ever since has surrounded my text. I knew that, as a Christian man 66 abiding in Christ," I must not willingly sin, but yet, to my shame and sorrow, I am deeply conscious of sin, and that consciousness depresses me. "Oh, wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" But I can add, with St. Paul, "I thank God, through Jesus Christ," I am delivered. I am like that stone in the river's bed, once filthy and defiled, but now clean, and kept clean. And as it is protected, by that which originally cleansed it, from all contact with filth, so am I protected by that precious blood, which cleanseth (is cleansing) from all sin. The world, the flesh, and the devil may, and will try to defile, but the swift torrent of the shed blood will sweep all away.

For the Christian who is conscious of failure, for you who humbly confess you have "left undone what you ought to have done, and done what you ought not to have done, and there is no health in you," here is your comfort, your safety— the precious blood of Christ Jesus, which originally justified, will still keep clean. It will sweep away every atom of defilement; it will not allow sin to contaminate. A cloud may for one moment dull your purity, but it will soon be dispersed. You live in the very torrent of that stream, and by it you are kept clean. Trust in this alone for cleansing, Pray to God, that His

for it "cleanseth from all sin." Spirit may apply it more and more.

G. C. B. M.

"WHAT must I do to be saved care? "Layup for yourselves trea

Trust all in the hands of your Father insures in heaven, where neither

Profitless Farming.

HERE is in many a Christian too much selfish enjoyment of privileges, and too little serving of the Divine Master. Many a one asks God to undertake for him, yet is in no way urgent in asking, "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?" Multitudes pray for the gifts God has to bestow, but not so many are concerned with the question, "What shall I render unto the Lord for all His benefits towards me?" There is with them much getting, but little giving; and much of Christian privilege, but little of Christian practice. Their life, with little of labour for their God and Saviour, reminds me much of this:-A young man is sent by his father to a distance to cultivate a farm, and furnished with all that he can stand in need of servants, horses, implements, and seed; and is told, moreover, that whatever else he may require, he has only to let his father know, and it will be sent. He avails himself largely of this permission, till his farm-yard looks like a depot for agricultural implements, and all of them of the best. At last, at the year's end, comes the time of reaping.

"My son," says the father, "I have dealt liberally with you, and grudged nothing that you stood in need of for your work. Tell me now, what have you made out of the farm ?"

"Oh," says the son, "I have the horses-they are in the best possible condition; and the implements are all in good repair, and the ploughs have not a speck of rust upon them, and the sickles are sharp as a razor !"

"Yes, yes, my son; but what have you done upon the farm by means of them? How many acres have you tilled? How much grain have you gathered in? What profit have you made by the year's farming ?"

But

"Acres, father! grain ! profit !—why, none at all! come and see how fine is my set of implements; how

beautifully kept, up in the granary, the corn you gave me; how sleek the horses, and how bright the harness !"

We can hardly refrain from smiling at such a picture, for it would be impossible to find such folly in the ordinary business of the world. Yet this is what thousands are doing in the Church of God. They are continually getting material from God, but never executing any work for Him. They seem to look upon their life and being as a store-house for accumulation, rather than as a factory where the material that God gives is to be wrought up into fabrics of preciousness and beauty for Him. Alas! they who act thus will soon find their gathered stores mildewed, and the brightness of their treasures dimmed, unless they keep those treasures bright by use, and fill their granaries year by year with harvests for their God, new gathered from the field.

R. R. T.

H'

Hagar's Spring.

From KARL GEROK.

Gen. xxi. 19.

ER eyes full of tears, full of anguish her heart,
With her child on her arm, Hagar wanders apart;
Her bottle is dry,

And bitter her cry,

Around her the desert is spread far and nigh.

"Oh, mother, I'm thirsty!" thus crieth the child,

She looks till she's blind, and she runs till she's wild;
Wherever she turns,

The desert still burns,

The terrible desert her sorrow but spurns.

She snatches her boy from her lap in despair,

She tears her away, 'neath the shrubs leaves him there;
The cry of his woe,

His life passing slow,

She cannot behold it, aside she must go.

She sits afar off with a wild vacant gaze,
Then music of heaven strikes her ear with amaze;
She lists to the call,

The sounds rise and fall,

Her sorrow now changes to ravishment all.

She fills her flask full at the brook bubbling bright,
She gives the boy drink, and his eye gleams with light;
O'erflowing her bliss,

Health comes with her kiss,

No longer their way they to Beersheba miss.

Still is there a mother who wanders apart,
And clasps in her anguish her child to her heart?
On God cast his case,

Seek patient His face,

For sinful art thou, but o'erflowing His grace.

He feeds of the raven the famishing brood,
And finds for the young of the lion their food,
He heareth the groan,

He knoweth the moan,

Of poor writhing worms, and will He be as stone?

And e'en though of water thy bottle be bare,
The fount of the Highest is full and to spare,
From deserts of sand,

Fron. the cliff's rocky band,

Flow waters of life 'neath the Lord's mighty hand.

S. BOMPAS.