The skies may put on mourning for their God,
And earth heap ashes on her head; but who

Shall keep the sun back when he thinks to rise?

Where is the chain shall bind him? Where the cell

Shall hold him? Hell he would burn down to embers,

And would lift up the world with a lever of light
Out of his way: yet, know ye, 'twere thrice less

To do thrice this, than keep the soul from God.

Many of the most expressive sentences in the Bible are monosyllabic. A few are subjoined, selected at random :—

And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good.-Gen. I.

At her feet he bowed, he fell, he lay down: at her feet he bowed, he fell: where he bowed, there he fell down dead.-Judges V.

O Lord my God, I cried unto thee, and thou hast healed me. O Lord, thou hast brought up my soul from the grave: thou hast kept me alive, that I should not go down to the pit. Sing unto the Lord, O ye saints of his, and give thanks.-Psalm XXX.

From the second to the eighth verses, inclusive, of the third chapter of Ecclesiastes, there are one hundred and forty-two words, of which one hundred and thirty-three are monosyllables.

And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou knowest.-Ezek. XXXVII.

Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. And if any man will sue thee at the law and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also.-Matth. V.

....

But when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth.-Matth. VI.

The first fourteen verses of the well-known opening chapter of the Gospel of St. John contain two hundred and twentynine words, of which two hundred and one are monosyllables. The fifteen verses from the ninth to the twenty-third of the seventeenth chapter contain three hundred and fifty-three words, of which three hundred and eleven are of one syllable, and several others are pronounced as one syllable.

And he kneeled down, and cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And when he had said this, he fell asleep.-Acts VII. Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.-1 Thess. V.

For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him.-2 Tim. II.

I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.-2 Tim. III.

For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand? -Rev. VI.

And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day; for there shall be no night there.-Rev. XXI.

....

And there shall be no more curse; but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and his servants shall serve him: and they shall see his face. If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book; and if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.-Rev. XXII.

The Bible.

God's cabinet of revealed counsel 'tis,
Where weal and woe are ordered so

That every man may know which shall be his;
Unless his own mistake false application make.

It is the index to eternity.

He cannot miss of endless bliss,

That takes this chart to steer by,

Nor can he be mistook, that speaketh by this book.

It is the book of God. What if I should

Say, God of books, let him that looks

Angry at that expression, as too bold,

His thoughts in silence smother, till he find such another.

ACCURACY OF THE BIBLE.

ONE of the most remarkable results of modern research is the confirmation of the accuracy of the historical books of the Old Testament. The ruins of Babylon and Nineveh shed a light on those books which no skepticism can invalidate. What surprises us most is their marvellous accuracy in minute details, which are now substantiated by recent discoveries. The fact seems to be that when writing was laboriously performed on

stone, men had an almost superstitious conscientiousness in making their records true, and had not learned the modern indifference to truth which our facile modes of communicating thought have encouraged. A statement to be chiselled on rock must be correct; a statement which can be written in five minutes is likely to embody only first impressions, which may be amended in five minutes thereafter. Hence it comes to pass that we know more exactly many things which took place in the wars between Sennacherib and Hezekiah, than we know what is the precise truth with regard to some of the occurrences in the battle of Bunker's Hill. Sir Henry Rawlinson, speaking of his researches in Babylon, states that the name and situation of every town of note in ancient Assyria, mentioned in the Bible can be substantiated by the ruins of that city. The visit of the Queen of Sheba to Solomon is perfectly verified. The prosecution of the researches will be regarded with great interest as corroborating the truth of Scripture.

An astonishing feature of the word of God is, notwithstanding the time at which its compositions were written, and the multitude of the topics to which it alludes, there is not one physical error, not one assertion or allusion disproved by the progress of modern science. None of those mistakes which the science of each succeeding age discovered in the books preceding; above all, none of those absurdities which modern astronomy indicates in such great numbers in the writings of the ancients, in their sacred codes, in their philosophy, and even in the finest pages of the fathers of the Church,—not one of these errors is to be found in any of our sacred books. Nothing there will ever contradict that which, after so many ages, the investigations of the learned world have been able to reveal to us on the state of our globe, or on that of the heavens. Peruse with care the Scriptures from one end to the other, to find such blemishes, and, whilst you apply yourselves to this examination, remember that it is a book which speaks of every thing, which describes nature, which recites its creation, which tells us of the water, of the atmosphere, of the mountains, of the

animals, and of the plants. It is a book which teaches us the first revolutions of the world, and which also foretells its last. It recounts them in the circumstantial language of history, it extols them in the sublimest strains of poetry, and it chants them in the charms of glowing song. It is a book which is full of Oriental rapture, elevation, variety, and boldness. It is a book which speaks of the heavenly and invisible world, whilst it also speaks of the earth and things visible. It is a book which nearly fifty writers, of every degree of cultivation, of every state, of every condition, and living through the course of fifteen hundred years, have concurred to make. It is a book which was written in the centre of Asia, in the sands of Arabia, in the deserts of Judea, in the court of the Temple of the Jews, in the music-schools of the prophets of Bethel and Jericho, in the sumptuous palaces of Babylon, and on the idolatrous banks of Chebar; and finally, in the centre of Western civilization, in the midst of the Jews and of their ignorance, in the midst of polytheism and its sad philosophy. It is a book whose first. writer had been forty years a pupil of the magicians of Egypt, in whose opinion the sun, the stars, and elements were endowed with intelligence, reacted on the elements, and governed the world by a perpetual illuvium. It is a book whose first writer preceded, by more than nine hundred years, the most ancient philosophers of ancient Greece and Asia,-the Thaleses, and the Pythagorases, the Zalucuses, the Xenophons, and the Confuciuses. It is a book which carries its narrations even to the hierarchies of angels-even to the most distant epochs of the future, and the glorious scenes of the last day. Well: search among its fifty authors, search among its sixty-six books, its eleven hundred and eighty-nine chapters, and its thirty-one thousand, one hundred and seventy-three verses; search for only one of those thousand errors which the ancients and moderns have committed in speaking of the heavens or of the earth-of their revolutions, of their elements; search -but you will find none.

THE TESTIMONY OF LEARNED MEN.

SIR WILLIAM JONES' opinion of the Bible was written on the last leaf of one belonging to him, in these terms :—“I have regularly and attentively read these Holy Scriptures, and am of opinion that this volume, independently of its Divine origin, contains more sublimity and beauty, more pure morality, more important history and finer strains of poetry and eloquence, than can be collected from all other books, in whatever age or language they may have been composed."

ROUSSEAU says, "This Divine Book, the only one which is indispensable to the Christian, need only be read with reflection to inspire love for its author, and the most ardent desire to obey its precepts. Never did virtue speak so sweet a language; never was the most profound wisdom expressed with so much energy and simplicity. No one can arise from its perusal without feeling himself better than he was before."

WILBERFORCE, in his dying hour, said to a friend, "Read the Bible. Let no religious book take its place. Through all my perplexities and distresses, I never read any other book, and I never knew the want of any other. It has been my hourly study; and all my knowledge of the doctrines, and all my acquaintance with the experience and realities, of religion, have been derived from the Bible only. I think religious people do not read the Bible enough. Books about religion may be useful enough, but they will not do instead of the simple truth of the Bible."

LORD BOLINGBROKE declared that "the Gospel is, in all cases, one continued lesson of the strictest morality, of justice, of benevolence, and of universal charity."

Similar testimony has been accorded in the strongest terms by LOCKE, NEWTON, BOYLE, SELDEN, SALMASIUS, SIR WALTER SCOTT, and numberless others.

DANIEL WEBSTER, having been commended for his eloquence on a memorable occasion, replied, "If any thing I have ever said or written deserves the feeblest encomiums of my fellow