bodily constitution, but fevers are not reckoned among our temporal mercies. No more are contentions spiritual mercies to believers in Jesus Christ. They come not of the creed, but of the infirmities of those who hold the creed. They gender acrimonies which eat away the charities for which the creed was given. In almost every instance they give a relatively false importance to points of difference, and drive the combatants to opposite extremes. They are proverbially the nurseries of sectarian jealousy; and so inveterate has that jealousy often become, that the spirit of the truth is extinguished in zeal for its prerogative, the strength of its friends turned into weakness, and the conversion of the world grievously retarded. This is the dark side of the picture, and, verily, it is dark enough. We ought not to forget, and yet our usages have made us prone to forget, that it is not a natural thing for the church of Christ to be in a state of disunion; it is most unnatural; “it is like a broken tooth, or a foot out of joint;" there is dislocation in it-there is deformity-there is imbecility-there is that which mars the great purpose for which God has given to his church a habitation and a name on the face

of the earth.

Now, we believe that the occasions of warrantable separation are not nearly so numerous as has been generally supposed; and that these occasions are to be found, not so much in churches where there may exist a little diversity of speculative opinion, for no community on earth can be exactly of one opinion, but in churches where vital godliness has deeply declined-where the really godly are comparatively few -where the spirit of the gospel within them is wantonly overborne by the spirit of the world among their so-called brethren-and where the doctrines of the gospel, with the fellowship which these doctrines generate and sustain, are, the one and the other, corrupted and profaned. These are the grounds of se

paration which God has been pleased especially to own, while they who scparate on slighter grounds are seldom seen to prosper; and it is pleasing to witness a growing disposition to look at the subject in this light, not merely among those who are given to change, but among the wisest and the best of the friends of the truth. Ours are obviously times of convergence among the various sections of the christian church. No doubt our divisions are still numerous; few of them have, as yet, been healed; and now and then a new fragment is flying off from a main body, to run its noisy round for a little, and then to disappear. But the more considerate, in all our churches, are becoming sick of our divisions, sensible of the reproach they daily entail on the cause of Jesus Christ, and more and more convinced that division has its origin less in the dictates of enlightened conscience, than in causes which tend to pervert the conscience by obstructing the amenities of the christian brotherhood.

This is undoubtedly a change for the better; and, if kept under the necessary restraints, it cannot but lead to melioration. Union is strength to any community, and especially to a community essentially spiritual. Look at the union of the two great branches of the Secession Church. It has acquired a history, and is old enough to give lessons. How deep is now the conviction, on both sides, that the early separation which preceded it was a sinful separation! With what contrition and shame is that separation reflected on! How earnest and yet how fruitless is the wish that so foul a spot had never rested on so fair a reputation! But look at what the wiping of it out has done for the now united church. It has not only enlarged the sphere of her fellowship

a great boon to a good man-and given her an influence at home and abroad to which she was previously a stranger; but it has inspired her with a missionary energy-a consciousness of power, and a heart to exert it

which, in her previous state of separation she never would have thought of, and never could have reached. Nay, it is beyond a question, that unity among the faithful, not in concealed reality merely, but in visible display, is one of the most efficient means of evangelising the world. On this subject the words of our Lord should be engraven on every christian heart. My prayer, said he, is, that all who believe in me, MAY BE ONE, AS thou, Father, ART IN ME, AND I IN

THEE, THAT THE WORLD MAY BELIEVE THAT THOU HAST SENT ME.

These are things which ought not to be overlooked by us, at any time, or for any reason, much less when a case of union is offered to our consideration. Nay, they ought to be pondered, and that very seriously, lest the fact that we are familiar with separation, and have each become accustomed to the solitude of his own den, should sour our hearts, and blind our eyes, to the more desirable state of things. To crude negotiations, or a hasty commingling of the pure with the impure, they give no countenance; but they tell all who really love our Lord Jesus Christ, that a great duty is pressing on them that a great reproach is cleaving to them, which must be wiped away that they ought to be earnest in seeking after union, so far as may be practicable, because this very union is the healing of a disease, the reducing of a dislocation, and the recovery of strength, that health and heart for spiritual enterprise may be more fully enjoyed. It is an interesting consideration, that while apostolic men have made ample provision for separation from those who, finally or for a time, forfeit their claim to be regarded as brethren, they have made no provision for such separations as are to be found among us; where churches recognise one another as constituent parts of the body of Christ, and yet repudiate that incorporation which this recognition

*John xvii. 21.

so obviously implies. They say they are parts of the same body, and yet they refuse to come together, bone to his kindred bone. This is strange; it is passing strange; nothing but the witchery of use and wont prevents it from being startling; but it will not continue; it cannot continue; for, while it is matter of undoubted certainty that, beyond the pale of the christian church the elements of disruption have unbroken sway, it is equally certain that, within her pale, or among those who are renewed in the spirit of their minds, the elements of union-of true, solid, christian union-are to be found, and need only to be quickened into action, in order to obtain a visible ascendancy. That all who are united to Jesus Christ are united to one another, is a first principle in practical Christianity; no one doubts it; and if this union to Christ, and in him to one another, were only realised as it ought to be, many of our divisions would be speedily healed, while those which remain and cannot be healed, would bring no discredit on the faith, or on the faithful.

In entering, then, on the question of union with a christian brother, of another fellowship, it will not do for me to say to him, "I will consent that our fellowships be one, provided that, in addition to the great matters of faith and practice, in which we are agreed, you give up with your peculiarities, and bear with me in retaining mine,"-this, I say, will not do. No; there would be an arrogance in it, altogether inconsistent with the laws of brotherhood, and precisely that kind of arrogance by which strifes and divisions have been usually gendered. What, then, is to be done? The answer is easily given, although not always so easily taken. Let both parties mortify their party presumption, and learn true humility: let them go together to the word of God, with an honest desire to be corrected wheresoever they are wrong: let them abound in prayer to him in whom they are

already one, for the spirit of heavenly conciliation: let them persevere in these exercises till they feel the christian rising within them, and getting the mastery over the sectary; and then, perhaps, they may come to see that concessions are due on both sides, while the disposition to tender these concessions makes them better reasoners and better friends, and more enlightened in their love to the truth, than either was before.

Much, however, for the success of any union-particularly of the one about to be consummated, and of which this united periodical may be taken as the first fruits-depends on the material, might we so speak, by which it is cemented. Sectarian jealousy will not cement it, for that is a disruptive thing; reckless liberality will not cement it, for that is a relaxing thing; indifference to the claims of practical godliness will not cement it, for that is a deadening thing; a passion for party aggrandisement will not cement it, for that is a corrupting thing. Nothing can cement it, as a

union really christian, but a special visitation from the Spirit of Jesus Christ, pouring down on the uniting bodies an increase of purity, an increase of piety, an increase of cordial but well-defined forbearance, an increase of zeal for holy enterprise in the specific work of the christian church. If this outpouring be withheld, the name of union, if even that, is all we can attain to. But if it be granted,and granted it shall be if our cry for it be earnest and confiding, for God giveth his holy Spirit to them that ask him, a new day will dawn on our destinies, new sights will be seen by us, new emotions will rise within us, and onward shall we go in the right direction, rejoicing in the God of our salvation, and saying to Him as we move along, "Thou shalt arise, and have mercy upon Zion: for the time to favour her, yea, the set time is come. For thy servants take pleasure in her stones, and favour the dust thereof. So the heathen shall fear the name of the Lord, and all the kings of the earth thy glory.",

FOR a number of years the mass of our labouring population has been gradually sinking in the scale of comfort, from causes which we shall not at present investigate; but recently they have been precipitated into deeper than usual wretchedness by the failure of that part of the crop which formed the principal means of their subsistence. After all allowances are made, by way of deduction, for what has not been destroyed in this department of the fields, and for the excess, as alleged by some, above the average abundance in other departments, it seems to be a moderate calculation to state the loss, sustained by the united kingdom, as amounting to not less than ten millions of pounds sterling. Reckon

ing it, however, as certainly not less than eight, it proves the destruction

of as much food as would have sustained for twelve months a million of men! The consequence is that the woe of famine is abroad in the land. Of the "four sore judgments" of God (Ezek. xiv. 21), this appears to be the sorest. The breath of pestilence, the tooth of the wild beast, and the spear of war, make short work with their respective victims; but famine! how protracted is the torment! The craft of the tempter was for once at fault when he chose boils for the overthrow of Job's integrity. His chance was hunger-faith-quelling hungerresistible only in the strength of that spirit which was in Christ, for whom

the contest with hunger was fitly appointed at the commencement of his career as proof of his prowess.

No more in that famine with which our country is at present visited, than in any other which ever occurred, are all the members of the community subjected to the pains of hunger. Wealth has always secured an exemption for its possessors. I make this remark, lest any foolish and selfish person might object, that there is nothing among us which can be properly denominated a famine, since he and his family fare sumptuously every day. On that principle there never was a famine in the world, except on such occasions as the sieges of Samaria and Jerusalem. It is sufficient for warranting the allegation, if a great number of our industrious fellow-citizens are sufferers. Well, they are to be reckoned by tens of thousands in Scotland, by hundreds of thousands in England and Wales, and millions in Ireland, who never partake of one satisfying meal; and there is a multitude of them who suffer actual starvation. What more do you regard necessary for proving a case of famine? Must there be an invasion of the table of the wealthy, so that even they shall complain of lack of food? Beware, I counsel you, of despising the judgment in the lighter form, lest it be inflicted in the heavier, and you yourself, and your children, be num bered among the famishing.

Having considered the calamity, reflect now that it has been inflicted by the hand of God. For enforcing and deepening this reflection, I shall not take advantage of its mysteriousness, in respect of the careful investigations both of practical and scientific men having hitherto failed in discovering the physical cause or causes of the disease. That some law of nature is operative in the case there can be little doubt; and I would have summoned my friends to make the same reflection on the providential agency of God, though the failure had obviously been

occasioned by a deficiency of sunshine and rain, and an excess of stormy wind; which sunshine, and rain, and wind, I yet believe are regulated by established laws: but then, I believe, that these laws are directed to their end by a presiding Deity; that, according to the illustration of Dr Chalmers, as philosophical as it is imaginatively beautiful, He holds in his hand the upper end of that long chain of effects and causes which, diminishing in the perspective, enters the invisible, and ascends to his throne, whence he directs it, by touching the first link, to swing as he wills with its suspended mass of woe for crushing the head of the wicked, or with its suspended casket of wealth to empty its abundance into the lap of the righteous. It is in this manner that a particular providence governs the world by fixed laws. Reader, be on your guard: to deny, to question or doubt this special providence of God in the world's government, is as atheistic, as unphilosophic, and as pernicious in its moral consequences, as to deny or doubt his agency in its creation. To acknowledge the latter is of little advantage, yea, it is of no advantage, if the former be disputed. It is the Christian's faith that the hairs of his head are numbered, and that when there is evil in the city the Lord hath done it.

This calamity, then, which at the present season particularly demands our consideration, being, like all others, inflicted by the hand of God, the next question is, Wherefore has he sent it? There is only one satisfactory answer: he has sent it because of men's sins; as a judgment on them-as his witnessing against them as a warning that men turn from them lest greater evils befall them: that rotting of the crops is an indication of the rottenness which he beholds in men's hearts. Is God's curse causeless? Does he ever afflict willingly, or grieve the children of men? There are these two things imputed to God which are equally dishonour

ing to him the first, when men imagine that he is careless about sin, and will not visit its commission with punishment; the other, when, the punishment having been inflicted, they deny that sin was the provocative, and contend that the reason is to be sought for in something else. In the one case, the divine holiness is dishonoured; in the other, the divine goodness-imputing to him the affliction of a sinless intelligence. It might afford amusement, were not the conduct so profane, to listen to the manner in which some men endeavour to escape from the conclusion that there is any indication in this matter of the divine anger. At their own wellreplenished tables they will sit and discourse of it as being a rich mercy rather than a sore judgment; because, say they, besides awakening our legislators to a sense of the necessity of instituting many measures of salutary reform, it will effect a change on the economical habits of the lower orders, for whom that wretched root made the means of life and the support of a family too easily accessible, so that they have become indolent, and contract marriage alliances prematurely and imprudently. It is not a few who, in the midst of their luxuries, speak after this fashion: but independently of the unsoundness of the views of political economy which they exhibit-independently of the profaneness and cruelty, as if it were to be lamented that God had provided for the means of life being easily secured; and supposing that some good should in future result from this evil, in the way they expect, what say they of the present distress of so many hundreds of thousands? Ah! how pleasantly you discourse of hunger at your banquet! What does it signify to the famishing man, with his famishing wife and children, to be assured that the next generation will be more prudent and cultivate wheat instead of potatoes? Contrariwise, rather, let us act the

part of common sense and sympathy as well as devotion, and reverently and penitently acknowledge that we are overspread with a cloud of judgment indicative of God's deep displeasure with our nation, on account of multiplied and aggravated iniquity.

All

The judgment is universal. of us suffer necessarily. Some of us, through the scanty provision of themselves and their complaining families, and the manner in which other comforts are denied them in consequence of the whole of the hire of their labour being consumed by the high price of food; the rest of us, through the diminution of their income either as agriculturists, whose crops have failed, or as manufacturers and merchants, whose trade is consequently impaired; and through the augmentation of assessments for the support of the poor; and through the measures which the Government has found it necessary to adopt for saving large districts of the country from the horrors of actual starvation, ensuring the maintenance, if not the increase, of a high rate of taxation. In these and various similar ways all suffer necessarily; but besides this, and in some cases much more, there should be on the part of the wealthy and those who enjoy the more comfortable circumstances of life, a considerable amount of voluntary suffering. A national judgment is designed of God for the whole of the national family; and on whomsoever of the brethren it may be that it falls more immediately and directly, it is the duty of all the rest to share the burden; and no compulsory poor-rate nor Government taxation can reach, or at all events has reached, many of us to enforce our taking an adequate share; so that much is left to a freewill imposition. If there be any of us, then, who does not suffer, or does not intend that he shall, it is great wickedness to him. God designs he should-he designs that the wealthiwhose business may be as

est man,