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of events which led that excellent man to become one of the most honouredand successful pioneers in this great work."

Thus Philip Embury, Robert Strawbridge, Captain Webb, and the "mother in Israel," mentioned before, instrumentally, laid the foundations of one of the most numerous, well governed, pious, and useful Protestant churches in the world: and the powerlessness of the instruments must lead all to acknowledge that this is indeed "the finger of of God." It was not until about four years after this that Messrs. Pilmoor and Boardman were sent by the Conference to take charge of the work the former to labour at Philadelphia and the other at New York; when they found societies already organized, and a third chapel erected, capable of containing seventeen hundred people, and Mr. Boardman's (writing a few month's after his arrival), says it "could contain only about one-third of those who came to hear, the rest being glad to hear the word outside."

From the continent of America we pass to the West Indies, and it is remarkable that so early as the year 1760 the gracious influence of this revival extended to the West Indies, and through it the sable slave was introduced into the liberty of the sons of God. The honoured instrument in this instance was no other than Nathaniel Gilbert, Esq., the speaker of the House of Assembly. This gentleman, being in England for the recovery of his health, was induced to attend the ministry of Mr. Wesley, and through it was brought to the knowledge of the truth. Returning to Antigua full of the love of God, he began to teach both the negro and the white man the way of salvation. His labours were blessed of God, and about two hundred persons were united in church fellowship. On the death of Mr. Gilbert, the coloured people were without the supervision and care of a minister or leader; but two black women met the negroes, and got the people together every night for prayer and religious converse, until the providence of God sent them a spiritual guide and shepherd. John Baxter, a ship carpenter of the Royal Dock at Chatham, was sent by government to Antigua, and, being a member and a local preacher in the Methodist body, collected the scattered members and took them under his paternal care. In a letter to Mr. Wesley, written in 1768, he states, "The work that God began by Mr. Gilbert is still remaining. The black people have been kept together by two black women, who have continued praying and meeting with those who attended every night. I preached to about thirty on Saturday night; on Sunday morning to about the same number; and in the afternoon of the same day to about four or five hundred. The old members desire that I would inform you, that you have many children in Antigua whom you never saw. I hope we shall have an interest in your prayers, and that our Christian brethren will pray for us." It was eight years before a missionary was sent, but John Baxter fed this flock of Christ in the true spirit of Methodism-combining his toils in the dock-yard with his vigilant pastoral attention and his labours for the welfare of souls, and with such success that about two thousand persons were united in church fellowship.t

Time would fail to speak of a Brackenbury, a Dawson, a Carvossa,
Jubilee Volume.

* Dr. Dixon on Methodism in America.

a Bourne, a Clowes, a Halkyard, and a host of others in our own denomination, and in the sister branches of Methodism. Many worthies of this class have recently gone to their rest, and many thousands of others are still labouring in the field of action; their works are too well known to require extended mention, but a future generation may collect and memorialize their deeds, and show what God hath wrought by their instrumentality.

Among these there are men of all grades in station, talent, and acquirements. There are humble labourers, industrious mechanics, thriving tradesmen, prosperous manufacturers, and merchant princes. The dust of the mill and the mine may cover the raiment of some, and titles of distinction adorn the names of others, but the deepest poverty does not degrade the office, and the most exalted are honoured by it. There are men, too, of rude speech and slender acquirements; and there are others of gigantic intellect, classic attainments, refined taste, and stirring eloquence, whose powers of reasoning and speech would grace the forum and the senate, and render them fit to guide the councils of a nation. All these varieties have in Methodism their spheres of action and their modes of usefulness. If the one attracts the humbler classes by his homely diction and his impressive fervour, the other can interest the intelligent by his enlightened expositions, edify the refined and educated by his clear and conclusive reasoning, and pour the light of truth on listening multitudes of all classes. Every man has his proper gift of God, and every one divinely called to the work, may minister in some degree to the edification of the church, which is the body of Christ. Nor are the Methodist bodies alone in this usage at the present day, as among the Independents, Baptists, and others, lay preaching is admitted; and many of their pious and faithful pastors in small towns and villages, are compelled, like Paul at Corinth, to labour with their own hands for the bread that perisheth.

What, then, is the conclusion to be drawn from the arguments and facts before us? Is the lay ministry a thing to be despised and set at nought? Is it to be accounted as an excrescence which has grown up and luxuriated in an impure atmosphere, and a rank but spurious piety? Is it the creature of wild enthusiasm, or the offspring of Providence and the ordinance of God? To every calm, thoughtful, and unprejudiced mind, there can be, we believe, but one opinion. We have seen that in every age of Old Testament history, a lay agency was employed by God in the most spiritual functions-the ministry and prophecy included; and at times called into special activity to rebuke a slumbering church and reform a corrupted nation. We have seen that in the primitive times of Christianity a lay agency, in connection with the Apostles themselves, was extensively employed by the Holy Spirit in the diffusion of the Gospel and the planting of new churches. We have seen that the ancient church in subsequent periods, even when decline and apostasy had begun to set in, still recognized, though with a fainter and more faltering testimony, the ministerial agency of the laity. We have seen that the Reformation in the sixteenth century brought with it a partial restoration of the primitive practice; that in the days of the puritans the practice had a still fuller recognition, and a more extensive prevalence. But with the great revival of religion in the rise and progress of Methodism, it sprang up as an essential element of

aggressive Christianity, and has so remained to this day. At this moment there cannot be less than about 30,000 lay preachers in these realms, whose labours are each Sabbath dispensing the word of life to about six or eight thousand congregations, and without whose services the preaching of the gospel could not be supplied to them. With such evidence, then, we must conclude that a Lay Ministry is an ordinance of God, and is designed by Him to operate as a powerful agency in perpetuating and extending his kingdom upon the earth. Nor does this fact at all invalidate the claims of the stated and separated ministry as a Divine institution. It rather sustains it; for the two classes of labourers have in every age received the sanction and appointment of God. They have existed simultaneously, except in isolated cases, where pride and corruption in the church have set aside the order of God; but in the Methodist denominations, the one becomes almost invariably the introduction to the other; so that to despise a lay ministry is to despise the origin of the separated ministry; and to denude a separated ministry of its claim to a Divine institution is to renounce God's authority, which has explicitly sanctioned it; and at the same time to jeopardize the scriptural right of the lay ministry itself; for the same men, unaltered in character, are found at different periods occupying each capacity, and are blessed of God in both spheres of labour. It is the work of the ministry in both cases; but in the one the duties are more ample, and more exclusively sacred, because of an entire consecration to its hallowed functions.

In the laity, then, we have a great phalanx of auxiliaries to the separated ministry—a powerful staff of evangelists supplementing the regular pastorate. Both are of God; and both, with no jealousy but that for God's honour, and no rivalry but that of doing good, are to be employed in the great work of saving immortal souls. With such a power, the great question is, How can it be most effectually used? How can its mighty energies be best employed, and its inexhaustible resources of usefulness be fully brought out? In this age, when the church, ashamed and confounded by her own impotency, is constantly putting forth the interrogation “What can be done to arouse and save the masses?" it becomes a solemn question. Is our local agency doing all that might be done? Is this mighty staff of labourers fully accomplishing its great commission? We think not. But our views on this subject must be reserved to a future number.

THE NEW YEAR: REFLECTIONS THEREON.

ANOTHER year has taken its departure. With all its privileges and duties, its blessings and trials, its joys and sorrows, it is gone for ever. Its death-knell has been sounded, and it is no more. A year of more eventful character has not, perhaps, come and gone in modern times. In addition to the more ordinary occurrences of 1857, the lamentable and wide-spread rebellion in India, characterized by the most shameless atrocities and revolting cruelties, and scattering, like a violent tornado, terror, havoc, and death thickly in its course; and the disastrous and appalling monetary and commercial panic, bringing down by its over

whelming pressure numerous banking establishments, mercantile firms, &c., hitherto considered most respectable, crippling the springs and paralyzing the energies of commerce, and causing the most strongnerved and stout-hearted men to fear and quail;-these events will signalize the year, and render it eminently memorable, not only with the present generation, but in the annals of the future historian.

Looking at the events of the past year, as well as those of preceding ones, we cannot but discern that God has a controversy with the nations of the earth. The sins of men bring down the judgments of Heaven. It has ever been so, and is so still. Righteousness exalteth a nation, while sin is both a reproach and a curse to any people. Not only is this doctrine abundantly taught in the Scriptures; it is also corroborated by all history. Need we wonder that the cupidity, the worldliness, the indifference, the glaring inconsistencies of many religious professors, and the profligacy, the open wickedness, the daring impiety, the unblushing infidelity, so fearfully prevalent among men in general, should awaken the divine indignation, and cause a holy and just God to pour out the "vials of his wrath?" Whilst, however, Jehovah chastens us in his displeasure, we have reason to gratefully adore him that he tempers judgment with mercy. Contemporaneously with the manifest indications of his chastising hand, we have the fullest proof that he is "rich in mercy," and "abundant in goodness." Even judgments may in one sense be regarded as mercies, inasmuch as they are designed to be corrective in their operation, inducing repentance and reformation, and leading to the adoption of a better course. May we have wisdom and grace rightly to understand the "dealings of the Lord," and so to regard every dispensation of his providence, and every indication of his will, as to turn each to a profitable and good account!

We are entering on a new year. What improvement shall we make of the season? The period is interesting, and suggestive of profitable reflections. While multitudes spend it in unhallowed and riotous feasting, and the pursuit of fleshly pleasures and enjoyments, be it ours to employ it in a more enlightened and becoming manner-in a manner better comporting with the great purposes of our being, and our high destiny.

1. The commencement of another annual cycle calls upon us for the renewed exercise and expression of devout thankfulness and praise to Almighty God for his countless mercies. "Let the Lord be magnified; make a joyful noise unto God all ye lands; sing forth the honour of his name; make his praise glorious. He crowneth the year with his goodness, and his paths drop fatness. They drop upon the pastures of the wilderness, and the little hills rejoice on every side." How great has been the sum of our mercies during the year just terminated! Where or how shall we begin to count them up? And what is the measure of our indebtedness to our great donor? On him have we been dependent for life, and health, and friends, and every blessing both temporal and spiritual; and he has "given us all things richly to enjoy." It is true, some who read these lines may have had disappointment, sorrow, and suffering to pass through; but even they, on a calm review of the matter, will find their mercies greatly to have preponderated. And what exercise more appropriate at the beginning of the year than that of rendering praise to God for his goodness?

"Praise is comely for the upright." And while the cultivation of that frame of soul which prompts to the ascription of praise for the unnumbered blessings received, both of providence and grace, is in itself proper, and well-pleasing in the sight of the Most High, it will also exert a most blessed reflex influence on the mind of him who is the

subject of it. Than gratitude, there is no feeling of which our nature is susceptible, the exercise of which is more delightful in itself, or more salutary in its effects. It chastens the spirit, excites to love, and prompts to ready and cheerful obedience. It sweetens labour and renders duty a delight. "Bless the Lord, O my soul," exclaims the Psalmist," and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits: who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases; who redeemeth thy life from destruction; who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies; who satisfieth thy mouth with good things, so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's." How excellent the spirit that found expression in these terms; and how appositely may we employ similar language. Though during the departed year grave troubles have arisen, the ultimate source of those troubles is the wickedness of men ; and we doubt not that Jehovah will so order and overrule them as that they will be rendered subservient to the accomplishment of purposes of the most benevolent and gracious character. The Lord is good-his "goodness endureth continually," and we should praise him.

2. The new year presents a suitable opportunity for serious, faithful, and solemn self-examination. The importance of the Apostolic injunction, "Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves," will be readily admitted by every reflecting and candid mind; and the present period is specially seasonable for attention to this exercise. Not that the commencement of the year is the only proper time for the performance of the duty in question; it ought to be attended to daily. But there are some periods which seem to invest it with especial interest, and to render attention to it more than ordinarily desirable and important; and the beginning of the year is, we think, a period of this character. In self-examination we recall the past, and endeavour by a process of investigation to ascertain and determine how far our conduct has, during a certain period, been conformable to the will of God. This examination of ourselves must not, however, be limited to the past; it must likewise embrace the present; testing our feelings, desires, attainments, and conduct, by the only legitimate and authorized standard-the word of God, that "liveth and abideth for ever." At this interesting period, each of us may with the utmost propriety put to himself such questions as the following:How have I spent the three hundred and sixty-five days of 1857? Their record is on high. Could I see that record, what would it reveal as to my thoughts and words and ways? Would it bear inspection? What would be its language? Have I "walked with God"? Have I possessed and exemplified the "spirit of Christ"? Have I manifested deadness to the world, and been uniformly spirituallyminded? Has entire holiness of heart and life been with me an object of constant and ardent pursuit? Have I, on all occasions, striven to

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