2. If men always prayed, there would be no swearing, Sabbath-breaking, or drunkenness, or lewdness, or oppression, or dishonesty, or injustice, or war on the earth. 3. If men always prayed, they would always be happy themselves, and would always be seeking to make all others happy. 4. If men always prayed, God would always bless them with all needed temporal and spiritual blessings, through our Lord Jesus Christ. GOD'S ETERNAL LOVE. "He hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world."-EPH. i. 4. THERE is "sweet, pleasant, and unspeakable comfort to godly persons," in the declarations of God's word which teach that our interest in the redemption of Christ Jesus arises from no hasty or recent impulse of the Divine Author of salvation. This is "our everlasting covenant." Jesus is "the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." "Eternal life," for which we hope, was "promised before the world began." Says Mr. Goode, justly, "If the Lord have drawn you with loving kindness, it is because he hath loved you with an everlasting love." This grace of God is no purpose of yesterday, which may change with the perpetual changes of which you are conscious, and which rob you of your peace and joy. It was laid for you from eternity with God. Then his heart was towards you, before creation started into being. Then it was his purpose to bring you to himself. Then your Divine Surety pledged himself to all that was necessary for your redemption, and the Blessed Spirit of God engaged to perfect this grace in you till you were ripe for glory. No ages have altered this everlasting design of God. No multitude of counsels have diverted his thoughts from its accomplishment; no aggravated offences have caused him to repent of his purpose. His eye saw you when as yet you were not. His providence has brought you into being, and his grace, beginning in eternity, has brought you into second being, and will presently issue in never-ending blessedness and glory in the immediate vision of your God. WORKING OUT SALVATION. "Work, for it is God that worketh in you." THIS beautiful union of holy fear, and yet holy courage, of entire dependence upon God, and yet unabated and zealous "diligence, to make our calling and election sure," is attainable only, nay, I might say intelligible only, to a spiritual mind. Not that there is any inexplicable mystery in their connection-men are continually acting in the affairs of life in the same way. They clear their ground, sow their crops, go through all the toils of husbandry with unremitting diligence, and show they can do no more; they watch for the increase, they think of it, they talk of it with the deepest interest, while yet it is undeniable that they cannot make a single blade of wheat to spring up or bear produce. sun must shine upon it; the rain must water it; the air must nourish itthey can command none of these. God must work with them, and for them, from first to, last; and it is all of his good pleasure, when he will, and how he will; and for aught they know, The rost or flocd, blight or drought, may spoil all their labours in a moment. But do they therefore desist from their toil, and say, It is all of God; what can I do? or what need I do?-far from it. God has connected their la bour and his blessing, and men know this; and, therefore, though utterly unable to ensure the least profitable result from their toil, they rise up early, and late take rest, and work as i success depended absolutely and only on their own unassisted efforts. Alas! that men should be so wise for time, so foolish for eternity! Biography. DR. THOMAS GOODWIN. THE Lives of the wise and good have ever been a favourite subject of study and meditation to the people of God. On the present occasion we shall direct attention to the facts of the history of a man of eminence, in his day and generation, Thomas Goodwin, a name that will long shine with lustre in the roll of English Independency. Dr. Goodwin was born Oct. 5, 1600. At thirteen years of age he was sent to Christ's College, Cambridge; from thence he removed to Katherine Hall, under the tuition of the famous Dr. Sibbes. During the first six years which he spent at college, he walked in the vanity of his mind. Ambitious designs engrossed his attention, and his whole aim was to obtain preferment and applause; but God who had designed him to higher purposes, was pleased to change his heart, and to turn the course of his life to his own service and glory. On Oct. 16, 1620, while at Cambridge, his attention was directed by the tolling of a bell for a funeral, and a sermon being expected, one of his companions persuaded him to stay and hear it. To this he was not much inclined, being at that time averse to serious preaching; but Dr. Bambridge being accounted a witty man, he con sented to stay. Though the remarks made by the preacher were far from being uncommon, yet to him it was a word from the Lord; he was much affected, and told his companions, "he hoped he should be the better for tha: sermon as long as he lived." Instead of spending that evening in mirth, as he intended, he returned to his own college, and passed it in retirement. His mind was now greatly oppressed with a sense of the evil of sin, and its dreadful consequences. He saw the vanity of his former religious profession; and the deficiency there was in the root of all his devotion, the flowers of which had withered, there being no gracious moisture in the heart, to afford them nourishment. found the disposition of his mind entirely changed; and instead of vainglory, and the love of academic praise, he proposed the glory of God as the end of all his actions. In 1634, being in his conscience dissatisfied with the terms of Conformity, he quitted the university with all its preferments. In this he acted with sincerity, and altogether contrary to his worldly interest. The spirit of persecution under Archbishop Laud growing hot, in Charles I.'s days, he went to Holland, to enjoy liberty of He now In tions I shall get rid of for ever. I could not have imagined I should ever have had such a measure of faith in this hour. No! I could never have imagined it. My bow abides in strength. I am found in Christ: not in my own righteousness, but in the righteousness which is of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ, who loved me, and gave himself for me. I am swallowed up in God!"-" Now," said he, "I shall ever be with the Lord!" An eminent minister, well able to estimate his subject, has summed up his character as follows::-"From the days of the Apostles to the present hour, I verily believe, the Church of Christ hath never been blessed with one more highly taught of God. He appears to have been specially raised up for great purposes. He shone, and still shines, as a star of the first magnitude in the hemisphere of the ministry. And although now for nearly two centuries, the great Head of the Church has taken him home to himself in heaven, yet his labours which he left behind him, still lighten, and will continue to lighten, to the latest period, the church upon earth.” conscience. He returned to England at the beginning of the Long Parliament, and gathered an Independent congregation in Thames-street. 1643 he was chosen a member of the Assembly of Divines at Westminster, and was one of the dissenting brethren in that Assembly. Of their transactions he took notes, which he left in fourteen or fifteen volumes. Being in high favour with Oliver Cromwell, he was in 1649, by an order of Parliament, appointed president of Magdalen College, Oxford. Here he also formed a church upon the Independent plan. Soon after the Restoration, he was deprived of his presidentship; when he again retired to London, and formed an Independent Church in Fetter-lane, and preached to them till his death. In the dreadful fire of London in 1666, he lost above half his library, to the value of five hundred pounds. He acknowledged that God had struck him in a very sensible part; but he was thankful, however, that the loss fell chiefly upon books of human learning, those on Divinity being preserved. The sacred Scriptures were what he chiefly studied; and upon the glorious doctrines contained in the inspired volume his mind soared with the greatest delight. The labours of this eminent man were terminated in a few days by means of a fever, Feb. 28, 1679, in the eightieth year of his age. He enjoyed the full assurance of faith, and rejoiced in the thought that he was going to have uninterrupted communion with God. "I am going," said Here lies the body of the Rev. Thohe, "to the Holy Three, with whom I mas Goodwin, D.D., born at Rolesby, have had communion. They have in the county of Norfolk. He had a taken me; I did not take them. I large and familiar acquaintance with shall be changed in the twinkling of the ancient, and above all, with ecclean eye, and all my lusts and corrup-iastical history. He was exceeded The dust of this admirable man reposes till the resurrection of the just, in Bunhill-fields. The Inscription, which was penned by Dr. Gibbons, presents a comprehensive view of his talents, learning, character, and labours, and runs thus: MONUMENTAL INSCRIPTION. by none in the knowledge of the Holy He was at once blessed private discourses, as well as in his public ministry, he edified numbers of souls, whom he had first won to Christ, till having finished his appointed course, both of service and sufferings, in the cause of his Divine Master, he gently fell asleep in Jesus. His writings already published, and what are now preparing for publication (the noblest monuments of this great muse's praise), will diffuse his name in a more fragrant odour than that of the richest perfume, to flourish in those far distant ages, when this marble, inscribed with his just honour, shall have dropped into dust. He died, February 23, 1679, in the eightieth year of his age. The Inscription, we regret to say, is now obliterated, but it has been rescued from oblivion by the meritorious labours of the Rev. J. A. Jones, in his interesting work, Bunhill Memorials. Popery. WHICH IS THE RELIGION OF LOVE? THERE is no point in which Popery is weaker than when subjected to the legitimate and infallible test of truth and error. If we inquire into its effects on the social character of nations, whether as to morality, industry, commence or agriculture, general science or useful art, as compared with Protestantism, it will everywhere be found wanting. We do not speak of the religion of the understanding and the heart, as produced, sustained, improved, and perfected by the knowledge and study of the Word of God, since it were a mockery of the understanding of mankind to reason after this fashion. We look upon it in far lower lights; and even there its defects are everywhere patent to astonishment. We are meantime, however, concerned with it simply as it regards "humanity, equity, forbearance, and compassion,” the words employed by one of its present Apostles and Advocates,-Father Newman. Dr. Newman is labouring with all his might, perverting talents in some respects superior, with learning by no means contemptible, and a persuasive popular eloquence, to prove the superiority of Popery, as the religion of love. It is somewhat curious that while the Englishman is declaim ing on this topic, and throwing dust in the eyes of Protestant simpletons that may happen to mingle with his auditory, a French Journalist, writing unshackled in the midst of Romanists, is drawing & picture of the same religion, about as opposite as light to darkness! Let us first hear FATHER NEWMAN. Doubtless, in the long course of eighteen hundred years, there are events which need explanation, or which the world might wish otherwise; but the general tenor and tendency of the traditions of the Papacy have been mercy and humanity. It has ever been less fierce than the nations, and in advance of the age; it has ever moderated, not only the ferocity of barbarians, but the fanaticism of Catholic populations. The Church has been a never-failing fount of humanity, equity, forbearance, and compassion, in consequence of her very recognition of natural impulses and instincts, which Protestants would vainly deny and contradict; and this is the solution of the paradox stated by the distinguished author I just now quoted, to the effect that the religion which forbids private judgment in matters of revelation is historically more tolerant than the religions which uphold it. His words will bear repetition: “We find, in all parts of Europe, scaffolds prepared to punish crimes against religion; scenes which sadden the soul were everywhere witnessed. Rome is one exception to the rule; Rome, which it has been attempted to represent as a monster of intolerance and cruelty. It is true that the Popes have not preached, like the Protestants, universal toleration; but the facts show the difference between the Protestants and the Popes. The Popes, armed with a tribunal of intolerance, have scarce spilt a drop of blood; Protestants and philosophers have shed it in torrents." What say our readers to this? Has anything more preposterously barefaced and mendaciously impudent ever met the public eye? What "Protestants and philosophers have shed human blood in torrents"! What says history history written by the pen of the disciples of Rome herself? But in the meantime, let us, eschewing the path of the dignified and veritable historian, listen to the brilliant Parisian Journalist: Paris Univers. A heretic, examined and convicted by the Church, used to be delivered over to the secular power and punished with death. Nothing has ever appeared to us more natural, or more necessary. More than 100,000 persons perished in consequence of the heresy of Wickliff; a still greater number by that of John Huss; it would not be possible to calculate the bloodshed caused by the heresy of Luther, and it is not yet over. After three centuries we are on the eve of a re-commencement. The prompt repression of the disciples of Luther, and a crusade against Protestantism, would have spared Europe three centuries of discord and of catastrophes in which France and civilization may perish. It was under the influence of such reflections that I wrote the phrase which has so excited the virtuous indignation of the Red journals. Here it is: "For my part, I avow frankly my regret is not only that they did not sooner burn John Huss, but that they did not equally burn Luther; and I regret further that there had not been at that time some Prince sufficiently pious and politic to have made a crusade against the Protestants." Well, this paragraph might have been better penned; but as I have the happiness to belong to those who care little about mere forms of expression, I will not revoke it. I accept it as it is, and with a certain satisfaction at finding myself faithful to my opinions. That which I wrote in 1838 I still believe. Let the Red philanthropists print their declaration in any sort of type they please, and as often as they please; let them add their commentaries, and place all to my account: the day that I cancel it they will be justified in holding the same opinion of me which I hold of them. LOUIS VEUILLOT. (Signed) Again, what say our readers to this? |