How is its universality to be accounted for? If you say by tradition, you cannot stop until you go back to Noah or to Abel; and in both cases you have satisfactory evidence that they were institutions of God. Or, if you say that the idea is instinctive in man's mind, I would still say that you virtually grant the point, for an instinctive idea is a divine implantation. II. THAT THE RELIGION OF MAN IS VALUABLE ONLY AS IT IS BASED ON EVANGELICAL FAITH. "By faith." What made Abel's sacrifice acceptable? It must have been either because of the thing offered or the mode of offering. Was it the former? It is true that there was a difference in the sacrifice. Cain brought of the fruit of the ground as an offering, and Abel brought of the firstlings of his flock, and of the fat thereof. As far as the offerings themselves are concerned, one seems to be as good as the other; and as far, also, as they were related to the offerers, each brought what he himself had reared. Cain brought not a living creature, for he was tiller of the ground, and Abel was the keeper of a flock. Each brought what was his own, and this seems to have been proper. And in their relation to God, too, they seem equal. The fruit of the ground was as acceptable to Him as the fruit of the cattle. Under the Jewish law He actually enjoined both. We cannot, therefore, discern the difference in the sacrifice itself. The one sacrifice, in every respect, seems to have been as good as the other. Both had offered from their own property; and each of such offerings God in subsequent time, required and accepted. If then the dif ference is not to be discovered in the offerings; it must be in the offerers, in the different states of mind they possessed. And this accords at once with our reason and the passage itself-Abel had faith-faith in God-faith in his moral relations—faith, too, perhaps, in the necessity of mediation; and Cain had not this. The virtue was not in the sacrifice, but in the sentiments; not in the materials presented, but in the minds of the presenters. III. THAT THE RELIGION OF MAN HAS EVER BEEN OF IMMENSE WORTH. "Whatever is not of faith is sin." Paul speaks of this faith as doing three things. First: Giving divine acceptableness to existence. God had respect to Abel we are told. (Gen.) Faith gave acceptableness to Abel, and nothing else could. A man may make the greatest sacrifices; he may devote his property, his time, labor, health, life, all, yet without faith his attempts at worship are only insults to Omniscience. Without faith it is impossible to please God. Faith generates the spirit of reverence, gratitude, and worship. Secondly: As giving moral righteousness to existence. 'By which he obtained witness that he was righteous." But in what does righteousness consist? In being right in our external relations, right in relation to God, to His government, to the universe, and in being right in the spirit of our minds. The human heart is corrupt; it is deceitful, and desperately wicked. This must be rectified, &c. But how did God testify of the acceptableness "of his gifts"? Perhaps by fireGen. xv. 17; Lev. ix. 24; Judges vi. 21; 1 Kings, xviii. 38. Thirdly: As giving an honorable and lasting significance to existence. "He yet speaketh,"-in the margin "is yet spoken of." These different translations express a different idea ;the one the undying influence of his life, and the other his immortal fame; both ideas are true and vitally connected, and therefore we canvass not the merits of their respective translations. We assert an undoubted historical fact, which includes both ideas, when we say that his faith gave a lasting and an honorable significance to his life. His voice comes down to us through sixty centuries, and it says that the great God will accept the worship of sinners, if offered in evangelical faith, and that He will honor and bless such worshippers with the testimony of His approval. True faith, or moral goodness, alone gives a lasting and honorable significance to life. The men who live in history and are honored by posterity, are only the men of genuine moral worth. SUBJECT:-Mediatorial Influences Mirrored in Showers. "As showers that water the earth."-Psa. lxxii. 6. Analysis of Homily the Four Hundred and Seventy-seventh. THE influences of gospel truths in relation to humanity, are in other places of scripture, as well as here, compared to the rain of heaven. (Isa. lv. 10.) I. BOTH DESCEND FROM THEIR CREATOR. Whence come the showers? "He watereth the earth from his chambers," &c. No one else can send them. Gospel influences, the influence of redemptive truth, and love, are of God. No man could originate them.. “Eye hath not seen," &c. II. BOTH DESCEND WITH APPARENT IRREGULARITY. First In relation to place. On some spots showers descend more copiously than on others, and some places they scarcely ever visit. So of gospel influences. They are abundant in England, there are other lands on which they have never fallen. Secondly: In relation to quantity. On the same scenes showers descend more copiously at some times than on others. So with gospel influences. They sometimes come very powerfully upon the heart. III. BOTH Three objects are aimed at by both :-The production of Life-Beauty-Fruit. "As the rain cometh down from heaven to water the earth that it may give," &c. IV. BOTH ARE OFTEN ALLOWED TO RUN TÓ The man that never tills his ground will not secure the full benefits of the showers. Nay, the rain will only nourish the weeds, thorns, and thistles, that ruin his land. So with gospel influences. Unless man work, all will run to waste. V. BOTH ALWAYS PROVE INJURIOUS WHERE THEY ARE NOT USEFUL. Showers either mollify or harden, vitalize or deaden, consolidate or rot, invigorate or weaken. So will gospel influences. They either nourish in the heart the hemlock of depravity, or the vine of holiness and truth. They ever prove either "the savour of life unto life, or the savour of death unto death." ARE INTENDED FOR BENEFICENT PURPOSES. WASTE. [The utmost freedom of independent thought is permitted in this department. The reader must therefore use his own discriminating faculties, and the Editor must be allowed to claim freedom from responsibility.] CORPORAL DISCIPLINE. reason. REPLICANT. In answer to QUEKIST No. 25, p. 532. The question by our anonymous correspondent, relates rather to morals than theology. The text quoted is only one of many in Solomon to the same purport. The finding of any particular moral, maxim, or precept, in the Bible, does not shew it to be a part of revelation. The Bible contains much matter of the sort, which comes under the head of natural law, and evidences itself to We think this maxim about the rod to come under this categorya moral maxim adopted by biblical authority. Some boys have sufficient intellect and heart to be governed wholly by moral means; and the number of such boys would probably prove far greater were the trial more extensively made. But there are fools who can neither be reasoned with nor touched by entreaties nor tears; and the soundest practical philosophy says of such-" A whip for the horse, a bridle for the ass, a rod for the fool's back!" Well for the lad if the father should, as Shakspere says: worthy of living under grace, of enjoying the noblest relations with the father, it is well and beautiful. Let there be no hint of the rod. Let even discipline be wholly moral in its instruments, as well as spirits and aim. But if the boy debases himself to the lower and brutal sphere, nothing will wake him but physical pain; and it is mere cant to talk Were he about degradation. sensitive to the degradation of the rod, he would be to the arguments of his father. Was it not Dr. Johnson who used to say, "My dear sir, clear your mind of cant"? There is a false, puling sentimentalism gaining ground in certain quarters, which, in relation to reason, is illogical, in relation to feeling, is mawkish; and which, if carried into practice on the small scale of the family, and on the larger scale of the state, would have the most disastrous consequences. C. W., M.A. [We also insert another reply.] REPLICANT. In answer to QUERIST No. 25, p. 532. Cruelty and violence according to the evidence daily before us afford no symptom of being on the decrease. For every effect we should trace a cause. How is it then that in a Christian country, where tenderness, compassion, goodwill and love, should be household words, we find so many offences being committed against the person! Do not children learn more from example than precept ? Yet is it not the practice (a practice most ancient and worldwide) to visit children with corporal punishment whenever they may give offence to those around them, by any intellectual shortcoming, moral failing, or childish error? The same class of punishment which is often applied to criminals, and in many cases held as demoralizing even to them, is availed of for the development of rectitude, love, and the charities of life, in a child. The rod, a generic name for all appliances used for producing pain for corrective purposes, has one striking feature, it is an immediate and summary mode of disposing of a difficulty for the present time. If it does not cast out, it makes dormant, any evil; moreover it is clearly retributive and sanctioned by society. The nature of the rod, however, is absolutely to govern by brute force, and is this right teaching and proper domination ? Is it not ignoring our persuasive and reasoning influence ? Granted that a blow may be easier than an argument, who can tell the ultimate effects of the former upon the child, or say that the latter, if continuously, strenuously, and consistently, followed up would fail ? Which is most Christ-like? Christ is our model. He was patient and His power was a moral one. Are we justified in doing that which the mind cannot imagine Him doing? The great lever of Christianity is love. Good influences are inseparable from good examples. Law has now succumbed to love; and who has yet gauged, weighed, or fathomed, the vast and wondrous influence which dwells in those who speak and live out the Christ-like ? The rod, the literal rod, is surely not a neces sity of the Christian dispensation. Old things have passed away. May the words, "Come let us reason together, " be the language of the old to the young! The pulpit may teach love and the other virtues to a child, but if the home sceptre, the paternal or scholastic reformatory agency, is the creation of pain, upon what principle of philosophy can the two influences, church and home, converge? Who can cause bodily suffering to a child and retain a real, calm, unruffled, Christ-like, frame of mind ? Has Christianity no substitute for the rod, no advance to make in this respect upon the usages of heathenism? P. M. H. THE GOSPEL AND THE POOR. REPLICANT. In answer to QUERIST No. 26, p. 533. It is impossible to read this query without mentally exclaiming, who is 66 Virgitate et Orate" ?-from what language, living or dead. did he select his nom de plume? To what Christian community does he belong? And what newspapers does he read ? For my own part, I am bewildered. In the Churches of my neighbourhood (Southwark) the seats for the poor are the best placed and best filled parts of the buildings. Sermons to working men are advertised well nigh ad nauseam. The lowest theatres have been used for worship, if by any means their debased frequenters might be brought into contact with the gospel. Incessant appeals and efforts are made on behalf of visiting societies, scripture readers' societies, tract societies, home missions, and ragged schools, which, though not strictly preaching, come fairly within those endeavors to evangelize the masses, which the scriptures |