unknown. Let us offer a few remarks on this intricate subject, in the hope of clearing up, if ever so little, the difficulty with which it is surrounded. As we look abroad into the universe of God, we meet everywhere with the existence of general laws, by which the purposes of God are fulfilled throughout creation. Those general laws were part of the arrangements made for the government of the world from the beginning-even from everlasting. Looking at those general laws, I see that they are not mere mechanical contrivances affecting the huge masses of matter by which we are surrounded. I see the physical is made subordinate to the moral, and that these general laws constitute the moral administration of the world in which I live. I see that these laws are ever on the side of what is virtuous and good, and always against that which is vicious and bad. The bounties of his providence are thus supplied to the upright and the industrious. It is thus the plots of wicked men are detected, and themselves covered with shame: and it is thus that men who violate law carry with them the self-inflicted penalties of transgression; it is thus that a life of integrity gives a man a sunny heart in the decline of his years, while a life of false and fictitious excitement leaves nothing but vain regret and mortified experience. All this is done by general laws—that is, by the pre-ordained constitution of things, by which the course of this world, either with or without its consent, is rendered subservient to the law of God. And these general laws, let it be again observed, are not of a physical character merely; they have a marked moral character, indicating most clearly that something besides the mechanical regularity of the world has entered into the mind of its Creator.

It

Now, we may get some idea from this of the way in which God answers prayer. There are spiritual purposes to be realized in the government of God as well as moral ones. is intended that man should not only be moral, but religious. It is the will of God that he should not only be just and upright and faithful in the sight of man, but that he should also be devout, loving, obedient to him. And when I find

that the moral government of God is always served by his general laws-that is, if I fall in with the previous arrangements of law, and become just and moral-I may calculate certainly on the results of that established law; if I find this, I have very little difficulty in seeing how spiritual laws of a general character are made to serve the spiritual purposes of the Divine government. When I enter within the precincts of law, and walk in harmony with God's will about truth, and temperance, and integrity, and so on, I know there is no peradventure about the results; it is all fixed-immutably fixed-in the foreordained constitution of the world.

So also when I enter within the precincts of other and more spiritual laws-when I bow my knee to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ-when to the source of my intelligence I render back my intelligent homage-when to Him in whom I live and move, and have my being, I express my filial dependence and my devout thanksgiving-when to Him against whom I have revolted I acknowledge my sins, and seek his pardon ;-when I do this, I am walking in harmony with spiritual law, I have come within the range of Divine agency, I stand within the precincts of God's own fixed will; and because he has already anticipated the prayer of his faithful people, I may rely on the certain fulfilment of his previous arrangements.

The time does not allow us to dwell upon the vast evidence everywhere surrounding us, that there is a wondrous uniformity and simplicity of law in all the departments of Divine operation; and it is altogether congruous-with all that may be learnt of God from his works or his word-to suppose that this is the way in which God answers prayer, without any interference with laws already in operation.

There is an objection that may be made to these views which it would not be right to pass over. It may be said, then, if God changes not, and governs all things by fixed laws, why pray at all, since your prayer cannot alter the course of things? This is a deistical objection that has often been made. The fair reply, I think, is this: that the laws

by which the answer to prayer is secured proceed upon the foreseen fact that prayer will be offered. He who knows all things knew that the devout heart would pray, and, knowing this, has arranged spiritual laws, contrivances of the most subtile and delicate kind, connexions between events of the most intricate character, by which prayer is answered, and the promise of our text fulfilled.

Besides which, this objection proves too much. I might as well say, why be industrious, when general and fixed laws have already arranged the result? Why be temperate, if it has been previously arranged that fixed results should follow? In other words, Why should I place myself in harmony with any of God's laws when I know that these laws are fixed and definite in their results? Or thus: placing myself in harmony with all other Divine laws, why should I place myself out of harmony in this one respect, and make prayer the only exemption, when, as evidence of the truth of their ideas, all those who have continued to persevere in prayer, have, without exception, declared that, sooner or later, God has attended to the voice of their supplications?

Now, to bring these considerations to an end, if some things should have been too argumentative or too subtle for you to grasp, or to retain with readiness, let me add, that it is not necessary for you to see the connexion between obedience and its result to enjoy the blessing spoken of in our text. To any minds that ever feel perplexed when they meditate on this subject, the remarks we have made are offered in the hope that they may tend to widen the basis on which the duty and the privilege of prayer rest. It is no vain thing to wait upon the Lord. They who so wait will find their homage anticipated, and the merciful provision made for the full supply of all needed good. "He is able to do exceeding abundantly above all we can ask or think."

And, on the other hand, to withhold prayer from God is to oppose the spiritual constitution of the universe. It is the refusal of obedience, of worship, of the acknowledgment, of dependence, of confession, of supplication, and of thanks

giving; and we cannot imagine that to place ourselves at that distance from God is the way to secure eternal bliss.

Let me urge you all to a consideration of these thoughts. Life is too short, and its consequences too serious, for us to spend it all in cavils or disobedience. We shall pray when we come to die. It may then be too late to pray aright. Oh! come now unto Him, and He will save us with an everlasting salvation.

Royston.

W. G. BARRETT.

MEN OUGHT ALWAYS TO PRAY.

"In this precept-to pray always-there is nothing of exaggeration, nothing commanded which may not be fulfilled, when we understand of prayer as the continual desire of the soul after God; having indeed its times of intensity, seasons of an intenser concentration of the spiritual life, but not being confined to those times; since the whole life of the faithful should be, in Origen's beautiful words, one great connected prayer, or, as St. Basil expresses it, prayer should be the salt which is to salt everything besides. That soul,' says Donne, that is accustomed to direct herself to God upon every occasion; that, as a flower at sunrising, conceives a sense of God in every beam of his, and spreads and dilates itself towards him, in a thankfulness, in every small blessing that he sheds upon her;-that soul who, whatsoever string be stricken in her, bass or treble, her high or her low estate, is ever turned towards God;-that soul prays sometimes when it does not know that it prays.""-Trench.

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Analysis of Homily the Forty-fourth.

"In the same hour came forth fingers of a man's hand, and wrote over against the candlestick upon the plaister of the wall of the king's palace : and the king saw the part of the hand that wrote. Then the king's countenance was changed, and his thoughts troubled him, so that the joints of his loins were loosed, and his knees smote one against another."-Dan. v. 5, 6.

SUBJECT:-The Awakening Hour of Conscience.

THIS chapter develops two solemn facts, deserving the most earnest attention of every human being:-First. That neither the revolutions of time nor the opposition of man can hinder the fulfilment of the Divine word. Upwards of one hundred and sixty years before the catastrophe recorded in this chapter had taken place, the overthrow of Babylon had been predicted, with all the minute details of the sad event. Up to the very hour probabilities seemed against such an occurrence. Babylon, with its high and massive walls, its lofty towers and broad ditches, on the last morning, seemed well defended, and truly impregnable; but now, even when the king and his court appeared the less apprehensive of danger, Cyrus and his army were turning off the Euphrates, and making their way into the heart of that empire which heaven had foredoomed. "In that night was Belshazzar the king of the Chaldeans slain." Thus his word will ever be realized. Ages may transpire, but the ETERNAL forgets it not: mountain obstacles may oppose, but the ALMIGHTY Will level them with the dust. Secondly. That at the period when men fancy themselves most secure, the peril is frequently the most imminent. Probably, in the midst of the revellings of that night, many a contemptuous joke was passed as to the futilities of all invading projects. Thus it was with the Deluge, Sodom, Jerusalem; and thus, we are told, it will be with the Judgment.