentile glory, then, over the branches broken off? He could not. To the Jew his natural place was in the olive-tree, it was only through his sin of unbelief that he was broken off. To the Gentile it was of divine goodness that he was there at all, grafted in on the principle of faith, to be continued there only if he abode in God's goodness. All those, then, who are really saved are in the olive-tree, but far more than they are numbered amongst its branches. It takes in the faithful remnant of Israel. It includes all Christendom. The Gentiles, if once cut off, will never be restored. The
Jews may be, and will, if they abide not in unbelief. How truly will that be felt and confessed by and by, when that which Zech. 8:13 says, shall receive its accomplishment !

2. The fig-tree suggests teaching of a different order, and was used as an illustration to a different audience. The Lord made use of it when warning Israel, and instructing His disciples. (Luke 13:6-9; Matt. 21:19-21; Mark 11:12-14, 20-23.) Its fruit makes it of such value. If the tree is fruitless, why let it occupy the ground? Now there is one feature in the fig-tree which made it so suited to depict the state of Israel. Its flowers are formed before the bursting out of its leaves. Hence the presence of leaves suggests the promise and appearance of fruit. One sees at once, then, how fit an emblem such a tree would be of Israel, who by profession were God's people, but who, nevertheless, when the Lord came, proved by rejecting Him their unfruitfulness for God. The olive-tree, as an evergreen, fitly represents the continuance of the line of promise on earth, which would never end, even in appearance, during all the ages that should precede the establishment of the kingdom of God in power upon earth. As the olive-tree from its character suggests the thought of continuance, the fig-tree from its habit is well adapted to illustrate profession, which should be accompanied by the proofs of fruitfulness. And if it lacks such proofs, cutting down surely the tree richly deserves. God's forbearance, then, with the nation of Israel till the cross, the parable of the fig-tree in Luke 13:sets forth. The sentence on the barren but leaf-clothed tree on Olivet was the indication of the carrying out of the judgment against Israel, of which the Lord had previously warned the people. A tree cut down ceases to be seen by men. Israel, as an ordered nation, would cease to exist. Profession without fruitfulness will never do for God.

3. Turning to the vine, we get instruction of a different character. It speaks of, and to, Christians in truth.

God had a vine, which He had brought out of Egypt:that vine was Israel. (Ps. 80:8-2:) A vine which is unfruitful is useless, as Ezekiel (15:2-4) reminded his countrymen. The Lord then, in Jno. 15:, teaches His disciples that He is the true vine :hence, fruitfulness in them could only be produced as they abode in Him. For those who were of the Jewish race this teaching was important :national position, a lineage after the flesh, such would not avail. They must abide in Christ to bear fruit for God:-teaching, too, this for us, useful, needful at all times. "I am the true vine, and My Father is the husbandman. Every branch in Me that beareth not fruit He taketh away :and every branch that beareth fruit, He purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine ; no more can ye, except ye abide in Me. I am the vine, ye are the branches :he that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit; for without Me ye can do nothing. If a man abide not in Me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered ; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned. If ye abide in Me and My words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. Herein is My Father glorified that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be My disciples." (Jno. 15:1-8.)

When we come to the Lord's teaching about the vine, we leave dispensational truth about Gentiles and Jews, and come to that which is vitally important. But, to understand it aright we must ever remember, that the simile of a tree suggests something which is upon earth, not something about heaven. Keeping this in mind, we shall understand the bearing of what He says. He speaks of that which is seen upon earth :a branch, therefore, might be in the vine and yet be unfruitful. But no one could be in Christ before God without being really a child of God. If we bring in standing before God when we read of the vine, we shall get all wrong. If we remember that a tree is a simile of something existing upon earth, we shall be kept right. A branch, therefore, in the vine is a professing Christian. There might be that without the person being a true believer. At the moment the Lord was speaking there was a marked illustration of it in Judas Iscariot. He was one of the twelve, appeared to be a believer, was a branch in the vine ;but his occupation at that very moment indicated that he had not abode in Christ. Mere profession, then, would not do. He is not merely impressing on them that there must be reality and life to be fruitful; He is telling them how, and how only, they can be fruitful, viz., by abiding in Him. The curse on the fig-tree showed that God would not be satisfied without fruit. The Lord's teaching about the vine makes plain how fruitfulness can be insured. Professors there might be, there have been, there are still. Of such, if that is all they are upon earth, the Lord speaks in ver. 6, but let the reader remark He does it in language which, while pointedly showing the dreadful future of such, carefully guards against the idea of any real Christian perishing. Speaking to those who were true, He says, " Ye." Describing the barren professor, He says, "If a man" etc. There is no discouragement to the weakest believer. There is the most solemn warning for the mere professor. -Bible Witness and Review.

A RECORD OF THE SOUL’S PROGRESS, AND A WITNESS TO THE WORD.

Josh. 15:26-28.-(Continued from p. 209.)

Now in the third series to follow, it ought to be peculiarly the Spirit Himself that is before us, although as seen in His work, of course. And here, if the first name of the second series speaks of the rule of law, the first of the third may well illustrate the "dominion of the Spirit."Strange and startling will the name be, then, that we find here ! it is another " Hazar," "inclosure;" but no more the "conflict;" it is-

"Hazar-shual," the "inclosure of the jackal," the jackal-pen !

"Shual" is in our version always taken as the "fox," and this, it is believed, is sometimes the true meaning; but if so,'it must at least have a wider significance. Samson's " foxes," of which they collected three hundred, were more likely jackals, which are gregarious, as the fox is not, and could more easily have been found in number. But there is another passage more decisive, where, speaking of his enemies, the Psalmist says (Ps. 63:10), "They shall fall by the sword, they shall become a portion for foxes ; " for the jackal is a well-known carrion-feeder, as the fox again is not. The name "shual," which means " burrower," might apply to either.

But what are we to make of this word, then, with its sinister meaning, coming just where we might expect to find the dominion of the Spirit indicated ? is there indeed any kinship between such thoughts ? I believe so, assuredly; "Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh:" what is that but saying, " Walk in the Spirit, and the jackal-nature is penned?" This unclean creature, with its earth-burrowing, carrion-feeding propensities, is it not an apt figure of what the flesh is whenever it has leave to show itself ? And under the rule of the Spirit, might we not expect that the first thing we should be taught would be the effect upon the evil in us, if it will be allowed that any evil is indeed left ?

I know that there are many Christians to-day who deny that in the " perfect man "-the saint in his matured and proper condition-the flesh still exists. Those Galatians, they tell us, of whom it is said, "the flesh lusteth against the Spirit," were no good examples of a Christian state. They may have had a jackal in a cage, perhaps scarcely so much as that. Had they kept him in, would he not have starved and died there ? and why should the noisome beast be kept alive ?It may be possible even to answer this. Even if it were not, the prior question to be settled is as to the fact.

Paul the apostle was certainly not himself a " foolish Galatian;" and if any mere man could be proposed for an example to others, he would be the man. Nay, he can even propose himself:three times over he says, " Be followers of me" (i Cor. 4:16; 11:i; Phil. 3:17); and in the last case adds, " And mark them which walk so as ye have us for an example."Who, indeed, of all the apostles labored so much as he ? or who could give such a record of what he had endured in service?"This one thing I do," speaks of the ardor of his concentration; and his "earnest expectation" and his hope is, in his own language, this:"that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but with all boldness, as always, so now also, Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life or by death."
(Phil. 1:20.)

This being the man he was, what has he to say for himself of that absence of sin from his life of which many of its advocates can speak quite freely ? Of his faithfulness as a minister of Christ, in the very chapter in which he bids us be followers of him, and while his testimony shows abundantly his spiritual stature, he says, " For I know nothing against myself; yet am I not hereby justified, but He that judgeth me is the Lord." (i Cor. 4:4.) That is, where his conduct might seem to himself to be most blameless, he dare not assert it:only the Lord fully knew, and in that sense he protests, "Yea, I judge not mine own self."

When he had been caught up into the third heaven, and heard there unspeakable things, yet because there was still in him a capacity for self-exaltation, " There was given to me," he declares, "a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure." (2 Cor. 12:7.) How plain, then, that there may be in us tendencies which do not even come out, and for which God's dealings with us may be needed lest they should come out,-tendencies which may be hidden too from ourselves ! If such remained in this ardent apostle, spite of an activity, a zeal, a love, which had no equal, who shall dare to say that they are not in him? But these tendencies are the manifestations of a fallen nature,-of a heritage from her who fell by aspiring to be what she was not, and which were the successful work of him who himself fell by pride-"the condemnation of the devil."

Our rule is, to "walk as Christ walked:" how much here is it safe to claim ? How much of any claim may be due to self-ignorance, and little standing in the light of God!

Scripture is clear enough as to the fact:but why the fact ?-why merely pen the jackal ? Such an inquiry may be reverently as well as irreverently made. It can, I believe, be measurably answered. The living man bound to the carcass would learn at least a horror of corruption. An apprehension of sin in this way, in the very light of God's grace, may be a lesson profitable to all eternity. And it is surely a triumph over evil to make it thus subservient to holiness. A training in humility, in watchfulness, in the ways of a holy government to which we are ever subject, may be of infinite value in the eternity to come.

Only let us remember ! if we have the jackal, our responsibility is, to have the jackal penned. " Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh." To walk in the Spirit is not to live a mere blameless life :it would be mere meaningless tautology to say, Walk blamelessly, and you will not do evil. To walk in the Spirit is to walk in occupation with Christ,-to "walk in Christ," -to live as identified by grace with Him who is our Representative in the presence of God. It is to walk as separate from the world, because belonging to heaven,- strangers and pilgrims, our hearts where our treasure is, to set our mind on things above, where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God. With our hearts there, our eyes there, the world will not attract us, the lusts of the flesh will find no object, the jackal will be penned ! And for this we are responsible, and for this we have the power. The Spirit of God is surely abundant power, and it is practical infidelity to doubt it.

How much more would one desire to say, but we must go on to the second word in this series-a beautiful and a simple one :it is-
" Beersheba," "the well of seven," or "the well of the oath." It is both, really. The word "to swear" is in Hebrew the word "to seven "-to give complete assurance:"an oath for confirmation is an end of all strife." (Heb. 6:16.) At Beersheba also seven lambs were witness for Abraham that the well was his. For us, a perfect Christ before God has secured to us the well of water,-here, without any doubt, the type of the Spirit of God, the "living water." The numerical place is that of witness, as we know, and the Spirit of God as come into the world is indeed the Witness for Him who is gone out of it,-the joy and refreshment and power of the new life in the soul. Here we have, therefore, the positive side of that of which Hazar-shual gave us the negative side.

Blessed be God that we have the well of water ! Notice how accurate and beautiful is the figure here. Without water, the tree would die in the midst of abundant food. Water is needed both to prepare the nourishment for the root, and to enable the root to take in the nourishment. And in the human body, no less than in the vegetable, the necessity is similar. Men have, without a miracle, passed through forty days without food, but how long would any one succeed in living without water? Oh that we knew better the infinite need that we have of the Spirit of God!

But notice, again, how man's responsibility is insisted on in the matter. The earth's unseen channels may be flooded with what he needs, but the well speaks of energy in getting at it, and of care needed even after access has been got. Desert sands, no less than the hands of Philistines, may choke the well. Men have proved widely how in both these ways the treasures of the Spirit may be sealed up from them again after they have been fully in faith's possession. But after all, the thing most to be dreaded is our own neglect. Let us remember that we may and do limit blessings which on God's part He has not limited for us. With all the Scripture-research today (thank God for it!), yet, alas! how few of us even think of the abundance which God has made our own ! how few claim and realize the possession of the well!

"Water" stands, in Scripture, both for the Spirit and the Word. " Living water " is the Spirit of God acting in and vivifying the Word of God. The Word of God is the only test of what is of the Spirit of God. The Spirit of God cannot set aside or ignore what He has Himself indited for us. Just as the Word without the Spirit leads to rationalism and the dishonor of the Word, so the claim of the Spirit where the Word is slighted leads to enthusiasm and fanaticism and the dishonor of the Spirit. How many are governed by their emotions, or their sense of the fitness of things ! How few of God's people are there that have not some reserve-ground, where tradition, reasoning, and other things are permitted to assume control, and God's voice is hushed before these ! Are we really "men of one book," proving how thoroughly Scripture can furnish to every good work ? Ah, beloved, need we have to study and remember the lesson of Beersheba.

One word more, and we have done. It is in the same line with the rest of this series, of course. It speaks of the Spirit; but not to repeat what we have already had. As the third name of the third series, it ought in fact to give us the fullest and highest thought of all in this direction :so we shall find it does; the name is-

"Biziothiah," and Dr. Young, in his concordance, renders it, "the house of Jah's olives." I think it is more literal, and gives a better meaning, if we render it simply " among Jah's olives."

And this ought not to be difficult to interpret either. The olive, in Israel, was that out of which the oil so constantly used and spoken of was obtained; and we have one solemn, blessed word which can never permit us to forget the method of its extraction :that word is, " Gethsemane," "the oil-press." It was the pressure of the cross, now just before the Lord, which wrung out of Him what shows at once the depths to which He was descending, and the absolute submission, even there, of One who had come into the world only to do the Father's will in it. It was under this infinite pressure that His unique glory was exhibited upon whom the Spirit of God had come "as a dove," the bird of love and sorrow,-of sorrow which was that of love itself, and into which love brought Him. All was according to the Spirit throughout:the sorest pressure only brought forth the oil. It is the invariable type of the Spirit in His work, and that with which the prophet, priest, and king were anointed. But the olive was the home of the oil, so to speak :there was its abiding-place; and if we are "among Jah's olives," then we are those not only ministered to, refreshed and sustained by the Spirit, but in whom the Spirit of God dwells:"Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, and ye are not your own ?" "For ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, 'I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.' " (i Cor. 6:19; 2 Cor. 6:16.)

Here, then, is the supremest point reached in this series, for it is the seal and crown of all the rest. It was Christ's own peculiar excellency, that, as with the high-priest of old, who was but His type, He could be anointed without blood. For us, as we see in the priests afterward, the oil must be upon the blood. It is the completeness of Christ's work for us, the power of His blood to cleanse us from all sin, the absolute perfection which we have in Him, which enables God to put upon us thus the seal of His Spirit. "Behold, thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee." The value of that changeless, perfect work is proclaimed in the power and joy of this abiding Presence. We are not our own :we are bought with a price :and because His who has redeemed us, the Spirit of God has come to take possession of us, to fill us with the brightness of His glory, to be in us the earnest of the inheritance, to display in us the power of the risen Lord our Saviour.

Only, in the mystery which reveals to us at once our height in creation, and at the same time the peril to which this necessarily links itself, it is for us still to say how far this blessedness shall be known by us,-how far we will yield ourselves to this sweet and marvelous control. Beloved, what do our hearts say to this magnificent grace of God ? Shall we yield freely to the compulsion of a love which is satisfied with nothing else than our free yielding? or shall we, by careless indifference and unbelief, do our best to limit the power of Omnipotence, and grieve the Holy Spirit of God by which we are sealed unto the day of redemption ? That is the momentous question, which no one of us can settle for another, which we must, each one for himself, decide. F. W. G.

(Continued from page 132.)

Now, coming to those on the eastern side of Jordan :we have, first, Bezer, nearly always spoken of as "in the wilderness." The word means, apparently, "precious ore." It occurs, and in this identical form, just twice; and that in Job, chap. 22:23-25, where Eliphaz tells Job that if he puts his treasure (bezer) with the dust, and the gold of Ophir among the stones of the brook, (1:e., evidently, trusting not in earthly wealth,) then the Almighty shall be his treasure (bezer),-1:e., true riches (see R. V.). It is closely connected with, and is said to be derived from, "Bazar," which is constantly translated "fenced," "fortified." The idea, evidently, in the word is "riches," "treasure," "gold," looked upon as a source of confidence and strength. The verse quoted in Job gives us much help, for it shows that the word is applied, not only to the fleeting riches of earth, but the true riches,-"the Almighty shall be thy 'precious ore,' thy bezer, (or defense, or wealth)." Then may we not see in Bezer the resources, the wealth, the redeemed have in their Lord Jesus,-that of which they learn more and more as they go along, proving and experiencing the infinite depth of the wealth they have in Him, and so truly able to put other confidence "with the dust, and among the stones of the brook ?"

Bezer, too, is beautiful for situation. If "in the wilderness," it forms a lovely oasis therein. The dear apostle dwelt ever within its borders, and knew its language well. Would we hear its speech ? Then listen to him when addressing the Philippians. " Not that I speak in respect of want; for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, to be content. I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound:everywhere and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound
and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ which strengthened me." And, again, he exhorts us to dwell in Bezer when he says, " Rejoice in the Lord alway; and again I say, Rejoice."

Mark 4:19 is a strong, warning, on the other hand, against wandering from this refuge-city.

Now let us see what we have thus far in these names, and note the admirable correspondence with the summing up of the apostle in the epistle to the Hebrews, in chap. 10:The general thought of security in the idea of refuge itself -that thought so carefully wrought out in the epistle, and summed up in the words " By one offering He hath perfected forever them that are sanctified," and "Where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sins." Then " Kedesh," the holiness of the place to which we are brought,-" Having, therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus."

Then the activities of that place in service, " Shechem,"

-"Let us provoke one another to love and to good works." Then the sweet association thereof in " Hebron,"- "Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together;" and lastly, the wealth-the precious treasure there, which, if I through faith grasp, then I can, as the Hebrews, take with joy the spoiling of goods of earth, knowing that I have "a better and an enduring substance." Surely there is some confirmation of the meanings and significance of the names of these cities in this harmony; nor does it conflict with this that Bezer is in the wilderness.

"Our whole resource along the road,
Nothing but Christ-the Christ of God."

It is there we realize and are made to realize our needs, and there realize how full and complete the resources- the wealth in Him. Wilderness needs cause us to dig for the precious ore, and then we find we have an inexhaustible "seam "of it. In the land, His people drank the water from the rills and brooks and fountains with which it abounded ; but in the wilderness their thirst was only quenched by the Rock that followed them ; and so for every need. Mark, with trembling, that in the end of church-days, the professing church forgets this entirely. She says she is " rich, and increased with goods, and has need of nothing," and knows not that she is "wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked ; she has forgotten the lesson of "Bezer in the wilderness." And, my soul, remember that thou art in these very days,-the spirit of the times in which we live is that:be jealous of any thing that clouds in the least the glory of Christ, or tends to the slightest independence of Him.

Does its being in the " plain " further harmonize with the significance of humility, dependence?

Ramoth in Gilead out of Gad. The word means, without any doubt whatever, "elevation " or "height," "eminence." " Ramoth," then, must speak to us of the moral superiority or elevation in which the believer in Christ is, -1:e., there is connected with his salvation a moral elevation above the world ; he lives in a higher moral atmosphere,-that is the air faith breathes. Ramoth is, in some sort, the opposite aspect to Bezer ; if the latter speaks of the infinite resources in Christ for the poor pilgrim here in the wilderness, Ramoth speaks rather of his life hid with Christ in God, and of the superiority this gives to all of earth ; hence, to carry on the comparison with the epistle to the Hebrews, of that elevated walk of faith as pictured in Heb. 11:And, my soul, listen to the words of the king of Israel, "Know ye that Ramoth in Gilead is ours?" Alas! it gets so quickly into the enemies' hands, and has been there so long, that we actually forget that it belongs to us at all. But it does. The heights are ours.' If a Christian has learned what Bezer is,-has dwelt there till the resources and wealth he has in Christ have put in their true light all create resources, then is he at Ramoth too, walking, dwelling far above the level of the world in the heights of faith. " Cast not away such confidence," or we too may soon have to ask if Ramoth in Gilead be ours.

Shall we climb the hill-side, and examine Ramoth a little closer. As we reach the summit, and enter our city, we become blessedly conscious of a change of air. Our Lord Jesus Himself told us to expect it when He said, " These things have I spoken unto you that in Me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have-tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world." It is not exactly a change either-the tribulation has not gone; it is only unable to affect the quiet heavenly calm of Ramoth. As one of our own poets beautifully expresses it,-

"It is not that I feel less weak, but Thou
Wilt be my strength; it is not that I see
Less sin, but more of pardoning love with Thee,
And all-sufficient grace. Enough! And now
All fluttering thought is stilled; I only rest,
And feel that Thou art near, and know that I
am blest."

Ramoth is certainly not far from Bezer. One can see how near together they are in Gen. 14:, 15:-"I will not take from a thread even to a shoe-latchet," said Abram:there is surely the moral elevation-the heights of Ramoth. Ramoth is too high for low, earthly motives to influence its people. " Fear not, Abram ; I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward :" there are the divine resources of Bezer.

Nor can the terrors of the tyrant and persecutor reach the heights of our Ramoth. We see this shown in many of its blessed citizens in the record of God's Word, and we recognize the language of Ramoth in the three Hebrew youths when they said, " O Nebuchadnezzar, we are not careful to answer thee in this matter. If it be so, our God, whom we serve, is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace ; and He will deliver us out of thy hand, O king. But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up." Glorious language this of Ramoth ! But 'tis the privilege of the feeblest believer in our Lord Jesus to speak this language. Ramoth is ours-no one must question that. It is not the language of nature, it is learned in faith's school; nor the courage of nature, it is the grace that is in Christ Jesus that gives it. May we too be strong therein. Amen.

Golan, in Bashan, out of Manasseh. The meaning of " Golan " is given by one authority as " Place of Pilgrimage," or " Exodus," from " Gahlah;" but the meanings to this word are very many,-all of them, however, may be reduced to two-"to uncover or reveal," and "to carry away (generally) captive."The word is used in the former sense in such passages as i Sam. 3:21-"The Lord revealed Himself to Samuel;" Is. 40:5-" And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed;" Ex. 20:26, etc.; and in the latter sense, Jer. 20:4-" And he shall carry them captive," etc. I think the word points, in connection with its position-the last of the cities, to that end of the goal when, in the full light of that day, all shall be revealed and brought to light; for He comes " who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts; and then shall each man have praise from God."The end of the pilgrimage !How happy to find there a word that speaks to us of no sorrow for the path run, no complaint for a life wasted, no disappointment at the goal reached; but, whilst all things revealed, every man to receive " praise from God " !We may well credit, then, those authorities who derive " Golan " from a word signifying " joy," for quite in harmony with its position would this be at the end of the course. The dear apostle longed, therefore, in the language of these cities, to reach Golan, when he said, "Neither count I my life dear unto me, that I may finish my course with joy." Nay, more :may we not reverently say that our Lord Jesus, the Perfect Example of the pilgrim's walk of faith, looked forward to "Golan " when he passed through the shame and suffering of the cross; despising the one and enduring the other, because of the clearness with which He saw that glorious end- " the joy set before Him " ? When we lose sight of Golan, hands and knees sink toward earth (Heb. 13:12). But he who, through grace, knows his blessed security in his Cities of Refuge, and learning the holy lesson of Kedesh, in cleansing himself from all filthiness of flesh and spirit in the fear of God, whilst walking in the fruitfulness of Shechem, the sweet communion of Hebron,-he who joys in his Bezer in the Lord Jesus, and consequently knows well that Ramoth is his, will be apt indeed to be able to see with a clear eye the Golan-the goal of his pilgrimage, and press on thereto with a patient race.

Will any one say that these lessons from these cities are the results of mere ingenuity, and not the distinct intention of the Spirit of God ? Surely this would require more credulity than to recognize the divine intention and design. For as each meaning shows its own beauty and harmony with the whole, so is the probability lessened of such meanings being the result of mere coincidence, until this becomes a sheer impossibility. So if we see further beauty and design in the way these cities are placed, (their very position confirming the meanings,)-three on one side and three on the other side of Jordan,-without controversy, we may have the comfort of the assurance that it is the finger of God, and we may rejoice in the works of His hands. Now there is very distinctly such harmony. We are reminded (and who shall question if it be intentional or not?), with the very first city on the east of Jordan, that it is " in the wilderness." Is it strange, then, that all of these cities bear meanings that may be helpful to us in our journey as pilgrims through the wilder-ness-whether they whisper to our hearts of our resources in Christ, of our peaceful calm elevation in Him amid a restless surging world, or of the blessed joyful goal at the end ? But cross the river of death-Jordan, and who will question the design in the gracious reminder of the character the redeemed shall bear forever-" He that is holy, let him be holy still" (Kedesh),-of the service which death itself only perfect, for there " His servants shall serve Him" (Shechem),-or of that communion only complete when those servants " shall see His face, and His name be in their foreheads" (Hebron) ? F. C. J.

4. JUSTIFICATION.

"Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." (Rom. 5:1:)

At the close of the preceding paper, we spoke of justification as one of the results of redemption ; let us now look at it a little in detail. It is a subject upon which many Christians are not clear, yet one upon which clearness is most important for settled peace and a true conception of the believers standing. Let us seek to gather from Scripture, first, a definition of justification; secondly, the ground upon which we are justified ; thirdly, the means ; and lastly, the effects.

"It is God that justifieth "-the One against whom man has sinned, the only One competent, or who has any right to do so. But what a view of grace it gives us. The insulted, wronged One declares the justification of those who had wronged and insulted Him. "That justifieth the ungodly"-sinners are the ones justified. It is as sinners that grace meets men, and justifies them where they are and as they are. A man's fitness for justification is his need of it, his title to it his sins. How much anxiety, useless efforts, vain struggles would be saved did the anxious sinner realize that he needed no fitness for justification but his sins; that his very struggles and efforts to be something else than a sinner only show that he wishes to justify himself, rather than let God justify him.

Justification is connected with forgiveness of sins, though they are not identical. "Be it known unto you . that through this Man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins; and by Him all that believe are justified from all things." (Acts 13:38, 39.) Forgiveness of sins is their pardon ; it is the removal of the debt; it is an act of mercy, though on just and sufficient grounds. Forgiveness alone would leave one with the stain, the shame of his sins still upon him ; justification does more; it declares the sinner to be righteous, to have a positive standing before God as though he had never sinned, nay a more certain standing than if he had never sinned, as we shall see when we come to examine the grounds of justification. The first part of the epistle to the Romans is the great treatise on justification. An ordinarily careful reading of the first five chapters will show how frequently the words "righteousness," "justify," and the like occur. First, after a short introduction, in which the theme is given-the righteousness of God-(chap. 1:17), we have the solemn and awful fact brought out that man has no righteousness of his own. Man is looked at from every point of view. In chap, 1:, we see the lowest degradation, morally, in those who, not wishing to retain God in their knowledge, were given up to all manner of uncleanness-even linking God's name and professed worship with their vile affections and practices. In chap, 2:, we have in the first part, those who are able to judge the evil spoken of in the previous chapter, and yet do the same things, a state of hardness and impenitence that will surely bring down God's judgment. These are Gentiles, and such is their condition. The Jews are treated of next ; they had the law, boasted in it, but their own conduct was condemned by it. The very height of privilege to which they had been lifted through the law, outward nearness to and knowledge of God, only made more awful their fall from that place. Thus, after giving an exhibition of man, both as without law, the Gentile, and under law, the Jew, the apostle sums up the whole matter:"We have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin . . . Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law :that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore, by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in His sight:for by the law is the knowledge of sin." (Rom. 3:9, 19, 20.) This is the conclusion of the whole matter as to man's righteousness:he has none, whether Jew or Gentile :he is brought before the bar of God, aud tested by the light he has had, he is found guilty before Him. This, then, is man's standing before God naturally, without one particle of righteousness. Now comes in the display of another righteousness altogether-that of God. Naturally one would suppose that this righteousness could only be exercised against the sinner, that nothing but judgment could go forth against unrighteousness.
Here comes in, however, not only the grace, but the wisdom of God. He could not lay aside His righteousness, that would be to lay aside His being, an impossibility. Righteousness is in full exercise, but, amazing grace! for us- not against us. The very same justice which naturally would demand punishment, now not merely demands the pardon of the guilty, but declares him righteous before God. Pardon gives quietness in view of punishment, a knowledge that we have escaped it; justification enables one to ask, "Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect?" One can lift up the head, and look God in the face. God himself declares him to be just, that is, -positively righteous. It is just as if he had always been well pleasing to God. This is imputing righteousness to one who had none of his own. It is God's Tightness in full exercise, declaring the sinner who stands with closed mouth before Him to be clean every whit. This, then, in some sort, is the meaning of justification.

Next, let us see on what grounds so strange and amazing an act can take place. "Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God has forth to be a propitiation (or mercy seat) through faith in (or by) His blood, … to declare at this time His righteousness ; that He might be just and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus." (Rom. 3:24-26.) The grounds, or the reason why, God's righteousness is for instead of against the sinner are said here to be " the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,"-" a propitiatory through faith by His blood." The justice was turned against Him when He, as the substitute, took the place of the guilty. That wrath, in all its fulness and intensity, fell on Him. How well we know this ; but oh ! do we ever grow weary of it ? Blessed Jesus, Thou wast made sin for us, Thou didst bear our sins in Thine own body on the tree. The wrath spent itself on Him. Let the Christian be clear on this subject. Nothing can be more important than correct views of the atoning work of Christ. We are not saying that many who are saved do not fail to see the fullness and completeness of this work. If is sadly true that faulty or incomplete views of Christ's work are common, and the low state of soul resulting from this are also common. But for settled, abiding peace there must be the knowledge of wrath-bearing by our blessed Lord. We are justified by His blood, on that ground. – He has become the propitiatory-the mercy-seat where God meets the sinner. The mercy-seat was the cover of the ark, covering from view the law, preventing it, as it were, from being defiled by Israel and judging them. "Thy law is within My heart," said the Lord Jesus-perfectly loved and kept. But the mercy-seat was the place where the blood was sprinkled. The body of the beast was burned without the camp, as Christ suffered "without the gate," figure of that outer darkness of separation from the presence of God-"My God, My God, why has Thou forsaken Me." The blood of that beast burned at the greatest distance from God is brought within the vail and sprinkled upon the mercy-seat-the place of greatest nearness to God. So Christ entered by His own blood into heaven itself, there to appear in the presence of God for us. He is the mercy-seat, the meeting place where all the righteousness of God, instead of condemning the sinner, proclaims him free, nay, righteous. This is our standing,-the blood of Christ. On this rock we stand forever, not only forgiven, but having boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus.
Thirdly, the means of justification. "Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law." (Rom. 3:28.) Law, works, wages, death. Such is the down grade for all who seek to be justified by the law. The whole fourth chapter of Romans is devoted to showing that the means by which we are justified are not works, but faith. Faith is the direct opposite of works. If it is by works, it could not be by faith. Faith is believing the record God has given. It is accepting a free gift. It is the acknowledgment that God is truce, that His love is real. Faith takes its stand before the mercy-seat at God's invitation. Many un-established souls stumble about this simple matter of faith, as though there was something difficult about it. Faith never occupies us with itself. We do not believe in our faith, but in Christ. Faith sees the blood, rests upon it, magnifies it. To be occupied with our faith is only another subtle kind of self-righteousness, which for the earnest soul is self-torture.

Lastly, what are the effects of justification? "Being justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ." How could there be any thing but peace when all wrath has been borne, all sins blotted out and forgotten ? Peace with God! feelings are not here thought of, but the relationship with God. We have now received the reconciliation. (Rom. 5:2:) "By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God." Nearness to God, boldness to enter into the holiest. A standing in grace; the glory our joy, so that the trials by the way are not to be compared with the glory soon to be revealed. But Christ was "raised again for our justification." His resurrection declared God's full acceptance of His death for our sins, and now as risen He stands before God as our righteousness. Not only are we regarded as righteous, but He is "made unto us righteousness," so that He is in the fullest sense our representative before God. A glorified Christ is the measure of our acceptance, of our righteousness. Is there fault, spot, or blemish in Him ? Then there is none in His people who are in Him. "The love of God (God's love to us) is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us." Justified by faith ; sealed with the Holy Ghost. Boldness and access with confidence by the faith of Him. Joyful exultation in the bright hope of that glory which even now is our home, to which we shall soon be introduced by Him who has done' it all.

But thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in the Christ." (2 Cor. 2:14.)

Such is the improved rendering of the verse. Victory, triumph, not through ourselves, but through God. David won the victory over the giant. A mere stripling-as such, type of One who took the place of weakness-with only such weapons as he could get from the brook, he meets the giant and lays him low. So our David too for us met the foe, for us won the victory. Sin was there as having had dominion over man since the fall; Satan was there with the power of death; the world was there, with all its hatred of Him. He met all, He conquered all, by His very death. " Having spoiled principalities and authorities, He made a show of them publicly, leading them in triumph by it." (Col. 2:15, new version.)The cross, which speaks of His shame, of His woe and death, was that by which He triumphed. And now the Victor has come forth from the grave-the Captain of our Salvation. He is the Leader of His people. He has gone up with a shout, passed through the heavens, and as an overcomer sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high. That victory was won for us.

How blessed it is to dwell on that precious fact, to look calmly, again and again, at all that was against us, and to know that all those foes were vanquished. Take the matter of our sins-we were guilty, waiting but for judgment. By His death, He took that guilt and bore its consequences, bore them so perfectly that there is no wrath for us-simple truth this, so familiar, one might say, that there is danger of its being worn threadbare; but can there be such a danger? Is not the danger rather that we forget these things-lose the joy of them and the sense of victory.

Again, take Satan's power and authority over us. Man had put himself in Satan's hands as being willing to believe him rather than God; hence he was under his, power. Satan was the strong man, we were his goods, held with a grasp "which nothing could relax. But a stronger One came, and now we no longer belong to Satan :we are free through the One who has won the victory for us.

But let us look forward a little-a very little while. " Thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." (i Cor. 15:57.) This is the shout of victory in anticipation of the resurrection at the Lord's coming. These bodies, bodies of humiliation (Phil. 3:) are to feel the quickening power of that shout. (i Thess. 4:6.)That which has been the sad witness] to the ruin brought in by sin will then be witness to the! blessing brought in by Christ. No longer will weakness, nor even suffering be the position of His people, but victory enjoyed away even from the presence of the conquered. Christ will then be the object before a!4.He will be the Victor, but we will share in the results with Him who thus loves to have His people associated with Himself. What joy there will be then !How complete the triumph !

What are to do meanwhile? Are we victors when we look back at the cross, or when we look forward to the glory, only to be defeated in the time between ? Are we to run from the enemy or to hang our heads in shame now when in a little while we will be joining in the song of victory ? Our verse gives the answer, "Who always leads us in triumphant." Israel's journey should have been a triumphal procession from Egypt to Canaan. So should ours. The apostle-oppressed, opposed, mistrusted and persecuted-his walk through the world was a triumph. Wherever he might be, whatever his surroundings, always -in the jail at Philippi, on the sinking ship, before the Roman Emperor, he was a victor. Are we different from Paul ? Surely, his being an apostle did not make him victor,-he had no grace of which we too cannot make use. As Elijah, he was a man of like passions with ourselves. Then if he conquers, so can we. This verse can be true of us. The stages of our lives can be so many milestones in the path of our triumphant progress.

Let us illustrate a little. Take the serious matter of sin. As we well know, provision has been made for us to walk in freedom from it, "sin shall not have dominion over you ; for ye are not under law, but under grace." How familiar are the words-alas! do we in any good degree practically realize their truth ? Here we go on, year after year, and one must ask himself the question, "Is there any progress-any growth in holiness?" Or, again, as we consider our circumstances, can we say we are led in triumph through them. Trials in our business, in our homes,-all such things as would give us opportunity of testing God's grace for us-how are we meeting these ? Every thing that comes,-sickness, bereavement, poverty,-all should but furnish occasion for the truth of our verse to be shown. Especially in our intercourse with one another are we permitted to exemplify this truth. Differences will arise, and misunderstandings too. The question is, Are we to be conquered by these things or to be led in triumph through them. Alas ! Satan has too often been allowed to see discord and permanent weakness brought among God's people, instead of a little self-denial, which would have overcome all the difficulties. Satan triumphs over the these ruins of once happy fellowship and confidence. Shall he continue to do so?

But how was Paul always led in triumph ? It was the way of the cross. He followed the Master, and in bearing about in his body the dying of the Lord Jesus, His life was manifested in his poor body. May the Lord give us to know more of this way of triumph-this lowly way- passing through this world with a song in our hearts and on our lips as well.

AN EXPOSITION OF REVELATION IV.-XXII.

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

The Restraint upon Satan. (Chap. 20:1-3.)

The judgment upon living men is followed by that upon Satan their prince, though not yet is it final judgment. This partial dealing with the great deceiver means that the end of man's trial is not even yet reached. He is shut up in the abyss, or bottomless pit, of which we have read before, but not in hell (the lake of fire). As restraint, it is complete ; and with the devil, the host of fallen angels following him share his sentence. This is not merely an inference, however legitimate. Isaiah has long before anticipated what is here (chap, 24:21-23):"And it shall come to pass in that day that the Lord shall punish the host of the high ones on high, and the kings of the earth upon the earth. And they shall be gathered together as prisoners are gathered in the pit, and shall be shut up in the prison, and after many days they shall be visited. Then the moon shall be confounded and the sun ashamed; for the Lord of Hosts shall reign in Mount Zion. and in Jerusalem, aud before His ancients gloriously."

Here the contemporaneous judgment of men and angels at the beginning of the millennium is clearly revealed, and just as clearly, that it is not yet final. The vision in Revelation is also clear. The descent of the angel with the key and chain certainly need not obscure the meaning. Nor could the shutting up of Satan mean any thing less than the stoppage of all temptation for the time indicated. The " dragon," too, is the symbol for the explanation of which we are (as in the twelfth chapter,) referred to Eden, "the ancient serpent," and then are told plainly, "who is the devil and Satan." It is simply inexcusable to make the interpretation of the symbol still symbolic, and to make the greater stand for the less -Satan the symbol of an earthly empire o.r any thing of the Sort. What plainer words could be used? which Isaiah's witness also abundantly confirms. God has been pleased to remove all vail from His words here, and it does look as if only willful perversity could misunderstand His speech.

That after all this he is to be let out to deceive the nations is no doubt at first sight hard to understand. It is all right to inquire reverently why it should be; and Scripture, if we have learnt Peter's way of putting it together,-no prophecy to be interpreted as apart from the general body of prophecy,-will give us satisfactory, if solemn, answer. The fact is revealed, if we could give no reason for it. Who are we to judge God's ways? and with which of us must He take counsel? It should be plain that for a thousand years Satan's temptations cease upon the earth; and then they are renewed and successful, the nations are once more deceived..

What makes it so difficult to understand is that many have a false idea of the millennial age, as if it were " righteousness dwelling" on the earth instead of " righteousness reigning" over it. It is said indeed of Israel, after they are brought to God nationally, "My people shall be all righteous" (Is. 60:21); but that is not the general condition. The eighteenth psalm, speaking prophetically of that time, declares, "The strangers shall submit themselves unto Me," which in the margin is given as "lie," or "yield feigned obedience." They submit to superior power, not in heart; and so it is added, " The strangers shall fade away, and be afraid out of their close places." (Comp. 66:3; 81:15.) And Isaiah, speaking of the long length of years, says, "The child shall die a hundred years old," but adds, "and the sinner being a hundred years old shall be accursed." (65:20.) So Zechariah pronounces the punishment of those who do not come up to Jerusalem to worship the glorious King (14:17).

The millennium is not eternal blessedness; it is not the Sabbath, to which so many would compare it. It answers rather to the sixth day than the seventh,-to the day when the man and woman (types of Christ and the Church) are set over the other creatures. The seventh is the type of the rest of God, which is the only true rest of the people of God (Heb. 4:9). The millennium is the last period of man's trial, and that is not rest:trial in circumstances the best that could be imagined, righteousness reigning, the course of the world changed, heaven open overhead, the earth filled with the knowledge of the glory of God, the history of past judgment to admonish for the future; the question will then be fully answered, whether sin is the mere fruit of ignorance, bad government, or any of the accidents of life to which it is so constantly imputed. Alas ! the issue, after a thousand years of blessing, when Satan is loosed out of his prison, will make all plain; the last lesson as to man will only then be fully learned.

The Resurrection and Reign of the Saints, (20:4-6.)

And now we have what requires more knowledge of the Word to understand it rightly; and here, more distinctly than before, there are vision and the interpretation of the vision, so that we will be inexcusable if we confound them. The vision is of thrones, and people sitting on them, judgment (that is, rule) being put into their hands. "The souls of those beheaded for the witness of Jesus and the word of God " are another company separate from these, but now associated with them; and "those who have not worshiped the beast" seem to be still another. All these live and reign with Christ a thousand years, and the rest of the dead do not live till the thousand years are ended.

That is the vision. The interpretation follows :" This," we are told, "is the first resurrection;" and that "blessed and holy is he who hath part in the first resurrection:upon these the second death hath no power; but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years."

We must look carefully at all this, and in its order. First, the thrones, aud those sitting on them:there should be no difficulty as to who these are, for we have already seen the elders crowned and seated in heaven, and before that have heard the Lord promise the overcomer in Laodicea that he should sit with Him upon His throne. That being now set up upon the earth, we find the saints throned with Him. In the interpretation, it is said they reign with Him a thousand years. The vision is thus far very simple.

Daniel has already spoken of these thrones:" I beheld," he says, "till the thrones were placed," (as the Revised Version rightly corrects the common one,) "and the Ancient of days did sit." (Chap. 7:9.) But there was then no word as to the occupants of the thrones. It is the part of Revelation to fill in the picture on its heavenly side, and to show us who these are. They are not angels, who, though there may be "principalities" among them, are never said to reign with Christ. They are redeemed men,-the saints caught up at the descent of the Lord into the air (i Thess. 4:), and who as the armies that were in heaven we have seen coming with the white-horsed King to the judgment of the earth.
This being so, it is evident that the " souls " next spoken of are a separate company from these, though joined to them as co-heirs of the kingdom. The folly that has been taught that they are "souls" simply, so that here we have a resurrection of souls, and not of bodies,-together with that which insists that it is a resurrection of truths or principles, or of a martyr-"spirit"-bursts like a bubble when we take into account the first company of living and throned saints. In the sense intended, Scripture never speaks of a resurrection of souls. "Soul "is here used for "person," as we use it still, and as Scripture often uses it; and the word "resurrection" is found, not in the vision, where its signification might be doubtful, but in the explanation, where we have no right to take it as other than literal. What is the use of explanation, except to explain?

The recognition of the first company here also removes another difficulty, which troubled those with whom the " blessed hope" revived at the end of the last century, that the first resurrection consisted wholly of martyrs. The second company does indeed consist of these, and for an evident reason. They are those who, converted after the Church is removed to heaven, would have their place naturally in earthly blessing with Israel and the saved nations. Slain for the Lord's sake, during the tribulation following, they necessarily are deprived of this :only to find themselves in the mercy of God made to fill a higher place, and to be added, by divine power raising them from the dead, to the heavenly saints. How sweet and comforting this assurance as to the sufferers in a time of un-equaled sorrow!

When we look further at this last company, we find, as already intimated, that it also consists of two parts:first, of those martyred in the time of the seals, and spoken of under the fifth seal; and secondly, the objects of the beast's wrath, as in chap. 13:7, 15. This particularization is a perfect proof of who are embraced in this vision, and that we must look to those first seen as sitting on the thrones for the whole multitude of the saints of the present and the past. To all of which it is added that "the rest of the dead lived not again till the thousand years were finished," when we find in fact the resurrection of judgment taking place (10:11-15). All ought to be simple, then. The "first resurrection" is a literal resurrection of all the dead in Christ from the foundation of the world, a certain group which might seem not to belong to it being specialized, as alone needing this. The first resurrection is "first" simply in contrast with that of the wicked, having different stages indeed, but only one character :" Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection ! upon such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years."

To suppose that this passage stands alone and unsupported in the New Testament is to be ignorant of much that is written. " Resurrection from the dead," as distinct from the general truth of " resurrection of the dead," is special New-Testament truth. The Pharisees knew that there should be "a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and unjust." (Acts 24:15.) But when the Lord spake of the Son of Man rising from the dead, the disciples question among themselves what the rising from the dead could mean (Mark 9:9, 10.) Christ's own resurrection is the pattern of the believer's. The "order" of the resurrection is distinctly given us :" Christ the first-fruits ; afterward, they that are Christ's at His coming " (i Cor. 15:23):not a general, but a selective resurrection. Such was what the apostle would by any means gain:not, as in the common version, " the resurrection of" but "the resurrection from the dead." (Phil. 3:2:)

In his epistle to the Thessalonians, the same apostle instructs us more distinctly as to it, speaking in the way of special revelation, by "the word of the Lord:" "For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent"-or, as the Revised Version, "precede"-"them that are asleep. For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God:and the dead in Christ shall rise first; then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord." (i Thess. 4:15-17.) Thus before He appears shall His saints be with Him; and, of course, long before the resurrection of the lost.

But the Lord Himself has given us, in His answer to the Sadducees, what most clearly unites with this vision in Revelation (Luke 20:34-36). They had asked Him of one who had married seven brethren :" Whose wife shall she be in the resurrection ?" meaning, of course, to discredit it by the suggestion. "And Jesus said unto them, 'The children of this world marry, and are given in marriage; but they which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage; neither can they die any more ; for they are equal unto the angels ; and are the children of God, being the children of the resurrection.' "

Clearly this asserts the fact and gives the character of the special resurrection which the vision here describes. It is one which we must be " accounted worthy" to obtain, not one which nobody can miss:it is grace that acts in giving any one his place in it. Those who have part in it are by that fact proclaimed to be the "children of God," thus again showing that it cannot be a general one. They die no more :that is, (as here) they are not hurt of the second death. They are equal to the angels:above the fleshly conditions of this present life. Finally, it is the resurrection from the dead, not of the dead merely. All this is so plain that there should be no possibility of mistaking it, one would say ; and yet it is no plainer than this scene in Revelation.

How dangerous must be the spell of a false system, which can so blind the eyes of multitudes of truly godly and otherwise intelligent persons to the plain meaning of such scriptures as these ! And how careful should we be to test every thing we receive by the Word, which alone is truth ! Even the " wise " virgins slumbered with the rest. Which shows us also, however, that error is connected with a spiritual condition, even in saints themselves. May we be kept from all that would thus cloud our perception of what, as truth, alone has power to bless and sanctify the soul! F. W. G.

(To be continued.)

Beloved brother,-I have just read the first few pages of an article on "Hannah and Eli:A Contrast," in help and food, which is, I believe, very timely. But there is one thought which I wish to suggest in connection with Eli's failure:a thought which the experiences of the last twenty years among brethren, or, perhaps more correctly, with my brethren, have intensified in my own soul, to such a degree, that if you consider it worth any thing, I should like to give it to others of your readers.

And I will first introduce the thought by a quotation from "Collected Writings," J. N. D., on "God is light." "There is nothing more dangerous than to use the Word when it has not touched my conscience. I put myself into Satan's hands if I go beyond what I have from God, what is in possession of my soul, and use it in ministry or privately. There is nothing more dangerous than the handling of the Word apart from the guidance of the Spirit. To talk with saints on the things of God beyond what I hold in communion is most pernicious. There would be a great deal not said, that is said, were we watchful as to this, and the Word not so used in an unclean way. I know of nothing that more separates from God than truth spoken out of communion with God; there is uncommon danger in it."

I would like to emphasize these lines and repeat them ! and underscore them and repeat them again:and double underscore them and add a voice-shall I say of thunder, earthquake, fire, and hail and tempest:or of the still small voice which goes home to the conscience with divine power, or both; for sometimes thunder is God's instrument to open the ear; and without an open ear, the conscience is never reached. Beloved, I only wish this truth could be emphasized in the soul of every one who reads these lines as it has been in my own. There can be no doubt but that the writer of these lines felt and realized the importance of the sacredness of sacred things ? He could not have intensified the thought as he has in this brief quotation, if it had not been a divine reality in his own soul. Let me appeal to my reader:Have you, in your soul, a proper regard for sacred things ? Now, don't be offended at the direct appeal ? I speak as before God. Let us face the question, "For the word of God is quick and powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in His sight; but all things are naked and open unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do." (Heb. 4:12,13.)

If we cannot face it now, how shall we face it when we meet Him, " whose eyes are as a flame of fire"? Beloved, how little we realize what it Is to stand in the presence of the living God, with unshod feet! (Ex. 3:1-6.) Compare also with care the nineteenth chapter of Exodus, also Heb. 12:18-29. But do you say, " Oh, that was the ground of law, and a God of judgment; but we are on the ground of grace"? Yes, thank God we are, but is a God of grace any the less holy than the God of judgment ? And are we not in danger of "turning the grace of God into lasciviousness " ?

Think a moment, my brother, how do you handle sacred things? Do you say, "Not at all." Think again! Who is it that does not handle them at all ? Are you a member of the body of Christ ? Are you indwelt by the Holy Ghost ? Are you linked up with a risen and glorified Christ in heaven, and thus "made a king and a priest unto God ?" And have nothing to do with sacred things ? To say that you do not handle sacred things is to betray your lack of heart for your birthright, like Esau.
Beloved, I believe the root of the sin of Christendom is the confounding of sacred and profane things; and the result is the complete loss of conscience, even in religious people, many times. And there are no people in greater danger as to this than ourselves-myself and yourself.

Undue familiarity with sacred things, if not consciously in the Lord's presence, is most hardening.

This was the key to the sad failure of Eli; he had lost the sense of sacred things in his own soul; and hence had lost all power to restrain his sons; and this same failure may be read in the atmosphere and deportment of many a household.

Depend upon it my brother and my sister, if sacred things have not power to control you in the presence of your household, Satan will have power to control it and you. It is Christ to be honored or dishonored, just as you will have it:first, in your heart, then in your home, then out among men. Sacred things as herein contemplated are the things of Christ, not the things of religion :sacred things in religion, where the Holy Ghost is ignored and Christ is left out, are but superstition, and have power in the Cathedral and at the confessional, and it is the power of Satan; hence the Priest and the Prayer-book are held in authority, while Christ and the Word of God are left out, and Protestantism is hastening in the steps of her mother.

But to bring this question home once more in practical power for our own hearts. For there is one place above all others where we shall betray our lack of a proper sense of, and care for, sacred things, and is, at the Lord's table!

My reader, have you ever been there ? And who did you meet ? Your brethren ? Yes. And what would you have done if none of your brethren had come f Would you have gone to the window to look out for some one coming, or have gone out to find them ? Or would you, on entering the room, in a quiet and careful manner, have gone to your seat, as though in the presence of the King of glory, the blessed Lord Jesus Christ, to receive His recognition of your presence and joy as one who would "keep His word and not deny His name ?" and is this a divine reality to you ? and from which you could not afford to be absent, unless your responsibility to Him required your absence? Sickness in the family, faithfulness as a servant, or relieving distress of others, where the will of the Lord was plainly indicated, might be just as acceptable to Him and just as precious to you, if taken up in faith. But never to entertain company. To stay away from the Lord's table on account of company, shows a very sad lack of respect for the Lord Himself, and that you are willing to grieve the blessed Lord Jesus to please your company.

But let us take still another view. Did you ever on entering the room sit down or stand and talk awhile with this one or that one, not realizing that your first and best respects belong to Him who is Lord of the feast ? Or would you sit down as indifferently as you would in a hotel while waiting for your dinner ? Or interest yourself very diligently in studying your Bible or Hymn-book ?

Now, my dearly beloved, don't let any of these Questions bring you into bondage; but, if there is a needs be, let them wake you up to look carefully after your deportment in the presence of the Lord of glory.

Let them search you out as regards your care for sacred things, and your regard for the Lord's honor. Surely, He cannot be indifferent as to how we behave ourselves in His presence, and not only at His table, but always everywhere He is with us.

Yes, beloved, our estimate of Himself, the value we put upon His company, will surely form our manners on the road. For we always behave the best toward those we love the most.

"Keep thy heart with all diligence. . . . Put away from thee a froward mouth. . . . Lei thine eyes look right on. . . . Ponder the path of thy feet" (Prov. 4:23-28.)

" Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path." (Ps. 119:105.)

Fellow -pilgrim, keep thy heart
With all diligence ;
Let thy Master rule and guide.
This is thy defense-
Peace thou canst not understand
Will thy subject heart command.

Put a guard upon thy lips.
Many a hurt and smart
This will spare thee by the way-
Many an aching heart.
Teach thee wholesome self-control,
Many a humbling spare Thy soul.

Let thine eyes look straight ahead
To the glorious end.
Though through window dimly now,
Faith doth comprehend.
Faith from heavy burdens frees us,
Links us with the risen Jesus.

Ponder o'er the way He leads thee,
Seek to know His will.
Turn not from His gracious guiding,
For He surely will
Give thee brightness more and more,
Till thy pilgrim journey's o'er.

Heart and lips and eyes and footsteps,
All in sweet accord.
Subject to His gentle leading
By His holy Word.
Thus Lord, if we follow Thee,
We shall never barren be.

" Lord, my heart is not haughty, nor mine eyes lofty :neither do I exercise myself in great matters, or in things too high for me. Surely I have behaved and quieted myself as a child that is weaned of his mother :my soul is even as a weaned child. Let Israel hope in the Lord from henceforth and forever." (Ps. 131:)

The fifth book of which this psalm forms a part is the Deuteronomy of the book of Psalms. Corresponding to the last book of Moses it (in harmony with the significance of its number, five-God with man's weakness) recapitulates the experiences of the way, applying the principles of divine holiness, and looks forward as well to the end-sure and near-an end of such blessing that praise cannot be withheld, but bursts forth in fuller and fuller strains of music until at last the whole chorus of creation joins in the oft-repeated Halleluiahs. How cheering the thought that we are nearing the time when praise, feeble now, and mingled often with tears and prayers, shall be unhindered, full, and worthy of Him who is " above all blessing and praise."But meanwhile the lips need not be silent, nor the heart cold. " Thy statutes have been my songs in the house of my pilgrimage."So here in this psalm we have something suited for the journey, something we can sing even now.

It is one of a group of fifteen " Songs of degrees, or Ascents." Whatever may be the opinions as to the exact and literal meaning of this expression, there need be no doubt that the thought to be conveyed is that these were songs which indicated approach, drawing near to God. "Jerusalem is builded as a city that is compact together :whither the tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord, unto the testimony of Israel, to give thanks unto the name of the Lord." (Ps. 122:3, 4.) We see Israel, long estranged from their God, drawing near to Him and each step, as it were, is marked with a song. In captivity they cannot sing, " How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?" (Ps. 137:4.), but now drawing near, "going up," their lips are again opened in song. These songs are fifteen in number, five, the number of the book, God with us, and three, complete manifestation. Such will be the experience of Israel returning to the Lord. Then will be completely manifested the fact that God is with them, the name of the city will be, Jehovah Shammah, the Lord is there. (Ezek. 48:35.) The special psalm before us gives us the state of heart of the once proud and stubborn people, who had so long held out against the Lord with a brow of brass and a neck like an iron sinew. Now, their pride is broken, and in its place the simplicity of little children. In this childlike state they can at last say ''Let Israel hope in the Lord from henceforth and forever."

But if we wish to see this state in its perfection, we need only look at One who could truly say, "I am meek and lowly in heart." He who emptied Himself, not of pride and haughtiness, as Israel must, for He had none of these, but of that which was His right, equality with God-equality of glory, as to His person He ever remained equal with God. Here we see meekness in all its perfection. That lowly One, who would have thought, save those with anointed eyes, that He was God over all blessed forever ? Obedience, dependence, subjection to the Father's will in all His intercourse with God :gentleness, kindness, sympathy, these characterized His intercourse with man. It was not difficult to approach Him ; little children were not afraid to be in His arms. Here was One who perfectly exemplified the spirit of our psalm.

Nor have we here merely that which is prophetic, or which gives us the picture of the Lord Jesus. We have as well something for our ourselves. This is the spirit for us to have, if we would know what real rest of soul is.''The proud He knoweth afar off." What, then, is a haughty heart? It is one that is satisfied with itself and occupied with itself. A heart whose personal interests are dearer than all else ; a heart which will brook no contradiction, allow no correction, for it is always right. Ah! such a heart may seem splendid to its owner, but how lonely and how cold !Now, if we are to enjoy God, the heart cannot be haughty. God has two dwelling-places :"I dwell in the high and holy place,"-heaven, surrounded by " light inapproachable," by seraphim who vail feet and faces before that Majesty. But God has another dwelling-place-"with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit." (Is. 57:15.)In the fourteenth chapter of John, our Lord speaks of these two dwelling-places:" In my Father's house are many mansions." (5:2.)"If a man love Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him, and make Our abode with him." (5:23.)The word for mansion and abode is the same in the Greek. But how precious is this thought :He who fills heaven with His glory is pleased to dwell in the hearts of His people, who are not haughty !But the childlike spirit does not come to us naturally. The cross must be known, not only as the place where our blessed Lord hung for our sins, but where we were judged and set aside as unfit for God. Then His love and our worthlessness are seen, and we can sing,

"When I survey the wondrous cross,
On which the Lord of glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss,
And pour contempt on all my pride."

Lord, give Thy people this meek and childlike spirit!

Having this spirit, the desire to be something, or to strain after what is beyond us, is checked. In one sense, we are never to settle down satisfied with present attainments. The spirit of Phil. 3:should ever be ours ; "not as though I had already attained." But there is a spirit of restlessness, of effort, which so far from indicating true progress, is a hindrance to it. " Not boasting of things without our measure," says the apostle whose motto was forward.

Beautifully exemplified is this spirit in Mary. Her sister Martha was exercising herself in great matters, in things too high for her unaided strength. Mary does nothing but drink in at the Master's feet what He has to say to her. "A weaned child." Isaac was circumcised the eighth day. It was a good while after that he was weaned. Circumcision is the seal of death put upon us, a sign, we might say, that we belong to God, through Christ's death. Weaning is the practical carrying out of that death in the daily life :it is the bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus. (2 Cor. 4:10.) There was a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned. Joy had its proper place there. Just as in the case of Israel sheltered by the blood of the Lamb in Egypt, it was not until they were weaned from that house of bondage, at least externally, that the joy of Exodus 15:, the song of deliverance bursts forth. Samuel was dedicated to the Lord before his birth, but it was not until he was weaned (i Sam. 1:24) that he was carried up to the house of the Lord, there to learn from Him.

A feast-the Lord's house-these are the thoughts connected with weaning. It is the giving up of the old things for that which is better. Many of God's children are babes, and remain so all their life. Such, the apostle says are carnal (i Cor. 3:) not able to eat strong meat. In another sense, we are to be babes always, " as new-born babe, desire milk of the Word that ye may grow thereby." (i Pet. 2:) We are to be always receivers from the Word, but we are not to be carnal, such as need the most elementary truths, and never get any further.

This brings us to the other thought about weaning- progress. " That we henceforth be no more children tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine . . . but speaking the truth in love, may grow up into Him in all things which is the head even Christ." (Eph. 4:14, 15.) There is a great difference between being childish and childlike. When the apostle became a man, he put away childish things; but he ever retained the childlike spirit. In other, words, his soul was like a weaned child.

It is this spirit which enjoys the future, well knowing that with God for us no harm can befall. May we all know more of the spirit of this small but beautiful psalm. There is not the martial ring of conflict and victory in it, but there is the fulfillment of that word which says, " In quietness and confidence shall be your strength." (Is. 30:15.)

Whom have I in heaven but Thee ? and there is none upon earth I desire beside Thee." (Ps. 73:25.)

Lord Jesus, be Thou alone my heart's sole object;
Fill all its longings with Thy precious love,
Till I forget its weakness and its sin-stains,
In Thee, who didst Thy love so dearly prove.

Soothe every sorrow with Thy sweet consolation,
Change Thou my cry to sweetest songs of praise,
My close companion e'er, in rest or labor,
So shall I ne'er complain of lonely days.

And when, at evening, my sun of life is setting.
Touch Thou my sky with gleams from glory's light,
Then let me rest, as oft in life I 've rested,
On Thy dear breast, while faith gives place to sight

Then hushed forever all sounds of sin and sorrow,
Then nevermore the power to grieve Thy heart;
Then,-oh, the rapture !-earth's poor shackles broken,
Thee to behold, and nevermore to part.

H. McD.