remembrance. No, blessed be His name! emanating as they did from Himself, they are treasured up in His loving heart, to be fulfilled and accomplished, in His own time and in His own way, to the glory of His own great name, and to the astonishment, admiration, and overwhelming gratitude and satisfaction of His now poor and needy ones.

We fancy we hear one and another of these poor and needy ones say, "And can it be possible-is there indeed the veriest ground of hope that certain thoughts and feelings and desires which now and then-perhaps only for a few moments-have possessed my heart, shall ever issue in accomplishment and fulfilment?" We answer, yes, verily they shall, provided they were not desires for fleshly gratifica tion or human pleasure, but, on the contrary, were directed to the Lord Himself, and embraced a wish and a longing for a clearer knowledge of Himself-conformity to His will-and nearer, sweeter, and more blessed access to Himself! If this were incorporated in your hopes and expectations and desires, verily they shall be granted. No felt unworthiness-no creature barrier-no fleshly obstacle-no Satan-wrought hindrance-no unbelieving doubts and fears, shall ever eclipse or nullify that precious truth, "All my desires are before Thee; and my groanings are not hid from Thee."

Lastly, dear reader, who can estimate the unspeakable blessedness of that man-poor as he may be in the world, and looked upon, as probably he is, with contempt and indifference by the haughty, the affluent, and the purse-proud-who is privileged, at the same time, to be simply looking to the Lord-leaning upon the Lord—and, as the heart-searching and rein-trying God, appealing to Him, in the language of our text, with a, "And now, Lord, what wait I for? my hope is in Thee ?" Oh, how blessed is the assurance, "The expectation of the poor shall not perish for ever!" "The Lord heareth the poor and despiseth not His prisoners."

Finally, beloved, when the trials and turmoil of this poor mortal life are all but at an end (and how soon-yea, how very, very soonwill that be), when the eternal morn is just breaking; when the climax of all blessedness is about to be realized in the eternal smile of a Saviour's loved and loving countenance; when "the hope that is laid up for us in heaven" is about to be possessed, and the fulness and fruition of everlasting and uninterrupted blessedness is about to be enjoyed; how well, as a parting word to a wearisome world, and the summing up of earth's temptations and travail, may we exclaim :"When life sinks apace and death is in view,

The word of His grace shall comfort us through;
No fearing or doubting with Christ on our side,
We hope to die shouting, 'The Lord will provide.””
Dear reader, "The God of hope fill you with all joy and peace, in
believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the
Holy Ghost." So prays

Yours to serve in the Gospel of His dear Son,
THE EDITOR.

St. Luke's, Bedminster, May 8, 1872.

Wayside Notes.

EBB AND FLOW.

"As unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and, behold, we live; as chastened, and not killed; as sorrowful, yet alway rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things."2 CORINTHIANS vi. 9-10.

WHAT a cluster of paradoxes to the world we have here! but expressing a varied state of soul-experience well understood by the family of God-" As unknown, and yet well known.' And is not this often so literally? Some of the choicest of God's saints live in the humblest abodes; the world knows nothing of them, and cares nothing for them; but they are jewels in the diadem of a Saviour's glory. Beloved, we could take you by the hand and lead you into quiet nooks and byelanes, where, upon a bed of sickness, you would find trophies of divine grace, all well known to the Lord. It is in the shade of an unfrequented country lane that the sweetest violets grow; and some of the choicest things in nature are hidden, and, to be obtained, have to be searched out. So with the Lord's own: often unknown, hidden and concealed, they yet live a life fragrant before the Lord, and are treasures in His sight. Our precious Lord, when on earth, had His unknown yet well-known ones, and we have often thought the_loved family at Bethany were probably His very dearest friends. Leaving the busy Jerusalem, with its crowds of scribes and Pharisees, He would wend His way to the quiet home of Martha and Mary and Lazarus. There was always a welcome for Him there; and the details of one memorable visit He paid them are full of import to the children of God. Martha had busied herself about her household affairs, her great aim being to show her regard to her Saviour by having everything in order and her table well spread for the Master's comfort. But Mary was of the stamp of those who, wholly absorbed in spiritual desires after Jesus, care little for eating and drinking. She would sigh,

"Oh, Master, when Thou comest, it is always

A Sabbath in the house-I cannot work;

I must sit at Thy feet; must see Thee-hear Thee!
I have a feeble, wayward, doubting heart,
Incapable of endurance or great thoughts;
And only when I hear Thee am I happy;
And only when I see Thee am at peace.
Thy presence is enough-I ask no more,
Only to be with Thee; only to see Thee
Sufficeth me: my heart is then at rest."

Ah! Mary, thou art right; it is indeed "a Sabbath in the house" when the Master is present, and no joy is comparable to that of sitting at His feet, and drinking in His words of comfort and love. And, in thinking of the sweet character of Mary, we are reminded of one who we had the privilege of knowing, and who always made us think of her. We allude to that chaste and richly-taught saint of God, the late Ruth Bryan. Being at the time on a visit to the inestimable Lady Lucy Smith, she proposed our going to see her. Cheerfully did we accede; and, wending

Z

our way through the antique village of Wilford to the water side, we were ferried across that flowing river which Kirk White was wont to call "The silver Trent," we soon plunged into the ins and outs of the town of Nottingham. In a cold and bricky-looking house in one of the busy parts of the town we found the object of our search. Simplicity marked everything we saw; the room-the furniture-the apparel of the dear one-was all simple and neat, but sublimity shone in her conversation -she breathed Christ in every sentence; and never did we feel such a babe in grace in any one's presence as in hers. To be silent was our position, while we listened enraptured to her talk about her Beloved. Here was one of the Lord's choice ones-unknown by the world, but well known by Him, and living in that close fellowship with Jesus, day by day and hour by hour, that few attain to this side of the grave. Still, while we cannot attain to this, it is a sweet mercy to gain some visits of Jesus by the way-to feel it is a Sabbath in the house when He is there, and to be reckoned among those whom the Apostle describes as "unknown, and yet well known;" and yet, probably, here he did not merely refer to the outward state and position of the child of God in this world, so much as to their eternal and spritual state; for herein indeed are they a myth and a mystery to the ungodly, who cannot understand spiritual things at all; and no marvel, "for the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto Him; neither can He know them, because they are spiritually discerned." And yet, in the various exercises of their souls, the people of God are "well known" to the Lord. “I know my sheep," He hath said. Yes, blessed be His dear name, Christ well knows every one of them for whom He died, and He glories in this knowledge before the Father: "All mine are Thine, and Thine are mine, and we are glorified in them." And, although infinite space may separate Saviour from saint-the one down in the depths on earth, and the other up in the heights of heaven-yet, as infinite space is nothing to omnipresence, He is as much with His earth-bound ones, though to them unseen, as He is with His glorified ones, by whom He is well seen. And not merely does He know every one of them, but He knows their condition and case; and He who hath delivered will deliver. And it is remarkable how He does deliver, again and again, when matters seem with us perfectly hopeless. To all human appearance, Peter was fast bound in prison with no hope of escape, chained between two soldiers, the inner and outer doors being locked; but, when the Lord worked his deliverance, neither chains nor soldiers nor barred gates could hold him another moment. Take it, then, dear fellow-tried-one, for your comfort—the Lord well knows you, and all about your case and condition, tears and trials, -and that "unknown, yet well known" aptly expresses your position in this world on the one hand, and your position before God on the other. But let us go on to the next ebbing and flowing in Divine experience which is before us, namely,

"AS DYING, AND, BEHOLD, WE LIVE."-That the Christian lives "as dying" must indeed be another perplexing paradox to the man of the world, yet is it well understood in daily exercises of soul by the Christian. Christ was crucified: we have not, like Him, to have the body crucified, but still we have to be crucified in the body; we have to realize with Him union as the Man of sorrows, as well as union with Him as the God of glory; and why is it that we cannot read of the sufferings and dying of our precious Redeemer without drawing tears to our eyes? We read

often of others' sufferings, and though to a certain extent we sympathize, yet, generally speaking, we are so accustomed to human woe, that we read of it only as a tale that is told; but, when we think of Him buffetted and led to Calvary, and when we hear as it were His plaintive cry from the cross, "Eloi, Eloi, lama Sabacthani," why does it touch such a tender cord in our hearts? but just because we know that He endured all, and suffered all, and died for us; it comes home, and we feel our sins nailed Him to the cross.

That is a remarkable expression used by the Apostle Paul, "I bear on my body the marks of the Lord Jesus." He might have meant personally, through his varied sufferings for Christ's sake, he had endured much with the regard to the body, but we think the expression is also applicable to all the Lord's dear people who, in the trials and exercises of soul they pass through, become partakers with Christ of His sufferings. True, it is in a minor and subordinate way, still often as much as they can bear, and would be much more than they could bear, but for supporting grace; yet with it all, "behold, we live." Yes, blessed be the God of our salvation, inspired by the Holy Ghost, we live a supernatural life, hidden in Christ, fed by the Word, and having its fruition in glory; and, if we look back upon the way the Lord has led us, with its many exigencies and multiplied cares, yet in the midst of all, we must exclaim, with grateful acknowledg ment, "Behold, we live:' behold, we remain the living to praise our covenant-keeping God." And the Lord intends that we should thus hold our lives with a loose hand, feeling astonished that, though so undeserving, we are still preserved and upheld by Him. "As dying, and behold, we live." "Daily sin and care and strife,

While the Lord prolongs our breath,
Make it but a dying life,

Or a kind of living death."

"What a contradiction!" the world might well say "A living Death!" Ah, beloved, it is none to you; you well know what it means-at least, if your heart-experience throbs with the writer's. And then another ebbing and flowing, well understood by the children of God, is that of being

"CHASTENED, AND NOT KILLED."-Ah! but the chastening is so very sore sometimes, that it seems as if we were very nearly killed; crushed under some afflictive providence, the prostration of soul and spirit is very great, and we cannot so much as lift up our head. True, by ourselves we cannot; but, when the sweet presence of Jesus is vouchsafed, and when He commands the troubled waves of trial to be still, then can we lift up the voice of praise, and cry triumphantly, "No, Satan, we are not killed yet, nor can you kill us; the wheat has been sifted, but not lost; the metal has been cast into the furnace, but only to melt away the dross." And year after year finds us upheld by sovereign grace and mercy. We have thought again and again it must be otherwise; there have been so many things to contend with of a heartfelt character, that we have thought we must give up; but, blessed be the Lord, He will not give us up, and while He holds us we are safe. Oh! how many times in God's Word are we encouraged to review the past, and think of God's upliftings and gracious dealings with us in trials that have been weathered, and are for ever past! And yet this falling back does not give us the confidence with regard to the present and future which one would have thought it would. We are under the present trial as fearful and timid as if we had never encountered a previous one, and been wonderfully delivered; and are driven under every fresh

need as much as ever to our Well-beloved. He keeps us dependent, that again and again we may fly to Him. "Chastened, yet not killed." No, the chastening of the Lord, or sanctified affliction, will never kill us; it may bend the tree to the ground, but it will not break it. The fiery furnace may be seven times heated, and yet not a hair of our head become singed, or even the smell of fire adhere to us. Ah! we have often thought that those who in after-life have the clearest and highest views of the doctrines of grace, are those who have gone deepest into the experience of themselves as sinners. We must go down to get up; be emptied to be filled; be stripped to be clothed; be shipwrecked to be saved. Like Jonah, it is in the depths we learn that "salvation is of the Lord," and it is in the valley of Achor we find a door of hope. So it is, beloved, however severe the discipline, even it may be "chastened every morning," yet not killed; for, though

"Plagues and deaths around me fly,

Till He bids I cannot die;

Not a single shaft can hit

Till the God of love sees fit."

But we pass on to another ebbing and flowing expressed in our passage, namely:—

"SORROWFUL, YET ALWAYS REJOICING." — An absent Lord, a felt unworthiness, a consciousness of guilt, an evil heart of unbelief, a proneness to yield to some besetting sin, the unkind treatment of even fellow-Christians, discouragements by the way, and a temper often manifested which is anything but like Jesus; these, and many other things, make that plaintive word "sorrowful" one that aptly describes the Christian's experience; and yet there is an under-current of joy ever flowing; and, touch the right spring, and it will bubble up through all; and our mercy is that our "sorrowing is after a godly sort, which is vastly different from that sorrow of the world which worketh death." Yes, beloved, there is something always appearing that will keep us in a sorrowful spirit. It is said of our blessed Lord, He was never known to laugh. His followers must drink into the self-same spirit; yet they shall have cause for wondrous spiritual mirth and joy, and thus become strange characters. How sweetly, under a recent pressure which caused us to be much cast down, did that passage come to us: "Why art thou cast down, 0 my soul? and why art thou disquieted within me? hope thou in God, for thou shalt yet praise Him, who is the health of thy countenance and thy God!" It seemed to come as a tender rebuke from our Lord, and to say to us, "Why are you so forgetful of past mercies, and of my unchanging character? O thou of little faith, wherefore dost thou doubt ?" And then among other things that will cause the child of God to be sorrowful, is, the fear lest after all he should prove a deceiver. And, when the assertion of our blessed Lord to His disciples at the last supper comes up to view-“One of you shall betray me"-he is led, knowing his own frail heart, to mingle with them, as it were, in the inquiry, "Lord, is it I?" Ah! there was leaning upon that occasion on Jesus' bosom, one whom He loved, and who loved Him. Oh, sweet resting-place! hallowed and sacred repose! so blessedly near to the Redeemer! And yet, even in that enviable position, there was no confidence in self, so that when Simon Peter beckoned to him that he should ask Jesus who it was of whom He spoke, John does not respond, "I am certain it is not me, ask for yourself;" but, in the tenderness of love, yet timidity of heart, that the work of grace produces,