Jehovah thy Gods is one Jehovah." The creed of the Christian, in perfect accordance with that of the Jewish church, is: We worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity and in this Trinity none is afore or after other, none is greater or less than another; but the whole three Persons are co-eternal together and co-equal: their glory equal, their majesty co-eternal: such as the Father is, such is the Son, and such is the Holy Ghost."

In directing attention to some practical observations which are deducible from this doctrine,' he makes the following glowing appeal to the tempted, tried, and afflicted believer; in which we recognize the genuine features of christian experience; and we lay it before our readers with an assurance that it will be received with gladness, and be productive of much good.

"Is the believer sorely tempted by the sin that doth most easily beset him? -is he constrained to acknowledge, that "the spirit indeed is willing, but that the flesh is weak?"-is he compelled, in bitterness of soul, to cry out, with the apostle, "O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?"-is he vexed in soul, by reason of his backslidings and the withdrawings of Jehovah's face?-he has but to remember the everlasting covenant, 66 regular and guarded in every article;" he has but to apply for sanctifying grace to Him who is the administrator of the covenant, and this grace will be given, and Christ" will with the temptation make a way to escape, that he may be able to bear it." Let him contemplate the vastness of the Saviour's love, and he shall have peace in believing, even that peace which the world can neither give nor take away.

"Is the believer passing through deep waters, and tried in the furnace of affliction? Your covenant God, O believer, who hath subjected you to this severe trial, will overrule it to the purgation of your dross, the confirmation of your faith, and the glory of his own name. He will bring you forth from the furnace, like gold seven times purified in the fire: " his rod and his staff shall comfort you :" and he will "supply all your need, according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus."

"Are the believer's motives misrepresented? are his principles misunderstood? is his conversion attributed to earthly rather than to heavenly causes? "Blessed are ye, when men revile you, and persecute you, and say all manner of evil against you, falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad; for great is your reward in heaven; for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you." "This is their hour and the power of darkness." This, O believer! is your race, your trial, and your conflict; but your covenant God, who hath bidden you to His gospel feast on earth, will soon translate you to His kingdom of glory in heaven. Then shall you sit down, in the kingdom of your Father, with all those who "have come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." "Does a settled gloom hang over the believer's temporal and spiritual prospects? does the storm seem ready to burst over his devoted head? Ŏ believer, instated in the covenant of grace, grounded on the Rock of Ages, armed with the celestial panoply, recumbent on the everlasting arms of Jehovah, resting on the divine promises, supported and strengthened by the Holy Spirit, rest you assured, that God will be better to you than your fears, and that all things shall work together for your present and eternal good. Christ will "never leave you, nor forsake you." In all your afflictions, He is afflicted : yea, "all things are your's, and you are Christ's, and Christ is God's."

This Sermon is followed with a variety of invaluable Notes, from the pens of Bishops Horsley, Pearson, and others, on the same subject, "The Doctrine of the Trinity."

We are at a loss to offer to advantage a specimen of the excellence of Sermon II. on Exod. iii. 14. Our admiration is chiefly excited by the practical inferences from the subject of discourse, "The Sovereignty of God:" one of which is thus stated.

"It is said of God in his word: "He hath mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth." But this declaration does not justify the impenitent sinner in rejecting the gospel of Christ, and saying in his heart, "I will not have this man to reign over me." Thus saith the Lord: "To them that are contentious, and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish," shall be " upon every soul of man that doeth evil, of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile." Whosoever is not found written in the book of life, shall be cast into the lake of fire.

"Let us not, then, vainly endeavour to solve the problem, How the decrees and sovereignty of Jehovah can be reconciled with the responsibility of man. It is sufficient for us to know, that man is a responsible agent, and must stand at the judgment-seat of Christ. "Secret things belong to the Lord our God; but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law." Let us not, then, dive too inquisitively into the mysteries of Omnipotence. Let us refer every act of obedience to the efficacy of his grace, and every act of sin to our own corruption. Let us labour with watchfulness and prayer for the grace of faith, that we may believe and practise his revealed will. Let us "receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save our souls."-" Let the two principles of divine sovereignty and human responsibility be firmly maintained, and all their practical connections invariably and constantly preserved, and there will be no danger of partial and erroneous exhibitions of Christian truth. But if either the one or the other be forgotten or denied, the order and harmony of the sacred system are destroyed, and Pelagian pride or Antinomian presumption will be the fatal result."

We might go on thus to multiply quotations, and from each Sermon transcribe such portions as we fully approve, and our readers would admire; but this cannot be done and before we quit the volume, it is required of us to express our disapproval of the author's views on one or two points. There appears couched within the expressions, instated in the covenant,' and the union of the believer to Christ effected by faith,' that which corresponds not with the clear testimony of the oracles of God. There are senses in which we might take and adopt those terms, but we apprehend they would widely differ from the sentiments here intended to be conveyed. He does not in so many words state an objection to the eternal union of the church to her living and glorious head, nor to the grace of faith as evidencing prior interest in the covenant of grace; but if he appreciated these great verities in a high degree, we do think, the Sermons would have been more fruitful of remark on those essential principles of the gospel of God our Saviour. The necessary consequence of incorrectness on these matters is observable in the preacher's general offer of the gospel, and his unfrequent allusion to that part of the covenant work of the Lord the Spirit, to which the Lord Jesus referred when he replied to his disciples, "This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent."

Our author is peculiarly happy in his mode of address to believers who are involved in the gloom of dark providences, or smarting under the corrections of their heavenly Father. He appears to be well versed in the lesson communicated to the church from the mouth of God himself. Ps. lxxxix. 30-34. "If his children forsake my law, and walk not in my judgments, &c."

Whatever, believers, may befal you here below, flows from the Divine will, and is registered and provided for in the everlasting covenant, which is "regular and guarded in every article." All your affairs are regulated by the infinite wisdom of him, who is your "Sun and your Shield; who will give grace and glory; and no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly." Commit, therefore, yourselves and all your concerns to his guidance; and he will bring that to pass, which shall best promote your eternal good. If the providence of God now appear dark and mysterious in any particular, "what thou knowest not now, thou shalt know hereafter." Above all things, strive, by the grace of God that is given you, to maintain an unruffled peace of mind respecting your temporal affairs, "casting all your care upon him, for he careth for you." He who curbed the furious Laban, and turned the heart of Esau, is ever present with his people, and "will never leave you, nor forsake you." "He will keep you as the apple of his eye, he will hide you under the shadow of his wings.' Moreover, the throne of grace is ever open to your supplications. "Prayer removes the hand that moves the world." "My God shall supply all your need, according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus."

It is with regret we leave the greater number of these Sermons untouched, as they each contain matter of immense interest, with gospel truth conveyed in attracting and convincing terms. But, as we have stated the titles in full, the reader will supply our lack of service, by giving closer attention to those most agreeable to his own views which we may not have noticed.

Sacred Pieces: being Reflections on certain Spiritual and Scriptural Subjects and Truths, Doctrinal, Experimental, and Practical. By William Hore. Palmer.

THE series of essays which comprize this volume are founded on the following subjects. 1. The Divine Trinity. 2. The Person of Christ. 3. Gospel Truth and Grace, as strikingly exemplified in the case of the daughters of Zelophedad. 4. The ordinance of Baptism. 5. Church Fellowship. 6. The ordinance of the Lord's Supper, &c. &c.

As in the former volume so in this, we find a scriptural and valuable dissertation on the divine Trinity; in which the author proves the fallacy of the arguments raised in support of one of the heresies that infest the church at the present time.

66

Let it, however, be observed, that believers who are members in Christ, are not hereby partakers of his essential Godhead, whist it is a truth, according to his inspired apostle, Peter, that they are " partakers of the divine nature," 2 Epis. i. 4. i. e. of those communications which are divine, constituting a principle of spiritual and divine life, and a resemblance and likeness to Christ their head; and which are the new-man, formed in regeneration; and such a participation of the divine nature, as is suited to the creature's capacity in the new-birth: it is a communication of spiritual and Vol. IV. No. 39.

I

eternal life from Christ, the life-giving head of his church and mystic body, to those his members.

"Although it is an undoubted and joyous truth, that the mystic body of Christ are one with him, their glorious and ever-living head, thereby possessing a vital and unalienable union to him; and, as believers, and so united to him their head, are interested in all the benefits arising from his headship; yet do they not share in his personal glory; nor in his glory as the only begotten Son of God; nor in that glory acquired by Christ as the Saviour and Redeemer of his church: these are his own, incommunicably, and he will ever remain unrivalled in the possession of them. He trod the wine-press of the fierce wrath of God, alone, and of the people there was none with him. Isa. lxiii. 3. His own "arm brought salvation unto him," chap. lix. 16. He stood up under the stroke of the justice of God, Zech. xiii. 7. bore the curse due to the sins of his people, removed their iniquity, chap. iii. 9. and purged their sins by the sacrifice of himself on the cross: the honor of which, he is most rightfully in the full and sole possession of, in his session at the right hand of God. Heb. i. 3.

"There is, moreover, the relationship which Christ, the Son of God, bears to Jehovah the Father, which is his exclusively; which his redeemed have no share in the high dignity and glory of: most copiously, as before remarked, do they partake, as members in him, and of his body, of the blessings he has obtained for them as their living, federal, and covenaut head; but the royal crown which he wears, as one in the undivided essence, and as the Son of God, the Redeemer and Saviour of his Church, must rest on his head alone, and the glories of it be possessed by him only, unshared in, even by his redeemed ones, to all eternity: for HE IS WORTHY. Rev. v. 12."

The interesting case of the daughters of Zelophehad claiming the possession of an inheritance among the brethren of their father, (Num. xxvii.) forming the subject of the third treatise, has elicited many very excellent and spiritual observations. By the teachings of the Lord the Spirit, the believer is doubtless justified in gathering thence much gospel grace and instruction, as our author has proved and elucidated. But we cannot follow him in the extremes to which his argument runs, for we conceive thereby he has given plausibility (to say the least of it) to the reasonings of our opponents, when they accuse us of spiritualizing those parts of God's word, which bear an historical and literal signification only. Let us not be misunderstood: we approve of Mr. Hore's comment on the particular application of the scripture narrative, but consider he has taken much from its effect by extraneous and injudicious reflections.

The fourth, fifth, and sixth essays we read with much pleasure, under the full impression of the Apostle's exhortation, so often quoted in reference to those subjects, "Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind." It is to the shame of the Lord's people, that so many, so many thousands take up their opinions of gospel ordinances and church fellowship, on the recommendation of others, without exercising so much as a thought, whether" Thus saith the Lord" is their warrant, or the command of Christ their authority. Greater decision would mark the conduct of wavering minds, and more honour be done the cause of the gospel, were those disputed points taken up and discussed with the temper and sanctity which pervade the arguments produced by the writer before us.

1

The only remaining subject we can now refer to is No. XI. on Ps. lxxxiv. 5, 6. the substance of which we were favoured with in the early part of last year, and it appeared in the Spiritual Magazine p.p. 273—8, Vol. 2. It is re-arranged and considerably enlarged in this interesting collection of "Sacred Pieces," the whole of which are worthy the perusal and consideration of our readers.

Scripture Lyra; containing the Study, and other Poems, chiefly illustrative of the Sacred Scriptures. By the Rev. John Young. Palmer.

In this neat volume of Poems, we know not which to admire most -the evangelical strain of sentiments it inculcates, or the style and correctness of its arrangement for the press. From so great a variety of subjects as those which employed the fruitful genius of the author, it is difficult to make a selection answering the purpose of recommending the whole, and at the same time not exceeding the limits by which we are confined. We must endeavour to make room for an extract from "The house appointed for all living."

"Honor, nor wealth, nor pow'r can save,
Nor talent bribe the greedy grave,

Nor beauty's self can move;

The wit, the fool, the base, the good,
The man of peace, the man of blood,
The same event must prove.

Byron must fall! his sceptic mind,
High taught, shall yet instruction find,—
But, ah! how sad to know,-
Mistakes of all mistakes the worst!
Each scatter'd particle of dust
Gather'd for endless woe.

The tuneful lyre of Sheffield's Bard
Must be unstrung-its sweetness marr'd:
Montgomery must die!

Death has no ear for sweetest sound,

Or Sheffield's Bard would ne'er be found
Among the saints on high.

My musings too will soon be o'er,-
The palpitating heart no more

With joy or pain shall beat;

Death's film shall o'er my eye-balls spread,
The lonely clod shall be my bed,

Where friends no more can greet.

But from the tomb a voice I hear,

Its mystic sounds revive and cheer,
'Tis JESUS speaks again:

"He that believes shall never die,

But through death's house, to realms on high
Shall pass, and glory gain."

Enough! my fears begone! no more

Death's roaring waves from Canaan's shore

Shall fright my soul away;

Cheerful I'll pass the valley through,—

His grace will bear and guide me too,

To heaven's unclouded day."