most intensely labour to make them WHAT THEY OUGHT TO BE. A more joyful day is nigh, when the lightnings of the skies, shining from the east even unto the west, shall light the steps of the Son of Man; when, the Spirit descending like rain upon the mown grass, or as showers that water the earth, the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose; when Jehovah shall solve all doubts, as he did by the dew on Gideon's fleece, afford a refreshing shadow, as he did by Jonah's gourd-and satisfy the hungry, as he did when the widow's barrel of meal did not waste, and her cruse of oil did not fail, or when thousands feasted on the barley-loaves; and when all nations shall take up their song and sing "God is in his holy temple-Alleluia; for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth."

REMARKS

ON

CREEDS AND CONFESSIONS.

PART I.

SECTION I.

Ir is a very unhappy circumstance, that the corruptions of Society can be traced back to so early a period in the history of man. Antiquity often arrays vice in the lovely attire of virtue, and not unfrequently consecrates error as an inheritance too invaluable to be dispensed with. How often do men sustain a favourite scheme by the example of past ages, and argue out the orthodoxy of their own particular views, by appealing to the opinions of their fathers. What religious denomination does not boast of its lineage, and "minister questions" by telling of "endless genealogies?" What disputant now appears on the theological arena, who is not flushed with victory, in proportion as he is able to enlist great names in his favour? In what controversy does not that scale preponderate,

into which you may throw the opinions and sayings of such men as Newton, Calvin, Luther, Melancthon? And why is it so? Is that which is old, necessarily right? Has the world undergone no changes in modern times? Have the circumstances of society been in nothing modified? Is the intellect of man too much degenerated in the present day, to permit him to think, judge, decide, and act for himself?

We have no intention to satirize the memory of those who have gone before us, to meet the Judge of all the earth. He who does not reverence his fathers, and love their very shades, is out-stripped by barbarous Scythians in one of the most amiable qualities of the human heart. He is too parricidious, to estimate those exquisitely tender descriptions of divine love, which the scriptures afford, when they would liken it to the parental storge. But, at the same time, by no principle of social honour, is any man bound to bury his own individuality of existence under the exactions of their arbitrary rule; nor to paralyze the powers of his own mind, and to extinguish the affections of his own heart, by cherishing an awful and desolating feeling of their federal responsibility. In doing so, he would mock the wisdom of the most High, quench those intellectual fires, which illume and cheer his own soul, and sport with the fearful realities of that dreadful day, when every one must give account of himself to God.

Selfish as man is generally represented to be, yet so common is his dereliction to the best in

terests of his own spirit,-a dereliction, which it would be the very affectation of filial feeling to justify, by a regard for his father's honourthat we cannot but rejoice in those revolutions, which sometimes are permitted to occur by an overruling Providence. They serve to break that stillness of death which settles on the human heart, and to afford to whole generations another start for "glory, honour, and immortality." Society, it is true, experiences a tremendous shock, and the most calamitous consequences are endured, ere such changes have accomplished their grand design. But to leave human things alone, and suffer them to run heedlessly on to irremediable ruin, would be more tremendous still. What a tale of terrible things would the spirit of judgment have written out, to appal the universe, if no Redeemer had appeared, to quench the livid flames that sin had kindled around the tree of life! And what sad and gloomy prognostics, would now fill our thoughts by day, and give frightful forms to our dreams by night, when we contemplate the awful desolation of morals which overspreads so large a portion of earth, and converts human genius into so fearful an engine of satanic policy, if we did not know that Jehovah had promised the millennial extension of the gospel of peace! There would be no relief but in a dire insensibility, from which every noble spirit would most quickly break away, to breathe out its aspirations for heaven's rich and all-sufficient mercy.