while some obscure, unlettered disciple, whose draughts of truth have been taken undiluted from the wells of salvation, will be sensible of some painful deficiency; and the anxious inquirer, thirsting for the gospel, will listen and wait in vain to be taught what he must do to be saved. Let us remember the wide difference between being able to preach forcibly on the importance of religion, on the one hand, and on the other, to show clearly in what all spiritual, saving religion consists. It is one thing to prove that there is no salvation but in Christ, and quite another to direct a soul panting for mercy how he is to "win Christ and be found in him."

Some, under the idea of glorying only in the cross, confine their preaching almost exclusively to a few topics more immediately connected with the death of Christ such as, atonement, faith, and justifying righteousness to the great neglect of numerous derivative or introductory truths of absolute necessity to a just exposition of the gospel. But the spiritual wisdom of a minister is to be exercised in giving to every part of the gospel plan its portion in due season; assigning to all subjects their places, according to their rank in importance; and exhibiting each in its relations to the others and to Christ.

Do we speak of Christ as the sinner's righteousness unto complete justification through faith-and continually should we present him in this blessed aspect-then must we show the sinner his absolute need of such righteousness. To do this, we must awaken his conscience. He must be so convinced of sin, as to feel that he is condemned and lost without that refuge. Blessed is he whom God hath taught to teach this lesson! Our text-book is the law. By it is the knowledge of sin-preached, in a spiritual application to the thoughts and intents of the heart, not only as a rule of life to all, but as the condition of salvation to every one who does not accept the salvation of Christ, on the perfect keeping of which depends all his hope, and the tremendous curse of which is incurred by a single transgression-preached in view of the cross, as establishing, instead of impairing, its obligation; as confirming, instead of diminishing, the certainty of its penalty upon every soul of man that doeth evil without repentance:-it is made the instrument of the Holy Ghost, to convince men of sin, to strip off their self-righteousness, and, as a "schoolmaster, to lead them to Christ." He that would preach justification by faith in Christ, must also preach entire condemnation by works under the law: he must lay his foundation in clear, unequivocal statements of the Divine law, in all the uncompromising strictness of its demands; taking special care to show, that it looks with as

little favour as when first promulgated, upon imperfect, though sincere, obedience: that every the least transgression incurs the condemnation of God as much under the dispensation of Christ as under that which preceded: consequently, that whosoever is not justified by faith, being shut up under this law, is "condemned already." Thus to preach the law is the direct method of preparing the way of the Lord. More consciences would be awakened, more hearts would know the need and the preciousness of Christ, were there more directness and clearness in thus pressing upon those who are still under the law, as a condition of life, its unmitigated strictness, and therefore their own present and entire condemnation. From this, to repentance and faith, the way is plain.

Again: Do we preach Christ, as "of God, made unto us sanctification? We must not expect that our hearers will appreciate this excellency of the knowledge of Christ, till we have taken pains to exhibit that condition of entire depravity by nature which makes them so absolutely dependent on his sanctifying grace. Hence, in our preaching, a large department should be assigned to the setting forth of that original state of spiritual ruin and death-that enmity against God, and natural inclination to evil-which "is the corruption of every man that naturally is engendered of the offspring of Adam," and under which he is not, and cannot be, in subjection to the Divine commands. This leads directly to the absolute necessity of a new birth unto righteousness; and makes the subject of spiritual regeneration, its evidences and fruits, of conspicuous magnitude in the preaching of Christ. And this again introduces the sinner, now sensible of his disease and helplessness and necessity, to the only Physician. Then comes in the agency of the Holy Ghost. Christ is not preached in faithfulness, unless the Holy Ghost, "who proceedeth from the Father and the Son," is distinctly and continually preached as of the same Divine nature with both; alike to be honoured and worshipped; sent of Christ, to be the Teacher, the Sanctifier, and the Comforter of sinnersthe Author and Preserver of all spiritual life; by whom alone we are born again, and daily renewed in the spirit of our minds-the Spirit of all prayer, wisdom, and holiness; without whom we are as little able to will as to do of God's good pleasure. To be full of the Holy Ghost in one's sermons as well as one's soul-to keep up the attention of the sinner as continually to His influences, for all the beginnings of spiritual life and all growth in grace, as to the righteousness of Christ for all reconciliation to God-is not only the way to be blessed with increase in our work, but to preach Christ as he preached himself.

In the preaching of Christ, there is a text which a minister should, in some shape or other, be always illustrating: "By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast." Let it be his continual effort to magnify the grace of God in all the work of salvation. He cannot exceed the truth in that which has no bounds. But there is another text of equal emphasis, which St. Paul connects with the other, as we should always connect them in our ministry: "Created in Jesus Christ unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." Works of righteousness are no less earnestly to be preached, as essential fruits of a saving faith, than to be renounced as having any part in our justification with God. We are to make the office of faith so prominent, that without it there can be no union to Christ; and the necessity of works so absolute, that without them there is no evidence of faith: and, at the same time, both faith and works are to be represented as deriving all their efficacy, value, and existence from Christ, their source and end.

IN CHAINS.

ON a sabbath evening, when the services of the day were over, and I directed my steps towards the next appointment, I alighted at an inn, and was ushered into the common room appointed for travellers. It was nearly dark, and the only light in the room was that proceeding from the fire, around which a number of persons were sitting. Taking my seat among them, my eyes were soon arrested by the sight of two persons sitting together, with downcast eyes, sad and sorrowful: and soon after I perceived that their hands were manacled, and themselves bound fast to each other, and, on inquiry, learned that they were on the way to the penitentiary of our State, there to remain for ten or twelve years, for robbery committed in concert. The one was an old man, the other a young one. Shall I inform my readers that they were a father and his son? What a sight! and who, think you, was first and chief in guilt? Was it the father or the son? Did the son say to the father, Father, let us steal? Impossible. The lips of a son could scarce utter the words, except first taught by the father. Is it the son that teaches the father to utter words of blasphemy, that raises the accursed cup to his lips and says, Father, drink? Or, is it not the father who teaches his infant child by precept, perhaps, as well as example, to swear, and pour the first fatal drop into his opened lips? The scene I have described followed me for a long time, from day to day, from church to church,

and seemed ever before my eyes. I could not rise up in the pulpit, and look upon the congregation, but it seemed to be renewed before me. I thought I saw parents and children, husbands and wives, sitting side by side, bound by invisible chains of sin stronger than links of iron, and going onward, not to some temporary prison, but to an eternal one, from whence there is no escape. What a thought, that on some sabbath day, and in some house of God, parents and children may be sitting side by side, and moving onward as fast as the wings of time can bear them, to some eternal abode of darkness and misery, the parents leading the way in guilt and suffering! Let all parents examine themselves well, and see how deeply guilty they are by reason of their evil example.. Bishop Meade.

A SONG FOR THOSE WHO LOVE STRONG DRINK.
WHO is it that talks in the lisp of a child,
With the look of the aged, the eye sickly wild;
Now foolishly angry, now sillily guiled?

The Drunkard.

Who is it that sleeps with a breath-bearing fire,
His visage blood-spattered, his bed the cold mire,
His limbs marred with bruises from impotent ire?
The Drunkard.

Who, waking in anguish, the scene must review,
And find all the wrong deeds he willed not to do
Committed, when madly he reason o'erthrew ?

The Drunkard.

Who is it that sees around him all rise,
While each of his hopes scarcely buds e'er it dies;
The blight his own folly, yet his wrath 'gainst the skies?
The Drunkard.

Whose children are they who oft weep in the street,
The rag on the shoulder, the torn shoe on the feet,
And fly from the coming of him they should greet?
The Drunkard's

Whose home is a cellar unmirthful with light?
Whose wife, shivering couchless, bemoans the long night,
Yet thinks of the morn's wants with still deeper fright?
The Drunkard's.

Who is it that shipwrecks all good in this life,
A curse to his kindred, his babies, his wife,
To thirst, without drinking, in hell's burning strife?

The Drunkard.

OCCASIONAL MEDITATIONS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS. UPON THE BEGINNING OF A SICKNESS.

Ir was my own fault, if I looked not for this. All things must undergo their changes; I have enjoyed many fair days; there was no reason I should not at last make account of clouds, and storms; could I have done well, without any mixtures of sin, I might have hoped for entire health; but since I have interspersed my obedience with many sinful failings and enormities, why do I think much to interchange health with sickness? What I now feel I know; I am not worthy to know what I must feel; as my times, so my measures are in the hands of a wise and good God; my comfort is, he that sends these evils, proportions them; if they be sharp, I am sure they are just; the most I am capable to endure, is the least part of what I have deserved to suffer. Nature would fain beat ease; but, Lord, whatever become of this carcass, thou hast reason to have respect to thine own glory; I have sinned, and must smart. It is the glory of thy mercy to beat my body for the safety of my soul. The worst of sickness is pain, and the worst of pain is but TRACT MAG., THIRD SERIES, NO. 93, SEPT., 1841.

K