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be said, or done, or witnessed; and the fellow who thus interlards his Italian with English profanity and national satire, is puffed off as enjoying he Majesty's gracious admiration of his talents.

Now contrast all this with the solemn and edifying scene last year at Westminster Abbey. Read the admonition of the venerable prelate on delivering the Bible to the Sovereign. "We present you with this book, the most valuable thing that this world affords. Here is wisdom: this is the royal law; these are the lively oracles of God. Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this book; that keep and do the things contained in it. For these are the words of eternal life, able to make you wise and happy in this world, nay wise unto salvation, and so happy for evermore, through faith which is in Christ Jesus." Read also the whole of the exhortations and stipulations of that devout ceremonial. Read also the Bishop of London's faithful Sermon ; and still more his subsequent one on "The Duty of prayer and intercession for our rulers.' We only ask, is the general spirit of affairs consonant to this hallowed beginning. We grieve to say it is not; and we cannot but think that much of the disappointment is connected with official proceedings; that the government has not made religion, so to speak, the leading feature of its policy; and though Lord J. Russell deserves gratitude for his opposition to Mr. Duncombe's proposition for opening the Westminster theatres in Lent, yet it were more than truth would warrant to say that it has been the endeavour of her Majesty's advisers to present to the nation and the world the blessed spectacle of a religious government and a religious court.

We copy the following passages from the Bishop of London's Coronation Sermons :

"We are bound to tell them, that if God has done more for them, as to worldly things, than for the rest of mankind, they are thereby enabled, and will be expected, to do more for Him. If He has advanced them to the highest pinnacle of earthly grandeur, they are to advance his honour and glory, by the special means entrusted to them for that purpose. Of no other individual members of the whole family of mankind can it be said, with equal truth, that they live not for themselves alone, but for the weal or woe of others. Their virtues, or their errors, are not confined within the narrow precincts of a court; but are felt, through the entire frame of society, in their effects upon the tastes, the morals, and the habits of the people at large.'

But

"They are too highiy exalted, too completely removed from every thing like competition or rivalry, to excite a feeling of envy in those beneath them; while the outward "circumstances of their state, their power, and privileges, and the visible glory of their regality, will ensure submission and deference from the great bulk of mankind. those very circumstances, added to an unlimited command over the sources of enjoyment, and the absence of contradiction and control, are but too likely to make them forget their essential equality, as moral and accountable agents, as servants of Jesus Christ, with those from whom they are so widely separated by the accident of birth. It is therefore the more important that they should be continually reminded of that word of Divine truth, which is not changed, nor weakened in its application, by any worldly distinctions whatsoever: He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good. And what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God.'

ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS.

A PEDO-BABTIST DISSENTER; CLERICUS; S. B.; CHAD; AN ENGLISH PRESBYTERIAN MINISTER; G. B.; A POOR PLURALIST; and several "Constant Readers," are under consideration.

Mr. Noel wishes to add the following postscript to his note on the Essay on Schism: "I do not wish to charge the estimable author with the least unfairness toward myself; he repeatedly offered to submit the proof-sheets to my inspection after his revisal all that he has done has been to use, in some instances, severer expressions towards the Establishment than were in the original manuscript, for which therefore the adjudicators obviously cannot be responsible."

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THE HE fact in the first establishment of the Christian religion which the day of Pentecost witnessed, and which Whitsunday has since been set apart by the Church to commemorate, is among the most remarkable and important, whether in its intrinsic nature, its accompanying circumstances, or its continued effects, which the Gospel history records.

During the period of forty days which intervened between the resurrection and ascension of our Blessed Lord, he had appeared, at frequent intervals, to his Apostles, whom he had chosen to be witnesses of his resurrection: to whom, as St. Luke expresses it, he shewed himself alive after his passion, by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God;-ever, let it be remembered, directing their attention to the revealed and written word. This we learn from that single and interesting specimen of the mode of instruction which the risen Saviour adopted, when, in his conversation with the two disciples on their way to Emmaus, he opened the ministry of the consummated Gospel. Even then, in the plenitude of avowed and acknow ledged Deity, he did not demand the implicit faith of ignorance, the slavish obedience of servants, who know not what their Master doeth; but he referred and appealed to those things which were written in the Law of Moses, and in the Prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning him; and opened their understandings that they might understand the Scriptures.

But the all-sufficient atonement had been offered to God; the example of perfect holiness had been exhibited to man; the resurrection had been abundantly evidenced; and the purposes of his mission having been thus completed, the time had now arrived when the risen Saviour was to re-ascend to the bosom of the Father, from which he had come forth on his errand of self-immolating love; to re-possess that glory which he had with him before the world was, but of which he emptied himself, that we, through his poverty, might be made rich; and to exercise that prerogative of his meditorial kingdom CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 17.

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which he purchased on the cross, when he led captivity captive; and by the operation of which he was to see of the travail of his soul, and be satisfied.

The ministry of the word was henceforth to be intrusted to feeble man; the treasure of the Gospel was to be committed to earthen vessels; and in order to impress deeply upon the Apostles, and upon all who should succeed them as ambassadors of Christ, that the excellency of the power was of God, and not of them, he commands them not to enter immediately upon their ministry, but to tarry in the city of Jerusalem until they were endued with power from on high thus pointing their views and expectations to "the promise of the Father," and preparing them for the effusion of the Holy Spirit, which was the distinctive privilege and grand energy of the Gospel.

I shall not here dwell upon the circumstances which accompanied this effusion of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost, and which the portions of Scripture appointed for the service of Whitsunday minutely detail. I shall merely observe, in passing, that these circumstances were evidently emblematical, and designed to typify moral and spiritual effects to which they were analogous. The sound, as of a rushing mighty wind, with which this first effusion of the Spirit was announced, plainly typified the omnipotent and inscrutable influences of regenerating grace-mysterious in its origin, and invisible in its agency, yet palpable in its effects: as the wind which bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, or whither it goeth, so is every one that is born of the Spirit. You can discern the path and progress of the one, but by the uprooted forest, or the prostrate tower; of the other, but by the strong-holds of Satan it has cast down, and the carnal affections which it has eradicated.

The tongues evidently typified the gifts of the Spirit-all that furniture with which God equips the ministers of his word; and especially the miraculous knowledge of languages, which was immediately bestowed upon the Apostles, and which was essentially necessary to the dissemination of the Gospel at its first establishment, that it might throw out its branches unto the sea, and its boughs unto the river.

The curse at Babel, while, with the calm yet resistless energy of Omnipotence, it effected God's wise purpose of dividing the family of Adam, and scattering abroad its members to people the face of the whole earth, excluded from a knowledge of God's revealed and written will all but one favoured branch, which He had chosen for the purpose of maintaining, publicly, in the eyes of men, and angels, and devils, the possession of his kingdom of grace on earth; and that it might be the depository of his promises, and the guardian and herald of his truth and unity. The gift of tongues at Pentecost reversed the curse; and by enabling the ambassadors of Christ to invite many from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south, to be reconciled to God, and to sit down in the kingdom of heaven, promoted that happy reunion of the family of man, when a multitude which no man can number, of all nations and kindred and tongues and people, shall join, in harmonious concert, and without a single discordant note, in singing one common anthem of never ceasing praise: "Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to

receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing."

And as the tongues, in their form, typified the gifts, in their substance they typified the graces of the Spirit. The fire aptly represented that fervent piety, that ardent zeal, which the love of God shed abroad in the heart, through the Holy Ghost given unto us, never fails to enkindle; consuming in it every corrupt and carnal affection, and fostering with genial warmth every embryo grace; shedding a bright and pure light upon the path of truth and holiness, to teach and to guide us into all truth; cheering and comforting the disciples of Christ under their various privations and sufferings; and animating them with boldness and fervent zeal constantly to preach the Gospel unto all nations, and to bring them out of darkness and error into the clear light and true knowledge of God, and of his Son Jesus Christ.

Fire is frequently used in Scripture to designate the influences of the Holy Spirit,-and very appropriately. As fire, quick and powerful, refines and purifies, enlightens, warms, and assimilates to itself, every object upon which it acts, and the tendency of its pure flame is ever to ascend heavenward-so the Divine Spirit purifies the heart; enlightens the understanding with wisdom from above; warms the affections with holy love; by its transforming efficacy assimilates the soul to its own nature; with a Divine energy diffuses itself over every capable subject; and ever seeks to re-ascend to its native heaven, bearing with it the whole man, on the wings of faith and hope, in the aspirations of piety and the accents of prayer.

To see the importance of the day of Pentecost in the annals of redemption, we need but briefly review the moral history of man.

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When man proceeded from the Creative hand, he bore impressed upon his soul the whole moral image of God. As face answereth to face in a glass, so did the heart of man to the heart of God. As wax corresponds to the seal, so did the soul of man bear impressed upon it, in legible characters, a perfect, though softened, copy of all the moral attributes of the Divine Mind; and, like God, man was holy, spiritual, and immortal. Here was the source and the security of man's happiness his will was thoroughly conformed to the will of the All-wise and All-disposing Mind; and therefore acquiescence in the doings, and obedience to the commands of God, was not a forced submission to the extrinsic authority of a paramount and resistless power, where the hand might perform, while the heart bitterly mourned; where the poverty, and not the will consents. No! there was no act of the Sovereign Will in which the heart of primeval man did not cordially sympathize-no command of the Sovereign Authority which was not anticipated by his own tastes and desires. In a word, man himself was the sole temple here on earth of praise and peace, and in that temple the Spirit of God continually dwelt.

That from this blessed state man has wholly and thoroughly fallen, is undeniable for however various the degrees in which the moral attributes of God have been obliterated from the several individuals of the human race, how many soever the shades of character in which constitutional temperament, or the laws of society, may present to us the different members of the family of man, in this one feature all bear the image of their second father the devil, that "the carnal mind

is enmity against God, is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be," and that, in some one shape or another, the lusts of their father they will do.

In a temple thus desecrated the Holy Spirit of God could no longer dwell. "Let us depart hence," ascended from earth's polluted soil and altered climate, and drew down tears of pity, such as angels weep, upon apostate man. The Divine Spirit fled from earth, and left man's bosom desolate and defenceless. The "strong man armed," the prince of the power of the air, " the Spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience," took undisputed possession of that desecrated and forsaken shrine from which the glory of the Lord had departed. Satan usurped that delegated sway which man's rebellion forfeited; and, as the God of this world, subjugated its created Lords, then ruled them with a rod of iron. He partitioned out that paradise which was once the peaceful abode of a happy and united creation, into lands of darkness and cruel habitations; introduced anarchy and disorder throughout a scene where God had once pronounced that all was very good; and filled the earth with the most opposite sins, and those sins linked together by their most opposite extremes, with ungodliness and superstition, with atheism and idolatry, with slavery and tyranny, lust and malice, impurity and blood.

Such were the fatal consequences of the departure of the Divine Spirit from man. But how was this Spirit, the only remedy for the misery of man, to be again restored? Fallen man had no resources within him by which to purchase it; no attractions to win it back to earth nor if he had possessed these, would he have availed himself of them; for, degraded and miserable as he was in its absence, yet every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was arrayed in hostility against the Holy and Blessed Spirit of God. And though, on God's part, mercy was infinite, who could show how that mercy might be extended to man, in consistency with the other, alike infinite, attributes of truth, and justice, and holiness? Who could show how it were within the compass of possibility that man could be pardoned, and restored to the Divine favour, without compromising God's truth, and thus shaking the very pillars of heaven, overturning the throne, and annihilating the nature, of God. Abstract truth, on which the security and permanency of creation is founded, dictated that warning voice, "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die". for, not arbitrarily, but necessarily, "the wages of sin is death :" and that same truth, which extorted from the Divine mercy this prospective sentence of condemnation, demanded, with still louder voice, its fulfilment. The majesty and honour of the Divine administration outraged the eternal law of righteousness broken-that law on which the pillars of heaven are based, by which the order and happiness of universal creation are maintained, and the performance of God's promises secured, demanded by God's justice the enforcement of its penal sanctions against offending man. That holiness too which is the concentration of all the Divine attributes; which forms the halo of glory that encircles, as its diadem, the brow of heaven's king, and beams from Deity with mild yet awful splendour; which lies still deeper than any other of God's infinite attributes at the root of the Divine Nature, and, as his essential characteristic, makes God to

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