And then the signs in the East are not less portentous. The Mahommedan power, in its progress and its downfall, are clearly predicted in Holy Writ, as well as the precise period for the latter under the emblem of the drying up of the Euphrates; the way being thus prepared for the kings of the East, and the return of the Jews to their own land. We may think that interpreters of prophecy mistake in venturing to lay down so precisely the definite period when the events awaiting our world will take place, but with the manifestly rapid development of facts which clearly harmonize with the predictions of Scripture regarding what shall precede the grand consummation, we cannot wonder that they should be led to the fixing of dates, and to a belief in the near approach of Christ's kingdom. Whether we can venture to concur with them or not, there is something of overwhelming interest in the concurrent belief of holy and learned men that the Turkish power will come to its conclusion during the next year, and that the last portion of the 1335 days of Daniel will expire in the year 1865, at which, or soon after, will be the advent of Christ, and the first resurrection, and the beginning of the millennium. I say, we may hesitate to adopt such definite calculations, but I for one dare not venture to assert that they are wrong; or that the wonderful signs of the times do not so far elucidate the Scripture testimony as to warrant their expec tations. Yet they who dare not go thus far, must admit that God, in an especial manner, is holding a controversy with the nations of the earth, and thus calling upon us as with a voice of thunder to seek his shelter and his favour. No reasonable expectation can be entertained that the troubled sea over which we are passing will stay its tumult, until He who is our peace comes to take to himself the kingdoms, and subdue his enemies; nay, as the latter days advance, we can only, with the Scriptures in our hands, be led to expect that its waves and billows will rise higher and higher. APRIL-1848. What feelings of indescribable interest are awakened by the thought, that you who are in the spring-time of life, may live to witness all that the interpreters of prophecy are looking for at no distant period; yea, that even others of us, whose sun is somewhat declining, may perchance witness the clear and unequivocal unravelling of the divine counsels before our course is ended. What a revolution to every thought and desire within us does the possibility of such a thing occasion! "What manner of persons ought we to be in all holy conversation and godliness." But, at all events, the present are perilous times, and we see in all directions the materials for still greater trials. I would press, then, upon you all the seasonable and prudent inquiry-Are you ready for all that may await you? Oh, let not God's controversy pass by unheeded! He is speaking from heaven with a voice that cannot be mistaken. Take care that you distinguish between the conviction of truth, and its application and saving influence. You know that God is a refuge for us; but have you made him such for yourselves? Have you felt your perishing need of him, and fled to him for refuge? And are you daily doing this, and are you daily fearing lest the avenger of blood should find you venturing to stray from your refuge, and live independently of your stronghold? There is no safety for any of us out of Christ. He is the city of refuge. The poor trembling soul who has been awakened to the discovery of his guilt and danger as a sinner, both by nature and practice, and who is, in consequence, overwhelmed with a horrible dread of the wrath to come, can find no ease or safety but in Christ the refuge. There, he can repose his burden and have rest. There he obtains his freedom from condemnation. There he can ask with holy confidence and triumph, "Who is he that condemneth?" And being safe in Christ from the storm of God's wrath, all other storms are as nothing. Yet for every blast that assails him, and that may await him till he reaches the border of the L wilderness, he has recourse to the same refuge, he finds the same security. And past experience of divine faithfulness and tender mercy encourages him for the future; so that he fears not to anticipate the last bursting of the tempest, the last grapple with the enemy, but can say in peaceful confidence, "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever." Now, beloved, do you know any thing of this? Do you know what it is to run into the name of the Lord as a strong tower, and to shelter yourselves from present or anticipated storms under the omnipotence, and omniscience, and faithfulness, and boundless tender-mercies of a reconciled God in Christ? Is this a habit with which you are familiar? Do you naturally, and practically, and constantly turn to God, mourning if you cannot apprehend his nearness and sufficiency, and rejoicing when you do find him a very present help? Oh rest assured, we shall reap as we have sown. If we have sown to the flesh, lived for the flesh, trusted in an arm of flesh, the time will come when we shall reap the whirlwind, and madly exclaim in our extremity, "They have taken away my gods, and what have I left?" Then without delay secure your resources. Expect your stability from the everlasting hills. All below is on the sand. If beset And see to it that you remove every root of bitterness, every stumblingblock, every impediment out of the way of your ready access to your refuge; it is not even the most entire obedience which merits this privilege, but if we regard iniquity in our hearts, the Lord will not hear us. ting sins are allowed and cherished, we must take them as our gods and our deliverers, and see what they can do for us in the hour of need; it would be an offence to the Majesty of heaven for us to act in concert with his enemies as long as we can, and only turn to Him for succour when we can do no better. No, all must be given up for Christ. There must be an entire surrender. "Whom have I in heaven but thee, and there is none upon earth I desire beside thee?" must be our honest appeal. Then we are safe. The gates of hell shall not prevail against us, the machinations of man shall not advance one jot beyond the permission of our faithful, covenant-keeping God. Trembling Christian! fill not your present portion with trouble and anguish on the ground of anticipated evil. It may never come to you, and if it does, depend upon it, it will come with strength proportioned to your day, and grace sufficient for your need. You may not feel that you have now the power to withstand the loss of all things, you can easily picture to yourself many awaiting circumstances in which you scarcely know how you could possess your soul in patience. It is easy enough to do this, but faith must do her duty. Faith must be suffered to whisper in your ears, "thou wilt be able to do all things through Christ, which strengtheneth thee." Suffering grace will be given for suffering times. When was the holy martyr at the stake permitted to sink even under his torments? Oh, no; the glory of the Saviour, under whose banner we are sheltered, will constrain him to make good his promises. Not one thing shall fail of all that he has spoken. But he needs no constraint. He is touched with a feeling of our infirmity. He knows how to sympathize. His love for his afflicted ones is beyond that of a mother for her offspring. The saints are privileged to go fearless on through life, not because troubles and afflictions do not await them, but because their God will not fail to supply all their need out of his riches in glory by Christ Jesus. Fear him, ye saints, and ye will then 163 (For the Christian Guardian.) SCRIPTURE ILLUSTRATIONS.-No. I. THERE is, of course, much in this There was before this world was made a shapeless mass, or deep of darkness. What it was exactly we cannot tell; but it also was a creation of God. It was, however, watery; and when God began to form our world, "The Spirit of God moved" over this dark deep of waters, and as the first act of creation, called into being in the midst of it, light. What light is exactly we do not yet know; but if you look at the sun, or at a bright lamp or candle, you see that it consists of bright straight rays, darting out in all directions from a bright centre, filling the space round that centre, and, to a certain extent, overpowering or doing away the darkness. And when the sun rises, you see that it scatters and drives away the clouds that have gathered low down upon the horizon; and removing them to a distance, makes to itself a bright space in which it shines unclouded. This observation will help us to conceive how the creation, according to the will of God, went on. There is, in the 6th verse of this chapter, a word which is very seldom used, and its meaning, therefore, is not easily caught. "God said, let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters." In the margin of the larger Bibles, however, this word "firmament" is explained by another. You will find there the word "expansion;" and this is precisely what is meant; that an expansion, or spreading out, was to take place in the dark deep. Now from what we see of the acting of light, we may easily imagine it acting from a centre, as it does now, darting forth its powerful rays, so as to produce in the midst of the deep this expansion or "firmament." And here there is, at the outset, a mighty power or impulse, set to work, under the immediate guidance of God, and according to laws, which it appears that from eternity he had established, to bring about the formation of that part of creation which we call the Solar System, or the Sun System. The solar system is a number of orbs or worlds, of which our earth is one, that move round the sun, as their central light, in the expansion or firmament. The distance of the furthest of these worlds from the centre is about 3000 millions of miles; and the light, which now proceeds from the sun, is such a power, and has such a rapid flight-nearly 200,000 miles in the 60th part of a minute-that it crosses that distance in 30 minutes; and the light by which we see the moon, or any of the planets, i. e., the other worlds of our solar system, is only the light of our sun, reaching those worlds, through the distance, just as it does ours, and reflected from them at that great distance, and seen by us in the same way as we see it reflected from a wall, or the bright vane of a weathercock or any other object. With such a power, then, we may readily conceive of a great change being brought about by this central light in the deep, dark watery mass which had till then, perhaps, very much the appearance of an intensely thick, murky fog. The created light, spreading out, pushing forward, or expanding, makes in it a great wide space, firmament, or expansion; the grosser parts, in obedience to the Divine command, draw together and become solid; and thus form a number of worlds; which, according to another law closely connected with the law of light, are put in motion to run their perpetual round in the firmament. The light also, or that which is the cause of it, draws into one bright centre, or orb, many times larger than any of the other orbs which are formed around it; and thus the sun was made, which was to enlighten and warm all the others, and by its great attraction keep them in their places. In this way also the heavier particles of the shapeless mass would be all taken up to make these several worlds; and the "expansion," or space, would become quite clear for the travelling of the rays of the sun's light; and also to allow the inhabitants of this, and very probably of the other worlds, to look out, as they roll along, into still more distant spaces than those which enclose our solar system, and to see the stars which God has made to be the suns, or light-centres of larger and very distant systems. And under the same mighty influence of light and heat (for they go together,) the waters roll off and evaporate, the dry land appears, the processes of vegetation begin, and an atmosphere is formed fitted for the breathing life of the animal creation, and fitted to cherish and perfect all those supplies of various kinds which that diversified creation needs. If we can grasp this idea, what a splendid notion we obtain of the act of creation by the agency of light. What simplicity and what power! What majestic simplicity in that one command, "Let there be light! which contained in it so much of those subordinate workings, by which this beautiful world and its sun, and all the other worlds of our system, however beautiful, were to become precisely what they are! And we can scarcely fail to observe how the agency of light in the material creation seems to illustrate the regenerating work of redeeming love. Christ comes into this dark world, darkened through sin-the true light -the light of the world! He shines at first into the darkness, and the darkness comprehends him not; but the purposed work of grace and mercy prospers. Christ hath brought life and immortality to light by the Gospel. His message is, "Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light." And on every side this gracious message makes its way, subduing the darkness of men's hearts, and giving them power to receive him, and to become the sons of God. In this way he pours so powerfully his blessed influence on men's souls, that they become a new creation-as it is written, "if any man be in Christ he is a new creature"-an innumerable company, redeemed out of every kindred, and people, and nation, and language, to move around him in holy and happy obedience to his will; a new and heavenly world of perfected beings, in which Christ the incarnate God is the source and centre of life, and peace, and purity, and joy; the former things are passed away; and the Lord is their everlasting light and their God their glory! Among the many properties of light which unfold the infinite wisdom of its creation, modern discovery has ascertained that by its power an image can be in a few moments painted and fixed permanently of any object, even "the human face divine,' with such exquisite accuracy, that no microscopic observation can detect its defects. This is a wondrous property of natural or sun-light; and it serves also very beautifully to illustrate the power by which the illuminating Spirit of God can at once stamp the holy image of the divine Saviour on the fallen soul of man. The work of God is perfect; and such will be found to be the agency of this spiritual light working by the word internally, to conform the poor, sinful, degraded tenant of this earth to the moral likeness of God in Christ. Rolling ages of moral consciousness in an intelligent and boundless creation shall reverently adore the perfection of this work in the unnumbered hosts that shall surround the throne. We should be thankful to be enabled thus to read visible nature round us by the light of revelation. The Bible alone tells of this mighty agency of light in creation, which, when weighed and considered in connexion with experience, seems correct and right! We should be thankful to read Scripture, and illus trate Scripture doctrine by those facts in nature which we observe. Both visible nature and written revelation come from the same gracious God, and they illuminate each other. May we obediently use both means of instruction in their right places. Taught by his blessed word, may we look up to our Maker through that firmament which showeth his handiwork; and, coming through the one Mediator, whom he has appointed, may we receive into our souls the renewing influence of that Sun of Righteousness who has arisen on us with healing on his wings. CEPHAS. (For the Christian Guardian.) THE WINTER VIOLET. WHAT dost thou here, frail blossom? watching so dark a sky, Spring's darling babe, thou broughtest glad prophecies of yore, Speak not of the warm summer, with red and golden flowers, Bright face! thou hast a message, this bleak December day, Thou art a child of sorrow, of dim and stormy hours, Who doth not bid thee welcome, meek teacher of content? Yea, and we need the spirit, that whispers from thy hood, I. T. |
