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HARMONY OF THE PRIMITIVE DISCIPLES.

JUNE 3.

And the multitude of them that believed, were of one heart and of one soul.

To this pleasing picture of primitive union, when wearied with the public contentions and private animosities which distract the world, every good mind will turn with delight, as to some region of peculiar fertility blooming in the wilderness. Though numerous, promiscuous, and recently embodied, the first christian community were all of one heart and one soul; for they acknowledged one master, were exposed to one common scene of dangers, bound by one great law of love, and inspired by one hope. They took the image of charity bright from its great original, and therefore, like their Saviour, were gentle in temper, compassionate in feeling, candid in judgment, and pacific in conduct. Their lives reflected his heavenly influence.

Their gratitude to Christ bound them to each other. Brought out of darkness into his marvellous light, they felt that their eternal hopes were connected with him; and when they remembered that he had lived, laboured, prayed, wept and bled for them and for the world; had interceded on the cross for his murderers, and breathed out his soul in an act of the sublimest devotion; had burst, on the third day, the gates of the grave, and ascended, before their eyes, to the realms above-what faith, affection and gratitude must have been awakened in their minds; and what ardour to fulfil those offices of love which he declared were done to himself, when done to the least of his disciples.

Their heavenly citizenship was another bond of union. Aspiring to the promised mansions of eterral peace, they could not consistently harbour the uneasy sentiments of envy or ill will. They breathed already the upper atmosphere of benevolence. Joint heirs with Christ, mutual aids to each other here, and destined companions for eternity, their social good will rose in ardour proportionable to the unlimited extent of its duration. All separate inclinations were blended in the joint participation of future bounty.

Thus religion exercised its amiable empire over the hearts of the primitive disciples. We can cherish the same spirit, display the same life, and then enjoy the same hope.-God is love, and to be his children, we must be love. As expectants of a better country, bound to the same blissful shore, guided through like dangers by the same heavenly light, shall we not contribute all we can to the safety, prosperity and cheerfulness of this general voyage? Shall we not dwell together in unity, exercising forbearance to the faults, liberality to the wants, and compassion to the sorrows of one another? Shall we not display our Father's love and our Saviour's kindness? Let us abolish all remains of a cold unfeeling temper, and view in every fellow-creature a kindred probationer-let our countenances beam with benevolence, and our hearts beat with undissembling generous humanity. Then the troubles of life will be softened by the balm of sympathizing friendship, and human nature flourish and expand beneath the genial sunshine of indulgent candour.

Devout follower of Christ! your home is in heaven. There the golden days of christian charity shall return; the spirit which God requires and which Jesus exhibited, shall pervade all hearts, and you shall mingle with the just made perfect in the realms of eternal peace.

UNITY OF GOD

JUNE 4.

There is one God, and there is none other but He.

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THE first argument alleged in support of the UNITY OF GOD, is derived from necessary existence. Necessity cannot, with propriety, be called the cause, but the reason, why God exists. But necessity is absolute, simple, uniform. There cannot be two absolute necessities, and therefore there cannot be two necessarily existent beings. It is, therefore, as impossible that there should be two infinite beings, as that there should be two infinite spaces.

The second argument is-Two or more infinite beings would perfectly coincide with each other, and to our minds become one and the same being. Two men exactly alike may be imagined, when occupying different portions of time and space; but when they are imagined to occupy the same time and space, the numerical diversity is immediately lost. Two infinite beings having the same manner of existence and action, thinking, willing and executing in exactly the same way, place and time, cannot be conceived by the human mind as separated. The ideas completely coalesce into one.

The third argument is-more Gods than One is unnecessary. No more causes are to be admitted than are necessary to account for existing phenomena. No single event, phenomenon or individual, throughout the universe, has begun to exist which may not have originated from one self existent, intelligent and omnipotent Cause.

The fourth argument is derived from the unity of design in the structure of the universe.-It seems improbable that two or more infinite beings, each competent to create, should unite in forming the same system, and carrying on the same plan, so that the creatures of one should be dependent on those of the other. In the universe all is uniform; all motions are mathematically correct, and all laws perfectly fixed. In our world, all means tend to one important end, the happiness of the creatures of God. One chain binds all together. All worlds are thus connected; and there is not in the created system, an insulated, detached, unconnected being. Every arrangement aims at moral discipline, and thereby at universal virtue and happiness. If the design is one, and if all the works of nature, animate and inanimate, animal and rational, contribute in their respective stations to the accomplishment of that one design, we conclude that the Great Artificer of all is ONE being.-Defects are, by modern discoveries, found to be useful in the general system; and evils disappear, in God's sight, in the immense preponderance of good they are intended to produce.

It is more honourable to conceive of God as one and unrivalled, than as one among a number of equal and co-ordinate deities.-If other Gods exist, they would be entitled to our homage, and therefore their existence would be revealed to us.

Revelation discloses but one God, and declares there is none other but He. It was the main object in the Jewish revelation, to bear public and constant testimony to the unity of God; to expel all belief in the revered many, and fix the belief of the holy ONE. Christianity strengthens this doctrine. To us, who profess the apostolic doctrine in its primitive purity, there is but ONE GOD, the FATHER-ONE Meditor, the man Christ Jesus. The Lord is our God, the Lord is ONE. There is therefore ONE great Architect, ONE presiding Intelligence, ONE governing Will, ONE energetic Power. To him we can give an unembarrassed, because an undivided homage.

If our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence towards God. And herein do I exercise myself, to have always a conscience void of offence toward God, and toward men.

OUR Conscience is our understanding deciding on moral questions. A well instructed conscience anticipates the sentence which will finally be pronounced upon unrepented guilt. It entertains no foolish hope, that infinite mercy will overlook crime, or that any miracle will be wrought for the extermination of vicious and indulged habits. Conscience tells the persevering offender, that he must rise at last to sorrow and misery.-Nor will he be able to persuade himself that. this suffering will be light in degree or short in duration. Though he may not admit the vulgar conceptions of a local hell, or a material fire, he will plainly see, that with the most correct views and the most rational expectations, enough remains to alarm the awakened offender to the utmost extent of his faculties and powers. He knows from consciousness how difficult it is to subdue one vicious habit. He feels that all he suffers from the tyranny of corrupt affections now, that all his remorse, all the temporal inconvenience, all the disgrace, all the terrours which cleave to destructive habits in the present life, combined with the apprehensions of a life to come, are insufficient to separate him from his sinful courses, and to accomplish substantial and thorough reformation. What then, he asks, will be the nature, the extent, or the degree of those sufferings in a future life, which will be found effectual to produce that entire and mighty transformation from vice to virtue; to exterminate this deeprooted depravity of heart, to renew the moral nature, and to restore the soul to holiness, to happiness and to God? Though we believe God has made nature too strong for vice, yet the sinner knows well it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

Measureless the importance of instilling right principles into the minds of youth. Be encouraged, Parents-you have a friend in the bosoms of those you wisely and piously instruct, who will not suffer your doctrine to be lost. Describe vividly the value of moral truth and the obligations of a holy life. Win them to happiness by christian promises, and frighten them from sin by christian denunciations. Conscience is God within us. It is a man's best friend, or his dreaded enemy. Where sin has made it an enemy, it haunts a man every where. He has no power to resist it, and he lies perpetually at its mercy. It is a flame kindled in his soul, which inwardly torments and consumes him. It is a viper which twines about his heart, and stings him in the tenderest places. It is a hungry vulture, a never-dying worm, which secretly preys upon his vitals, and fills him with agony and dismay.-But where conscience is enlightened and obeyed, it is a friend indeed-a friend at home—an inward, intimate, truly bosom friend. It never deserts us even in the greatest extremity, and is precious beyond all earthly connexions. The friendship of conscience will compensate for the enmity of worlds. He who has a friend in his own heart, possesses the most solid ground of consolation and peace. In the midst of storms, encompassed with dangers, oppressed with sorrows, loaded with undeserved reproach, involved on all sides in impenetrable gloom, he still enjoys inward, unutterable peace and serenity of spirit, which the world knoweth not of, and conscious of integrity, his heart is at rest, trusting in God.

What is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?

THE soul is lost, when it is corrupted; when sin lays it in ruins. The soul may therefore be lost in this life; lost to all the valuable ends of living, lost to all capacity for enjoyment. The experiment has been made. Alexander, after wasting nations and subverting thrones, grieved that the havoc was over, and bemoaned the melancholy void within. That arch tyrant Tiberius, after similar devastations and triumphs, declares the anguish of his soul, "which," says he, "I feel destroying me every day."-Thus on the summit of their ambition they found the grave of their hopes. When the soul, the seat of enjoyment or suffering, is vitiated, vain are all outward sources of delight; they rather aggravate than quench the burning thirst of the fever that consumes it. A man of genius who cut short a life of splendour and popularity, by intemperance, exclaimed on his death bed, "O, fool, fool, fool."-This madman cannot be fully known, till eternity discloses all that is lost by vice or gained by virtue. The worldling had exhausted, pleasure's cup. Regaled with the luxuries and charmed with the splendours, which minister to vanity, he breathed the incense of adulation, revelled with triumphant pride, and domineered over his fellow beings. He dies. The grand apartment, the brilliant circle, the obsequious retinue, the tumult, the revelry, the delirium of his brief and busy day, are no more. And what follows? He gained the world-and paid the dreadful forfeit. The eternal laws of the universe are not to be violated with impunity. Dreadful indeed is the anguish which sin may thus bring on the full manhood of future existence. Here, then, let us weigh in the balance of christianity the hopes of this world and the next. He who chains himself to the dust, prevents his ascent to heaven. He cannot serve God and mammon. The human mind revolts at such degraded servitude and abuse-and he who dares thus contemn God's gifts and laws, should, like the Cicilian tyrant's flatterer, see a glittering sword hung by a single hair above him.

This we should remember, whatever else we forget, that we have within us eternal powers, susceptible of ever growing happiness. Let us beware of defiling, or resigning to the stagnation of sloth, the grand spring of action and enjoyment. It is preeminent in dignity; it is twin-brother with the angels; its home is heaven, and nothing but the external pressure of the earthly tenement prevents its ascent to its destined sphere.-Becoming holy, is its great act of consecration. This shows the wonderful extent of its capacities, the variety and elevation of its enjoyments, its progressive character and its opening prospects. It is destined to advance forever; to expatiate in a field of action continually enlarging; to sustain a part of ever growing subservience to God's boundless wisdom, Latent powers shall break forth, and worlds within worlds shall disclose unimaginable riches, to adorn with fresh accessions of glory. and joy the soul's progress in eternity.

Let our introductory education then be such, that our souls shall not go into futurity crippled by errour or paralyzed by vice; but nourished and spiritualized by pure, vigorous and christian virtue; and may they while here, as with their proper motion, ascend in fervent piety to God, and stream out in benevolent affections towards mankind.

166

OUR SAVIOUR'S PRAYER FOR HIS CRUCIFIERS.

JUNE 7.

Then said Jesus, Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.

THIS prayer was uttered while they were nailing our Saviour to the cross. There is here a moral sublimity in Christ's fortitude, compassion and piety, which you cannot find in the philosophers, legislators or heroes of ancient or modern days. This prayer was no momentary flight of enthusiasm. The life and death of Jesus were, both of them, wonderful and consistent. He who at the beginning of his ministry said, "Love your enemies and bless them that curse you ;" now in his extreme agony on the cross, prays, "Father forgive them."-Observe Jesus at the bar of the high Priest, of the Roman governor, and of Herod-mark his expressive silence; his noble profession; his soul piercing look at Peter; his mild rebuke of the wretch who smote him; his lamb-like patience under cruel indignities, and his prayer amidst the savage clamours of the populace. Did ever man, before, speak, think, act and feel, like this man?

This example poured into the martyrs the breath of spiritual life. Is it not, then, a most humiliating thought, that we who can occasionally glow with admiration and melt with tenderness at the review of our Saviour's life and sufferings, should yet so often fall short of him in our temper and actions? Can a christian be vainglorious, proud, revengeful and unforgiving? Can the follower of the prince of peace, mingle in strife? Can the doctrines of eternal love be conjoined with envenomed rancour? And why this lukewarm attachment? these divided affections? but from the want of that entire conviction and that deep impression of gospel truth, which overawes the passions and brings every thought into subjection?

The faith of Christ sustained him. Imagine the day when the land of Judea trembled, and the sky was darkened, and the innocent blood was shed; when the weeping mother of Jesus and the beloved disciple, were bequeathed to each other by expiring lips, and when all who came together to that sight, smote their breasts and returned -imagine these; and could you expect through all the gloom and horror of a crucifixion, to find such enduring patience, overflowing kindness and unshaken piety, without hope in God? If you would see extreme misery without hope, cast your eye at the impenitent thief. Here you behold an awful contrast. Christ's trust in a future recompence supported him. His death showed the spontaneous tenor of his soul, and his conduct was a becoming close to his eventful and unspotted life.

he was.

If the Saviour's example carries no practical influences to our hearts, we are lost to the tenderest sympathies of our nature, and blind before the pattern of the sublimest virtue. Our Lord has thrown over his religion the beautiful illustration of his own life; and to be happy with him where he is, we must be on earth what We must be, like him, steadfast to the cause of truth and piety, however unsupported and opposed-we must manifest unshaken friendship to mankind, though requited by their enmity--and adore the goodness of God, notwithstanding clouds and darkness surround his throne.-Let us prepare for sufferings; and when we enter our garden of Gethsemane, let our heartfelt prayer be, Father, not as I will, but as thou wilt.