look forward to 66 an inheritance, incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away." We hope to be there one day; there, in one of the “many mansions" of our Father's house. But shall we have it by our own merit, on account of our own righteousness? By no means. It is all of mercy. Brothers, this doctrine should humble us. We have nothing whereof to boast. However elevated our station in life; however distinguished our excellence of character; however brilliant our triumphs in the cause of Christ, we have nothing whereof to glory. We ascribe all, not to our righteousness, for we have none, but to the free grace of Heaven. Let this doctrine encourage us. However imperfect and unworthy in character, let us not sink into despair under a sense of corruption, since salvation from evilis all of mercy. every Let us be inspired with adoring gratitude, for all we have and hope to be we owe to the mercy of Heaven. "Bless the Lord, oh, our souls!" &c. THE PATH TO GODLINESS. "All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the LORD: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee."Ps. xxii. 27. THIS passage leads us to consider the path to godliness, and VOL. XIV. that there are three stages in the path to perfect godliness. I. REMEMBRANCE is the FIRST stage. "The world shall remember." Remembering implies subjects; things that we recall to mind. What are those things, the memory of which tends God-ward ? First The memory of what God is, and what He requires. Secondly: The memory of what we are, and what we deserve. Thirdly: The memory of what Christ has done, and how we should act. II. TURNING is the SECOND stage. Godliness begins with the intellect-with thought and memory. thought of my ways and I turned my feet into thy statutes." The mind, dwelling upon these subjects, generates emotions in the heart that determine the will, and the soul turns to the Lord. First Turns in profound contrition. Secondly: In earnest prayer. The soul in its depraved state is going away from the Lord; thought arrests it, and brings it back. III. WORSHIP is the THIRD stage. "Shall worship before thee." Worship is a loving self-surrender of the soul to God. It is the soul absorbed in the sublimest reverence, adoration and I praise. It is the soul delighting itself in the Lord, and chanting evermore, "Whom have I in heaven but thee, or on earth that I desire beside thee," &c. This is heaven. This is the path of godliness not only for an individual, but for the nations and the world. It is not until all the tribes of humanity properly remember the Lord, that they will turn unto Him, and worship before Him. A JOYFUL SYLLOGISM. "Because thou hast been my help, therefore in the shadow of thy wings will I rejoice.". Ps. lxiii. 7. I. THE CAUSE. Here isFirst: A grateful memory. "Thou hast been my help." When grace comes, it comes to the whole soul; a new retrospective power is given as well as a prospective one. One glad necessity of the new life is, "Thou shalt remember all the way," &c. Unbelief, on the other hand, has a bad memory. "They soon forgat his works." (Ps. cvi. 13.) Secondly: A personal possession. "Thou art my God." The soul lifts its hand, not to grasp abstract truth, nor a doctrinal system, but a personal God. Mix in holier company, rise to higher employments, the Christian may and shall; but to rise to higher rank is impossible, for bere and now we are children of God by faith in Jesus Christ. Thirdly: A present joy. How precarious the present life of man! Riches fly, comforts die, friends fail, thrones reel, crowns fall, death levels; but those things which cannot be shaken remain. (Heb. xii. 27.) "Thy lovingkindness is better than life." "There II. THE EFFECT. fore," &c. Three ideas will illustrate this :-First: Re fuge. "Thou art my hidingplace; thou shalt preserve me from trouble." "The name of the Lord is a strong tower," &c. This refuge is ample, accessible, and friendly. "Rock of Ages cleft for me," &c. Secondly: Rest. God is our resting-place. We are invited to enjoy it by the Saviour. (Matt xi. 29.) And many have said with tearful gladness, "Return unto thy rest, O my soul; for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee." This rest is reciprocal; we go to Him, He comes to us. "This is my rest for ever." (Ps. cxxxii. 14.) Wonderful fellowship! The helpless. leaning on the helper; the sinful on the sinless; the aching, guilty head, resting on the bosom of Christ. Thirdly: Residence. God is our dwelling place. He has been so in all generations. He has two thrones; the highest heavens, and the humblest hearts. (Isa. lvii. 15.) (1.) The heart is the dwellingplace of Christ. Paul prayed that Christ might dwell in the heart by faith. iii. 17.) (2) Of the Spirit. "The Spirit of God dwelleth in you." (Rom. viii. 9.) (3) (Eph. Of the Word. "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly," &c. (Col. iii. 16.) (4) Of the source of practical obedience. "He that keepeth his commandments, dwelleth in Christ and Christ in him." (1 John iii. 24.) Glorious hope for the needy; refuge, rest, and residence are found under the shadow of the wings of the Almighty. H. T. M. The Pulpit and its Handmaids. CHIVALRY. The ideal of chivalry, which Spenser has thus described, 66 'Nought is more honorable to a knight, Nor better doth beseem brave chivalry, Than to defend the people in their right, And wrong redress in such as wend awry." has much in it to command our admiration. To battle against wrong, in a spirit of righteous and generous heroism, is, of all services, most honorable and Divine, so far as it goes. The great mistake, however, of the chivalrous knights of these times, was this-their attempt to crush the wrong by violence. By the lance, the sword, and the battle-axe, they sought to put down that spirit of injustice and rapine that roused the indignation of their manly natures. This was a mistake that neutralized their efforts, and blackened the history of their exploits. This, alas, is the huge mistake of ages, a mistake which is being constantly committed even by the most enlightened nations of our own times -a mistake, too, by which the kingdoms of the earth are tossed about on the unresting, tumultuous, and bloody sea of civil and national wars. The attempt to put down wrong by violence, we hold to be just as absurd as the attempt to break stones by argument, thaw ice by love, or to govern the steam engine by the Ten Commandments. THE RELIGIOUS ELEMENT. The religious element is the strongest power in human nature. It may, alas, it often is, so overlaid by sensuality and worldliness, and remains so dormant, that men may even doubt its existence. Rut let it be roused, and every other power in life shall be to it only as a straw to the avalanche. Let the general awake it in his army, his men will fight with the desperate energy of Cromwell's battalions. Excite it, and then "Deus vult" shall be a talismanic watchword that shall lead men and women, not only to burn their own children in the flames, but mutilate their own flesh, and immolate their own existence. The force of this religious element in man, is the strongest of all arguments for a God. Does not the eye imply light? the ear sound? Do not the appetites imply provisions? Do we not in Nature find supplies exquisitely suited for all our physical organs and natural cravings? And can it be, that the deepest thirst of man's soul is for a God, and there is no God? Impossible! All analogy denies it; all our intuitions raise their protest against the impious thought. THE PHILOSOPHY OF CREDULITY. How comes it to pass, that men, in many cases sensible and enlightened, are so credulous and dupeable in connexion with religion? There must be some cause, and that cause must be universal, for the phenomenon is universal. What is it? It can only be accounted for on the supposition that the religious element has a vital relation to the mysterious. Our senses bring us into connexion with the material universe, our intellect brings us into connexion with the reason of things, but our religious sentiment brings us into connexion with God, the Incomprehensible One. The soul has an instinct for mystery, a craving for it. It sees mystery everywhere. It is a haze, enfolding the minute and the vast, a dark sea on which the universe floats. It is an ubiquitous spirit, The soul when excited, lives, revels, and worships under its mystic shadows. Man must have mystery, he cannot do without it. To talk against mystery is to talk against your nature, against the universe, against God. It is in mystery that the soul catches its poetic raptures, and kindles its lamp of piety and devotion. THE USE OF HISTORY. History gives us power over the great men and tyrants of past ages. Those ruthless warriors, intolerant ecclesiastics, crafty statesmen, and despotic kings, who struck terror into the heart of their age, history drags as miserable criminals to the bar of our judgment. They stand before us as prisoners, and we pronounce a sentence dooming them to the execration of ages. We can sport with the monsters of the world in history, as we sport with beasts in a cage of iron. Their deadly fangs and claws, their savage look and ferocious roar, which threw their age into an agony of fear, alarm us not. If we shudder at them, it is with indignation, not with terror; if we speak to them, it is with contempt, not with servility. JUDGMENT, THOUGH DELAYED, APPROACHES. Every judgment coming of Christ is as the springing of a mine. There is a moment of deep suspense after the match has been applied to the fuse which is to fire the train. Men stand at a distance, and hold their breath. There is nothing seen but a thin, small column of white smoke, rising fainter and fainter till it seems to die away. Then men breathe again, and the inexperienced soldier would approach the place, thinking that the thing has been a failure. is only faith in the experience of the commander or the veterans which keeps men from hurrying to the spot again; till, just when expectation has begun to die away, the low, deep thunder sends up the column of earth majestically to heaven, and all that was on it comes crashing down again in its far circle, shattered and blackened with the blast. It It is so with this world. By God's Word the world is doomed. The moment of suspense is past; the first centuries in which men expected the convulsion to take place at once; and even apostles were looking for it in their lifetime. We have fallen upon days of scepticism. There are no signs of ruin yet. We tread upon it like a solid thing, fortified by its adamantine hills for ever. There is nothing against that but a few words in a printed book. But the world is mined, and the spark has fallen; and just at the moment when serenity is at its height, "the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat," and the feet of the avenger shall stand on earth. REV. F. W. ROBERTSON, M.A. IN MEMORIAM. REV. RICHARD ALLIOTT, LL.D. THE last days of 1863 were also the last days of him whose name we have inscribed, with gratitude and affection, at the head of this page. Richard Alliott was born into this world in September, 1804, and into the great unseen world in December, 1863. Though he had thus only approached three-score years, all would, for some time past, have judged him a greater age, for hard mental toil and continual nervous excitement had long made his delicate and shrunken physique appear to be that of the old man. And now that he has gone where life has always the bloom of youth and the dew of the morning, it is fitting that the hands of some of his many students, in the three colleges of which he was successively theological tutor, should hasten to weave a wreath, or pile a cairn, or rear a monument to his memory. However much more worthily it ought to be done, and indeed, could be done by others, it is a sacred pleasure to us to be privileged here to record his in memoriam. Dr. Alliott studied for the ministry among the Independents, in Homerton and Glasgow ; evincing, both at the Dissenting Academy and at the more pretentious University, a distinguished diligence and ability, one of whose early fruits was the honorable degree that he bore. Having afterwards, for some years, and with much success, held the pastorates of churches in the provinces and the metropolis, he was induced to become the President of the Western College, and thence was led first to Cheshunt, and finally to Spring Hill College, Birmingham. With his course at the two former colleges we are most familiar. At Plymouth he was surrounded by students who, in attainments and position, to-day rank as high as most in their denomination; and at Cheshunt he was mainly instrumental in raising a drooping, and invigorating what had become a a very feeble institution. Its prosperity in his day, in many of those points where college vitality is expected to develop itself, is a worthy monument to his memory, and has had not a little to do with the fact VOL. XIV. I 2 |