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THE JUDGMENTS OF GOD.

pentance, Is their conduct really an honest index of their deliberate convictions in this matter? Do they in fact believe, that there are some in the Christian vessel who are to go to heaven as passengers, while others are to have all the toil and trouble of bringing the ship into port? Do they regard the Church as a joint-stock concern, in the labours and profits of which, as a whole, every member of it is hereafter to share, and share alike? They know as well as we can tell them, that such views are utterly at war with the letter and spirit of the gospel.

The sad and most frequent conclusion at which we arrive is, that these self-constituted exempts are those who are deceiving themselves with a name to live, while they are dead-who have the form of godliness, but are destitute of the power thereof. For our hope, God indeed has not revealed how little grace in the soul may be consistent with final salvation. But much more for our fears has he told us that MANY, who all their life long counted upon heaven, will discover, when it is too late to remedy their mistake, that hell is to be their everlasting portion. Perhaps no sight would so much surprise us in that world of despair, as the number of false professors who are now "suffering the vengeance of eternal fire."-N. Y. Presbyterian.

THE JUDGMENTS OF GOD.

BY THE REV. DR ALEXANDER, PRINCETON.

THE word judgment is used in the Sacred Scriptures in various senses, but we now employ the term to signify those providential dispensations of God by which men are visited for their sins, either in the way of punishment or chastisement. The difference between punishment and chastisement is, that in the first case the judgments inflicted are really the execution, in part, of the penalty of the law of God, the other are such as are inflicted by a loving Father for the correction and amendment of his children. Often, however, the same terms are applied indiscriminately to both kinds of dispensations.

The ideas of many persons, and those are found not merely among the ignorant and unlearned, are very erroneous on the subject of the judgments of God. They entertain the opinion, that nothing which comes to pass in the ordinary course of nature, the cause of which we can trace, is to be considered of the nature of a judgment of God. Some time towards the close of the last century, or the commencement of the present, a reverend and learned professor in a university published a small system of logic, intended to be studied by the under graduates. The book was respectable as a very brief compend; but in giving an illustration of false reasoning, he observed that many persons considered the yellow fever as a judgment of God, sent upon us on account of the sins of the people; whereas, the reverend author remarked (as though it were conclusive), that the yellow fever was produced by natural causes which could be ascertained. According to the principle involved in this remark, nothing can be properly considered a judgment of God which can be traced to a natural cause. And, consequently, since miracles have ceased, there have been no judgments of God in the history of the world. This is to exclude the Governor of the universe from the

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world with a witness. Few would be willing to adopt this conclusion who have any faith in God and his providence. Others suppose, that remarkable afflictions, out of the common course of experience, be reckoned judgments, but not those common afflictions which befall men every day. Both these classes of error arise from an inadequate conception of the extent of divine providence; and with many the error is rather practical than theoretical. If the question were proposed to them, Does the providence of God extend to all events, small as well as great? they would readily answer in the affirmative; but notwithstanding this, they never think of referring common events to the Providence of God; and therefore are not affected with a sense of his goodness in their prosperity, nor humbled to a penitent confession of their sins in adversity. It is true, some maintain a general while they deny a particular providence; they allow God to have some hand in the revolution of empires and downfal of thrones; but not in the minute and trivial affairs of men. But the fact is, that in the order of events, in the history of the world, there is an indissoluble concatenation of the great with the small; the revolution of a kingdom may depend upon a single word-yea, a single volition. A general providence cannot be maintained, whilst a universal and particular providence is denied. The doctrine of the Bible is most decisive and clear on this subject. According to our Lord, providence extends to the life and death of the smallest animals-yea more, to the perishing of a single hair of our heads. The whole history of the Old Testament is a history of a particular providence, in which the care of God extends to all events, of every kind, but in such a way as not to interfere with the free agency of men. And the whole book of prophecy supposes the truth of a providence which extends to all events, and even to all the free actions of men.

The notion that events brought about by natural and known causes are not judgments, is at war with most of the denunciations of God's vengeance against sinners, in the Old Testament. God's most common judgments on sinful nations are war, famine, pestilence, and destructive animals-destructive to human life, or to the productions of the earth intended for the sustenance of man. These judgments are not miraculous, but natural causes of punishment. And the whole catalogue of judgments, threatened in the 28th chapter of Deuteronomy, are afflictions pro duced by natural causes. The most common insects are often made the instruments of inflicting judgments on a rebellious people. The locust, the grasshopper, the palmer-worm, and the caterpillar, are among the executioners of the Divine judgments; as well as the inanimate elements, the hail, the lightning, and the inundation of waters. Thus it is said, "He gave also their increase unto the caterpillar, and their labour unto the locust. He destroyed their vines with hail, and their sycamoretrees with frost. He gave up also their cattle to the hail, and their flocks to hot thunderbolts."(Ps. lxxviii. 48.) Again, in the prophecy of Joel, we read, "Tell your children of it, and let your

children tell their children, and their children another generation. That which the palmer-worm hath left hath the locust eaten, and that which the locust hath left hath the canker-worm eaten, and that which the canker-worm hath left hath the caterpillar eaten."

Among the many curses denounced by Moses against the Israelites, in case of disobedience to the commands of God, were grievous diseases of various kinds. "The Lord shall smite thee with consumption, and with fever, and with inflammation, and with an extreme burning." "The Lord shall smite thee in the knees, and in the legs with a sore botch that cannot be healed, from the sole of thy foot unto the top of thy head." "And the Lord will make thy plagues wonderful, and the plagues of thy seed, even great plagues and of long continuance. Moreover he will bring upon thee all the diseases of Egypt, which thou wert afraid of, and they shall cleave unto thee. Also EVERY SICKNESS AND EVERY PLAGUE, which is not written in the book, that is the book of this law, them will the Lord bring upon thee, until thou be destroyed."

The CHOLERA, whence is it, and why has it come? The infidel will answer, it is a matter of chance; the rationalist will ascribe it to nature, and deny that Providence has any thing to do with it; but the believer will acknowledge the hand of God in this sore judgment which is now desolating our land; and he will be disposed to humble himself, and to call the people around him, not to a mere formal observation of a day of fasting, but to sincere and deep repentance. He will acknowledge that for this desolating judgment there must be a cause a moral cause. God has been provoked by the wickedness of this people, and by the dishonour cast upon his name by

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I almost think I never shall,
For often in my sleep

I dream that I am dying:
My sister, do not weep.

It is a joyful thing to die;

For though this world is fair, I see a lovelier in my dreams, And I fancy I am there.

I fancy I am taken there
As soon as I have died;

And I roam through all the pleasant place,
With an angel by my side.

To that bright world I long to go,
I would not linger here,
But for my gentle mother's sake,
And your's, my sister dear.

And when I read my book to her, Or when I play with you,

I quite forget that glorious land, And the blessed angel too.

But oft when I am weary

Of my books and of my play, Those pleasant dreams come back again, And steal my heart away.

And I wish that you, sweet sister,

And my mother dear and I,
Could shut our eyes upon this world,
And all together die."

Then spake his fair-haired sister,

In tones serene and low:"Oh! if heaven is such a pleasant place, Dear brother, let us go.

Our mother wept when father died

Till her bright eyes were dim, And I know she longs to go to heaven,

That she may be with him."

"So let us all together go,"

The thoughtful boy replied; "Ah! no, we cannot go to heaven, Until that we have died.

And sister we must be content
Upon this earth to stay,

Till the blessed Saviour Jesus Christ
Shall call our souls away."

Before the next year's roses came,

That gentle call was given,

And the mother and her two sweet babes Were all of them in heaven.

THEY WERE LEAVING ME!

Of many a young inquirer after salvation it has been asked," And what has disturbed the sinful peace of your mind?" The reply has been, "I saw my

THE QUESTION RETURNED.

young friends and associates going to Christ and leaving me." They could not be left.

There is great awakening power in the fact here announced. We wonder not that it penetrates the heart with a loud and startling voice. For:

1st, By conversion the Christian leaves sinners. He leaves the spot he himself once occupied. He has abandoned the principles which governed himhas given up the pleasures that once captivated him. He renounces the sins that once had dominion-over him. And, leaving all these, he leaves all who occupy such ground. He no longer has harmony of spirit with them. He has begun to serve a different master. The parties-once in such communion of character and spirit-are now, in their respective moral tastes and feelings, totally unlike. The sinner

is left.

2d, By every step in growth in grace does the Christian leave the sinner. There is a growth in sin as really as in grace. And that process goes on in every impenitent man. He treads, with a firmer step and a stronger will, the path of disobedience. Earth has more and more power, and the great concerns of religion less and less. He is receding farther and farther from all prospects of reconciliation to God, and descending into a state of more fixed and decided alienation from God.

But the young convert is making progress in precisely the opposite direction. He is advancing farther and farther into that goodly land, the spiritual kingdom of God. The flowers become more and more beautiful and fragrant, and the fruits more refreshing and nourishing. Religious principle grows stronger. Remaining sinful corruptions are losing their power. He is receding farther and farther from the kingdom of darkness, and knowing more and more of the power and glory of the kingdom of God. And he is thus leaving farther and farther behind him, all who have not been willing to enter with him into the service of God. And the separation is the more rapid and decisive, because neither saint nor sinner hold the same moral position, but are making progress in opposite directions. The history of each is the history, in moral character, of a greater and greater alienation from each other.

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3d, By a most solemn and decisive act of the divine government will Christians take their leave of sinners. Though separate, now heaven-wide in their moral tastes and feelings, yet personal separation has not yet occurred. They grow together until the harvest." But at the great separation day, which the judgment will bring, what numbers will use, with terrible anguish, the language of the young inquirer, My friends are leaving me!" Every Christian friend will leave-must leave. The utter contrast of moral character compels the separation as much as the adorable and awful justice of God.

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My Christian friends are leaving me." They leave me to what? To the kind of life I love -not what I approve; for keenly, at times, does my conscience condemn my course-yet to the kind of life I love. I love no higher life. I am being left not to the kind of life which all holy beings in the universe love-all the pure, and the good, and the happy; but to the kind of life that I, in spite of my own better judgment, love.

They are leaving me to myself. They would have me break away from my miserable selfishness, and love the glorious Saviour they love, and interest myself in the infinitely glorious realities of eternity. They have taken that course; but as my soul has no relish for it, they are leaving me to be wrapped up in my own selfishness, and to the dominion of these passions, whose indulgence shuts out all that is good and glorious in the universe.

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They are leaving me-to what companions? Those who like me have no God-no sympathy in the employments or enjoyments of the holy universe-those who offer no prayer, and give no praise, who neither love, honour, nor obey the author of all their mercies, who are, therefore, essentially like to God's great enemy, Satan, and who, by that likeness, compel eternal justice to bind them together in the same everlasting doom. And I, unchanged, must go with them.-Pascal.

THE QUESTION RETURNED.

[THE following anecdote was related in London, at the late anniversary of the London Missionary Society, by Rev. A. Sutton, missionary of the Orissa Mission.]

A friend of mine some time ago was travelling in the wilds of Orissa. As he pursued his way he came in sight of an officer's tent. The officer, seeing he was a European, invited him to dinner. He accepted the invitation, and after the repast the officer said, "Mr Wilkinson, you have come out here to try and convert the Hindus?" "Yes, that is my object," answered my friend. "And a pretty wild-goose chase," rejoined the officer, "you will make of it.

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You don't know these fellows so well as I do." "Oh, sir, I think I myself know something about them already!" "Ah! but you have not had to deal with them as I have. If you had been accustomed to the command of a company of Sepoys, you would soon find out their duplicity and faithlessness." Mr Wilkinson assured him he had made some converts, whose earnestness and sincerity were beyond all question or suspicion. "Oh!" said the officer, "“I should like to examine them." "Your wish can soon be gratified, for here is one of them coming up Gunga," continued Mr Wilkinson, the avenue. addressing the native who entered, "here is a gentleman who wishes to examine you as to your Christianity." "What right has he to examine me?" inquired Gunga; " and does he mean to do so in anger or in ridicule?" "So," said the officer you have turned Christian ?" "Yes." "How did you get your living before you turned Christian?" Gunga was astonished. His pride also was hurt. "I am a Brahman," said he, throwing back his robe over his shoulders and exhibiting a mark that attested that fact. He could not conceive how such a question could be asked of him, raising so obvious an appearance to his disparagement. The officer, somewhat abashed, asked how he had felt before he became a

Christian, and he replied, "I feel that I myself, like all my countrymen, was in miserable darkness. I longed for the truth, but I could not find it. At length I heard that the light of truth was to be found on the Padre side, and thither I instantly repaired to light my own taper at the source. I found what I sought for, and I carried my candle to the bazars and public places, that I might communicate the same light to others." As he went on, the officer admitted to Mr Wilkinson, that this was indeed something which he had not expected to hear. A tear stood in his eye as he spoke. He had found in a Hindu a true believer; and he was preparing to retire, to indulge in his own meditations, when

Gunga said, "I should like now to examine you. Are you a Christian? Are you indeed a Christian?" This was an arrow to the officer's heart, and this question, asked in Christian simplicity, became the means of his conversion.

FOR MINISTERS.

FLIGHTS OF RHETORIC.

So far as I ever observed God's dealings with my soul, the flights of preachers sometimes entertained me; but it was Scripture expressions which did penetrate my heart, and that in a way peculiar to themselves.-J. Brown, of Haddington.

Do not preach so much to please as to profit.

Choose rather to discover men's sins, than to show your own eloquence. That is the best looking-glass, not which is most gilded, but which shows the truest face. Thomas Watson.

"Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth. And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech, or of wis. dom, declaring unto you the testimony of God."

NOT DOING ANY GOOD.

You say you do no good by preaching. This is talking weakly; I had almost used a harder word. Should you not be chided for it ?-Orton.

to one.

"Why do you leave off preaching?" said Latimer "Because I do no good," was the reply. "That, brother," said the bishop, "is a naughty, very naughty reason."

"My word shall not return unto me void," saith the Lord," but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I send it." It may be demanded, What must be done, when the labours of our calling are in vain? Answer: We must follow the command and calling of God, whether we have good success or no, and whatever comes of it. Though Paul feared his labour was in vain, yet still he laboured. Thus to do, whatever follows, is true wisdom, and the fear of God.- William Perkins.

"We are unto God a sweet savour of Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that perish."

While I oversee the Church, Christ oversees me.Polycarp.

"Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.

"

I would rather serve Christ for nothing, than gain all the kingdoms of the world as the fruit of any sin, idleness not excepted.-Anon.

"If the iron be blunt, then must he put to the more strength."

A quiet application to those duties which are immediately necessary, though neither easy nor honourable, is of much more value than a long train of activity and zeal in a sphere of action sweetened by applause.-Old Author.

If one won't, another will.-Matthew Henry. God, and eternity, and the Bible, are with you, and what though the men of the world be against you? -Chalmers.

A minister has no ground to hope for fruit from his exertions, until in himself he has no hope-until he has learnt to put no faith in the point and energy of sentences-until he feel that a man may be mighty to compel the attention, and mighty to regale the imagination, and mighty to silence the gainsayers, and yet not mighty to the pulling down of strongholds.-16.

I would not go out of my way to distrust God's faithfulness; but neither will I go out of the way to put his faithfulness to the trial.—Ib.

AGED MINISTERS.

Like Samson in his old age, I continually forget that I am not what I once was. But when I take hold of the strength of God, I wonder at results.-Anon. O Lord! help an old man.-Thomas.

AN INDIAN'S GIFT TO CHRIST.

IN a portion of the Southern territory from which the red man has now been driven, I once attended a protracted meeting held in the wild forest. The theme on which the preacher dwelt, and which he illustrated with surpassing beauty and grandeur, was "Christ and him crucified." He spoke of the good Shepherd who came into the world to seek and to save the lost. He told how this Saviour met the rude buffetings of the heartless soldiers. He drew a picture of Gethsemane and the unbefriended stranger who wept there. He pointed to Him as he hung bleeding upon the cross.

The congregation wept. Soon there was a slight movement in the assembly, and a tall son of the forest, with tears on his red cheeks, approached the pulpit and said, “Did Jesus die for me-die for poor Indian? Me have no lands to give to Jesus, the white man take them away; me give him my dog and my rifle." The minister told him Jesus could not accept those gifts. "Me give Jesus my dog, my rifle, and my blanket; poor Indian, he got no more to give-he give Jesus all." The minister replied that Christ could not accept them. The poor, ignorant, but generous child of the forest bent his head in sorrow and meditated. He raised his noble brow once more, and fixed his eye on the preacher, while he sobbed out, " Here is poor Indian, will Jesus kave him?" A thrill of unutterable joy ran through the: souls of minister and people, as this fierce son of the wilderness now sat, in his right mind, at the feet of Jesus. The Spirit had done his work, and he who had been so poor received the earnest of the inheritance.

Fragments.

Look rather to God's end in afflicting than at the measure and degree of thy afflictions.

Seek the Lord and his face continually; let this be the business of your life and strength; and let all things be subservient and in order to this. You cannot find nor behold the face of God but in Christ;" therefore labour to know God in Christ-which the Scripture makes the sum of all, even life eternal.— Cromwell.

The promises are our legacies bequeathed to us in the will of our Father, and we are to claim them as we stand in need of any of them.-Alleine.

That course of life which is entered upon without principle, and conducted without a plan, cannot but be unproductive of either virtue, happiness, or ho nour.-Olin.

This great mart, the world, is full of distracted men, hurrying from place to place, to barter their souls for less, far less than nothing.—Griffin.

A false hope, fortified by a false profession, is the most effectual battery against the artillery of the gospel.-16.

THE CHRISTIAN TREASURY.

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THE RELIGION OF WORKS.

A RELIGION whose leading idea is to atone for the sins of the soul by the sufferings of the body is as old as human nature. There are two degrees of it. The highest degree is where the religionists devote themselves to a life of entire solitude and seclusion, and make penance, under various forms of self-denial and suffering, the constant rule of life. These are the saints. The second degree is that which is adapted to human life in general. Here the pursuits of men, whether of business or pleasure, are not laid aside; but only certain seasons are devoted to works of penance. Here the world and sin have one portion of life; and then hours and days of suffering, gifts to religious houses and institutions, self-humiliation, the observance of religious rites, and pilgrimages, settle the soul's account with heaven. The invention of a purgatory in another world enables the religionist to complete there the amount of suffering which he may have failed to pay here.

There is no trace of this religion to be found in the Bible. It is the religion neither of the Old nor of the New Testament. The Old Testament announces the Divine law, and in all its teachings, its examples, its moral influences, holds up the worship of the true God in spirit and in truth, and tends to form a character of truth and integrity. There was no asceticism, no penance, no reverence of saints and relics, no pilgrimages, among the Jews. Says the prophet Micah, "He hath shown thee, O man! what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to love mercy, to do justly, and to walk humbly with thy God?" This is the spirit of the religion of the Old Testament. The religious ceremonies of the Jews were impressive and rational. Repentance, humiliation, and prayer, and trust in God, were inculcated. The sacrifices were joyful feasts, and solemn types of a prospective atonement. But nowhere are religious observances, bodily sufferings, or any mere works of asceticism and devotion held up as making expiation for the sins of the soul. On the contrary, the Old Testament is full of passages reprobating any substitution of outward ceremonies for spiritual affections. Samuel tells Saul that the Lord prefers obedience to sacrifice. David affirms that the sacrifices acceptable to God are a broken spirit and a contrite heart. Isaiah represents a true fast to be not merely bowing down the head as

a bulrush, but to unbind the heavy burdens, to let the oppressed go free, and to feed the hungry.

The Old Testament was introductory to the New. Here the law of God, a spiritual worship, truth and righteousness, come forth in brighter effulgence. The ceremonial and the sacrifices are now laid aside, because their end is answered, and the great sacrifice of the Messiah abrogates all typical sacrifices. Jesus Christ was no ascetic. He ate, drank, and lived as other men, so that he was reproached as a "gluttonous man, a wine-bibber, a friend of publicans and sinners." His apostles were no ascetics. They adopted no peculiar costume, manners, or mode of life. The whole effort of Christ and his apostles was to inculcate and exemplify a life of faith, benevolence, and holiness. To reconcile man to God, to make man a good and happy being, was the end of their labours. Hence the religion of the Bible is a most cheerful and happy religion. It calls for repentance, and not penance-for faith, and not ceremonial observances for works of love, and not works of bodily mortification.

The question respecting faith and works is perfectly clear in the gospel. The works that justify in the ascetic sense are works of penance and ceremony-mere ritual works. The faith which justifies in the gospel sense is a trust which binds the soul to Christ and God in supreme love and obedience, and leads to all the graces of a holy character, and all the works of a benevolent and upright life. There is nothing which the gospel requires us to lay aside but sin, and this it enables us to do by the power of the Holy Spirit. But in delivering us from sin, it delivers us from guilt, fear, and misery, and makes us completely happy. Asceticism says, " Be miserable on earth and in purgatory, that you may be happy in heaven." The gospel says, "Come unto me all ye that labour, and are heavy laden, and I will give It bids us receive the love and you rest." spirit of heaven at once into our souls, and thus to begin our heaven upon earth.

Asceticism and penance set aside the law of God, and create an entirely new class of sins. Certain rules are laid down by the church, 80 called; to observe these rules is religion-to violate them is sin. Hence it is undeniable that the miserable subjects of Romish supersti

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