much less of the surface of the earth. Now we have on the surface all the waters the earth had before, and all the central waters in addition, in the form of vapour in the atmosphere, moisture in the earth, and fresh and salt water in the streams, lakes, seas, and oceans. Greatly must be changed the surface of the earth – as now about two-thirds of it are covered with waters of the ocean! And the balance, the land, how changed from what it was! How true speaks Young, the poet : "A part how small of the terraqueous globe Is tenanted by man! the rest a waste, Rocks, deserts, frozen seas, and burning sands; Wild haunts of monsters, poisons, stings, and death. Such is earth's melancholy map!" We know not, too, the depth of the ante-diluvian oceans or seas; but the depth of our present oceans must have been vastly increased to contain the central waters in addition to what they contained before. The subsidence of the water which was not evaporated, from covering the tops of the highest mountains, must have required a vast increase in depth and extent of bed, or a great general upheaving of the earth above them, or perhaps both. As the earth, before the deluge, carried within her bosom the seeds of her own destruction in the central waters she contained, so now she carries within her the seeds of a second and last destruction, in the central FIRES in her bosom ! And as the ALMIGHTY changed the state of the atmosphere, so as to bring about a universal rain, and broke up the fountains of the great deep, so as to cause the earth to disgorge herself of her central waters, and thus brought about the deluge and destroyed the world SO HE can just as easily change the state of the atmosphere again, so as to bring about a universal reign of FIRE and BRIMSTONE, as HE did on Sodom and Gomorrah, which is but a mere type; and can It This supposition that the earth carries within her the seeds of her own destruction, in a vast mass of internal fire, receives confirmation from examinations that have been made. has been found that in descending into the earth, the heat increases in a ratio that would make it, at the distance of ten miles below the surface, nothing but a mass of fire! Our globe, then, is a mere shell, and a very thin one, compared to the eight thousand miles diameter of the earth! And this is still further confirmed by what we know of volcanoes. Some of these have been burning for thousands of years-and where could they have been supplied, but from this inexhaustible source? It is impossible for them to have contained within them materials to have fed their fires so long-they would have been exhausted centuries and thousands of years ago! But we are left at no doubt on this subject, for the declarations of God himself, the Almighty Creator, Sustainer, and Preserver of the world, make the destruction of the world by water, a type of that by fire. "By the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water: whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished: but the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word kept in store, RESERVED unto FIRE against the day of judgment and per dition of ungodly men. The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also, and the works that are therein shall be BURNED UP-wherein the heavens being on fire shall be DISSOLVED, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat." And here the admonition of the Apostles in this same connection, should be impressed on the mind of the disciple: "Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be, in all holy conversa tion (behavior) and godliness." But in the midst of this "war of elements, wreck of matter, and crush of worlds," the Christian shall be safe. Borne upon angel-pinions, he will rise safely above this scene of conflagration "For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and the trump of God: and the DEAD IN CHRIST shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we EVER BE with the Lord." And although the world shall be burned up, yet the star of hope, lighted up by the promise of God, beams from beyond its destruction. A new world, phenix like, shall spring up from the ashes of the old "Nevertheless we, according to the promise, look for new heavens and NEW EARTH, wherin dwelleth righteousness." And now, "seeing that ye look for such things, be diligent that ye may be found of Him in peace, without spot and blameless." Amen. J. R. H. An hour of solitude passed in sincere and earnest prayer, or the conflict with and conquest over a single passion or "subtle bosom sin," will teach us more of thought, will more effectually awaken the faculty, and form the habit of reflection, than a year's study in the school without them.-Coleridge. WE see the necessity of this kind of evidence, to counteraet the antagonistic influence of evil spirits. The whole philosophy of miracles is to counteract that system. All things began in miracle, either by making new, or suspending old laws. No one can form any theory to account for nature, without supposing or admitting a miracle. Nature is the regular course of things. It makes no new creation : it simply preserves and changes the forms of old creations. There must have been a display of supernatural power to bring into existence things which had no being before. Hence there is nothing more true and just than to suppose it possible that God has spoken to man. The possibility of God's speaking to man, then, is our first position. Second, the probability that he has done so, is the fact that man speaks. Now as every man that we know anything of speaks his mother tongue, and since there was one man who had no mother, and could not learn to speak without hearing some one speak as language or speech is only an imitation of sounds-the probability is, that God taught him to speak; or, in other words, that God has spoken to man. Again, it is probable from God's benevolence to man: for all creation is made for man, because they do not depend on man for their existencethey were all created before man, who depends on them, proving that they are all means, and man the end. Now the end is always greater than the means hence man is the peculiar object of the divine love. Nor can we believe that he withheld from man the great desideratum to know who was his father. To do so would be unjust; and we conclude, therefore, that it is highly probable God has spoken to man. The very tongue he has given man, proves that he intended There are two classes of supernatural man to use it, and it is highly proba- power-supernatural intellectual and ble that he taught him how. The supernatural physical power. Now word probable, as employed here, is you know that there is a limit to not used in its common acceptation, man's physical power, or to natural as implying anything doubtful; but physical power; but there is none to in its technical sense as applied to supernatural physical power that we evidence, and is the same as moral. are acquainted with. We have many Third, the moral certainty that God displays of supernatural physical has spoken to man. Miracles appear power. The plagues performed by necessarily here, as they produce the Moses with his rod in Egypt were of highest class or kind of moral cer- this character, and they were pertainty or evidence. Miraculum, from formed in the presence of millions to the verb miror, means wonder, admi- give them credit, for the future desration. A miracle, then, is something tiny of Egypt and Israel hung upon wonderful. But what is wonderful? them. This is beyond the power of Not the ordinary course of things, man, and there have been lasting surely. It must be something that monuments set up in proof of these obstructs, contracts, or supersedes the miracles. The miracles of Jesus laws of nature, and that manifests calming the sea and raising Lazarus itself to human reason. It is more from the dead, are of the same kind, it is a sign, rhetorically speaking, and demonstrating supernatural physical must prove something. There can be power. I presume we are now unno miracle without something is to be derstood in regard to supernatural proved by it it is, therefore, equiva- physical power. Second, supernatulent to a seal. Nations give seals of ral intellectual power. The human power or office to their ambassadors, mind has its limit. It is true, we can when they send them on foreign mis- trace out the causes of a great numsions; and in this sense miracles were ber of things. We can make scafthe seals of the apostles and prophets, folds by which to ascend and measure who were sent from heaven to earth, the heavenly bodies, and by which we to transact God's business with men : can descend into the depths of the for since man's fall, God must treat earth; but no man has the power of with him by or through a mediator. foretelling a future event -no man Moses and the Prophets, Jesus and can tell what a day will bring forth. the Apostles, were all mediators be- Now there is a power of predicting tween God and man; and each of future events, not only of an ordinary these ambassadors from the court of character, but others of the most sinHeaven, had credentials in accord- gular kind and least to be expected, ance with the nature of their em- such as we have in regard to the birthbassies. To change any regular order place of the Messiah. This, then, is of things requires additional power. what we mean by supernatural, menMoses and Christ were endowed with tal, or intellectual power. It has more miraculous power than any pleased God then, to give us maniother of God's ambassadors to man. festations of two kinds of supernatural But all the miracles of Moses and power, and to manifest them only on others converge to prove one point, extraordinary occasions, if otherwise viz. Christ's mission. A miracle is a they would be natural. But in the display of supernatural power in at- meantime, he has given to every testation of the truth of a message or generation evidences of the most messenger from God. No man can secure kind, when he had not a reguunderstand supernatural power, with- lar succession of messengers. God out he understands natural power. has so made the Bible, that one class NO. II. ANGELS AND DEMONS. THE question last propounded was, Who and what are angels and demons? It is easier to say what they are, than to show who they are. They are both official titles: an angel is a messenger a demon is a knowing one, a leader or teacher. Etymology and history alike teach that a daimoon or demon (from daein scire, to know) indicates a knowing one-figuratively a teacher or a guide. Angellos is a messenger, an ambassador, a missionary-one sent to announce or bear a message. of mankind can always see the mira- THE SPIRITUAL UNIVERSE. cles with their natural or physical eyes-that is, the people of one age can; and that another class can see them with their mind's eye-the eye of faith. The last kind are called prophecies. There was a class of miracles and prophecies for those who were cotemporaries at the introduction of the law and of Christianity. These persons required a very great abundance of evidence of this kind, and the Jews received so much as to follow Moses even through the Red Sea and wilderness. But for posterity there was a scale so graduated, that for ages to come-even to the end of the world, every generation of men can see a miracle exhibited as certainly as those who lived in the days of Moses or Christ. We have, then, this body of evidence in support of the truth of Christ's mission. But if a man will not open his eyes and look, he would not believe it, though a man was raised from the dead. It is so in regard to these facts: if we do not examine them, we cannot believe them, nor see, indeed, these miracles which are daily performed before our eyes. The cotemporaries of Moses and of Christ saw one class of miracles, and believed another. It is even so with us-for we believe what they saw, and see what they believed. The human family, at this minute, have just as good reason to believe that Jesus rose from the dead, as those who believed at the time in which he arose. These arguments go to show, that the fact that God has spoken to mankind, is morally certain; and that mankind in all ages have the same amount of evidence to prove that God has so spoken. But who are they, is a question still more interesting. They are, by appropriation, made to indicate, in their highest sense, spirits. Hence demons are often called "spirits" and "unclean spirits." Angels, in the celestial acceptation of that word, are also spirits. True, the word is often applied to man as well as to spirits, when acting as agents for others. Still they are primarily, both in etymology and history, knowing or intelligent spirits. Before we can either understand the Scriptures, or teach them to others, on these two grand themes of ancient and modern controversy, we must be able to show the causes or reasons of distinction and difference between the spirits called demons, and the spirits called angels. They are different orders of spirits, apart from their character, office, or work. Such is my conclusion, for reasons hereafter to be set forth. But to ascertain, with all evidence and authority, the proper and essential difference between these two orders of spirits, it will be necessary to take a broad view of the use of the word demon, both in classic and sacred writings. Thus we may, inductively, come to a very satisfactory result, as to the New Testament acceptation of the term "demon." First, then, its Pagan and classic use. 66 We may say, in general terms, that the Pagan philosophers, one and all, so far as I am informed, regarded demons as holding a middle rank between gods and men, and were a sort of internuntios between them, carrying up the prayers of men, and bringing down the blessings of the gods in answer to them. Some of them were regarded as angels of destruction, to execute the wrath of the gods upon the impious. They had two classes of demons-the agathon daimoon or eudaimoon, the good demon, the guardian spirit or tutelary genius assigned to every one at his birth, to guard himself and fortunes through life; and also the kakodaimoon, a malignant demon who seems to have delighted itself in vexing or tormenting men. "All demons," says Plato, are an intermediate order between God and mortals." "And who has not read of the demon of Socrates ?" The Jewish usage is still more important to assist us in ascertaining its Christian acceptation, than the Pagan writers. In the Septuagint version it would seem that demons were regarded as the souls or spirits of dead men. We need not go back to Deuteronomy, to accuse the Jews of demonolatry to show that they "sacrificed to demons, and not to gods to new gods that came newly up, whom their fathers feared not ;" or to show that they regarded demons as the souls of deceased wicked men, since Josephus himself, a cotemporary witness with the apostles, testifies "that the spirits of wicked men deceased, were by the Jews called demons." Indeed, according to the Grecian and Roman Apotheosis, or god making power, they not only placed the statues of great men, especially heroes, living and dead, amongst their gods in the temples, but occasionally reared temples and altars to living heroes, and really offered sacrifice to them. So we find the Pagans at Lystra converting Paul into Mercury, and Barnabas into Jupiter, bringing decorated oxen to the gates of their city, to sacrifice to them as gods. But the New Testament itself suffices to indicate that the demons, or (as they are called in the Common Version) devils, were the spirits of deceased wicked men. To sustain and elucidate this view of demons we shall state a few facts, and offer a few remarks upon them. 1st. We have, in the New Testament, but one devil, and many demons. Diabolos, or Devil, is found in the Christian Scriptures only thirty-eight times. Of these, thirtyfour are applied to him we call "the Devil" and " Satan," and are, in every case, preceded by the definite article THE. Of the remaining four cases-the first John vi. 7-Jesus calls one of the twelve a Devil, not the Devil; and Paul, using it in the plural form three times, (the only times it is found in the plural number, and without the definite article) applies it to men and women: but only to those that do not restrain their tongue. They are the only Devils named in the plural form in all the New Testament Scriptures. Thus counting, one by one, we have ho Diabolos thirty-four times--Diabolos without the article, applied to Judas as a slanderer, or false accuser, once; and thrice with reference to candidates for the diaconate, or deacon's office, translated "slanderers, false accusers” (1 Tim. iii. 11, 2 Tim. iii. 3, Titus, ii. 3.) Thus the matter is briefly disposed of. We have Devil or Diable, as a proper name, thirty-four times applied to one otherwise called Satan, or ho Satanas. We find the word Satan thirtyseven times in the New Testament. Twice without the article, it is applied to Peter, as an adversary. But with the definite article, it is applied to the Adversary, called the Devil, or the false accuser. |