THE JEWS AN UNEXCEPTIONABLE EVI- WHAT earthly judge, if he had been questioned as to of avowed enemies? and should we not refuse to lodge our records in the hands of our opponents? on the young world radiant with celestial smiles. I rose upon the pinions of the first morn, and caught the sweet dew-drops as they fell and sparkled on the boughs of the garden. Ere the foot of man was heard sounding in this wilderness, I gazed out on its thousand rivers, flashing in light, and reflecting the broad sun, like a thousand jewels upon their bosoms. The cataracts sent up their anthems in these solitudes, and none was here to listen to the new-born melody but I! The fawns bounded over the hills. and drank at the limpid streams, ages before an arm was raised to injure or make them afraid. For thousands of years the morning star rose in beauty upon these unpeopled shores, and its twin sister of the eve flamed in the forehead of the sky, with no eye to admire their rays but mine. Ah! call me old! Babylon, and fell, and I beheld them in their glory and their and Assyria, Palmyra and Thebes, rose, flourished, decline. Scarce a melancholy ruin marks the place of their existence; but when their first stones were laid in the earth, I was there! 'Mid all their splendour, glory, and wickedness, I was in their busy streets, and crumbling their magnificent palaces to the earth. My books will show a long and fearful account against them. I control the fate of empires-I give birth, I conceal in them the seeds of death and dethem their period of glory and splendour; but at their cay. They must go down and be humbled in the And now that Christianity is actually made to dust-their heads bowed down before the rising stand upon such evidence, what test can be more satisfactory? Reason itself owns its validity; for glories of young nations, to whose prosperity there what collusion can now be charged upon the conturwill also come a date, and a day of decline. I poise rent witnesses to Christianity, when each party in my wings over the earth, and watch the course and court is decidedly at variance with the other? doings of its inhabitants. I call up the violets upon Who the hill, and crumble the grey ruins to the ground. can rationally question the strength of that title which is contained in their genuine archives; that I am the agent of a Higher Power, to give life and take it away. I spread silken tresses upon the brow evidence resulting from their hereditary denial of facts, of which they persist to reverence the predic-aged man. Dimples and smiles, at my bidding, lurk of the young, and plant grey hairs on the head of the tions? Where can we more confidently look for the truth of a religion they detest than to the verification conferred on it by their original history, their irreversible antipathy, their actual condition, and existing character?-Hannah More. But His wisdom, in whose sight ours is folly, has seen fit to make one of the most striking proofs of the truth of Christianity depend on the living miracle of the enmity of the Jews: "To them also were committed the oracles of God;" so that, to both their ancient testimony and their present opposition, we are to look for the most striking proofs of a religion which they behold with perpetual hatred. A POOR EXCUSE. “There are so many ways and religions, that we know not which to be of; and therefore we will be even as we are." Ans. Because there are many, will you be of that way that you may be sure is wrong? None are farther out of the way, than worldly, fleshly, unconverted sinners; for they do not err in this or that opinion, as many sects do, but in the very scope and drift of their lives. If you were going a journey that your life lay on, would you stop or turn again, because you met some cross-ways, or because you saw some travellers go the horse-way and some the foot-way, and some perhaps break over the hedge, yea, and some miss the way? Or would you not rather be the more careful to inquire the way? If you have some servants that know not how to do your work right, and some that are unfaithful, would you take it well at any of the rest, that would therefore be idle and do you no service, because they see the rest so bad?-Baxter. TIME'S SOLILOQUY. OLD! call you me? Ah! when the Almighty spoke creation into birth, I was there. Then was I born. 'Mid the bloom and verdure of paradise, I gazed up around the lips of the innocent child, and I furrow the brow of the aged with wrinkles. Old! call you me? ay, but when will my days be numbered? When will time end and eternity begin? When will the earth and its waters, and the universe be rolled, and a new world commence its revolutions? Not till He who first bade me begin my flight, so orders it. complished, then, and not till then-and no one can When His purposes, who called me into being are acproclaim the hour-I too, shall go to the place of all living. THE SIGN OF THE CROSS. THE Cross is but a sign of Christ crucified: Christ crucified, the substance of this cross. The sign,without the substance, is as nothing: the substance, without the sign, is all things. I hate not the sign,! I will not blasthough I adore but the substance. pheme the cross of Christ: I will not worship but Christ crucified. I will take up my cross-love my cross-bear my cross-embrace my cross:-yet not to His name: mine shall never bow in idolatry to adore my cross. All knees shall bend in reverence | his image. Warwick. THE TWO MONKS. Two Cistertian monks, in the reign of King Henry VIII., were threatened, before their martyrdom, by the Lord Mayor of that time, that they should be tied in a sack and thrown into the Thames. "My Lord," said one, "we are going to the kingdom of heaven, and whether we go by land or by water is of very little consequence to us." THE CHRISTIAN TREASURY. 133 MOUNT HOREB. BY THE REV. J. T. HEADLEY, NEW YORK. UNT HOREB not being so isolated as Ararat šinai, does not occupy so definite a place in are or history as it. One of the group that rounds Sinai, it presents the same barren desolate appearance, and stands amid the te bleak and forbidding scenery. These mn summits rise together in the same vens, and the silent language they speak the same meaning. Still Horeb has less tinguishing characteristics than Sinai, and latter overshadows it as much in interest it does in nature. The Mount of Terror is march there in the desert, and all other nmits are but his body-guard. They wit-Sea passage, and overthrow of his enemies, had ssed his grand coronation when the law was sen, and shook to the thunders that honoured > ceremony. leaf a leaf of fire that glowed unwasted in the still flame. As he stood amazed and awestruck at the sight, a voice, whose tones were yet to be familiar to his ear, exclaimed, "Take thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place on which thou standest is holy ground." IIere Moses received his first commission, and here was God's first outward demonstration to him in behalf of his people. Mount Horeb has not been consecrated once, thrice, and hence has a threefold claim for place amid the immortal list of Sacred Mounins. Moses learned his first lessons around base, and amid its solitudes formed the oughtful, stern, and decided character which ndered him fit to be the leader of Israel. When in his impetuous youth he slew the gyptian that would trample on his countryan, he came thither to escape the penalty of e deed. After the first gust of indignation ad swept by, and he saw the lifeless corpse at is feet, alarm took the place of passion, and astily covering the dead man in the sand, he led to the desert. Month after month he wandered about Horeb, thinking of Egypt and he royal court he dared not enter. Away from the temptations of the palace, and beyond the reach of the conflicting motives that might sway him there, he trod the desert a free man. With nought but nature and God to teach him, his character must be simple and manly, and his principles upright and pure. Amid the grand and striking features of mountain scenery, he could not but learn to hate tyranny and love freedom still more, and when, at length, his character was settled on a broad and permanent basis, God sent him back to Egypt to deliver his people. Wandering one morning along the slopes of Horeb, he saw before him a solitary bush blazing from top to bottom, but still unconsumed. Every branch was a fiery branch, and every In the exciting scenes through which he afterwards passed in Egypt, he may have entirely forgotten Horeb. But after the plagues, and death, and flight, and pursuit, and Red all been left behind, and the host of Israel entered the desert, the familiar scenery he began to approach must have waked up strange associations in his heart. At length the well-remembered form of Horeb, where he had wandered lonely and solitary, self-exiled from his home, rose before him. A gloomy fugitive, he first saw that desolate mountain in the distance; a leader of a mighty people, and the chosen of God, he pitched his tent the second time at its base. Doubtless his first interview with the Deity here, caused him to expect some other revelations now that the commission he had given him had been fulfilled. How much his early experience had to do with his encamping on this spot with the host of Israel it is impossible to tell; but that he should expect that God, who had first sent him forth, should here give him further instructions, was most natural. His expectations were not disappointed, and Sinai and Horeb together became the scene of the most wondrous events of human history. The shadow of Sinai falls over Horeb, and they stand together in immortal brotherhood. They cannot well be separated in contemplating the revelations of God to his people, on their journey from Egypt to Canaan, and hence I have not attempted it. Still, there are other scenes connected with Horeb, in which Sinai is not mentioned. Twice had it been honoured by the presence of Deity, which had so consecrated it that we find the angel of the Lord afterwards calling it "The Mount of God." It was, however, destined for a third baptism. When Elijah, hunted by Jezebel, fled for his life, he wandered across ""Twas but the whirlwind of his breath, Announcing danger, wreck, and death." The hurricane passed by, and that wild strife of the elements ceased; but before the darkened heavens could clear themselves, the prophet heard a rumbling sound in the bowels of the mountain, and the next moment an earthquake was on the march. Still Horeb rocked to and fro like a vessel in a storm, and its bosom parted with the sound of thunder before the convulsive throbs that seemed rend. ing the very heart of nature. Fathomless abysses opened on every side, and huge precipices, toppling over the chasms at their base, went thundering down through the darkness. The fallen prophet lay on the floor of his cavern and listened to the grinding, crushing sound around and beneath him, and the steady shocks more terrible than all that ever and anon shook the heights, thinking that Jehovah at last stood before him. Surely it was his mighty hand that lay on that trembling, tottering mountain, and his strong arm that rocked it so wildly on its base. No, "God was not in the earthquake." the desert to this mountain. His prayers had through the gloom—the earth rent where it brought rain upon the parched and desolate passed, and so boundless seemed its strength earth, but his sword had also drank the blood that the steady mountain threatened to lift of the prophets of Baal, and Jezebel had sent from its base and be carried away. Amid him word that she would do to him as he had this deafening uproar and confusion, and darkdone to her prophets; and so he fled into the ness and terror, the stunned and awe-struck wilderness, and sat down under a juniper tree | Elijah expected to see the form of Jehovah and prayed for death. Weary and discouraged, moving; but that resistless blast, strewing the the hunted fugitive lay down and slept on the sides of Horeb with wreck and chaos, was not barren heath, when the angel of the Lord God in motiontouched him and bade him arise and go to Mount Horeb. Elijah started for the desert, and after travelling for more than a month, he at length, worn and exhausted, came to the mountain, and took up his solitary lodgings in a cave. How many desolate days and lonely nights he passed there we know not, but broken in spirit, nay, his faith itself weak and well-nigh gone, his hours, whether few or many, were full of despondency and sorrow. Both the blessings and judgments he had brought on Israel, attended, though they had been, with miracles, had failed to turn the people from their wickedness. That Elijah was still in the despairing mood which caused him to pray under the juniper tree for death, is evident both from the interrogation of the Deity and the reply of the prophet. "The Lord said unto him, What doest thou here, Elijah? And he said, I have been very jealous for the Lord God of hosts, for the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenants, thrown down thy altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only am left, and they seek my life. And he said, Go forth and stand upon the mount," Jehovah was about to reveal himself, and Elijah evidently expected some exhibition of divine goodness or power, though he was not prepared for the scene which was about to transpire. Before he reached the entrance of his cave he heard a roar louder than the sea, that arrested his footsteps and sent the blood back to his heart. The next moment there came a blast of wind, as if the last chain that bound it had suddenly been thrown off and it had burst forth in all its unrestrained and limitless energy. In the twinkling of an eye the sun was blotted out by the cloud of dust, and the fragments that filled the air as it whirled them in fierce eddies onward. It shrieked and howled around the mouth of the cave, while the fierce hissing sound of its steady pressure against the heart of the mountain was more terrible than its ocean like roar. Before its fury and strength rocks were loosened from their beds and hurled ""Twas but the thundering of his car. The trampling of his steeds from far." The commotion ceased, and Nature stood "and calmed her ruffled frame;" but in the deep, ominous silence that followed, there seemed a foreshadowing of some new terror. and, lo! the heavens were suddenly on fire, and a sheet of flame fell like falling lightning from the sky. Its lurid light pierced to the depths of Elijah's cavern till it glowed like an oven, and from base to summit of Mount Horeb there went up a vast cloud of smoke, fast and furious, while the entire sides flowed with torrents of fire. The mountain glowed with a red heat, and stood like a huge burning furnace under a burning heaven, and groaned on its ancient seat as if in torture. But God was not in the fiery storm "Twas but the lightning of his eye" that had kindled that mountain into a blaze, and filled the air with flame. THE EVANGELICAL ALLIANCE. But this too passed by, and what new scene of terror could rise worthy to herald the footsteps of God—what greater outward grandeur could surround his presence? The astonished prophet still lay upon his face wrapped in wonder, and filled with fear at these exhibitions of Almighty power, waiting for the next scene in this great drama, when suddenly through the deep quiet and breathless hush that had succeeded the earthquake and the storm, there arose "a still small voice," the like of which had never met his ear before. It was small and still," but it thrilled the prophet's frame with electric power, and rose so sweet and clear, "That all in heaven and earth might hear; 66 -a And God was in the voice. The prophet knew that he was nigh, and, rising up, wrapped his mantle about his face, and went to the mouth of the cave, and reverently stood and listened. Oh, who can tell the depth and sweetness of the tones of that voice which the Lord of love deemed worthy to announce his coming! A ransomed spirit's harp-an angel's luteseraph's song-could not have moved the prophet so. But while his whole being, soul and body, trembled to its music, a sterner voice met his ear, saying, "What doest thou here, Elijah?" The prophet again poured the tale of his woes and of Israel's sin into the Infinite bosom. His wrongs were promised redress, and Israel deliverance; and the hunted exile went boldly back to his people, and Horeb again stood silent and alone in the desert. THE EVANGELICAL ALLIANCE. (Continued from page 114.) On Friday forenoon, the important resolution containing what has been called the basis of union, was moved by the Rev. Mr. Bickersteth. It was as fol lows: "That with a view, however, of furnishing the most satisfactory explanation, and guarding against misconception, in regard to their design, and the means of its attainment, they deem it expedient explicitly to state as follows: "That the parties composing the Alliance shall be such persons only as hold and maintain what are usually understood to be evangelical views in regard to the matters of doctrine under-stated, viz.:— 1. The divine inspiration, authority, and sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures. 2. The unity of the Godhead, and the trinity of persons therein. 3. The utter depravity of human nature in consequence of the fall. 4. The incarnation of the Son of God, his work 135 6. The work of the Holy Spirit in the conversion and sanctification of the sinner. 7. The right and duty of private judgment in the interpretation of the Holy Scriptures. "8. The divine institution of the Christian ordinances of baptism and the Lord's supper. ministry, and the authority and perpetuity of the "9. The immortality of the soul, the resurrection of the body, the judgment of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ, with the eternal blessedness of the righteous, and the eternal punishment of the wicked." The last article had not been among the number agreed cn by the preparatory meeting held at Liverpool, but had been added by the Aggregate Committee, at the special request of the American brethren. Mr. Bickersteth, after urging the necessity of some such statement of common principles as the above, referred to the additional article in these terms: "Brethren from America showed to me, and to us all, their peculiar dangers and difficulties from Infidelity in the form of Universalism; and the Calcutta missionaries also explained the peculiar dangers they had to contend with in India, from the infidelity of the Hindus; and we had their assurance. that our ninth article would meet the difficulties of the circumstances in which they were placed. And when our brethren from Germany had also shown us how Neologians deny the most awful truths which we believe, I felt that the article, No. 9, was most precious and important. It embraces, The immortality of the soul, the resurrection of the body, the judgment of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ, with the eternal blessedness of the righteous, and the eternal punishment of the wicked. I recollect ed also, in reference to the importance of making this addition now, that two departed saints-the Rev. Josiah Pratt, first secretary of the Bible Society, and the Rev. Joseph Hughes-had told me there would have been no difficulty in having prayer at the meetings of the Bible Society, had it been agreed to at the beginning: the difficulty was, in making the alteration afterwards. I do, therefore, feel that we are under a deep debt of obligation to our American brethren for coming forward to suggest the addition. It was worth their while to cross the Atlantic, to enable us to bring forward such a pro-| position. I feel, also, that it was not right to leave out all reference to the future state, and the future hopes of the Church of God. Knowing the terrors of the Lord,' said the apostle, we persuade men;" and the recompense of the reward, and the joy set before Him, affected our Lord himself." 6 The adoption of the articles was seconded by Dr. S. H. Cox of New York, in a remarkable speech, from which we make the following extracts: "I should be more pervaded, Sir Culling, with a sense of the honour now conferred upon me, if I were not so overwhelmed with a sense of the duty, compared with my meanness in my own sight, and infinitely more in the sight of God. I hope to have the same comfort which strengthened my excellent brethren-the prayers of Christians. When I think, Sir, of this assembly-an assembly "Such as earth saw never, Such as heaven stoops down to see" I say, how little is man! how great is God! I am comforted with a fine remark, which an excellent saint, a minister, made to another who had to preach on a great occasion in the United States. Can you,' said he, face that audience?' 'I am afraid I cannot. Did you not hear the advice of an old gentleman, to think them all a patch of cabbages?-to sink them, that they may not sink you?' 'Yes, but I am afraid.' 'You ought to be afraid to go with the inspiration of such a lie They are a most august assembly; the Areopagus of Athens was nothing to them.' 'So I think,' said the preacher; and what shall I do?' 'You must sink them, or they will sink you.' 'How can I?' 'I will tell you. When the sun is up, the stars are invisible; and when God is seen, men and angels together retire under his wing. In the light of his countenance, and in the succours of his strength, go; and may the Spirit of God go with you.' He afterwards said, 'I was calmed and relieved; and never preached with greater freedom.' "Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. We want the Rock of Ages for our basis. Your articles can only in a relative and a most inferior sense be called a basis. But God, who hath made us able ministers of the New Testament, will not allow us to be dishonoured by quibbling about words." "It has been said, that the eighth article, and possibly some others, may exclude some who are Christians. I think it quite possible. It is a great comfort to me. that God can see piety where I cannot. But, ignorant as I am, I feel called by Him to breathe good will to men, and to seek to do them service; but not to acknowledge the features and the family likeness of the children of God, where that family likeness is so mystified and caricatured that I cannot see it. When I refuse to see what I cannot see, I do not usurp the place of the most high Judge; the eternal God is witness, that I do not thus in my soul, any more than in outward demonstration. I would rather advance the interests of God's people than disturb them in one particular. But, in the very nature of the case, it is necessary that the members of this Alliance should have some symbolical mode of knowing one another, and of understanding who they are that stand up together. I have nothing to say of signs and pass-words, though in this hall; but I believe there is a mode of knowing one another between individual Christians, which the devil may have aped, but which God having established, remains as excellent and superlative as the communion of saints. I will repeat an anecdote, which at first troubled me, when I was born in 1812. A Christian from England, in an Oriental country, met with one from Syria. Having mutually heard of each other, but having no master of the ceremonies to introduce them-and having, in consequence of the confusion of Babel, no common language-they could not speak to each other, but knowing each other they shook hands, and looked, and felt, and gestured unutterable things. They felt that they were Christians; they were two sons of the King of kings, redeemed by the same blood, and therefore blood-relatives of the best blood in the universe. Then one of them said, recollecting some blessed words that are transferred from the Hebrew into all versions of the Bible (and I wish that more had been transferred, that cannot be translated) Hallelujah;' Amen,' said the other. guarded, if not with the flaming cherubic sword turn ing every way, yet with a line or scroll; not that which God alone can see, but which men can see. I most perfectly dissent from the idea, that a man does not exclude himself. I believe that sinners exclude themselves from the broad open glories of the gospel. We do not wish to exclude any one; but, if they wil not speak the language of Canaan, we must not be asked to translate gibberish. "And now, I throw myself upon the brotherly confidence of this sainted confraternity, to which I feel it a great honour to belong. I would refer to the Friends; and I presume to know more about them than men who are more learned than I: because I was born one, and educated one: and if the reading of George Fox, William Penn, and Robert Barclay, apologies, and excuses, and all, would make me know their views, I claim to know them. I wonderfully distin-. guish between a system and the men. I say the sys tem is very ricketty. If you say, and I have heard this objection, that we by this basis exclude them. I beg leave to demur. No, we do not. If you would alter the basis, or abolish it, they would be excluded.! except by an inconsistency; because they could not join in your prayers. No, George Fox would not do it; and Robert Barclay says, that prayers that are spoken without the antecedent motion of the Spirit are abhorred of God, and to be separated from by all his true worshippers. And they all believe it. They could not have joined your Bible Society, if you I never had not joined them in their mistake. undertook to dispose of them in the world, as if I were anything but a fellow-sinner. But I am bound as a Christian, as a member of this Alliance, and more as a minister of Christ, to tell men, with the voice of a trumpet that gives no uncer.) tain sound, the difference between truth and. error-between Christianity and a mistake. You may rely upon it, unless you are prepared to give up, not only your basis, but your prayers, you need not be sorry for what you have done; only grieve and pray over what they have done to exclude themselves. hope they will come into our Alliance yet: because I know that God is on the way to destroy all the wood, hay, stubble, that were ever put together, and to compact his children upon a basis which is more durable than adamant. Now I have another thing, to say: if your eighth article do not exclude them; (and I deny that, in a proper sense, it does), yet they are excluded by your first article. It is the TO dos of their system-the cardinal error of their whole theology is in the foundation, that there is a superior rule of faith and practice to the Scriptures. Your Bible, with them, is not the word of God That very phrase is expatriated from its own native domain. This phrase the Word of God-they mys tically connect with their views of the inward light. That inward light (according to them) is the fountain; and the Bible is one of its streams, and Sarah Grubb's Journal is another. I do not wish to cari cature them; but I am telling you the truth: and sc long as we say that the Word of God, in time and in eternity, is the supreme rule, they never can join with us, unless (which I hope will be the case) God shall enlighten them more, and extricate them by the love and glory of Christ. Then they will fing how much they need, that "God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, should shine inte their hearts, to give them the light of the knowledg of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. . . . "I have come to the last of the nine articles; and ] beg my honoured brethren to believe, that whatever I may say (and I am afraid to say anything, for fea An objection had been made to the eighth article, that, it would exclude members of the Society of Friends. |