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and drawing towards it the converted nations. God thus prefaces his threatenings of punishment with consolatory promises-the beams of his love fringe with new lustre the clouds that carry his judgments.

The prophet next specifies the sins of the people of Judah,-forsaking God, encouraging false prophets, allying themselves in marriage with idolaters, trusting in their weak and warlike resources; and then predicts judgments the humbling of the proud, the wasting of their wealth, the destruction of their idols; and at the close, He inculcates a precious lesson man is slow to learn, cease ye from man."

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Chapter III. predicts the failure of their trusted resources-the dislocation of the whole social fabric-the reign of anarchy-and the ruin of the holy and beautiful house; the reasons of which were the haughty hypocrisy, corruption and tyranny of the rulers, and especially the sad deterioration that had taken place in the character and conduct of the female portion of Jewish society.

Chapter IV. opens with a picture of the terrible results of the judgments inflicted on the nations, described by the fact, that such would be the destruction occasioned by the sword, that there should be seven women for every man, and these seven should contend for the privilege of being his wife-so truly would the female pride described in the previous chapter be laid low, in just and righteous retribution; their sufferings would, however, be sanctified, for in consequence of them they would begin to look for " Messiah, the Branch," they would renounce their crimes and return to God, and realise, in this transition, the benign and peaceful results of the favour and fellowship of the Most High.

The sacred prophets seem to deliver their denunciations of judgments with sorrow, and having done so, to pass on as rapidly as possible to those glowing and beautiful delineations of the glories of the kingdom of Jesus, which, like bright intervals of sunshine in April weather, relieve the prevailing gloom.

PROTESTANT HOPES.

THE Church of God in England's heart is the secret of the stability and splendour of the crown on England's brow. Both must flourish and fall together. Like Jacob of old, we may wrestle during the long dark night, but the morning will burst in benedictions around us. It was said, that the bones of the patriarch Joseph, in their Egyptian sepulchre, were to the Israelites the pledge that God would revisit them, and deliver them, and carry them to Canaan. Upon the moors of Scotland, and in England's Smithfield, there reposes the sacred dust of illustrious Reformers-the awful pledge that God will yet have mercy upon us, and that the hour of our visitation shall prove the hour of our triumphant and glorious deliverance. For the Church of God I have no fears. God has her walls continually before Him. Her destiny is linked with the throne of heaven. Should we be driven from our altars, our pulpits, our churches, and our chapels, by rampant Romanism, the God that built the universe, and gemmed the sky with all its stars, will build us temples. Persecution itself will protect us. The hills will be our castles, the tangled thicket our palisado, and the living God our ally. The gospel, in our country, however, let us not forget, is the life-blood of all its institutions -the oxygen of our atmosphere; Christianity is the parent oak, around which social prosperity and riches rise and grow, dependent on it for support, and feeding on its juices. Destroy it - cut it down-and you may write upon the altars, and churches, and palaces of England, "Ichabod, Ichabod-the glory is departed."

But I am not without bright anticipations of the ultimate issue. Clouds, however black, are not eternal nor immutable. The holy cause of heaven shall not want upholders, nor sufferers if needs be. Christianity shall yet emerge from the tents of Mesech and the tabernacles of Kedar, leaving behind her the scenes of her bondage, and put on her coronation robes, and move by universal love to universal empire, the eman

cipatrix of the oppressed-the ambassadress of heaven -the benefactress of the earth.-From a speech by the Rev. J.Cumming.

PURGATORY.

"Of your charity pray for the soul of Mr. Thomas Fairbairn, formerly a Professor at Stoneyhurst College, who departed this life, March 30th, at No. 37, Hartstreet, Bloomsbury-square, after having received all the last Sacraments of the Church. R.I.P."-Tablet, R.C. Newspaper of April 11, 1846.

How unsatisfactory a faith is that of the Church of Rome! All has been believed-all has been done- and still the departed spirit is tormented! "Absent from the body," is not "present with the Lord." dead that die in the Lord are not blessed.

The

Romanism is not Christianity. It conveys neither holiness to the living, nor happiness to the dead..

DR. PUSEY.

The following is an estimate of Dr. Pusey, by the Dublin Review for March, the quarterly organ of the Church of Rome. It is very complimentary to the reverend divine; but compliments from such a quarter are, in our opinion, calamities, and ought to lead the subject of them to suspect his position.

"We certainly desiderate in that amiable and revered person a less equivocal appearance, and a less vulnerable attitude. We could wish to see him either less assuming, or more manly; less forward in deeds, or less diffident in profession; withdrawn from the sphere of active influence, or publicly accredited in the exercise of it. We should rejoice to see him a religious, and we should rejoice to see him a bishop; what we feel of him at present is, that he is a nondescript in the ecclesiastical system; his position has no place assigned it in the Church's map, nor his office in her register. Were he in ostensible power, it would be natural for

him to speak freely, and act with decision; were he in shelter from the world, he would gain upon it another way. As it is, his high qualities do not sit naturally upon him, while the world seriously misunderstands him. And though much of this misconstruction is owing to the shallowness and censoriousness of the world, yet something is also due to his own defective, and we will add, needlessly defective, exhibition of himself. The world contrasts his forwardness of action with his lowliness of profession; and these opposite tempers, instead of resulting in a graceful equipoise, exhibit an uneasy antagonism. Each is the other's drawback, not its corrective; his restless zeal causes his self-depreciation to seem affected; while his almost obtrusive disclaimers, instead of gaining him, as they should, the character of humility, involve his efforts in the charge of presumption. Dr. Pusey's place is at Christ Church, Oxford; and most conscientiously, we doubt not, does he discharge the duties of his canonry and professorship; but he acts as if he had a mission for England. One day we hear of his preaching fifteen sermons in a week, at Leeds; the next of his organising conventual institutions in London, and directing the consciences of its inmates. He is known to be on terms of religious confidence with a large body of obedient disciples, chiefly ladies. All this is in itself most admirable and meritorious; but it would be infinitely more so, if Dr. Pusey could produce his credentials for a charge of such tremendous responsibility, and such gigantic power, as that which he claims to exercise, without limit of place or department, in the communion in which he is no otherwise ostensibly accredited, than as a dignitary without cure of souls. Has he the free sanction of the proper local authorities, in the exercise of his various functions? We strongly suspect that he has not. Where are his "faculties" for hearing confessions? where his authority for administering vows? where his ecclesiastical precedents for taking applicants for spiritual direction under his charge, without the implied consent of their respective pastors? His answer would probably be, that, in a desperate state of

things, like that in which he finds himself, all means which are not sinful become allowable, and that all which are allowable, are necessary; that a Church in extremes is no subject for the rules which apply to a Church in health."

THE HOME OF THE HEART.

BY MISS AIRD.-McLeod, Glasgow. OCCASIONALLY we find proof that sacred poetry is not extinct in the midst of our literature. Johnson oracularly pronounced it an impossibility, and too many have given occasion to others to adopt his criticism, by trusting entirely to the grandeur of the subject, and neglecting details in the execution. Miss Barrett has shewn that Johnson's opinion is incorrect, and Miss Aird, in her little volume, has written some stanzas of real poetry. We quote from one poem, which we think very beautiful. It is called,

66 THE MAN OF SORROWS."

"Who is He that purple wearing,
All the taunts of malice bearing-
Silent 'neath the mocker's scorn;
As a lamb to slaughter leading,
Bound and wounded, faint and bleeding,
Pale and weary-sorrow-worn;
Scourged and smitten, uncomplaining,
Dust and gore his garments staining-
See they pierce with thorns his brow;
Fainting 'neath the cross now bending,
Tears with Salem's daughters blending?
"Son of Man! 'tis Thou! 'tis Thou?"

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Hark! he prays, while agonizing,

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For the murderers who despise him!
Sinners! whence that anguished cry?

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