Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 25, 1858
MEETINGS IN OHIO.
By M. E. Cornell
AT GREEN SPRING. In consequence of rainy weather, some of the brethren and sisters in the vicinity did not come. But to those present we spoke on the certainty of the near approach of the Second Advent of Christ, and the necessity of a constant readiness for that event. Though much fatigued by journeying, yet we had tolerable freedom on this very important subject, and we do hope the evidences of the Lord's soon coming will be remembered; for the spirit of the times is to put off the day of the Lord, and our only hope is in watching.
AT REPUBLIC. Here we found the interest had very nearly gone; but after two or three meetings the Universalist meeting-house was again well filled, and before we left, it was literally crowded. We could hear of only four that were keeping the Sabbath, although many more were thoroughly convinced of the truth. Two of the clergy of the place had been warning the people against us; and for want of better arguments, they dealt out many hard savings, and most cruelly misrepresented brother Loughborough's testimony here. While in conversation with one of these elders since I came, he stated that brother Loughborough was an infidel, but in a few minutes after, said he would not say but that we were christians; but here he was interrupted by one of the bystanders, with the question, how can an infidel be a christian? The company present saw the elder's dilemma; but he would not acknowledge it. In all their hard speeches they have only crippled their own influence; for the majority had been deeply interested in the lectures in the tent, and well knew their statements were false. After a lengthy and earnest appeal on the importance of the Sabbath, and the necessity of being decided, and of obeying the truth, twenty-three manifested their determination to keep the Sabbath, by rising in the assembly. They immediately commenced their meetings, and they have been well attended, and several have been added, we trust of such as shall be saved.
AT GILBOA. We were glad to greet many dear brethren and sisters once more at this place, and to know that their faces were still Zionward. Our interview with them, though brief, was pleasing to us and we hope profitable to the church. The congregations were large and attentive. On First-day about two hundred were gathered in the large school-house, while at each of the other three meetings in the village, there were only from ten to twenty-five hearers. The jealousy aroused by their members neglecting their own meetings and attending ours, or some other cause, so stirred up one of their members, that he gave our people notice that they could not have the school-house for meetings. A meeting was called and it was voted to build a cheap house of worship immediately. The timber was out and on the ground before we left, and brother Butler was driving ahead with all possible dispatch, with a view to its completion in about four weeks. The cause in Ohio was introduced before the meeting, and after some pointed and appropriate remarks by brother Butler on the necessity of unity of action and diligence in looking after the wants of the Cause, remarks were called for from others. Brother Edwards arose and said, while on a visit in the south part of the State, he found a great interest to hear on the present truth. They opened the Methodist house, and by request he talked out the truth as well as he could. He gave ten discourses, and the result was, the whole church endorsed the views except about five members. His son said he never heard his father talk so before; but he supposed it was because the people were so honest. By request of Bro. Edwards I shall visit them as soon as possible.
Three or four others had been to see friends and found a great anxiety to hear. Several meeting-houses were open, and they were calling for some of our ministers to come among them. They wanted to see whether we had Scripture for our views. The church manifested a willingness to do their share towards forwarding the cause in Ohio. There are already a sufficient number of important openings here to occupy the time of half a dozen messengers the next six months. Who is sufficient for these things.
AT LOVETT'S GROVE. The school-house here was well filled with brethren and sisters that we had never seen before. In the first discourse we had to wade through awful darkness, and it was evident that there was a powerful opposite influence present. Another spirit seemed to prevail for a time, but in a social meeting it was manifested. There was a lack of order in singing, speaking and praying. Some that spoke were so far above the Spirit of the Lord, that their testimony was perfectly hollow, and exceedingly distressing. It seemed more like school boys trying to excel each other in making great speeches, than like humble christians expressing their hopes and desires. The order of the meeting was changed by one getting down to pray without any particular thing to pray for, and it was as sounding brass. We learned also that the fault-finder, and the complainer were there. Some were tried because brother and sister White were for once comfortably clothed. Others thought the "Spiritual Gifts" were too high &c. &c. But when we informed them that a superior quality of paper was used in the book; that sister W. spent many weeks in writing and preparing it, the labor being most fatiguing for both body and mind; that the express to and from the book-binders was considerable, and that what little profit there was on it was all solemnly dedicated to the Lord, and $25 out of it had already been given to one of the Lord's needy servants, we heard nothing more from them. Duty demanded a very pointed admonition; but certain sympathizers and worse than Job's comforters were ready, and one of them came to a sister that had been reproved, and said, "Now sister that is too bad." But the sister replied, "No, it is just right, and I am glad of it; for I want to know my faults." This was a good rebuke. The Lord gave unusual freedom, and the sword of the Spirit cut its way through the darkness, so that the meeting closed up triumphantly. Brother Holt was with us and assisted in the meetings by prayer and exhortation. The church there are preparing a comfortable home for his family. At the close of our meetings there, we requested all that were in union with the strait testimony and were resolved to live it out, to manifest it by rising up; when all with one or two exceptions stood up. O that the impressions there made may be lasting, and the solemn resolutions there passed, never be forgotten.
AT PORTAGEVILLE. A challenge had been given for a discussion, and by request of the brethren we accepted it. Two days and evenings were occupied on the question, "Resolved that the law of ten commandments as given on mount Sinai is binding upon all nations, in all dispensations." The moderators chosen were Bro. John Clarke and two ministers, one Methodist, and one United Brethren. As the arguments pro and con were nothing new, I will not mention them here. But one incident in connection with the discussion I cannot forbear to notice. In order to show the adaptation of each of the ten commandments to all nations, and illustrate them in their order, I hung up the chart of the law. Elder Bulger, my opponent, objected to its hanging up before the audience. We plead that it was our privilege to use any means of argument that was to the question; that it was not the privilege of our opponent or the chair to say whether we should have the "Law of ten Commandments" printed on paper, or cloth; whether we have a sheep or calf bound Bible, so long as our argument was to the question. Elder Piper, one of the moderators said it would attract the attention of the people from the arguments. We then offered to keep it down only when we wished to use it on the affirmative. Brother John Clarke earnestly protested against its being taken down, but the two elders said it must come down. It was submitted to the audience, and a majority of five voted to take it down. While rolling it up we said, Then the much-hated law of God must "come down," for2they are afraid of it. This remark so enraged the Methodist elder that he threatened to leave. Before the discussion closed we had the privilege of quoting what Paul says, "The carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the LAW OF GOD neither indeed can be," and remarked that there was no other way of accounting for the opposition there manifested against the law of God.
"THE LAW OF GOD MUST COME DOWN!" What a comment upon the fall of Babylon! Some of the brethren in the different places kindly enquired after our wants, for which we are thankful. It would have been a pleasure to visit all the saints at their homes; but many cares and the feeble state of my health is my apology. All have our prayers that they may overcome, and at last stand on Mount Zion.
M. E. CORNELL.
Republic, Ohio, Nov 14th, 1858.
“BRINGING OUR SHEAVES WITH US.”
THE time for toil is past, and night has come—
The last and saddest of the harvest eves;
Worn out with labor long and wearisome,
Drooping and faint, the reapers hasten home,
Each laden with his sheaves.
Last of the laborers thy feet I gain,
Lord of the harvest! and my spirit grieves
That I am burdened not so much with grain
As with a heaviness of heart and brain;—
Master, behold my sheaves!
Few, light, and worthless,—yet their trifling weight
Through all my frame a weary aching leaves;
For long I struggled with my hapless fate,
And staid and toiled till it was dark and late,—
Yet these are all my sheaves.
Full well I know I have more tares than wheat,—
Brambles and flowers, dry stalks, and withered leaves;
Wherefore I blush and weep as at thy feet
I kneel down reverently, and repeat,
“Master, behold my sheaves!”
I know these blossoms, clustering heavily
With evening dew upon their folded leaves,
Can claim no value nor utility;—
Therefore shall fragrance and beauty be
The glory of my sheaves.
So do I gather strength and hope anew;
For well I know thy patient love perceives
Not what I did, but what I strove to do,—
And though the full, ripe ears be sadly few,
Thou wilt accept my sheaves.
[Atlantic Monthly.
THE TRACT SOCIETY AND SLAVERY, Illustrated from Paul, Jonah, and John.
PAUL the apostle might have proclaimed Christ and him crucified through all Judea without molestation, if he would have consented to keep silent in regard to one sin. If he would only have said nothing against circumcision, if he would have spared that legal rite, if he would have refrained from denouncing it as usurping the place of faith in Christ, and making salvation impossible, if he only would just have said nothing about it, if he only would have yielded to the cry, Give us the gospel, and let circumcision alone; then would they all have let him alone.
And the Tract argument, the argument of expediency, was most assuredly pressed upon him, as it is upon us. Do you not see, O Paul, that by your fanatical obstinacy, and your one-idea'd narrowness in regard to this point, because you are mad on that, and must be ever thrusting the gospel against that, you are preventing a vast deal of good, cutting yourself off, and along with you, from the circulation of religious truth in whole communities, where it might go acceptably and freely, but where they will refuse it utterly, if you attempt to speak in regard to this evil? Let the iniquity of trusting in circumcision quite alone, and preach Christ and him crucified, and in that way you will conquer the sin.
But no! In that way you will only bind and crucify the gospel, and make that a minister of sin, in that way you fetter your own freedom, and give it to men to say, instead of God, what part of his word shall be spoken, and what shall not. To whom we gave place by subjection, says Paul, no, not for an hour; that the truth of the gospel might remain with you. Not the gospel in name merely, and sin acquiesced in under it, but the truth of the gospel, was what Paul would proclaim, the truth against all sin. Christ crucified meant, in Paul's view, the doctrine of sin crucified for Christ's sake, not speculative doctrine as the shield of sin. It is a false gospel which is the cloak and minister of sin.
And it is bribery of the worst sort, accepted, by which you consent to consecrate the gospel, in order to gain a sale for your dilutions of it; reducing its qualifications for service to just those required for the ministry of eunuchs in an oriental harem. You take away the life of the gospel, if you take away its testimony against sin; if sin can thrive along with it, and even be protected and sanctioned by its silence, then it is worse than no gospel at all. Its life becomes death, for by it men imagine they are going to heaven, when by sin under it they are only insuring for themselves a deeper hell.
THE BISHOP TO THE ZULUS.
The examples of such compromise with popular sin, in order to make truth popular, are pernicious in the extreme, when men see them in such high places, and with such expressions of pious zeal and unction. A similar proceeding has been adopted by the Bishop of Zulus in South Africa, who agreed that if they would only let him preach, he would not preach against their polygamy. The domestic institution should be sacred from the rebukes of the gospel, if they would let him and his ministers preach and make converts; their polygamy should not stand in the way of their piety, if they themselves would not stand in the way of his preaching. They might keep their wives and the gospel together, if only they would not turn him and the gospel out of the country.
What better is such preaching of the gospel, than the professed conversion of the heathen in the palmy days of Romanism, by sprinkling the idolatrous temples and the idols with holy water, and baptizing them with the names of saints, so that all their worship and their life might go on as ever, and they be proclaimed as christians? The gospel with a tariff of permitted and popular abominations was the appropriate result of such a policy; the truth more and more disappearing, and the indulgence and sanction of sin more and more becoming the essence of the system.
On the same theory of compromise, John the Baptist would have been excused for not speaking to Herod against his particular cherished sin; nay, on the theory of expediency, he would have been forbidden to do so; silence would have been the cardinal virtue, that the gospel might continue to speak out. Herod was much pleased with John's ministry; he did many things, and heard him gladly; he would doubtless have continued to hear him gladly, if he would only have kept silent on that one sin. He would have let him range up and down his Court and Kingdom undisturbed, preaching and distributing tracts, preaching the whole gospel, all but its warnings against that one sin. John and his disciples might have instituted a system of colportage over all Judea, and dispensed religious truth by the tun, out of their lips and knapsacks. They might even have preached against dancing, and Herod would have been interested with the tract and the argument; so that even the mazy evolutions of Herodias' daughter's twinkling feet might have been forbidden of John, and yet John himself not have been forbidden to preach.
JOHN THE BAPTIST A FANATIC.
And was not that sufficient freedom of the Pulpit? What greater liberty ought he to have desired than that? Herod's views of the freedom of the pulpit, and John's, were evidently the same. And having such doors of usefulness open before him, and so many subjects popular to preach upon, was not John a fanatical fool, a madman, to shut all those doors in his own face, and shut out all this truth, all those tracts, all that gospel, just for the sake of assailing Herod's adultery, just on the imagination that the gospel required him to denounce that sin? Why not let that sin alone, and continue to preach Christ crucified? It was manifestly not expedient to meddle with that sin, and the true view of expediency would have kept John silent.
But John must needs undertake to abolish instead of quietly and silently reforming. He might have satisfied himself with preaching about the moral duties that grow out of the existence of adultery, without attempting to turn the gospel into an abolition agency for abolishing the sin. But he must needs undertake to abolishize the gospel, and drive with radical madness and impudence at that particular sin. The very sin of all others, which Herod and his court held in highest regard, held dearest, and which, therefore, John ought to have carefully avoided, since, having become a court sin, it was political, and as such, forbidden to be touched; that very sin John must needs openly attack, and thereby lost his head, so that his whole preaching was put a stop to.
Manifestly, according to the theory of the Tract Society, John ought to have concealed the gospel in regard to that sin, in order that he might continue to preach the gospel unmolested. John was guilty of preventing a vast deal of good by his rash and impudent radicalism.
HOW JONAH MIGHT HAVE DONE.
There was Jonah also; very strange that he had not the sagacity of our Tract Committees; strange that he should take such a roundabout and troublesome way of evading duty, when he might have gone with the gospel, and concealed the truth. Must he needs go into the ship's sides, and into the whale's belly, and have his lights clean extinguished there, when he might have gone straight to Nineveh, and preached a compromise with sin? He might have traveled to Nineveh, consulted with the inhabitants, and had his choice of their sins, at their suggestion, with their permission, to hang upon, and he might have taken the one the least dangerous to meddle with. He might have preached against dancing, instead of saying a word against idolatry; and so he could have ranged up and down the streets of Nineveh, and preached in the market-places, unforbidden, undisturbed.
But the difficulty with Jonah was just this, that they did not then know how to do things by Committees, nor by resolutions passed in General Assemblies, to which men might refer for the testimony of God's word against prevailing and popular sins, when it would be difficult to preach against them. The prophet Jonah had to take his3commission from God, and to consult God and not man as to the interpretation and application of his word. Jonah had no Committee of fifteen to counsel him, and assume his responsibilities; no publishing committee, with Sambo and Toney as an example of the kind of preaching which might be expedient.
And the Prophet seems to have been himself very deficient in the inventive and apologetic faculty, while there was as yet no contrivance discovered by conservative philosophers, to avoid assailing sin as an iniquity, by proclaiming the moral duties that grow out of sin as an institution. Jonah was completely tied up by his instructions from God; preach the preaching that I bid thee; and he had not the authority of a Tract Society to put their interpretation on his commission, selecting such parts of the preaching as would be popular, and making it unconstitutional to assault organic sins.
Now how stands the case in regard to the example and teachings of the Tract Society on the sin of slavery? You agree to keep back and conceal the testimony of the word of God against a prevalent sin, because the sinners in that sin affirm that if you preach against it, you shall not preach at all, you shall not publish any of your tracts in that part of the country. On this ground you affirm that expediency, or a regard to the greatest good, requires you to make this compromise. But if you set up expediency as the rule, then you have to compare opposing probabilities; and the probability is that a greater injury will be produced by the sanction of iniquity, the corruption of conscience and of morals, and the diminution of the sacredness and power of God's word through such a course of purchased silence and omission, and consequent shielding of sin, than could be balanced by all the good of all the Tract publications. The Tract Society becomes a merchant, and the balances of deceit are in its hands. It is a frightful example of compromise with sin, all over the country, and of exalting expediency to a supremacy over conscience and God's word. It is sanctioning evil that good may come; and we cannot see why this is not the same thing as doing evil that good may come.
If you shield and sanctify one sin, you neutralize your own resistance against every other. Your testimony in every direction becomes suspicious. The whole Decalogue is violated, if you break one of the commandments, and justify others in doing the same thing. He that shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, the Lord Jesus declared shall be least in the kingdom of heaven. If you were charged with the care of a dyke against the sea, in vain would you justify the neglect and wickedness of keeping one breach open, by stationing guards over every other floodgate, every embankment, and affirming that if you did not let in the water at that breach, you would not be suffered to protect any other portion against it. Just so, all your tracts are bootless, while you give admission to one reigning sin. The conscience is corrupted, is defiled, to such a degree, by that one sin maintained, that all the virtues practiced partake of that corruption.—Independent.
PROMISES.
By J. Clarke
TRUE a bad promise is better broken than kept; but this is no excuse for continually making bad promises. One or two such promises in a lifetime, ought to teach a person not to make them; but there are some people, who, though they would not make a bad promise, yet they are so easy, and so accommodating, and they say yes so naturally and so often without reflection, that they find it impossible to perform the half of their engagements.
Thus Mr. A. calls at the door of Mr. Promise-all, and says, Friend P. can you come and help me raise my barn to-morrow? Says P., Let me see: I have promised to work for H. to-morrow; I owe him for cash borrowed, and besides, I have partly promised to help C. thresh; he wants me badly. Oh well, says A., one day won't make much difference; say you will come and help me raise. Well, says P., I don't know—I guess—(thinks awhile,) may be I'd best come.
Soon after A. departs, D. presents himself at the door of Mr. Promise-all, and says, Neighbor P., I'm in a pinch; my corn is being eaten up by the squirrels and birds; I want you to help me cut it to-day and to-morrow. Really, says P., I do not know: I'm engaged for to-morrow; I rather guess you will have to wait. I can't be put off so, says D.; you have promised to help me cut up my corn whenever I want you. Well, says P., I suppose I'll have to come.
Promise-all is industrious and honest in all other respects but this, and this will I fear be his ruin. He works hard, but does not get along, because he does not work upon any system or plan; and he cannot plan, because he is a servant of all—because he does not keep his word.
Now let us follow A. to the door of Mr. Prompt. Good morning Mr. P., Can you help me raise to-morrow? I am sorry to say, says P., I'm engaged for to-morrow. Well, says A., I shall have to get along without you, for I know you would not break your word for all the barns in the world.
Now suppose these two men, Prompt and Promise-all, should embrace the Third Angel's Message; which would be most useful? Which would progress most rapidly in the study of the Scripture? In fact, could friend Promise-all be an overcomer? Could he win the crown unless he should thoroughly reform in this matter? Will Christ accept the covenant-breaker? But says P., I am poor. Well, my dear friend, this is the way to remain poor. I can assure you that your friend Prompt has had a harder, and far more difficult task than yourself, and he has succeeded in paying his debts, and has brought up a large family, and been liberal all the while; and now he can live comfortably, while you are harassed.
Oh let us keep our word inviolate; while swift to hear, let us be slow to speak, slow to promise. Let us reflect! reflect! Let us know what we promise, to whom we promise, and disappoint no one. Do not forbear that little Saxon word "no." Only two letters in it. Oh there is a charm in it when needed. Will you break your promise? No! Will you work without plan or system? No! Will you displease God, and disgust men and angels? No!!! Will you be slow to promise and prompt to perform? Oh yes, with the help of God.
J. CLARKE.
An Evil Frame
By Dr. Love
AN EVIL FRAME. When the soul is in an evil frame, so long as it places all its hope in its duties, this evil frame must throw it into deep despondency; but if it be putting its trust in this secret mercy of God which is expressed in the absolute promises, then its evil frame is no hindrance to its hope. For the soul says to itself, "Though I be in a bad frame, that will not change the unchangeable purpose of love in God: and his love will be the more manifested, as well as his power, the more dead that I am. And, if he have a purpose of love toward me, whenever that breaks forth, it will remedy all; and therefore I will go and lay myself at his feet as I am, and look up. It may be he will be gracious, as he has promised. I will spread out his promises before him as I can. Who can tell, but that he will make them good to me? If his love were dependent on some good thing in me, or to be done by me, then indeed I might despair. But he tells me that it has been from everlasting toward those that have in them no worth at all—even to such as I am; and I know not but that I myself am even now the object of it. Therefore I will wait on, in the use of all means, till I see what he will do with me."—Dr. Love.
The Bosom Sin.
WE have known persons who were kept from submission to God for many years by an unwillingness to give up a single sin, or to perform a single duty. All the opposition of the natural heart centered on that one point, and they would not yield it. They sought to evade the cross. They struggled hard to come into the kingdom of heaven instead of entering in through Christ, the door. But all efforts were in vain. A heart-searching God would not be mocked, and at length broken-hearted and humbled, the sin was abandoned, and the duty performed, and in a moment the darkened soul was full of joy and peace. The necessity of abandoning the bosom sin is forcibly set forth in the following paragraph:
It scarcely matters whether the sin be small or great. It may be some passion, or habit, or interest, which holds but a small place in our lives, and may by the world be unmarked. If it exists with us, and we know it, no matter what otherwise may be our virtues, this one bosom sin will finally palsy our whole moral being. That one loose plank may sink the mightiest ship that ever floated on the seas. A man's first step onward must be over this sin of which he is conscious. It may be but taking a mote of the eye, it may be but cutting off the right hand, but that sin must be put away, or he will stand still in the christian course. And worse than this. Through the implications of society and habit, through the love of consistency, one such sin retaining its mastery, may drag the whole character down to its own level. If one purposes generally to be a good man, this sin will constantly recur to him, and will bring perpetual self-reproach. The thought of moral or religious progress will come to be associated with conquest over it. All else is easy. There must be the place of struggle, and if he fail there, he yields up and is dispirited and lost. It is as with an army in battle. There is almost always some point which is the key to the whole position, the loss of which decides the contest. It may be an eminence which the husbandman hardly observes as he passes over it with his plough. But around it the battle rages. There the veterans of a hundred fights are planted never to retreat. The artillery of an empire is pointed to sweep it with its iron hail, and squadron to squadron press on and are lost in the midst of the waving tempest of fire. Every where else the strife is nothing. The embattled rank pause to witness how on that point goes the day. If the position is lost, from rank to rank, from squadron to squadron, follow dismay, and flight, and disaster. Such a contest must go on in the heart of every man who desires to be a christian, and yet has reserved some bosom sin as an exception to his christian life. That is the key to his character. If he finally yield there, and surrender so much of his character up to evil, he will be enfeebled, the next point to contest will be yielded, and finally nothing will be left but the show of such virtues as interest or the community exact of him.—Sel.
Giving Glory to Christ
THERE are two things very hard; one is to take the shame of our sins to ourselves; the other is to give the glory of our services to Christ. Now then if I sacrifice to my own net; if I aim at my own credit or profit, and give the glory of all I do to self; then do I "sow to the flesh" and was never cast out of self, but act only from a natural conscience. But if I give the glory of all my strength and life in duty only to God; if I magnify grace in all, and can truly say in all I do, Yet not I; then am I truly cast out of self, and do what I do with a renewed conscience.—Mead's Almost Christian.
Judging Evil of Others.
Suppose it should be given to some malign angel to put upon every man some outward visible mark of the thoughts that you have had of him during the passage of a single day; and that at evening these men should come up before you, one by one, each having a blotch upon him significant of the judgment which you had passed? What would you think at such a sight as you would then see? Why, it would be as if a hospital had opened its doors, and let out a troop of its miserable, spotted, scarred, deformed, leprous inmates! You would say, "Who are these wretched, diseased creatures? Ah, who are they?" "They are the men who come before you, bringing only the spots and stains that you have given them!" Ah! let every man heed the Apostle's injunction, and let every man be not only slow to hear and to speak, but slow even to think evil of his fellow men!—Beecher.
HOLINESS.
No gifts, no duties, no natural endowments, will evidence a right in heaven; but the least measure of true holiness will secure heaven to the soul. As holiness is the soul's best evidence for heaven, so it is a continued spring of comfort to it on the way thither. The purest and sweetest pleasures in this world are the results of holiness. Till we come to live holily, we never live comfortably. Heaven is epitomized in holiness; and, to say no more, it is the peculiar mark by which God has visibly distinguished his own from other men—Ps. iv, 3: "The Lord hath set apart him that is godly for himself." As if he had said, This is the man, and that the woman, to whom I intend to be good for ever; this is a man for me. O holiness, how surpassingly glorious art thou!—Flavel.
SELF-CONSIDERATION.
By Dr. Owen
Who is there that considereth aright the vanity, darkness, and ignorance of his mind, the perverseness and stubbornness of his will, with the disorder, irregularity, and distemper of his affections, with respect unto things spiritual and heavenly, who is not ashamed of, who doth not abhor himself? This is that which hath given our nature its leprosy, and defiled it throughout. And he who hath no experience of spiritual shame and self-abhorrence on account of this inconformity of his nature, and the faculties of his soul, unto the holiness of God, is a great stranger to the whole work of sanctification. Who is there that can recount the unsteadiness of his mind in holy meditation, his low and unbecoming conceptions of God's excellencies, his proneness to foolish imaginations and vanities that profit not, his averseness to spirituality in duty, and fixedness in communion with God, his proneness to things sensual and evil, all arising from the spiritual irregularity of our natural faculties, (if ever he had any due apprehensions of divine purity and holiness,) that is not sensible of his own vileness and baseness, and is not oftentimes deeply affected with shame thereon? Isa. lxiv, 6: Dan. ix, 4.—Dr. Owen.
Power of Temptation
POWER OF TEMPTATION. I know from experience that habit can, in direct opposition to every conviction of the mind, and but little aided by the elements of temptation, induce a repetition of the most unworthy actions. The mind is weak, where it has once given way. It is long before a principle restored can become as firm as one that has never been moved. It is as in the case of the mound of a reservoir; if this mound has in one place been broken, whatever care has been taken to make the repaired part as strong as possible, the probablity is that, if it give way again, it will be in that place.—Foster.
Obedience Constrained by Love
Men may obey others from fear or self-interest; but the Christian obeys "because the love of Christ constraineth him."
The Poverty of Blindness.
By Tholuck
We say of the blind man, from whom the visible world is shut out, that he is poorer by half the world than the man who sees. O ye spiritually blind, ye indeed are poorer than we by a whole world!
Repentance
By Feltham
REPENTANCE. Repentance is the key that unlocks the gate wherein sin keeps man a prisoner. It is the aqua vitæ to fetch again to itself the fainting soul.—Feltham.
The Honor of Christ-Like Suffering
A Christ-like sufferer is an honor to religion.
WHENCE THE DIFFERENCE?
By Editor
We find ourselves at variance both in theory and in practice with the people of the world around us, and with every denomination of professors. We find, moreover, that this difference is almost daily increasing, that the breach is widening between us, that the different paths we are pursuing are becoming more marked and distinct. This fact suggests an inquiry as to the true cause of this difference. We aver that the churches, and through them the world, are apostatizing from the Bible; that its precepts and teachings are fast losing their hold upon the hearts of men; and that those who will adhere strictly to the sacred word will find themselves differing more and more widely from those around them.
As evidence that we are not resting in this matter upon mere assertion, we might refer to the extracts from A. Campbell which Bro. Carver has furnished us for this number, together with the fact that those who are members of the sect to which he gave rise, now know not what to do with them. At the time Mr. Campbell wrote, no issue, probably, had been joined with him on the claims of the fourth commandment. The demands of that commandment for the consecration of every seventh day to the Lord, instead of the first, with the sacrifice which it involves, had never been applied to his heart, calling for the surrender of every selfish interest at the shrine of truth. No interests of this kind, (too powerful with many at the present time,) intervened to bias his judgment in regard to the immutability and perpetuity of God's holy law. Hence he unhesitatingly took the Bible view, and gave utterance to Bible sentiments concerning it. If the claims of the fourth commandment had been strictly enjoined upon him, and he had remained true to the sentiments he uttered, he must have acknowledged the obligations of the seventh day.
How is it with his followers? Those "ten words" to which Mr. Campbell attaches such importance and sanctity have been examined by those who desired to keep them in letter and in spirit too; their claims have been held forth; other issues have been joined concerning them. Do his disciples acknowledge deductions legitimately drawn from his premises? Not on the contrary they know not what to do with his declarations. They have apostatized from the principles of their leader. Another illustration of this may be seen in the course pursued by these people in Gilboa, Ohio, when Bro. Cornell first presented the truth in that place; the report of which our readers will remember. Nor is this the only sect that is ready to abandon the sentiments of its founder under the influence of other motives.
The case is a very clear one. The development of truth is progressive. And as new light is springing forth, we have new confirmations of the great truth uttered by our Saviour, that men love darkness rather than light. When it comes they draw off. They shut their eyes to the light of truth, and their ears to its declarations. And hence there must a separation take place between those who follow it and those who do not. The two paths which the two classes take, diverge continually. The one is the straight and narrow path that leads to life; the other the broad way that endeth in perdition.
We are confident that this distinction will grow more and more apparent as time rolls on, till it will be easy to discern between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not, from the simple fact that one follows the Bible and the light that emanates from that holy book, and the other does not.
Reader, what is your decision? Will you follow the Bible, though it lead you into the straight and narrow path? Or will you be quietly borne down towards perdition by the popular tide that sets in thitherward? Decide for yourself; decide now; decide for eternity.