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awfully deceived and died, it is to be Are you happy? Are you happier, do feared, without hope: when seventy-'you think, without his salvation two, she said to a friend who en- than those are who have sought it? treated her to seek the Lord, "I am, You are mistaken if you think so ; poorly now, I shall soon get better, for there is no real peace without and then I will do it." Alas! she grace, and if you are not converted, grew worse, the season of repentance you are without it, and can never be was delayed, and death came without truly happy. Once again let me any evidence that she valued the warn you of delaying this invitation glorious Gospel, or had prayed to for fear another should not be given, be saved by it. Let such folly lead you may never hear another sermon you to avoid a like miserable hope--you may never again be told of less end; come now, while the grace the Saviour-you may not again be is offered, while the spirit is offered entreated to "consider your latter to make you willing to come. There end." This letter may close up the is no other way by which you can offers of mercy; yes, my dear aged have any hope of salvation: "for friend, this letter, prompted by pure there is no other name given under affection to your precious never dyheaven by which any one can be ing soul, may be the last message of saved; "other foundation can no mercy made known to you; and, oh! man lay, than that is laid, which is if you slight it, if you neglect to Jesus Christ:" he is the way and follow the advice given, to seek the the only way; "he that believeth on blessings urged upon you, I must him hath eternal life, but he that not forbear to tell you, that it will believeth not on him shall not see add to your sorrows in an eternal life, but the wrath of God abideth world; that it will bear its testiin him." Tremble to delay in a mat-mony in addition to all the sermons ter of so much importance. On the brink of eternity you are, my dear aged friend, and so long as unconverted, that eternity of woe and torment and misery awaits you; if you still neglect this glorious Gospel "there remains no more sacrifice for sin," and death will seal your doom for ever, where there "is weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth.' Yes, for ever!-for ever!

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for ever, will you have to endure the wrath to come, as the consequence of your own folly in neglecting the great salvation slighting the offers of the "glorious Go pel.

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And shall it be so with you? Will you indeed forego the joys of heaven, and choose the path that leads to hell? Oh! stop and think, I beseech you-pause and consider for what is it that you will lose your soul? What are you gaining now, by your neglect of the Saviour?

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you have heard, that you were warn⇒
ed of your danger told of a way
of escape- entreated to seek for
mercy; but that you "chose death
rather than life," that you
"would
not come to Christ, but made light
of his salvation," of his love, and
of his glory. Oh! that the Lord
may add his blessing to this effort
for your soul's good, and that from
this hour you may pray for the Holy
Spirit to make you a new creature
in Christ Jesus. Farewell.

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perpetuated by transcribers; and thus the impairing process affords scope for what may be called the empiric process, and also for what may be called the restorative pro

cess.

Syriac translator who lived after Paul, the original Hebrew expression was kol, signifying voice, and not that word deprived of its last letter, and thus appearing to the eye in ancient manuscripts as the Hebrew word for

If a transcriber adopts for a cor- | line. rection what he guesses to be right, and does not have recourse to sound principles of criticism, the empiric process will probably be realized in the unintentional substitution of one erroneous reading for another.

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That the Hebrew letter lamed has been lost, either from its disappearing at the end of a line, or from no notice being taken of the space it left elsewhere, is rendered highly probable by the Hebrew poetry. The connexion of cause and effect, For as voice and words coincide, and therefore, becomes highly important as the expressions "through all the in aiding the restorative process, earth and "to the end of the Thus if in an English Manuscript the world" obviously harmonize in words us and use appear as different meaning, there is that poetical rereadings in the phrase, "Books for iteration of ideas which is destroyed use," or, "Books for us," the first by retaining the Hebrew word for phrase is shewn to be correct, if there line. But when the Hebrew word is an absence of every cause besides for voice is admitted into the stanza, the impairing process. . For, by that that stanza becomes perfect, like the process, the word use may degener- | first stanza in the Psalm, which is ... ate into us, but the word us cannot "The heavens declare the glory of God; so amplify: itself as to become use "Yea, the firmament proclaimeth the work In such cases, therefore, it is obvious of his hands." that the right word is the including word, and not the included word; and on this principle we are led to the conclusion, that in Psalm xix. 4, the two Hebrew letters koph and vau, meaning line, are the remains of the" three letters koph, vau, and lamed, a Hebrew word signifying voice. In no part of this lower world, Thus, in Psalm xix. 4, the meaning therefore, has God left himself withis not “ Their line is gone out through out witness; and, consequently, all the earth," but " Their echo is gone out through all the earth," as expressed in the Syriac of Romans x. 18, where the Hebrew word for voice, already referred to, in connexion with the Syriac for daughter, is adopted as the equivalent expression for the Greek word used in Romans x. 18, and accurately quoted from Psalm xix. 4, in the Septuagint.11

In Psalm xix. 4, then, as well as in Roman x. 18, the language of the original may be thus expressed: Their voice is gone out through all the earth,

And their words to the utmost bounds of the world."

while infidels in a Christian country turn a deaf ear to the voice of the Gospel, idolaters are infidels with regard to the proclamation se universally made concerning God by his stupendous works.

As, however, man is no longer the perfect being beheld in paradise before the fall, the Book of Nature is a book of death, rather than a book of life. Like the law, it is in .. In the estimation, therefore, of itself excellent; but man's depravity the Greek translators, as well as in has made every law a terrible witthe estimation of Paul, who wrote ness against himself. In short, the more than three hundred years after-human race continue practical Athewards, and in the estimation of the ists till the Gospel dispels the dark

As I occasionally use this beautifully simple and comprehensive prayer in private, and always once on the Lord's day in public, I wish, most respectfully, to present a few queries to your esteemed correspondent.

clouds that chover over the mind, learned commentator, but I cannot and excites a re-animating and pu- implicitly, in all cases, bow to his rifying hope that raises man above decisions. the beasts that perish, and prepares him for the blissful regions of immortality. Thus, though the fabric of the universe has been a faithful but unsuccessful instructer, and perhaps has never been able to make one man wise unto salvation during six thousand years, yet the Gospel with its account of the Lamb of God who taketh away the sin of the world, has been the power of God to salvation to no less than three thousand souls on one pentecostal day; and such a display of the excellency of the Gospel was but the first-fruits of a harvest yet to come, when millions of the human race shall bow to the sceptre of the Great Redeemer, in the day of his powerful reign, and before "he shall come the second time without sin unto salvation."

Stratford, Essex.

J. F.

1. The "great Christian Rabbi, Dr. Gill," is opposed to the use of this prayer in public; but the great Christian Rabbi, Philip Henry, says, that the Lord's Prayer is so ficomprehensive, that all petitions may be reduced to it ;" and he was in the habit of closing all his public and private devotions with it. This was also the case with the excellent commentator Scott, and a multitude of others. Now, which of the Christian Rabbis are we to follow ?nend

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2. With much deference to Dr. Gill, who affirms, that our Lord picked and culled the several petitions of his prayer out of the absurd volumes of the Jewish Rabbis, I would beg leave to ask, Is not such a view of the subject without substantial

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QUERIES ON THE LORD'S PRAYER. proof? And, moreover, Is it not

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IN
your Number for October, you
have inserted an Essay from a very
respectable individual, against the
use of the Lord's Prayer in public
worship.

As Lentertain very different views from your correspondent, you will perhaps, allow me a page or two in your Miscellany, to address to him a few questions.

Before I do so, I beg leave to premise, that I do not undertake to defend the judiciousness or propriety of repeating this formula of devotion five or six times in the course of a service.

The authority of Dr. Gill is adduced in support of the opinion of the writer of the Essay. I have, as it becomes me, much respect for this

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derogatory to the character of Him in whom "dwelt all the fulness of the godhead bodily?" Had not he sufficient wisdom to compose a prayer, without sitting at the feet of the Jewish Rabbis, and supplicating

their aid?

3. Is it not a fact, which admits of ample illustration, that because the Established Church has chosen to use this prayer several times in every service, that many who dissent from her communion, have been led, perhaps unintentionally, to depreciate and neglect it?

4. In the use of this prayer in public worship, is there any conformity to the Church of England which can be reasonably censured? If there be, then, to be consistent, ought we not to give up the reading of the Scriptures in our religious

services, because the Established | very same words which our Lord Church reads so ample a portion of used them?

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11. Does not the writer of this Essay give up the point for which he contends in his sixth paragraph in which he says, "After all, we are, no doubt at liberty, to adopt in pub

5. Whether our Lord enjoined prayer, or not, as a form, and to be perpetually used in worship, is there any one of its petitions which is not in full and delightful accord-lic or secret prayer, the language of ance with all the best principles and our blessed Lord?" If so, why feelings of every truly pious indi- does he call it Judaizing? And vidual? Can it be wrong, then, to why does he censure the young miuse them at a throne of grace? nisters for using it?

6. If it be unlawful in Christian worship, to use the Lord's Prayer, as is intimated in the Essay, because there is no express reference to the name of the Mediator, should we not, for the same reason, avoid employing any part of the Book of Psalms, or of the Old Testament, in our public devotions?

I may, then, even with the writer's approbation, continue to use the Lord's Prayer; and our young brethren, surely, may be permitted, if they think proper, to employ in their devotions this beautifully simple and comprehensive form of supplication.

Southampton.

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B. H. D.

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EXPOSITION OF PSALM Ixxxiv. 5,

To the Editor of the Baptist Magazine.
DEAR SIR,

If the following short remarks are worth a place in your Magazine, they are at your service.

7. Under the fifth head of the Essay it is insinuated, that the Lord's Prayer is not "suitable to the circumstances of Christians," since the great oblation was offered on Calvary. But will this sentiment bear examination? Is it not a privilege of unspeakable value, under every dispensation, to be permitted to address God as a Father? Ought we not to be supremely concerned, that PSALM 1xxxiv. 5, presents a diffiHis glorious name should be hallow-culty which has perplexed many. In ed, and that His reign should be our common version it reads thus: every where established? But I "Blessed is the man whose strength need not enlarge; the writer of the is in thee: in whose heart are the Essay answers himself on this sub- ways of them." The words in Italject in his last paragraph. ics, are also in the same character in our Bibles, and are supplementary. Here the question is,-what does the expression "in whose heart are the ways of them" mean? The Hebrew word translated ways, means the highways raised for the purpose of travelling from place to place. The writer of the Psalm was contemplating the joy and advantage of attending the last of the annual Jewish festivals, which fell about the beginning, or towards the middle of our October. This appears from the word rendered rain, in the 6th verse, which means the Autumnal

8. Ought it to be called "Judaizing," to pray God our Saviour to take to him his great power, and to reign the uncontrolled and adored sovereign of the whole world?

9. If it be wrong to use the petitions of the Lord's Prayer in public, must it not be equally so, to use any other petitions of the Scriptures which were written previously to the actual sufferings of the Redeemer ?

10. If it be very right to ask for the blessing referred to in the Lord's Prayer, can it be wrong to use the

Norwich.

J. K.

THE ITINERANT CHARACTER OF
THE AMERICAN BAPTIST MIN-

ISTRY.

To the Editor of the Baptist Magazine.
DEAR SIR,

The following passage occurs in the Life of Wesley, by Mr. Watson, and it is referred to, with an expression of pleasure, in your recent review of that work.

rain. Viewing the approach of the present object is only to suggest an different bodies of worshippers and explanation of the single expression the earnestness with which they above mentioned. were pressing on, all in one road, to I remain, yours truly, one place, he pauses, and then says, "The ways (are) in their heart. (They) passing through the valley of Baca make it a well," &c. The reader will here perceive a slight deviation from our common version, but on this point, I appeal to those who read the Hebrew Bible; and assuming the correctness of my own translation, would remark, it takes away all that perplexity which has been felt in reading the passage, and gives this part of the Psalm a picturesque effect, as if the writer was "In the number of their minisbeholding the scene, and describing ters, members, and congregations, his own feelings at the moment. It (in the United States) the Baptists may be said, that this leaves one nearly equal the Methodists; and difficulty untouched, which is the these two bodies, both itinerant in change of number; as the author their labours, have left all the other goes from the plural to the singular, religious denominations far behind." and then to the plural again without | P. 235. an apparent reason, (see verses 4, 5, 6.) To this it is here sufficient to reply, that such transitions are far from being unusual in the writers of the Old Testament. Probably they were not in the habit of making the distinctions common among us; and from their modes of thinking referred to man collectively, and men individually in quick succession, without feeling the necessity of uniform expression. The Psalm alto. gether offers various subjects of critical and practical remark, but my

Can you, or one of your correspondents, favour your readers with a detail of the itinerant system, as practised by our American brethren.

Such a statement will not only be grateful to those who are interested in the welfare of the Baptist connexion in America; but it may suggest to the general consideration of our friends the propriety of adopting a similar system throughout Britain.

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And can it be that he who plows
The furrow'd ground, and sows the seeds
Of kindliest sort, at harvest hour,

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Shall fill his arms with noxious weeds?
And can it be that they who leave
Their all for God, shall perish too,
Deceived? Earth's creatures may deceive,
And earth be false, but God is true.

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