tion, but one refuge from the storm, one covert from the blast, one shelter from the tempest: in the words of the wise man, "The name of the Lord is a strong tower, the righteous runneth into it and are safe."

LECTURE IV.

GENESIS XIII. 8.

"And Abram said unto Lot, Let there be no strife, I pray thee, between me and thee, and between my herdmen and thy herdmen, for we be brethren."

THE points of interest which we have hitherto considered in the history of Abram, have been those chiefly which regarded his belief in, his dependence upon, and his obedience to his God. The incident which we are now approaching is one which will present the patriarch to us in the details of domestic life, in the common transactions between man and man; where we shall have the opportunity of observing whether his daily conduct and temper were in unison with that high character for spiritual attainments with which the writers of inspiration have invested him. Happy would it

be for the Christian world, if its

professors of all

ranks and in all ages could bear the scrunity so safely, and come forth from the investigation so unimpeachably, as the father of the faithful.

Abram had, as we have seen, returned from Egypt into Canaan with all his family, and accompanied by Lot, his nephew Both Abram and Lot had now become extremely rich; their flocks and herds covered the face of the country, and their servants, born in their house and dwelling in their tents, formed of themselves no inconsiderable multitude.

Such wealth could scarcely be expected to exist long in any family without producing its usual results, dissension and division between those who fear not God, and trial and disunion even between those who are the most closely allied to him. We are accordingly informed, "that the land was not able to bear them that they might dwell together; for their substance was great so that they could not dwell together. And there was a strife between the herdmen of Abraham's cattle, and the herdmen of Lot's cattle."

It does not appear that the strife had reached to the heads of the respective families, but it had commenced with the domestics: and instances have not been wanting in latter times, when feuds thus begun have kindled, not only individuals and families, but even clans and nations into war.

It was then that the practical nature of Abram's religion began to be developed. That we may

place it in the strongest light, let us for a moment consider the manner in which a man of the world would have acted upon such an emergency, and then mark the gratifying and instructive contrast. Would he not have argued thus ?-There can be no question that if the land will not maintain our whole company, it will at least maintain me, and all that belong to me; let therefore my nephew seek for himself, what I have already found, and what has been in so peculiar a manner promised to me. I have both the right to claim, and the power to maintain that right, and though I would willingly do every thing that is equitable and kind, it cannot be expected that the elder should yield to the younger, or that I should undervalue the promises or gifts of God, by being so unnecessarily ready to transfer them to another. If strife or hostility be endangered, the peril be to him who awakens it; I have wherewithal to defend myself, and to punish my opponents. Such would have been unquestionably the opinion of nine-tenths of mankind, and so prevalent is this selfish mode of reasoning and acting in the world around us, that we scarcely feel that there would have been any thing for the worldly man to animadvert upon, had this been the language and conduct of the patriarch

himself. Let us then hasten to contrast this with what were indeed his language and conduct upon this important occasion; “Abram said unto Lot, Let there be no strife, I pray thee, between me and thee, and between my herdmen and thy herdmen, for we be brethren." Of how widely different a spirit from those to whom we have alluded, must he have been possessed, who could thus speak upon a subject of considerable aggravation: "Let there be no strife, for we be brethren." When we look around us in the world, who would believe that the same relationship, and therefore the same blessed motive for peace, still exists among its inhabitants? When we see the quarrels and the coldnesses, the lawsuits and the strifes, between those who are not only bound by the common tie of Christian fraternity, but by the closest and most indissoluble bonds of affinity and blood, are we not tempted to inquire, can these men indeed be "brethren?" Can they be all trusting to the same hope of salvation, and expecting, or even desiting, to dwell together in the same heaven? It is impossible with such divisions of heart and affections, with such bitterness of feeling and expression, the same eternal mansions could not contain them the very tranquillity of heaven itself would