tion. What human artist could form or fringe the wing of the butterfly, or give life to the busy, buzzing fly which flits through the air; or give scent and colour to the flowers, and cover them with such fine gossamer down? A single blade of grass, or one quivering leaf of the beautiful foliage which throws its soft shade on my window, would baffle all his skill.

My senses, my faculties, my health, my sickness, my pains, my ease, my joys, my sorrows-everything within me and without me declare the being of a God, and his watchful care over me, even over the minute concerns of my life.

Without the knowledge of God, man is a guilty, depraved, ungrateful being. He is surrounded by innumerable benefits, yet discerns not the hand which bestows them. He is protected by day and guarded by night, yet acknowledges not a superintending providence.

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Corrupt are they, and have done abominable iniquity."

Man has no natural desire to be roused from the stupor of sin; he prefers the ways of sin to the ways of God; he loves darkness rather than light, because his deeds are evil."

"Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge?" Psalm xiv. 4.

No, they have no knowledge; their understanding is clouded, their senses are besotted, their hearts are hardened. Evil they know, but good they know not; and they would persuade themselves that there is no God, no retributive justice, no future day of vengeance. But there is a secret monitor within, which will not let the most obdurate sinner go calmly

on in the way of evil. "The wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt: there is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked." Isaiah lvii. 20, 21.

We may as well deny the whole of the divine revelation, as deny any part. And who are we to deny? From whence comes our understanding? In a moment may not that which we prize so highly become a blank?

Let us, then, earnestly pray for stedfast faith, and that we may be defended from those adversities of the soul which the delusions of Satan produce.

S. M.

IT has been well observed that if the 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th chapters of the epistle to the Hebrews had been expressly written against the mass, supposing it to have been then invented and palmed upon the church, they could not possibly have been more explicit or emphatic in their language. In fact we cannot doubt that the divine author had a double object in view— the denouncing the false doctrine then maintained by the Jewish teachers in the church, and the equally false doctrine which he foreknew would be introduced by the Romish teachers some centuries afterwards.-Essays on Romanism.

FEMALE BIOGRAPHY OF SCRIPTURE.

ABIGAIL.

No. I.

How rich are the children of God in the possession of the Bible! It is provided by a Father, and contains all that is needful for their training to that larger growth which will fit them for the full enjoyment of his presence, when they shall see and know even as they are known. It contains all that is needful for their spiritual sustenance and nourishment. There is in it milk for the babes-strong meat for the men: there is medicine for the sickly among them, support for the weak, direction for the inquiring, knowledge for the soul that is athirst, riches for the poor, wisdom for the ignorant, and a soul-satisfying portion for all. As subjects of that spiritual kingdom which Christ has set up on earth, it is their statute-book, containing the regulations which ensue from the relationships of each to the other, and of all to their common Head. It is their encyclopedia, to which they may refer for explanation of all the wonderful and mysterious operations in providence and in grace, which excite or perplex them. It is their spiritual geology, laying bare the firm foundations of their primitive faith, and shewing that in them originate the order and harmony of that divine system, by which the inexhaustible riches of eternity, and

the ever-freshening streams of grace, are all prepared for them. It is their book of Common Prayer, in which each, though he be not " eloquent," may find a mouth to make known his wants and his desires, and to which all can refer when question is asked of the reason of the hope that is in them. By means of this book they are thoroughly furnished unto all good works in this world, while, at the same time, they are fitted by the Divine Workman for a place in that temple now silently erecting in "Jerusalem which is above," but whose top-stone will be brought forth with the soundings of the silver trumpet of redemption, and the shoutings of everlasting joy. 2 Chron. xii. 6, 7.

Such are some of the purposes for which the bible was given; and woe unto them who, in the wifulness of a perverted understanding, would choke up those fountains of life, which the servants of God, by his command and inspiration, have opened in the wilderness of this world for weary thirsting souls. Gen. xxvi. 15. Woe unto them, above all others, who attempt to shake the confidence of the weak and ignorant in the divine authority of God's word, by specious objections, which harass even when they do not overcome, and which too often (Balaam-like) cast a stumbling-block in the way of many whose feet were travelling Zion-ward. And woe unto them likewise who, while they profess to honour the bible, as the revelation of God's will to man, assert with manifest inconsistency, that the truths it teaches are too crude and obscure to be discovered by the great mass of mankind, unless they be accompanied by the leaven of human tradition. In these days of wild fanaticism on the one hand, and frigid formalism

on the other, when every one "hath a doctrine, hath a tongue, hath a revelation," whither shall the perplexed and anxious inquirer turn, if he cannot go, "with all the desire of his soul," before the living oracles, and receive that illumination he seeks, in answer to his supplicating cry; if he cannot leave the differing and erring teachers of theology, and enter into the solitude of his chamber, to hear, as from the lips of Deity, in the stillness of a calm and contrite heart all that he so pants to know? Oh, wondrous act of providential mercy, which has preserved these leaves of wisdom from the damp of mouldering ages, from the exterminating sword of conquest, from the fierce fire of persecution, and from the canker of human addition, to be at length syllabled by every nation under heaven, that all the children of Adam may drink of the unpolluted fountain of truth itself, and not of those troubled streams, which grievous wolves' have rendered turbid, that they may find a pretext for devouring the flock.

Hold fast, ye who desire to choose "that good part which shall not be taken away from yon," the pure word of God. Bind it upon your hearts, tie it about your necks (Prov. vi. 21), turn aside from the noise and strife of the world to hold converse with it. Remember who has said, The holy scriptures are able to make you wise unto salvation through faith in Christ Jesus: call no man master on earth, and be not driven about by every wind of doctrine. "For the commandment is a lamp, and the law is light; when thou goest it shall lead thee, when thou sleepest it shall keep thee, and when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee."