and soon, along with the companions of my journey, I entered this home of love."

Peter."I love also to linger near this altar, and to listen to the voice of Jesus interceding with the Father in behalf of his Church and people upon earth. That intercession embraces the world. There is no respect of persons with God. Jew and Gentile are equally embraced in the glow of his covenant-love. How slow I was in learning this great and comforting truth whilst down in the world! Strange that I and my fellow-disciples should have so long misunderstood the meaning of these plain words of our Lord, Go into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature!' I was the first among the apostles to break away from our Jewish exclusiveness, and to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. I only did this after a special vision was vouchsafed to me from heaven, reminding me that the middle wall of partition was broken down, and that God in Christ was reconciled, and was overshadowing the world with his covenant-regards.

"How strange that those Christians upon earth who dishonor Jesus by looking to me as their head, should adopt the dogma, that there is no salvation. except in their Church! I was the first among the apostles to denounce such sectarian and contracted views, and to act a part the very opposite. Such a dogma restricts the grace of God, which is free to

all men, as well as his word, the conduit in which the grace of God generally flows downwards to men: such a dogma is just our old Jewish exclusiveness assuming the form of Christian bigotry. Oh that the ignorant followers of the man of sin would cease to look to me or depend upon me for salvation, and that they would learn to look to Jesus and to his finished work alone for acceptance with God! I have not the keys of the kingdom of heaven in my hand, neither has the pope: the keys are in Christ's. And in whose hands could they be so justly or so safely placed? for, in all the unrestricted glow of a love that embraces the world, he reigns upon that throne of glory, and in love he reigns to save the world."

Look up again, and in upon God's glorious heaven, where life and unity and love hold their triple reign. You see the river of life flowing forth from the throne of God and of the Lamb. And, lo! upon its banks, you see two glorified saints sitting in a bower of love, as much one in heart and one in view as if they had never been separated upon earth. These are Barnabas and Silas.

Barnabas." How sweet and holy and refreshing is the communion of saints in this heaven of love, compared with what it is upon the earth! Unbroken union exists here among all the children of God. It is not so upon earth. How much is Christendom rent into sects and parties! How dis

tressingly are Christ's followers divided and separated by names, creeds, forms, ceremonies, and, alas! often also by bitter personal hatreds. We, whilst in the world, were examples of this, and were separated for a season. When the contention with Paul was so sharp that I parted from him, you sided with him, and departed from me. We parted then in anger, and never met together again for God's united worship and praise, till we met after our death in this heaven of love. And oh, joyful thought!-we will never be parted and disunited again! With one heart and one voice, we will join for ever here in the worship of the God of our salvation, and will follow the Lamb in company whithersoever he goeth!"

Silas."I remember often, whilst enjoying together our unity and heart - communion here in heaven, the contention that parted us upon earth. But, whilst we parted from each other in the world, we did not part from Christ, I and Paul, you and John Mark, preaching the very same gospel in our separation that we did previously when united, and still doing the will and the work of our common Master in heaven. In our state of separation, we were still one; for we were each one with Christ through faith, and Christ was one with us all, and still continued to bless our respective ministries for the salvation of his people. It would have been wrong in me to have imagined, that, because you had parted from me, you had parted from Christ. This

would have been the bitterest sectarianism. You parted from us, but still clung to Christ. We did the same. This is a great truth, which Christ's

followers in the world below should remember more than they do in their separations and divisions. Christians differ, separate, and form themselves into different churches; but it does not follow, as a necessary consequence, that any of the parties have separated themselves from Christ. In their separated condition, Christians should agree to differ, go on respectively with Christ's work, and thus show to the world that they are still one with him, though separated; for they are preaching his gospel, are doing his will, are performing his work, and are preparing to meet as one in Christ's glorious heaven here. The rivers of earth are separated whilst flowing towards the sea they become one when they meet in the ocean. So is it with the followers of Christ. They will all yet become one in this ocean of glory, and before this river of life that flows at our feet.”

CHAPTER XXII.

LIFT again the eye of faith, and view, among the crowding assemblies of angels and saints who fill the heavens like an ocean of living glory, two glorified saints, who are standing together in their robes of white near to the throne of God and of the Lamb, and whose eyes are lifted in wonder upon him who is upon it. That is the place these two saints delight to occupy; that is the position in which they are often and often seen. They love to gaze upon the face of Immanuel, and to speak to each other in the courts of heaven about the great and comforting truth that God is reigning in grace, a God reconciled to save perishing men. These are Ambrose and Booth. Their views of divine truth were thoroughly evangelical and wonderfully similar whilst they lived in the world; and thus it is not strange that the attraction of sympathy should