ous prayer recorded in John xvii, seems to indicate that the 'glory' of Christ has to be conferred upon His disciples that they may be one,'

The last remark of our respected correspondent is so important in its bearings that we cannot allow it to pass without giving our own views upon the point he raises. A large class of excellent Christians take the view of it to which he refers. They look for the coming of the Lord, to settle everything that is wrong in both the church and the world. Hence they are but little affected by a sense of their own responsibility to bring about union among Christians as a suitable preparation and a pre-requisite for the Lord's coming. They forget that by the terms of the chapter to which he refers, the Lord's way of revealing Himself is through His church. Even at the open manifestation of His glory in the future, He will be glorified in them (xvii. 10, xvi. 14, 1 Thess. i. 10.). The point raised is a most important one. And it is intensely practical. Are we to acquiesce in this distracted state of the church, convinced that it is beyond remedy "during the present age," and to quietly fold our hands, and wait for the Lord from heaven to turn and overturn and set things right? Or is it our business to set His house in order before Him in order that it may be a fit habitation for His abode? Is the bride to make herself ready for His coming? These are questions of vast importance.

Let us see whether this last prayer seems to indicate that the glory of Christ must needs be conferred upon His disciples that they may be one." By this the writer means the glory of the world to come, conferred through and after a resurrection from the dead. There can be no doubt that His glory will not be perfected in us until then. But Jesus is here speaking of a manifestation of His glory by His disciples to the world before that great change, and, we believe, as preparatory to it. His words are, "Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word; that they all may be one; as Thou, Father, art in me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that Thou hast sent me. And the glory which Thou hast given me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one." It is this last verse which affords the only ground for the view that the glory must precede the oneness. And yet in the 11th verse this same petition for their oneness occurs in a form which makes it perfectly clear that the unity contemplated was to be reali

zed in this earthly state. "These are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are. While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name." We cannot understand verse 22, therefore, as making the bestowment of the glory a condition precedent to the desired unity. The gift spoken of is germinal and anticipatory. And, as an exceeding great and precious promise, it is to draw the subjects of it into sympathetic union. It is a powerful means to that end. But the unity prayed for was evidently something to which the disciples were to attain, and in which they were to be kept, while they were in the world. Moreover, we believe that it is a necessary condition to the fulfilment of the promised glory. We shall never come to the "measure of the stature of the fullness of the Christ" until we arrive at "the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God" (Eph.i v. 13). And this end is to be reached, as this whole discourse and prayer of Jesus teaches, and as the epistles throughout affirm, by the indwelling Spirit, knitting all the members of Christ into one body by joints and bands, and inspiring ministries for its edification. The point we are urging in this magazine is that the very first duty of the church in this day—a duty more pressing than that of "saving souls"—is to confess the sin and shame of her divisions, and to implore God, the Holy Ghost, to lighten for her a path out of this darkness and division, and to bring her again on to the ground of one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism, that she may be built up into a fit temple for His abode, and so become a fit vessel through which He can manifest His glory. Those who believe that such a trans. forming work in the church is now hopeless, and that we must wait for the Lord to give us victory over death before it can be effected, are neglecting a most important duty. Our present calling is to glorify Him on the earth. And this the church, as His body, cannot do while split up into sects. Abroken vessel is not

fit to contain nor to convey His glory.

From a Christian brother of this city.

"I just wish to bid you God-speed in your good work. Grow not weary in well doing; you shall reap in due season. Your writings must do good. Some of your views are new to me; yet I must say I am deeply interested in them as they seem to be in accord with the Word of God."

VOL. III.]

APRIL, 1887.

[No. 4.

EARTHQUAKES IN DIVERS PLACES.

Upon both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, and also among the Islands of the Pacific, there have been recent earthquakes. Everybody has read the accounts of the one which has just occurred in Italy and Southern France, and of the scenes of terror accompanying it, with the appalling loss of life.

No class of physical events is more closely associated in the minds of men with the "end of the world" than these quakings of the earth. The foundations of all human systems and structures, and even of all created life, seem to totter when the earth gives way beneath our feet. Men can never divest themselves of the idea that there is an intimate connection between such physical events and the moral government of the world. No matter how much may be learned of the physical forces which give rise to these disturbances, and of the mode of their operation, men will still believe that the hand of God holds these forces and wields them for moral ends. It is worth while to notice how frequently extraordinary natural phenomena are associated in Scripture with great moral crises. The plagues of Egypt, the lightnings and thunders and earthquakes at Sinai, the prolongation of the day and the great hail during the wars of Joshua furnish familiar examples. Such physical events not

only furnish the terms of language by which spiritual crises are figuratively set forth. They accompany them. There are more and deeper lines of connection between the worlds of matter and of spirit than men have yet dreamed of in their philosophy. It was in the fitness of things that the crucifixion should be accompanied by preternatural darkness, and by an earthquake, and that a great earthquake should have rolled away the stone from the door of the sepulchre (Matt. xxviii. 2). Paul and Silas were released from the jail at Philippi by means of an earthquake (Acts xvi. 26). And it is probable that the earlier recorded instances of the deliverance from prison of other apostles (v. 19, xii. 10) were by the same

means.

The fact that an "angel" is mentioned as the active agent only brings to view a truth we have often. insisted on, viz: that Scripture uniformly associates, if it does not identify, angels with natural forces, and thus teaches that the potencies of nature, which men regard as blind forces, are instinct with life.

In the closing hours of His earthly ministry our Lord gave to His disciples an outline of the progress and conflicts of His kingdom up to the final consummation. Among the attendants of its progress this was to be one, -earthquakes in divers places. This prophecy has been fulfilled. As a matter of fact there has been this succession of earthquakes,—some of them much more severe and fatal to human life than this recent one in Southern Europe. And others may be expected. The Book of Revelation, we are persuaded, is not dealing in "figures" only, when it speaks of such coming wonders, and especially of a "great and mighty earthquake" following

the seventh angel and the last vial (xvi. 17-21).

Even

if great moral and national convulsions are indicated, the sympathy between things seen and unseen already noticed would require that they have their counterpart in the kingdom of nature.

Two things are taught by our Lord's words in this discourse, and by all Scripture.

1. All things which are not on the sure foundation must be shaken, in order that the things which cannot be shaken may remain. All social and governmental systems, and even the fabric of nature itself, must be thus sifted. Nothing is more plainly taught in Scripture than that the creature itself is now in bondage, sympathetic with the yoke under which man groans. And the redeeming work of Christ has provided for its deliverance and transformation. Earthquakes belong to the travail of this created system which is now struggling to bring to the birth that anointed race, whose manifestation shall be her deliverance, her rest and joy. All birth-pangs are pangs of anguish. We do not indeed see the connection between what seem to be the blind throes of insensate forces, and the spiritual regenesis. But there is such a connection. "All these things are the beginning of travail" (Matt. xxiv. 8, R. V.) And the end of travail is a ransomed race, and a renovated creation, rejoicing together in the liberty of the glory of the children of God (Rom. viii. 19-23, Rev. v. 13, xxi. 1–4).

2. This great change is not to be ex abrupto, accomplished at one sudden burst, but progressive. Its steps indeed are startling ones. As the final consummation. approaches they will be most startling. But Jesus says,