misery of the one, and the cheerfulness and hope of the other. "I will go unto the altar of God, unto God my exceeding joy." How is the contrast to be explained but on this one sufficient principle,—that the Jews act under the guidance of an explicit written Law, and the Gentiles under the misguidance of those perversions of the truth which have grown up in the absence of such a LAW.

But if, in regard to this, the first, in point of importance, of all subjects of inquiry to man, the contrast is strong and evident between Heathenism and Judaism, what is it between Heathenism and Christianity? "For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect. For then would they not have ceased to be offered? because that the worshippers once purged should have no more conscience of sins. But in those sacrifices there is a remembrance again made of sins every year. For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away 'sins." Man's true feeling is, that as a sinner he has need of an atonement offered voluntarily in his behalf by a superior Being. He feels that he requires this as the ground on which to repose his hopes of Divine acceptance, with a satisfied judgment and conscience; yet he by no means feels it necessary to

P Hebrews x. 1—4.

P

་

possess precise philosophical notions of what may constitute such an atonement. He feels most profoundly that he requires a personal, Divine, everliving, and ever-present Mediator; yet he is sensible of no necessity to penetrate the mystery in which, to his feeble apprehension, such a Mediator might be expected to be invested. And all that he really needs, all that every humble, earnest inquirer can possibly demand, he finds in the Gospel of Christ, and can find nowhere else. "The pardon of the Gospel is PARDON FOR A REASON; that is to say, it is pardon granted in compliance with a rule, higher or more comprehensive than the law which was broken.

The

pardon of the Gospel, therefore, may be extended without reserve, because the reason whence it flows is greater than all other reasons." "Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: whom God hath set forth a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time His righteousness that He might be just, and the Justifier of him which believeth in Jesus." "All things are of God, who hath reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation; to wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing

a Isaac Taylor's Saturday Evening.

Rom. iii. 24-26.

their trespasses unto them." "Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God." "This then is the message which we have heard of Him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth. But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin." u

8

2 Corinthians v. 18, 19.

+ Rom. v. 1, 2.

" 1 John i. 5—7.

V.

THE COROLLARY.

"Their rock is not as our Rock, even our enemies themselves being judges."-Deut. xxxii. 31.

WE are now prepared to enter more immediately on the inquiry,-Are the claims asserted by the Scriptures to be received as an immediate Revelation from God established by satisfactory internal evidence? We find them self-designated "the Oracles of God." May this title in its proper import be intelligently conceded to them?

Suppose a document to be placed in your hands professing to be a communication from a distant friend. You have no reason to doubt the possibility of your receiving such a document; indeed you are aware of many reasons which might render its transmission to you highly probable. You open it and read; and you discover that its contents, though of a very extraordinary character, are, if true, of the greatest possible importance to you. Do you fear that it is a forgery? Certainly it is right, considering the interests you appear to have at stake, that you should be cautious. Yet beware of being governed by ungenerous and unreasonable suspicions. Examine the character of the document. Do you trace in it any mark of im

posture? Can you detect anywhere the proper features of falsehood? Can you discover any vestige, however faint, of some by-end or purpose? You test the communication by all available criteria of truth, and you are now persuaded that it has undoubtedly come from the friend whose name it bears. Then, observe, you have gained one very material point. Deal with this as settled, and renew your investigation. It is something to feel assured that there is no attempt to practise a fraud upon you; but are you equally sure that your well-meaning friend is sufficiently informed respecting the topics on which he writes, and that he is himself free from the misguidance of fanaticism? A re-examination of the whole results in perfect satisfaction on this question also. You find that the writer exhibits the clearest evidence of a thorough acquaintance with his subject; and that the simplicity, and ease, and calmness of his style preclude the idea of his writing from pictures of his own morbid imagination. The whole communication you find pervaded by an air of simple truth and reality. Indeed, the more carefully you consider the nature of the statements and the character of the writer,-together with the fact, that his opportunities of understanding his subject are not only the most favourable, but such as he alone does, or could enjoy,—the more difficult you find it to doubt the perfect authenticity of the whole. You feel eventually that the very existence of the record is a guarantee of its truth. And,