Our He Is our Father also merciful? Then he will sympathise with us. sufferings will affect him. They will touch his heart. They will awaken his tenderest sympathies. We shall not suffer alone. He will come to us. He will sustain us. He will administer to our necessities. He will even make our bed in our sickness. His sympathy will effectually benefit us. Others may pity, he will relieve. Others may speak, he will apply. Others may wish us well, he will really do us good. Of us it shall by and bye be said, as it was of Israel of old, "In all their afflictions he was afflicted." Is our Father also merciful? Then he will listen to us. Every sigh, every groan, every broken prayer shall enter into his ears. He will listen to the beating of the contrite heart, to the heaving of the troubled bosom, to the sobs of the distressed spirit. He will regard the prayer of the destitute, and will not despise their prayer. He will turn away from the strains of the seraphim, from the hallelujahs of all the celestial host, to listen to the moanings of his Ephraim, to the cries of his tempted, depressed, and afflicted children below. Beloved, he will never turn a deaf ear to our prayers,-poor, imperfect, and broken though they be. cannot, for he is merciful. Is our Father also merciful? Then he will pardon us. He will pardon not only once or twice, but every time we confess our sins with sorrow, and plead for pardon in Jesus' name. How often we have to go and confess the same sins, and seek forgiveness of the same offences. Nor dare we promise, that if he forgive us now, we will be guilty of them no more. For if we did, corruption within us, and Satan without us, would soon lead us to commit them. Still our merciful Father forgives us, and will do so. How strange was the plea of Moses when seeking pardon for the rebellious Israelites, "Let the power of my Lord be great, as thou hast forgiven them from Egypt until now." "As far as the east is from the west, so far will he remove our transgressions from us." Hear his own gracious announcement, "I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions, for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins." If our Father also is merciful, then he will notice the least good thing in us. He did so in Abijah, the child of Jeroboam, as it is written, "He only of Jeroboam shall come to the grave, because in him there is found some good thing toward the Lord God of Israel." It may only be the desire to labour for him, without the power. The wish to be useful, without the opportunity. A little zeal for him. A little love to him. A little faith in him. A little sorrow that we have grieved him. A little kindness to some one of his people, the giving of a cup of cold water only. The speaking a word for him. Whatever good there is in us, generated by his Holy Spirit (and there is no good but what the ever blessed Spirit does produce), he notices, approves, commends, records, and fosters. Man may overlook it. We may think little of it. Not so our merciful Father; it is precious in his sight, and is highly esteemed by him. How different prejudiced man! One fault hides ten virtues; for one spot, he overlooks a score beauties. Oh, to resemble our ever merciful Father, in noticing and admiring what is good in his children. If our Father also is merciful, then he will accept the smallest thing from us. The child has but little to offer, only some common field flower, or some mean production of art, but he brings it in love, he presents it to his father with a smile, he seems to say, "I wish it were gold, or some rich gem," and the father receives it gladly, and is pleased with it. Just so our ever loving Father who is in heaven. What can we bring him? What have we to present to him? It is, perhaps, only a loving wish, or a grateful acknowledgment, or a song of praise, or a poor sinful prayer. But it is what we have, and the Lord accepts it with more pleasure than he does Gabriel's services, or Michael's obedience. He says, "My child would bring me something worthy of me if he had it; but as he has it not, I accept the will for the deed." If there be first a willing mind, "it is accepted according to that a man hath, and not according to that he hath not." If our Father also is merciful, then he will suffer no real evil to befall us. He can prevent it, and he will. Afflictions are not always evils. Rather, sanctified afflictions are among our choicest mercies, our most efficient teachers. David had many, sore, and long continued afflictions, but were they evils? Oh, no, blessings; therefore he writes, "It is good for me that I have been afflicted." And again, "I know, O Lord, that thy judgments are right, and that thou in faithfulness hast afflicted me.' Solomon long since wrote, and providence has ever since proved the truth of the saying, "There shall no evil happen to the just." We have been tried. We have been cast down. We have been stripped. We have been disappointed. We have been painfully humbled. Our hearts have often bled, for they have been often and deeply pierced. But has any real evil befallen us? Can we bring this charge against our most merciful Father? Shall we be able to do so in heaven? No, never! Never! If our Father also is merciful, then he will have us love one another for his sake. He loves all his children. He pities every one of his family. He bids us love every one of our brothers and sisters. It is his will that we should love each other. It is our happiness to love one another. We cannot be like our Father, if we do not love all his children. If we do not love them always. If we do not love them with a warm and glowing love. Oh, for more love to the Lord's people! If God is our Father, and our Father also is merciful, what a source of comfort is opened to us. We know not what awaits us. We know not what we may have to pass through. But let what will come, we shall have one to love us, and one whose love is infinite, unchangeable, and glorious. Yes, our Father's heart will be always set upon us, it will always be full of love to us, it will rejoice over us to do us good. We shall always have one to care for us. He will care for our persons to protect them, for our graces to foster them, and for our circumstances to adapt his mercies to them. The believer can never justly say, "No one cares for me," for his God cares for him; and his care is so efficient, that he is bidden to cast all his cares upon God, and enjoy peace, because God cares for him. We shall always have one to provide for us. We cannot be fatherless. We cannot be neglected. Our Father knows our wants, our weakness, and our dependent condition; he is ever merciful, his mercy is ever great towards us, and therefore our supplies are certain. This led the Apostle to write so confidently to his kind hearted Philippians and say, "My God shall supply all your need, according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus." If God is our merciful Father, let us cherish the thought. It is sweet. It is pleasant. It is profitable. It must do us good. How much better to think of our mercies, than our miseries; of our merciful Father, than of our malicious foes. Let us improve the privilege. Let us go to God as his children. Let us ask of him as of a father. Let us credit his word, rely on his care, rejoice in his mercy, wait at his footstool, work in his vineyard, trust in his faithfulness, and hasten home to be with him in glory everlasting for ever. Let us honour the relationship. Let us walk with God in holy fellowship, obey God with ardent zeal, imitate God with care and caution, and endeavour to exhibit the excellencies of his moral character in our conduct and conversation. Let us be holy, for God is holy. Let us be loving, for God is love. Let us be merciful, for our Father also is merciful. Let us attend to our Saviour's admonition, delivered with so much love when instructing his disciples on the mount, "Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven." Reader, is God your Father ? Do you feel a child's love to him? Do you exercise filial confidence in him? Do you go to him for counsel, for supplies, for comfort, for all you need? Do you look upon him as merciful, and strive to imitate this excellence? Masters, are you merciful to your men? Men, are you merciful to your fellowmen? Mistresses, are you merciful to your servants? Servants, are you merciful to all about you? To be merciful you must not be unjust, or dishonest; but exercise mercy, every one toward another, consistently with the claims of kindred, and the requirements of God's holy precepts, as they bear upon the different relationships of life. Beloved, "be ye merciful, even as your Father which is in heaven is merciful." Claremont-Street, Shrewsbury. CHRISTIAN PROSPECTS. BY THE REV. W. MACLURE, OF NASSAU, NEW PROVIDENCE. Christian men, your Saviour needs you In His glorious battle-field; Fear not, for 'tis He who leads you, Soothe you when the spirits sadden, And the cloud in lightnings break: Souls beneath the altar lying, Tortured for the truth, and slain, Glorious times are drawing nearer; Oh, for times when vice, astounded, Shall her brazen features hide! Speed those times, when famine savage, Pain nor pestilence shall ravage, Crime and cruelty shall die. These times shall come, but, darkness scattering, Christian men, your Saviour needs you, THE LIFE OF CHRIST.* Biblical. Great numbers of our intelligent and thinking young men have heard much of German Theology, and of Strauss, the great infidel of the last few years. Many have read, more or less, in this line, and some perhaps have seen the cream of Strauss's infidelity in the pages of "Newman's Phases of Faith;" to these last-mentioned, especially, we most earnestly commend Neander's invaluable Life of Jesus Christ. Mr. Newman's book would have been more appropriately entitled the "Phases of Disbelief;" it is a mental autobiography, shewing how a mind of very high logical powers, but almost entirely wanting in susceptibility for impressions of the Divine and supernatural, could renounce, step by step, the evangelical creed of youthful life, and descend to doubting whether Christ ever existed, or at least to placing him on a level with Paul, Channing, Watts, &c.! In Neander we have a mind of directly the opposite order; wanting none of the intellectual powers of Strauss or Newman,-their superior, we should say, in this respect,and decidedly so in learning; but a mind in which the moral susceptibilities are of the most lovely and elevated kind. His numerous and devoted pupils constantly compared him with the apostle John, in whose writings he took especial delight. Should any of our young readers' feelings have chilled in perusing the fascinating but onesided and malign logic of Newman, or of Strauss himself, we earnestly invite them to the delightful contrast which Neander's work presents. To such the candour of the author in fully acknowledging difficulties, and in making concessions, which will almost revolt those who know nothing of the "life and death" controversy yet waging for the truth of the gospels in Germany, will rather give confidence than inspire distrust. Neander sets out with the principle, that those who have no susceptibility of impression from "the Divine," are wholly unfitted to comprehend and critically examine the Life of the incarnate Divinity. As a person with no ear for music would but betray his defect, if he presumed to canvass the merits of an oratorio'; or one who had no taste for beauty, if he criticised painting or statuary; so the man in whose heart no longings, at least, after God, no consciousness of his need of acquaintance and reconciliation with Him, existed, could never appreciate the Glorious Revelation of DIVINITY in the LIFE of JESUS. He would judge him simply by negative, logical, and human measures. He would have no spiritual intuition of that which is just the key to the understanding of Christ's whole life. Hence in this noble book, while, in the notes especially, historical difficulties and objections are adverted to, the author spends his strength upon developing the LIFE of Christ, the mind, the motive, the feeling, the ultimate design of all his actions and instructions. Nor do we know any work which by the mere force of a spiritual apprehension of our Lord's sayings and doings, side by side with learning inferior to none of the heartless sceptical critics, so entirely convinces the reader of the justness of its main positions; they evidence their truth for every devout mind, by their mere statement. We say advisedly, main positions, because English readers will think his views of inspiration much below the orthodox standard, and hence think he has used too much freedom in attempting to harmonize the gospel narratives, and in his views on particular passages. Neander, as will be seen in his letter to American Christians, among whom the translation first appeared, is fully conscious of this; but his thoroughly truthful mind will not allow him to speak with. positiveness when he feels any doubt, or to go beyond his assured belief for the sake of pleasing man. He apologizes for the imperfections of his book attendant upon the stormy times of its birth, as he would have preferred to present a work on such a subject as the fruit of calm contemplation. But the times forbade. The infidelity, the seeds of which England had sent to Germany in the beginning of the last century, had, in the first half of the present one, developed itself in the mythical theory of Strauss. That is, the gospel narrations are of the same character and *The Life of Jesus Christ, by Augustus Neander. (Bohn's Standard Library.) worth as the heathen myth-ologies; and the divine miracles and deeds of Jesus Christ, are historically of the same quality as the exploits of Hercules, and the filthy amours of the monarch of Olympus: there might be such a person once on earth as Christ, who gathered disciples around him; these persons found him to be the promised Messiah, and, piece by piece, put together the narratives in the gospels, to make his deeds correspond with their notions derived from the Jewish prophecies of what such a Messiah ought to be! For ourselves we have always thought, and we are happy to see our views confirmed by the opinion of the great Niebuhr (the man who first fully shewed the historical worthlessness of Roman and Greek legends), that the man who could fail to see the marks of historical verity in the gospels, is either destitute of genuine critical faculty, or, if he has it, is blinded by some metaphysical or philosophical theory. It may be needful to mention for the sake of some, that all the German Infidel School disbelieve the possibility of a miracle on philosophical grounds; they therefore come to the gospels to disprove their mira cles; they cannot pretend to be unprejudiced enquirers. We hope Mr. Bohn will soon give us Tholuck's Reply to Strauss also. Tholuck's theology is much nearer the orthodox standard of this country, though theologians like the late excellent Messrs. Haldane and Carson, will be wroth with all who deviate (except in one ceremony) from the "Westminster Assembly's Catechism." It is useless, however, to declaim against German theology, unless we wish to provoke persons to study it. Surely, if we include all grades of English theologians, from a Hobbes to a Haldane, we might denounce our own with equal consistency. German literature of any kind must and will be read. It is mere indolence to rail at what we are too lazy to refute, perhaps what we know only at second-hand. The manly course is that of Professor Davidson, whose valuable Introductions to the Scriptures supply a want which no mere compilations like Hartwell Horne's can ever do. The writer can only add, that if he covets the spirit of any christian of this age, it is that which has just left the earthly tenement of the lovely Neander. Tales and Sketches. A CURE FOR LOW SPIRITS. For some cause, real or imaginary, I felt low spirited. There was a cloud upon my feelings, and I could not smile as usual, nor speak in a tone of cheerfulness. As a natural result, the light of my countenance being gone, all things around me were in a shadow. My husband was sober and had little to say, the children would look strangeJy at me when I answered their questions, or spoke to them for any purpose, and domestics moved about in a quiet manner, and when they addressed me, did so in a tone more subdued than usual. This reaction upon my state only made darker the cloud that veiled my spirits. I was conscious of this, and was conscious that the original cause of depression was entirely inadequate in itself to produce the results which followed. Under this feeling, I made an effort to rally myself, but in vain; and sank lower from the very struggles to rise above the gloom that overshadowed me. I scarcely answered him, and I could see that he felt hurt. How much more wretched did I become at this! Could I have then retired to my chamber, and, alone, given my heart full vent in a passion of tears, I might have obtained relief to my feelings. But I could not do this. While I sat at the table, forcing a little food into my mouth for appearance' sake my husband said, "You remember the fine lad who has been for some time in our store ?" I nodded my head, but the question did not awaken in my mind the least interest. "He has not made his appearance for several days; and I learned this morning, |