SECOND CAUSES; OR, UP AND BE DOING. CHAPTER I. weakness of his faith in God, to come far short of the blessings that are within his grasp, if he would only reach high enough to seize them. They are carried away by a habit of calculating probabilities, which, however needful in some cases, is in many others nothing else than a questioning of God's power and love. How extensively applicable is the rebuke, "Ye receive not, because ye ask not." "HAVE FAITH IN GOD," was our Lord's reply to Peter's wondering exclamation, on In this day of Christian enterprise, and beholding the withered fig-tree. The con- of Christian struggle, it is incredible to text shows that the principle thus incul- what an extent the Lord's people are parcated is not the faith which justifies a sin-alyzed by this short-coming of their faith. ner, but that of which Paul speaks to the Corinthians-"Though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing." (1 Cor. xiii. 2.) This, in its highest manifestation, is a miracle-working power; but as no miraculous gifts are at present seen needful for the church, that power is withheld; and And thus, indeed, it has been, even from the faith to be continually exercised by of old time; for Asa, king of Judah, was a those who have already with the heart be- godly man. It is twice testified concernlieved unto righteousness, and with the lip ing him, that he did that which was right made confession unto salvation, is a trust- in the sight of the Lord; and also that ing, abiding, and active reliance, that takes | his heart was perfect with the Lord all his hold on the faithfulness of God, and viewing the whole creation, material and moral, intellectual and spiritual, as a vast machine, framed and directed by Him, recognises one almighty, overruling hand, and appeals to it alone. The common phrase, "second causes," may be allowable; but we like it not, nor that which it is generally taken to express. Means are appointed to educe certain effects; but the one sole cause of all things is the will of God-we, of course, except from this wicked works, of which we can but say, "an enemy hath done it," the Lord not interposing to prevent, but for some wise purpose permitting the evil. Man, however, seeking temporal good for himself, or desiring to shun calamity, is prone to fix his eye on what he denominates second causes, and so, through the days. He had faith to the end to save his soul, but not faith to save his life.-Early in his reign he was most trusting; and his appeal to the Lord for help against the army of Ethiopia is beautiful—"Lord, it is nothing with thee to help, whether with many, or with them that have no power: help us, O Lord our God, for we rest on thee, and in thy name we go against this multitude. O Lord, thou art our God; let not man prevail against thee." The event was according to his faith-"So the Lord smote the Ethiopians before Asa, and before Judah; and the Ethiopians fled." That little word so is very expressive, connecting the act of man's faith with the act of God's power. Asa publicly declared his undivided, unqualified reliance on the Lord's sovereign mercy and might, so the Lord gloriously mani fested both on his behalf, crowning him | against whom he was hired, was a brother with victory, and his land with peace. But after thirty-five years of a most prosperous reign, showing his faith by works, and reaping an abundant recompense, Asa betook himself to second causes. He did not revolt from the Lord, he did not rebuild the idol altars that his holy zeal had cast down, nor slacken his devotion to God's cause, nor turn away his heart from the ways of obedience; but he calculated on the advantages to be gained by securing the alliance of the king of Syria, already leagued with Baasha, king of Israel; so he took of the gold and silver stored up in the Lord's house, and also in his own palace, and with it he bribed Benhadad to betray his ally, and to combine with him in turning the war against his rival; so that they made excursions into the territories of Israel, and compelled Baasha to act on the defensive. In the sight of man, this might appear a shrewd, judicious movement, and the successes that crowned their enterprise seemed to justify it; but it was very evil in the Lord's sight, as the message sent by Hanani proved-"Because thou hast relied on the king of Syria, and not relied on the Lord thy God, therefore is the host of the king of Syria escaped out of thine hand. Were not the Ethiopians and the Lubims a huge host, with very many chariots and horsemen? yet, because thou didst rely on the Lord, he delivered them into thine hand. For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect towards him. Herein thou hast done foolishly; therefore from henceforth thou shalt have wars." Few things try the temper of a good man like having his faith in God's providential mercy questioned, even when it has signally failed.-Asa's conscience must have borne witness to his inconsistency, and he fell into a rage with the seer, punishing him for delivering the Lord's message faithfully, and venting yet farther his irritation by oppressing some of his unoffending subjects. But it may be said, this was not a case of calculating policy-it was a grave offence; because Ben-hadad, the Syrian, was an alien alike to the commonwealth of Israel and to the true faith, while Baasha, of the seed of Jacob, of the house of Issachar; and though he had obtained the throne by treason, and secured it by bloodshed, and brought himself under a curse by his evil deeds, still Asa was not justified in calling on an idolatrous Gentile to execute vengeance upon him; much less to slaughter the tribes over whom he ruled. Admitting all this, we have further proof that Asa offended, and ultimately lost his life, by ceasing to manifest that faith in God which had shone out so beautifully in his earlier days. He became diseased in his feet, and instead of doing as Paul did under some visitation in the flesh, and as he had himself done when the Ethiopians came against him-instead of proclaiming a simple dependence on the Lord, and looking to him for deliverance, Asa sought to the physicians, and died. The temple of God was then in Jerusalem; there the priests, the Levites, ministered, according to the institution of the Most High; and every possible encouragement had been given to Asa to approach the Lord, with whatsoever supplication he had to make. Hezekiah understood his privileges better; for when Sennacherib's menacing letter was received, he went straight to the house of the Lord, opened it before him, placed his cause in his hands, and was delivered. When, under a chastening visitation, he lay sick on his bed, unable to move from it, he prayed there, and without seeking help of man, rested his soul on the power and the love of God. The consequence was, that the Lord became his physician, prescribed an application for his sore, and healed him. The contrast is very striking: Hezekiah, with his lump of boiled figs, laid on by the prophet's direction, anticipating his thanksgiving service in the house of the Lord; and Asa, with a circle of court physicians, who added to their drugs charms and incantations, but all whose skill, drawn forth by the prospect of such rewards as kingly gratitude would confer, availed nothing to alleviate his pain; and he died. Now it is by no means to be inferred that we would have the believer seek a miraculous cure for his bodily ailments, to the exclusion of means which are evidently ordained of God. But conscience This, then, is the great object of our election, and of our continuance in mortal life: to show forth the praises of Him who hath called us out of darkness into marvellous light, we must glorify Him in our bodies, and in our spirits: with the last, He only can hold direct communion; but the first term includes all that we do and say-all that we leave undone and unsaid whispers, that in such cases we do lay a | says, "This people have 1 formed for myvery unjustifiable stress on what man can self, and they shall show forth my praise." do, acting on the same plan, if not from the same principle with the worldly, who do not even pretend to look beyond the skill of their professional helper. To give an ignorant or inexperienced person authority to tamper with the health of our bodies, under a notion that God will overrule all to our benefit, is presumptuous folly better leave the case to the Great Physician alone: but while fully acquies--not only in the view of our fellow morcing in the propriety of seeking out such remedies as experience has shown to be best adapted to the disease, we would inquire whether there is not a conscious leaning on the fame of a noted proficient in the healing art; a secret assurance that, if any thing can be done, he will do it; a limiting of the Lord's power, or a pre-judging of his will, as to the channel through which the mercy shall be conveyed. This evil lies so very deep in the heart, and is so peculiarly between the individual and his Lord, that in no case may any presume to judge his brother. To judge ourselves is the point; and if the hint here given lead to but one instance of deeper self-examination, redounding to the greater glory of God in the secret experience of one of his dear children, it will not have been given in vain. It is said of Israel, "This people have I formed for myself and they shall show forth my praise." They did so, during many ages of prosperous exaltation over all the nations of the earth: they do so, in this the time of their protracted affliction, witnessing that though judgment is the Lord's strange work, still as to his promises, so to his threatenings, he is faithful. They shall do so when, the daybeam of his mercy breaking again on their long night of affliction, they rejoice in the fulness of his salvation, and he is glorified in them among the Gentiles. But what Israel after the flesh at present put from them, a spiritual people are permitted to enjoy, through a participation in the faith of Abraham; and those who are newcreated by the power of the Holy Ghost, brought from the bondage of sin, and who are now proceeding to take possession of a heavenly inheritance, the words are likewise applicable. Of his believing church, whether Jew or Gentile, the Lord Jesus tals, but, in that of a multitude of beings who are not mortal, yet ever surround us; ministering spirits, employed on an embassy of mercy, and wicked spirits lying in wait to tempt and to destroy. Of this invisible host we think too little; we generally suppose that what is not perceptible to man, is known to the Lord alone; but this is an error, and perhaps a little consideration of the matter may quicken our perception of the wide range which this duty of outwardly glorifying God embraces. The man who in his family reads the Bible, and devoutly prays, and shapes his public life according to its precepts, so far glorifies God in his body, and shines as a light before his brethren and the world. If the same man, though a believer, so far yields to indolence, carelessness, or any other hinderance, as occasionally to neglect the private study of God's word, to omit, curtail, or with outward irreverence of gesture and deportment to go through his devotions in his own chamber, so far as the external act is concerned, he is dishonouring the Lord, and laying himself open to the suspicion of hypocrisy, among very many who cannot see faith in his heart, except as it works the outward indications of love to God and man. This may give a clew to a multitude of instances, where each of us has offended, and does daily offend; nor is it the less true because the church has sadly lost sight of it; but how evident is the fact, that what we find in the Bible alone, and very rarely hear insisted on in the pulpit, or find prominently forward in the writings of men, comes to be regarded by us as a thing that has been or that will be, rather than as a thing that is! So prone we are to put something between us and God, that even the most gifted of his faithful ambassadors, viewed as we view them, and to use. And since the things that will unconsciously eclipse some important doctrine of the word which they stand forth rightly to divide. They urge upon their people the necessity of closet religion, as in a season where they are alone with God; but man is never alone with God, save' in the silent workings of his spirit, which only the Searcher of hearts can discern. The spirit within him will often make intercession with groanings that cannot be uttered, and he who knoweth the mind of the Spirit, hears the unuttered cry, grants the request, and replenishes the weary thirsting soul with such beamings of divine love and pity, such whispered assurances, "It is I; be not afraid," as the eye of an archangel cannot catch, nor the ear of an archangel overhear. Often and often in the busy throng of men, surrounded by the host of heaven, and dodged by the emissaries of hell, is privileged man alone with his God. We do not, therefore, encroach on what is strictly spiritual, while contending that what is visible includes far more than is usually conceded; and by consequence that we manifest our want of faith in God, our distrust of his mercy, our offensive limitations of his power, more provokingly than we are willing to admit; frequently placing obstacles in the way of those gifts which he is so willing to bestow. Whether prayer be audible or not, the Lord hears and accepts it, as the utterance of the heart; but is he not especially glorified when the petition is presented, the plea advanced, so that they who witness the mercy vouchsafed shall know that it was asked and obtained in the all-prevailing name of Jesus! The people whom he has formed for himself thus continually showing forth his praise, to the intent that unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church, the manifold wisdom, and mercy too, of God. aforetime were written by inspiration, were written for our ensample, the experience of believers, recorded in the Bible, will serve at once as a balance to weigh, and a light to elucidate our own practice. There was no mercy vouchsafed to them that is not equally free to us: no measure of holiness attained to by them that we are not encouraged to strive after: to them strength was imparted according to their day, and strength is promised to us according to ours. The faith that Abraham had is precisely the faith required in every believer, though he may not be called on to place it in such a trying furnace as Abraham did. Yet tried it will certainly be, for it is gold; and through the alloy that man's nature inevitably mixes up with it, the Refiner's fire is needful to purge and to brighten it, that it may be found unto His praise and glory, reflecting his beautiful image at his appearing to acknowledge and to claim his own in the presence of his Father and of the holy angels. Bearing this in mind, and not excluding from our thoughts those whom we cannot exclude from our presence, seeing that God has stationed one class about us to thwart the malignant designs of another class, placed there by Satan, we will enter more closely into the every-day actings of that "faith in God" which our Lord Jesus Christ has commanded us both to cherish Our object is to prove that holy people of old shone and prospered in proportion as they overlooked what we term second causes, and used the privilege so graciously recorded of the Most High, by coming to him in all their perplexities, clinging to his promise, and waiting for his mercy, If we can bring this home practically to ourselves, blessed indeed will be the result; for in what perfection of peace is he kept whose mind is wholly staid upon the Lord! CHAPTER II. FANCY has a great deal to do with unsettling our faith. The mischievous practice of mixing pictorial representations with God's simple word, has helped on the affliction. We know that the saints of old were men of like passions with ourselves, and in the interest excited by their history it is probable we should find little time or inclination for sketching out their bodily appearance. With very few exceptions, it is wholly passed over in the Bible, which, being written for all ages and all nations, is divinely so arranged, as If he has called us from an ungodly rated us from even such of our own kindred who still, in works, deny him, can we not confidently appropriate the sequel? Surely to us is the word sent―" Fear not; I am thy shield, and exceeding great reward." Yet how few aspire to the standard of Abraham's faith! and while pausing contentedly, perhaps, very far short of it, do we not practically attest that we regard his attainment as somewhat inherent in, and peculiar to the individual, rather than as the gift of God, who is able to bestow on us an equal portion of the same grace? Does not the doctrine of second causes here creep in, and mar the beauty of what we are called on to survey as a glorious instance of God's work in the soul of man? Certainly the total disregard of second causes, and a full, unwavering, unflinching dependence on the plain word of the Lord, literally understood, and without a reference to any of the laws, as they are called, of nature, which he who made them can at will suspend, forms the feature in Abraham's character which constitutes him the father of all who believe; and since in following the example of his faith consists our title to be numbered with his spiritual offspring, and also our well-grounded assurance that amid all the changes of this mortal o bring before us what is common to all. | us. Popery, however, always opposed to spiri- world, and in principle and practice sepatuality, prevailed to establish a fashion that we cannot now get rid of. Images, whether sculptured or engraven, maintain their credit, though they have lost their worship among us; and we can hardly meet with the name of a patriarch or apostle, without picturing to ourselves the outward man, according to the notion given us by these artists, and, however accurate it may be, it still keeps alive a feeling of dissimilarity, perhaps undetected by ourselves, so that Abraham's faith seems a thing as little suited to us as his costume. We identify him, probably, less as the sinful, idolatrous human being chosen by sovereign grace, called by sovereign power, upheld by sovereign love, and gifted out of the abundance that is in Christ Jesus, whose day he, by faith, saw and was glad,-less as having a body just like our own, composed of bone, and flesh, and muscle, born and growing, dying and turning to dust, even as we, than as a mysterious-looking apparition, with long beard and flowing robes, dwelling in a tent, reclining under a palm-tree, and in every such particular unlike ourselves. We are willing, yea, most fervently desirous, to be blessed with faithful Abraham; but his very faith seems a thing as alien to our habits of feeling, as are his garment and habitation from those belong-life, we should be protected, sustained and ing to ourselves. This is one of the obstacles which, though not universally, are yet very extensively found to exist, when once the mind is fairly bent to analyze its most familiar impressions. Imagine Abraham living in the same street with us, habited like our neighbours, and pursuing such avocations as are customary among us, and we shall find how much of his personal appearance, how little of his inward life has taken hold of our imaginations. This applies to all, or nearly all, whose acceptable works, the fruit of faith, are related in Scripture. We would gladly reject whatsoever God has not told us, and fix our attention on what he has spoken concerning those whose footsteps we are enjoined to follow. The Lord spake to Abraham from heaven-he speaks to us by his word lying before us, by his Spirit moving within us, by his providences unfolding around guided, even as Abraham was, the more closely we examine the texture of his faith, the better able shall we be to detect the imperfections of our own faulty copy. For, let it be remembered, the raw material is what we receive from above; to shape and apply it according to his own daily requirements is the part of the recipient. In quality, the gift is uniform: we cannot be justified, neither can we do acceptable works, by means of a faith in any wise differing from that of Abraham and the other saints; but though God gives liberally to all who ask, many receive not, because they ask not, the abundance that they might obtain; and to which among us is not the Lord's reproof applicable-"If ye had faith but as a grain of mustard-seed!" Yet we must make an exception, when commending the patriarch Abraham. He had received the promise, that not |