single plant was preserved, and sown regularly for only four years, at the end of that time there would be as many plants as would quite cover this earth, and all the planets in our solar system. All thistles have winged seeds, which fly about in every direction; and, besides this, many of them, as our common hedge thistle, spread their roots for yards round, throw up many suckers, which not only produce seeds in their turn, but extend their roots, propagate like the parent plant, and stifle and destroy all vegetation except their

own.

Craigie. Well, I think we shall be doing a great deal of good if we knock the heads off the thistles; but more if we can manage to root them out.

M. You are quite right there; always try to get at the root of an evil-that is the surest way of doing good. Thistles are a very striking emblem of sin, which, if not rooted out, will spread in all directions: and if there had been no sin, there would have been no thistles. The rooting out of sin has proved a great blessing to Scotland. That was what John Knox did in the days of the Reformation-he said, "Let us root out the evil, lest it should spring up and choke the good seed of the Word of God;" and so well has it been done, that many seeds of God's planting have sprung up here more luxuriantly than anywhere else. I shall only mention one, that is, the keeping of the Sabbath; and Scotland is better known now all over the world by the name of the "Land of the Sabbath," than by the name of the "Land of the Thistle." Although called the Land of Thistles, there are fewer thistles in it than in any other country. This is owing to well-cultivated gardens and fields; and

having gained the name of the Land of the Sabbath, I think, proves that there are fewer also of the thistles of sin.

Annie. That is a far more honourable name. I hope she will never lose it.

M. I hope so too, but a great deal will depend on you all. The keeping of the Sabbath is a sacred trust which God has committed to us; and if we prove faithful, a blessing is sure to follow. There is a promise in one of our texts for to-day, and God's promises never fail. In no country was it better kept at one time than it was in Scotland, and God kept His promise. Britain rides upon the high places of the earth. She is exalted above all nations, and she will continue to prosper as long as the Gospel is preached and her Sabbaths kept. Look in 2 Chron. xxxvi. 20, and you will learn what is the punishment God sends upon those who break His Sabbaths.

Annie. "And them (the Jews) that had escaped from the sword carried he away to Babylon; where they were servants to him (Nebuchadnezzar) until the reign of the kingdom of Persia; to fulfil the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed her Sabbaths for as long as she lay desolate she kept Sabbath."

M. And when the Jews returned from Babylon, what did Nehemiah do, when the people began again to break the Sabbath?

Douglas. He was very angry, and contended with the nobles of Judah for allowing the profanation of the Sabbath, by treading the winepress, buying, selling, and carrying burdens. He said to the nobles, "What evil thing is this that ye do, and profane the Sabbath

day? Did not your fathers thus, and did not our God bring all this evil upon us, and upon this city? Yet ye bring more wrath upon Israel by profaning the Sabbath."

M. Quite right; and if we prove faithless to our trust, and allow the Sabbath to be profaned in like manner, we may depend upon it that God will punish us, and it may be with the same punishment, causing all trade to cease, and the land to remain uncultivated. Tell me on which day of the week God rested from all His works.

Rachel. On the seventh day.

M. Did He rest on that day because he was tired and required rest?

Annie. Oh, no! God never tires: the Bible says, in Isaiah xl. 28, "Hast thou not known, hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary?"

M. Quite right; God cannot tire. Turn to Mark ii. 27, and you will learn why God made the Sabbath. David. "The Sabbath was made for man."

M. Never forget that. It is one of God's best gifts, and none may deprive us of it. The first day man spent in the garden of Eden was the Sabbath; this was to teach him that the chief end for which he was made was to glorify God; the things of this world were not the first things he was to care for; and on the first day after he was created, man was taught to contemplate God and His wonderful works, to love, thank, praise, and adore Him for his own creation, and the creation of all things, and "to remember the Sabbathday, to keep it holy." Tell me what was the reward of Christ's sufferings and obedience?

Rachel. Phil. ii. 9-11, "God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things in earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."

Eph. i. 20-22, "God hath set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come: and hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the Church."

M. Look in Matt. xii. 8, and tell me what it says there.

Frances Jane. "The Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath day."

M. Yes; God hath made him King of kings, and Lord of lords. He has given Him all power both in Heaven and earth; and the very first use He made of this power was to change the Sabbath from the seventh to the first day of the week. We must never forget that our Sabbath has been purchased for us by the blood of Christ. I told you that Adam in Paradise was called upon to contemplate God and His wonderful works; but remember, these works, beautiful as they are, are not what the Christian is called upon first to contemplate. God will not suffer them to take the place of Christ. And the Christian is called upon to love, thank, praise, and adore Him for the wonderful work of redemption. He has not only a new subject but a new day. And do not you think it deserved a new day? Was it not very wonderful that He by whom

all things were made should become a man, poor, despised, rejected, and suffer and die that you might inherit eternal life?

Jessie. Yes; very, very wonderful; it did deserve a new day. Did it not also receive its new name, the Lord's day, because Jesus finished His work by rising from the dead on that day?

M. Yes; and the better it is kept the sooner will the promise be fulfilled, that the whole earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord, when Christ will reign supreme over all nations, when all sin will be rooted out as well as its emblem the thistly curse. Wilhelmina. Cowper speaks of that time in our last He says

lesson.

"O scenes surpassing fable, and yet true!

Scenes of accomplish'd bliss! which who can see,
Though but in distant prospect, and not feel
His soul refresh'd with foretaste of the joy?
Rivers of gladness water all the earth,

And clothe all climes with beauty; the reproach
Of barrenness is past. The fruitful field

Laughs with abundance; and the land, once lean,
Or fertile only in its own disgrace,

Exults to see its thistly curse repealed.

The various seasons woven into one
And that one season an eternal spring;

The garden fears no blight, and needs no fence;
For there is none to covet, all are full."

That will be a very happy time: I wish it had come.

M. Who knows but Scotland may be the honoured instrument in God's hands of hastening it. We learned from Sandy's oat how many fields can be sown in a few years with the produce of one single plant, and it is the same with the Word of God. Let us with His help keep the Sabbath as a nation, root out sin, be