self with the joys and sorrows of his flock. The widow and the orphan were sure of his sympathy. For them he ever prayed most touchingly. He had not the means to relieve the wants of others, but he had kind friends who, trusting to his judgment, committed large portions of their substance to his care, and from these it was his joy to help the widows and the poor.

In the Sabbath-school connected with his church he took a deep interest. It was his custom to go there every Sabbath afternoon and open the proceedings with prayer. After the prayer he used to go round to the different classes, noticing the children, and saying a kind word to each. He felt very much when children were about to be separated from their parents, and his prayers for them were very tender and earnest. Doubtless many of them listened with moistened eyes, and even now remember how Mr. Leslie prayed for them.

III. The Christian man.

Mr. Leslie never liked to say any

thing about his own experience. He did not keep a diary, as he thought it very difficult, indeed almost impossible, to be thoroughly honest in writing a record of spiritual exercises. But all his life was that of a thorough man of God. He had lofty views of the holiness of God, consequently he had very low views of himself. The atonement of Christ was his only hope, as he often touchingly said. In a will written by him during his residence in Calcutta, this passage occurs :

"And lastly, I hereby declare, that the atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ,the great God,even our Saviour, is the only ground of my hope for the pardon of sin, and for admission after death into the abode of the spirits made perfect."

And in a similar paper of a later

date the same sentiments are expressed, but more strongly :

-

"The atonement of Christ is all my hope. In every relation of life, I have sinned. I have failed in every duty, and I know and feel myself to be a guilty sinner: and my only hope for mercy is what Christ has done. On the ground of that, and that only, I look for mercy and eternal life."

Mr. Leslie loved and studied the Bible most thoroughly. He liked to have it read through regularly in his family, and it was his endeavour to read it through in this manner once a year. The Bible settled every question with him. Family worship he most regularly maintained; indeed, his children would have thought it as possible to go without their daily meals as without the daily worship. He thought it right that every member of the family should present, unless prevented by sickness. The verses of the chapter were read in turn by all present. To prevent weariness, he was never long: and in the evenings he always had worship early, so that his children, be present and not be sleepy. even while very young, might always

be

Mr. Leslie was a man of much fervent prayer. From things he occasionally said, we have reason to believe that he kept a list of the members of his church and his own

personal friends, and that he had regular days on which he prayed for them by name. A copy of "Clark on the Promises " always lay on his table that he might have the promises at hand to plead in prayer.

Mr. Leslie ever lived with the prospect of death before him. This was gathered from his daily prayers and also from his practice of arranging his papers and putting his affairs in order before leaving home on any journey. He had suffered so severely

from the suddenness of his first bereavement, that he seemed afraid

lest he should be similarly overtaken again. It was therefore his custom, and one which he recommended from the pulpit, to look forward to the probability of bereavements. Thus, when any of his family were ill, he anticipated the possibility of a fatal termination, and prepared himself for it by prayer, and was also anxious that his family should be similarly prepared for God's righteous will.

In his principles, Mr. Leslie was very firm and uncompromising, both as a Dissenter and a Baptist. Yet he was no bigot. He loved all who loved the Lord Jesus. He did not associate much with those of other denominations in Calcutta, but it was not because he did not love them. He felt that his Church was his first care, and he did not wish to get himself involved in frequent committee meetings, &c., which would interfere with his pulpit preparations.

Mr. Leslie had a peculiarly refined and sensitive mind. His attachments were very strong. He loved to give pleasure to others. Of little children he was very fond. He had his little favourites, whom he used to watch for in his daily walks, and great was his delight when he saw them smile at his approach.

Had Mr. Leslie not consecrated his life to the service of Christ, he would doubtless have taken a high position as a scholar. The study of the classical writers was a passion with him. Greek he never wearied of reading, and there were some authors he read and re-read with ever fresh delight. Herodotus was

one of these special favourites. Latin he had studied with great care, and French, Italian, and German he knew something of. He loved to impart these his accomplishments to others. He had a large library and it was very saddening to see him during his last years stand and look wistfully at his books. The power of reading them with understanding had gone.

His tastes and habits were very simple. It was difficult to know what to give him or do for him. When asked what he would like, he would say, "I want nothing: I have everything." He used to rise early and retire early. He disliked late hours, as they unfitted him for his work, and whenever he went anywhere to spend the evening, he was sure to ask for the Bible at nine o'clock that he might have worship

and leave.

To the natives he was uniformly kind and respectful, never receiving any little attention even from his servants without kindly recognition. It was touching to see the numbers of natives who stood on each side of the road while the funeral passed, watching it with sorrowful interest.

Thus all through the days of health and vigour he was engaged in doing the will of God; the days of darkness and silence saw him bearing the will of God; and now that he has passed out of our sight, we are glad to think that the service is resumed, and that from the temple of our God he will go no more out.Abridged from the Calcutta Christian Spectator.

indestructible might of the Spirit of God than the Apostle Paul. All his heroic boldness in the face of his many foes, his firmness against the Jew, and his confidence and courage against the Greek, sprang not out of the natural daring and superior wisdom which he unquestionably possessed, but out of his implicit reliance on the Spirit of God. Though other men might think "his bodily presence weak and his speech contemptible," yet "strong in the Lord," he cared not, though all the powers of earth and air were ranged on one side, bolstered up by the wisdom of human philosophy and backed by the fiercest fires of persecution, if only he could be sure that on the other side there was the Spirit of the Living God. "Greater is He that is for us than all they that be against us." "The weapons of our warfare mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds."

are

But this renders it the more strange that he should write as he does here. Could that bright light, then, be extinguished, that fire be quenched, and the all-subduing be itself subdued? In what sense are we to understand these words; and where does the danger lie against which we are exhorted to be upon our guard?

We see, at once, that the words must be taken with some limits. Not only is the living Spirit of God be

yond the reach of human enmity to injure or destroy, and above the need of human friendship to foster and sustain, but the energy and might of the Spirit's work cannot be so resisted by man as to be ultimately unsuccessful. Not, indeed, that no men can put it from them (I have no such notion of irresistible grace as this), but that no human power can really put out the light, or prevent the ultimate triumph of the truth.

The reference in the text can only be to certain kinds of suppression, that are within the power even of the Church itself. And there can be no doubt, I think, that the Apostle's primary allusion is to those peculiar modes in which the Spirit so frequently manifested its power in the early Church. So that, to understand the real meaning of the words, and at the same time to see clearly their bearing upon ourselves, it will be necessary to trace out as distinctly as possible the marked diversity and yet essential unity between the work of the Spirit in the days of the Apostles and the work of the same Spirit in our own.

I shall simply arrange what I have to say upon the subject under these two heads::

I. THE POSSESSION OF THE SPIRIT
THE PERPETUAL DISTINCTION
OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH.
II. QUENCHING THE SPIRIT, THE

STANDING DANGER OF
CHURCH.

THE

1. The possession of the Spirit the perpetual distinction of the Christian Church.-The Day of Pentecost, the true birthday of the Church, stands out in the history of the world as the day when the Spirit was poured out from on high. Not that this was the first appearance of the Spirit of God on the stage of the world's history. We know, indeed, comparatively little of its earlier work in the world; yet the fact that it has always played a most important part in the moulding of human character and life, hardly admits of a moment's hesitation or dispute. It was not only the same Spirit which calmed the troubled waves of the early chaos and filled their depths with life; but it gave to Samson his gigantic strength; to Bezaleel, the great artist, his genius and skill; to David his poetic fancy; and to Elijah his prophetic fire. Holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." And we may even go further still, and say that the song of many a Gentile poet, and the lessons of many a Gentile philosopher were not altogether without an impulse from the same Spirit of the Lord.

Yet amidst all this, the gift of the Spirit was the object of a distinct promise to the Christian Church: apparently as something altogether new, evidently as something unparalleled before. Christ Himself spoke of it as "the promise of the Father:" held it up as the greatest of all possible gifts, dependent upon His own departure, and worth losing His visible presence to obtain ; whilst the Apostles claimed it as the great fulfilment of prophecy, the culminating glory of the Christian dispensation, the true sign of "the last days."

The importance of this gift was still further attested by the phenomena which attended its coming. Not only did it come down with the sound of a mighty rushing wind,

and cloven tongues of fire; but these tongues rested on every head, and from the lips of all the assembled Church, as though tuned already to the music of heaven, there burst forth a song of celestial praise, which, as it floated on the breeze, carried to every man in his own tongue the wonderful works of God,

Nor was it only at the first rush that these effects were produced. As if to prove that this was no tempo. rary phenomenon, no class endowment or merely national privilege, the same effects were repeated again and again. At Samaria, Corinth, or Ephesus, faith in Christ is followed in precisely the same way by the reception of the Holy Ghost. And lest some narrow-minded Christian should affirm that this marvellous gift was either dependent on the touch of an Apostle's hand, or restricted to the baptized, the Spirit itself set both aside, and fell directly on Cornelius and all that heard the (Apostle's) word, so that they all spake with tongues.

It matters not what this gift of tongues really was: whether, as some suppose, it was the ability to speak in foreign languages without the necessity of learning them, or as others think, a Divine impulse to pour out thoughts and feelings in unearthly or celestial sounds. Whatever it was and whatever it symbolised, it stood prominently out as the proof of this great fact that the Spirit of God had come down to men, not as an occasional visitant or merely to inspire the few, but to dwell in the Church, to inspire men of all classes and all nations, and to make of all believers temples of the Holy Ghost.

If we look again into that early Church, we shall find that the presence of the Spirit was also manifested in other remarkable ways. Foremost, of course, would ever be the greatest work of all, viz., the conversion and regeneration of the

sinner, and the sanctification of the believer. But while the Apostle never failed to keep this distinctly in view, it is not to this that he is referring here. And it is not for a moment because I regard this fact as one of trifling importance that I pass it by with these few words; but that we may give the more direct attention to the question raised by these words: What is the Spirit within the Church?

Looking back, then, to that early Church, the first effect of the presence of the Spirit of God, and the one which seems to distinguish it above the church of any later age, was the special inspiration of many, at least, of the heralds or preachers of the truth. There are few questions of greater importance in the present day than this. On every hand the inspiration of the writers of our Bible has been fiercely assailed; sometimes by the absolute denial that they had anything worthy of the name, and at other times by the polite admission that they were so inspired as to be worthy of a place not far removed from Socrates, Shakespeare, or Milton. Now, I grant that it is not easy to lay down a theory of inspiration, which will fully satisfy even my own mind, to say nothing of the minds of others. Nor do I think that, amidst all the conflicting theories that have been proposed, the full solution of the mystery has been arrived at yet. But perfect theories are not essential to the establishment of facts; and imperfect theories do not hinder the clearest perception of a fact. While the few have been settling the theory of light, the light itself has been shining brightly, and none but the blind have been unable to rejoice in it. And so it is with the inspiration of the great preachers and penmen of the Word of God. We may not be able to draw the exact line, and say who were and who were not inspired.

It may be impossible to determine how long the gift was continued, and when it came to an end. We are sometimes surprised that so little is said in the New Testament itself about a gift of such vast importance in our esteem. But for all that, when we look the facts fairly in the face, it does appear to us that it would be just as wise to deny the shining of the sun as to dispute the inspiration of the first teachers of the Gospel. Nothing but this will ever explain the marvellous contrast, discernible in two short months, between Peter's ignorance or John's despair, and the unfaltering confidence, the clear statements, and the rich fulness of their later words; or, between the maledictions of Saul, in his blindness, and the breadth and harmony with which he unfolds the whole Gospel of Christ. It is a

matter of little moment to us to define exactly how much this inspiration included, or precisely how many were within the magic ring. But it

is of incalculable importance to hold fast the fact that it was there, enabling the first teachers to unfold for all time the great truths of the kingdom. The Book, from their hands, comes with the demonstration of the Spirit. The truths from their lips or pens are not strung together for the daws of criticism to peck at, but are words of life, to be received as the choicest gifts of God; for, like their Master, they speak as having authority, and not as the Scribes.

In addition to this gift of inspiration, we find the possession of the Spirit in the early Church followed on a much wider scale, by many other special gifts of miraculous or supernatural power. Not only did the old gift of tongues burst out afresh in the Corinthian Church, and reach a climax unequalled elsewhere, but the new life and power of the Spirit were manifested in unusual ability to