Review and Herald, Vol. 25, No. 6. (1/3/1865)

Review and Herald

Jan 3, 1865

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jan 3, 1865

Authenticity of the Scriptures.

By John Norton Loughborough

CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN ELD. J. N. LOUGHBOROUGH, OF BATTLE CREEK, MICH., AND E. O. DARLING OF ROCKTON, ILLS.

Response No. 4.

MR. E. O. DARLING, My dear Sir: I still further reply to your questions in the letter of Jan. 2nd, in accordance with my promise in my last. You say, "Of these manuscripts, how, and where were they preserved, previous to their compilation? In other words, were they at that time genuine, and have they since such compilation been kept beyond the reach of all possible alteration?" Your first question I will answer first; "Were they at that time genuine?" I answer, Yes. A genuine document I understand, is one which is written by a person whose name it bears as the author of it. So my first proof will be to show that at the time of the earliest compilation of which we have any account of the books of the Old Testament, that compilation was of the genuine writings of Moses and others to whom those writings were ascribed. And the earliest compilation of the books of the Old Testament as we now have them, was, as I have shown, back as far as 300 years B. C. And to answer this question, it will carry us back to show the preservation of the books of the Old Testament before the time of its later writers, which may not be out of place here although you ask no question directly upon that point. I have already presented evidence to show that Moses was the founder of the Jewish book of laws, and the principal writer of the facts stated in the five

books of Moses. Of course the evidence presented in the other letter concerning the compilation of the books of the Old and New Testaments is equally valid on this point. But I will pass to notice other testimony bearing directly upon the point of the preservation of the books before and after their compilation. There could be no earthly object for them (the Jews) to change their laws, nor is there any evidence that they ever attempted to change them. Again, there is good evidence that they did not change their Scriptures, from the fact that they themselves thought it an unpardonable sin to change or mutilate them. Philo and Josephus both declare that the Jews would suffer any torment and even death rather than change a single point or iota of Scripture. A law was also given them denouncing him as guilty of inexpiable sin who should alter in the least their laws. See Deut. iv, 2; xii, 32. And for this reason the Jewish doctors got up their traditions in which they explained and gave their ideas of Scripture; but they did not call their tradition Scripture. Christ and the apostles charged them with reverencing their traditions, but they never accused them of altering their Scriptures.

Again, it would have been a great difficulty for any one person to have corrupted their Scriptures at that time; for others would detect them. Their rulers were required to have a copy of the law. The priests had a copy, and parents must have had a copy in order to comply with the requisition, to teach them to their children. So you readily see if any one attempted to alter the law at that time, others would detect them. If the priests or rulers had undertaken to change the laws, a people who had been taught these laws from their earliest infancy could easily detect any such change. These remarks, you understand, I design to apply simply to the Pentateuch, or laws of the people called "the book of the law of the Lord given by the hand of Moses." Their Scriptures which were written from the time of the giving of the law to the captivity, refer to persons and events connected with the affairs of the Jewish kingdom, and these writers refer to the records of their own nation as proof of many of the statements they make. It would be absurd for any one to attempt to write about events and tell the exact time and place, when and where such and such events occurred, if no such event had happened. The record of the affairs of the nation would of course give the lie to their statements, if they were not correct. But they, as already remarked, refer to the records of the nation to prove the correctness of their statements. And allowing that their records of facts when made agree with the records of the nation (as they must have done, or else they would have been rejected), we have a strong testimony for the genuineness of these documents, and an equal barrier to the changing of them, for the records of the nation would at once detect such an alteration if made.

Again, after the Jews were divided into two kingdoms, both the people of Israel and those of Judah still retained the same book of the law; and the rivalry between them would hinder either of them from altering it. For should they either of them alter it, the others would detect them. We find also that after the Israelites went into captivity at Babylon, the Samaritans possessed the Pentateuch in the old Hebrew characters, in which it remains unto this day, while the

Jewish copy (as I have already shown), after they went to Babylon, was copied into the Chaldee language. The jealousy between these two nations would of course be a barrier against either of them altering their Scriptures in any degree; for that alteration would be certainly discovered and used to the detriment of the one so changing them. The general agreement between the Hebrew and Samaritan Pentateuch, which are both of them now extant, show them to have come from the same source. And in the language of Mr. Horne I would say: "No better evidence can be desired that the Jewish Bibles have not been corrupted than this very book of the Samaritans; which, after more than 2000 years of discord between the two nations, varies as little from the other as any classic author in less tract of time differs from itself by the unavoidable slips of many transcribers." A copy of the Scriptures was always kept by the Jews in the sacred place of the temple and brought forth from thence in the time of some of their feasts, and every Sabbath, and read in the hearing of the people, so that all had an opportunity to know their oracles; not like heathens who kept theirs from the eyes of all except the rulers. As I have stated in my last letter, when we come down to about 300 years B. C. (or rather to be definite, 282 years B. C.), we find the same books we now have comprising the Old Testament translated into Greek. It was not certainly a very hard matter for the Jews at that time to know what books were authentic, as the law and prophets &c., had been read in their synagogues every Sabbath day, long previous to that time.

To sum up these facts already stated. We have the Septuagint Bible, carrying us back to about 300 B. C. The Chaldee Paraphrase carrying us back to 600 B. C., and containing the same books in our Bibles which were written previous to the captivity, and also those which were written in the same language after that time. We have the Old Hebrew text also written previous to the captivity. By comparing these together, we see they agree in their books, and facts related, which is a strong evidence of the preservation of the Scriptures of the Old Testament till the days of Ptolemy Philadelphus.

The Scriptures of the Old Testament were also translated into the Syriac language at the close of the first century. Of these different versions of the Old Testament which I have mentioned, a celebrated French writer, Cellerier, in his "Authenticity and Divine origin of the Old Testament," pp. 148-151, says: "These three versions have been preserved to our time; numerous manuscript copies and printed editions of them are extant; and, with the exception of a few unimportant differences, they represent to us the same text, the same books, the same predictions, and the same phrases. Now these agreements are not the result of any design on the part of translators, or of any fraud on the part of learned men. These three sister versions, having once issued from their common parent, have been forever separated by events and by a rivalry which still subsists. The Chaldee version which was carefully preserved and consulted by the Hebrews, remained unknown to Christians during the early ages of the church, and has been in their hands only for two or three centuries. The Christians of Syria know as little

of the Greek version, as the Greek did of the Syriac; and the Greek version, which was diffused throughout the West, and translated in its turn into Latin, and which, under this second form, became the object of exclusive respect in the Roman Church, could not borrow anything from the other versions, of the existence of which the inhabitants of the West, were utterly ignorant. The agreement, therefore, of these three witnesses is so much the more remarkable, as they never could have heard that these versions belonged to rival and hostile churches. They were the work of inveterate enemies of Christians and Jews, of Eastern and Western Christians, of Jews of Palestine, and Alexandrian Jews. They do, however, agree together. Therefore they give us, with certainty, the ancient and true text of the Old Testament, precisely as it was extant before the time of Jesus Christ." Since the time of Christ the alteration of the Old Testament would have been a greater difficulty than previous to that event, for we have the Jews of two or three classes, the Samaritans, the Syrian Christians, and finally the other hostile sects of the East and West. Many of these sects were at variance and utterly hostile to each other, yet all of them reverenced the Old Testament as the word of God, and had copies of it in their respective languages. The agreement of these different versions on bringing them together after being separated for so long a lapse of time, is the best of evidence of their uncorrupted preservation.

In answering your question on the genuineness of the books of the Old Testament at the time of their compilation, I have (virtually) also answered your question on their preservation. The two questions are in fact inseparably connected. Concerning the genuineness of the Old and New Testaments, the testimony given on their compilation, is a sufficient proof of their being preserved as genuine documents to the present time. But I will pass to notice some further evidence for their preservation. First, then, I prove their preservation, by the facts they contain. I have already presented proof that the apostles wrote a record of the life and sayings of Christ, and also epistles enforcing his doctrines. And on the genuineness of the New Testament, I have already presented some evidence that what they wrote is the same as we now have in the New Testament, which of course is evidence for its preservation.

But the question now comes up as to their uncorrupted preservation. We use the same arguments to prove their uncorrupted preservation, that would be used to prove the genuineness and preservation of any ancient manuscript extant. First then, these writings could not be corrupted during the lives of the writers of the books, without being detected. If like the "Sibylline oracles," they had been looked up from public view where no one could look at them without special authority from the emperor or king, there might be some chance for them to be corrupted without the common people knowing it; but we find, on the contrary, that these writings of the New Testament were addressed to large societies in different parts of the world. Within twenty years after the ascension of Christ, churches were formed in the principal cities of the Roman empire; and in those churches the writings of the New Testament, as then extant (namely, the gospels and some of the epistles) were read as a part of their public worship. Their Scriptures were exposed to public examination, and taught in public. When these writings were delivered to the world, the Christians held them in the highest estimation as giving a record of the life and sufferings of Christ, &c. Hence, copies of them were multiplied and disseminated as rapidly as the doctrine of Christ was spread abroad. Translations were made in as many languages as the Christians spoke, and were scattered throughout the empire, and many of these translations remain to the present time. And as Mr. Horne says: "We see by it being thus translated and copied by various individuals, it would very soon be rendered absolutely impossible to corrupt these books in any one particular word or phrase. Now, is it to be supposed (without violating all probability) that all Christians should agree in a design of corrupting or changing the original books? And if some only should make the attempt, the uncorrupted copies would still remain to detect them."

As these books could not be corrupted during the lives of their respective authors, and while a great number of witnesses were living to attest the facts which they record, so neither could any material alteration take place after their decease without being detected, while the original manuscripts were preserved in the church. The Christians who were instructed by the apostles, and their immediate successors, traveled into all parts of the world, carrying with them copies of their writings; from which other copies were multiplied and preserved. Harmonies of the gospels were also anciently constructed, and commentaries were written upon them, and the other books of the New Testament. Manuscripts were multiplied, and editions of the New Testament were put forth. These sacred records being universally regarded among Christians as the supreme standard of truth, were received by every class of Christians as possessing an authority belonging to no other book. The scriptures of the New Testament were appealed to by every one of them in matters of controversy, as being conclusive testimony. So you see, as these writings were appealed to by those who were at variance with each other in sentiments, it would be actually impossible for either of them to alter these scriptures without being detected by the others, as they each possessed them. If one party was inclined either to omit what opposed their creed, or peculiar tenets, or to insert what might afford them additional evidence, there was always some other party both ready and willing to detect the fraud whenever attempted to be made.

Again. Those books of the Greek New Testament have been transcribed thousands of times more than any other Greek author, and of course the difficulty of corrupting them increases with every transcription.

Again. The early opponents of Christianity, among whom we may mention Celsus, Porphyry and Julian, have never mentioned any attempt by the early Christians to alter their scriptures, and had any such alteration been attempted, it certainly would have been so public a matter, that it would have been known by them, and they would have siezed upon and used it against the Christians. But on the contrary Celsus quotes the New Testament books by the names they are now called, and speaks of them as teaching the same facts and doctrines which we now find them to record.

Again. You are perhaps well aware that in the fourth century, a division commenced between the churches of the East and West, which in the ninth century was irreparable and resulted in the establishment of the Greek and Latin, or Eastern and Western churches, and that that division of Latin and Greek churches exists at the present time, under the names of the Roman Catholic church and the Greek church of Russia. Now if after this division was commenced, the Eastern church had attempted to alter or falsify their copies of the Scriptures, those of the Western church would certainly have detected them. And so also the Eastern would have detected the Western, had they attempted to change their copies. But we find that the versions of these two churches agree, which is an additional evidence that neither of these sects falsified the sacred text.

Again. In the first centuries the New Testament was read over three quarters of the globe, while profane writers were limited to one nation or to one country. These writings have also been quoted by an uninterrupted succession of writers from the first century to the present time. These quotations were not only made by friends to the doctrines of the Scriptures, but by opposers to the Christian faith. This cannot be asserted of any of the best classic authors. And as translations of the New Testament were made in the second century, which in the course of two or three centuries more were greatly multiplied, it became absolutely impossible to forge new writings, or corrupt the sacred text, unless we suppose that those differing in sentiment and hostile to each other should all agree in a forgery, which would be an absurdity. The quotations from the New Testament by the early church writers are said to be so numerous that all the New Testament could be compiled from their writings. That is, in referring to passages in their various writings, they have quoted almost the entire New Testament.

One point I neglected to state on the preservation of the Old Testament, which I will notice here, although a little out of place. It is this: The Jews, since the destruction of their temple, have been scattered into every nation under heaven, and as they have gone into their various places of exile, they have carried their Scriptures with them, in the Hebrew and mixed Chaldee languages. And although these Scriptures in many of their testimonies which speak of the Messiah condemn them in rejecting Christ, still we find even those texts are unaltered; and surely if they were to change any of their Scriptures, here would be the texts which they would most naturally change. And we find by comparing various copies of their Scriptures together, that they agree, which of course is good evidence that they have not corrupted their scriptures of the Old Testament.

I know not how I could better close this testimony for the preservation of the New Testament than to quote a testimony from the writings of Rousseau on the subject.

He says: "I confess to you that the majesty of the Scripture strikes me with admiration, as the purity of the gospel has its influence on my heart. Peruse the works of our Philosophers with all their pomp of diction, how mean, how contemptible, are they when compared with the Scriptures! . . . Socrates, with all his wisdom, was nothing more than a vain sophist. He invented, it is said, the theory of morals. Others, however, had before put them in practice; he had only to say, therefore, what they had done and to reduce their examples to precepts. And where could Jesus learn among all his competitors, that pure and sublime morality of which he only has given us both precept and example? . . . Yes! If the life and death of Socrates were those of a sage, the life and death of Jesus, were those of a God. Shall we suppose the evangelic account of him a mere fiction? Indeed my friend, it bears not the marks of fiction; on the contrary, the history of Socrates which nobody presumes to doubt, is not so well attested as that of Jesus Christ. Such a supposition, in fact, only shifts the difficulty without obviating it; it is more inconceivable, that a number of persons should agree to write such a history, than that one only should furnish the subject of it. The Jewish authors were incapable of the diction, and strangers to the morality contained in the gospel, the marks of whose truth are so striking and inimitable, that the inventor would be a more astonishing character than the hero."

You say, next, "The Bible, its internals. Is it as a whole in its matter essentially different from any and every other book or books of which we have any knowledge? If so, in what does that difference consist?" I suppose the Bible is different from other books, not because its paper or letters in and of themselves are any more holy than those of any other book, but because it treats of matters which are of the greatest and gravest importance to man, even matters that decide his eternal welfare. Other books, some of them at least, tell us how to live, to secure the greatest benefit in this world; but the Bible tells us how to live to secure eternal life in the world to come.

You say still further; "Is it in a more direct manner than any other book composed by an omniscient, omnipotent, and all-good Being, so that in its every narration of fact and every precept enjoined, it can be depended upon as strictly true, so clear, concise, and plain that to a moderately well-balanced mind previous to all theological tinkering, it would be a 'safe guide to follow?'" I understand wherever moral precepts are enjoined they are a safe guide to follow, but I shall not take the position that every circumstance related that some one has done is a moral precept. And as to the "theological tinkering" of which you speak, I think much of it has tended more to blind the minds of men than to help them. For instance such tinkering as you sent me a sample of in the Elder's sermon on the Sabbath question, preached at Rockton, of which you gave me a brief report. A great deal of the tinkering that has been going on, has been to prove the truthfulness of doctrines which are not once expressed in the Bible. And of course to make such doctrines agree with the Bible, there must needs be a great amount of tinkering done. Of course, like other books, the Bible may use figures; but we shall expect

that those figures will be explained in the book, and that it will be necessary to understand the writer's use of figures and parables in order to understand their teachings in such testimonies. As to the Bible being composed by an omniscient, omnipotent and all-good Being, I suppose he gave directions to the people to write and what to write, and showed them in holy vision (in which they were under the absolute control of his Spirit) things to come. I do not know that it is essential to the truth of the book, or to show that it is an inspired book in the sense that we commonly understand the term, to claim that every word in it was spoken by the Lord to man. But I should claim that the moral precepts and prophecies of the book were directly taught to man by the Lord, while matters of fact which had transpired under the immediate observation of the people, they were commanded of the Lord to write. And as I have before shown, they of course could not fabricate facts of so stupendous a character that anybody could detect them if no such events had happened.

You say still further in speaking of the Bible: "In a word, is it as we generally understand the term plenarily inspired?" As I understand the term inspiration, I will say, Yes, to the above question. Then you will want to know how I understand the term inspiration. I understand a book to be inspired which the Lord directs a man to write, if he reveals to the man so writing, prophecy, moral precepts or even facts contained in such book, although the book itself perhaps may also contain facts which the said man is commanded of the Lord to write which he may know by actual observation without any express revelation being made of the said facts to him. Your next question is now due, "If you say it is so inspired I, of course, can only ask, what, and where is the evidence?" The two principal evidences relied upon to prove the inspiration of the Scriptures, is that of miracles, and prophecy. An inspired man, I understand, is one who is directed in his doctrine, and receives information by the teachings of the Spirit of God. The fact of such man's working miracles, would prove him to be possessed of some power superior to human power; then the foretelling of events which concern things perhaps hundreds of years in the future, when fulfilled would show him to be directed by some power or Spirit that knows all the future, "the end from the beginning", and that power must be that of the Spirit of God. This latter evidence of course in the form here stated becomes a stronger evidence to us than to those to whom such prophecies were made; but events were prophesied of by them which were immediately to come to pass, which when fulfilled would of course confirm them in the conviction that the one who had spoken of these events, was directed of the Lord. And then the miracles which these prophets wrought, were to the people an evidence that they possessed a power superior to that of human beings.

But in connection with all this, they were to watch the tendency of the teaching of such prophecies, or prophets, and if their teachings were of an immoral character, that would have a great bearing in the settlement of the matter, as to whether they were of God, or not. As we come to Sinai, we find testimony that the Lord spoke to the whole house of Israel in an audible voice, as he declared to them his law. Of course no man could write and tell them that they had heard God speak his law if they knew they had never heard any such thing. So we conclude they had heard such law spoken. And that now these laws, after that time, (according to the record) became the standard by which all teachings in the shape of prophecies must also be tried. These laws we think could not have been originated by the people at that time, for there was no model of them among the nations around them, but nearly all the people of the world were sunk in the depths of heathenism. But I am going much beyond my limits in the letter also, and must close for the present. I have now written you two letters in reply to yours of Jan. 2nd, and have received no reply. Yours with Respect.

J. N. LOUGHBOROUGH.

Feb. 20, 1862.

Rest.

Not here, within this desert drear, Find I my home; The beating sun brings weariness and death, The hot earth glows my toiling feet beneath, The shadows fall but rest not on my path, As day by day I roam.

Not here, where falls the blinding tear, Find I my home, Where hearts that love too fondly must be rent, Where cloud with sunshine, storm with calm is blent, Where joys that make us with the world content, Vanish like billow foam.

Not here, harassed by gloomy fear, Find I my home, So often tempted from the onward way, So often wandering from my Lord away, Shuddering, as through some devious paths I stray, Lest short of Life I come.

'Tis there, within a purer air, My home is given; Where Jesus reigns, the Lamb for me once slain, Where sorrows never come, nor sin, nor pain, Where saints who part on earth ne'er part again, The perfect rest of Heaven.—Observer.

Fear God.

A Ministerial Error.

By James White

It is, I think, an error into which many of our modern ministers, whose education has been carried to a high pitch, have fallen; that everything is to be done by the head rather than the heart. We know very well that the true method is to reach the heart through the head, and men must be made to feel by being shown why they should feel, and what is to make them feel. But in very many cases, especially in the least educated, the head is to be reached by appeals to the heart. We often hear the remark, "Yes, it was a smart sermon, but wanted heart. It sparkled like the stars, or shone like the moon on a wintry night, but it warmed no one." I have been sometimes struck, as every one else must have been, with the varying effect produced by different speakers at a public meeting; and how much more power over an audience, and how much more the object of the meeting has been accomplished by a few gushes of simple eloquence from the heart of some earnest and ardent advocate, than by the elaborate, but passionless pleader. The latter was coldly admired, and admitted to be an eloquent speaker; but the former melted and moved his audience by the depth and intensity of his own feeling.—James.

Treasures in Heaven.

By Dr. Tyng

We read of a philosopher who, passing through a mart filled with articles of taste and luxury, made himself quite happy with this simple yet sage reflection: "How many things there are here that I do not want!" Now this is just the reflection with which the earnest believer passes happily through the world. It is richly furnished with what is called good things. It has spots of honor and power to tempt the restless aspirings of ambition of every grade. It has gold and gems, houses and lands, for the covetous and ostentatious. It has innumerable bowers of taste and luxury, where self-indulgence may revel. But the Christian, whose piety is deep-toned, and whose spiritual perceptions are clear, looks over the world and exclaims, "How much there is here that I do not want! I have what is far better. My treasure is in heaven." [Dr. Tyng.

Ourselves and Our Saviour

Ourselves and Our Saviour.—Oh! did we but know ourselves and our Saviour! We are poor, but he is rich—we are dead, but he is life—we are sin, but he is righteousness—we are guiltiness, but he is grace—we are misery, but he is mercy—we are lost, but he is salvation. If we are willing, he never was otherwise. He ever lives, ever loves, ever pities, ever pleads. He loves and saves to the uttermost all who come unto him.

Sunshine.

Seclusion from the sunshine, Dr. Dio Lewis says, is one of the misfortunes of civilized life. The same cause which makes potatoe vines white and silky, when grown in dark cellars operates to produce the pale, silky girls that are reared in our parlors. Expose either to the direct rays of the sun, and they begin to show color and strength.

The Chief Art of Learning

The chief art of learning is to attempt but little at a time. The widest excursions of the mind are made by short flights, frequently repeated; the most lofty fabrics of science are formed by the continued accumulation of single propositions.

The Witch of Endor Raising Samuel.

CAN any one reasonably suppose, in reading the scriptural account of the interview of Saul with the witch of Endor, that she really did raise Samuel. I cannot. I give my reasons why I cannot.

1. It is not positively stated in the narration that she did raise him. It does not appear that Saul, or his accompanying friends, saw any appearance of Samuel, but only the woman saw a peculiar apparition, which she, at Saul's request, gave him a description of. See 1 Sam. xxviii. I know it may be said,--"but Samuel talked with Saul." I will notice that point hereafter. It will then, I trust, appear plainly to the contrary.

2. It is represented, that this apparition, which was by Saul called Samuel, came up "out of the earth," in the sight of the woman. Samuel was buried in Ramah, which was about a degree--quite a good many miles--from Endor; how then could he come up out of the earth at Endor?

3. It could not have been the "disembodied immortal soul" of Samuel that the woman saw; for she said it was an "old man covered with a mantle!" Do disembodied souls become old and wear mantles? She said he came "up out of the earth." Do disembodied immortal souls stay down in the earth? If so, would not Samuel's soul have been somewhere near his body at Ramah, rather than away there at Endor?

4. God had strictly forbidden the art which this woman practiced--witchcraft, on pain of death; and can we allow the unholy inconsistency, that this wicked woman, in open violation of the law of God, and at the desire of one whom God had abandoned, was permitted to disturb the repose of one of the most holy of the prophets, in the unseen world? The very thought seems to me almost sinful.

Let us now look at the whole connection of circumstances in the case, candidly. Saul was a very wicked man. God had left him to himself. In case of great martial emergency, he sought help from the Devil through one of his "mediums." God would therefore let him reap the full reward of deception due to a criminal course. Saul inquired for a woman with a familiar spirit. He was told of one at Endor. With two of his friends he went to her house in the night, and pressed her "to bring up," by evil power which she possessed, one whom he would name. She finally consented to his wish.

He named Samuel. She began to operate. Immediately she pretended to be, or really was frightened, and at once became aware, by some kind of superhuman intelligence, that it was Saul for whom she was operating; for until that moment she had not been aware of that fact, he having come to her disguised. Saul inquired of her what she saw. She replied, "I saw gods ascending out of the earth." (I saw Elohim God--a god, gods, a judge,--it is rendered differently.--Patrick.)

Saul inquired "what form is he of?" (What form is the Elohim, the judge,--the god of?) She replied, "an old man cometh up; and he is covered with a mantle." Then Saul "perceived" by the description which the woman gave of him, that it was Samuel, and addressed him accordingly. The apparition is therefore called Samuel, in accordance with Saul's perception. But we are not to conclude that Inspiration regarded it as being Samuel! It was perfectly proper to represent the matter as it appeared to Saul. There can be no room to doubt that this was a demon, counterfeiting Samuel, by the woman "medium." This demon was forced to speak that which would be most for the glory of God, in the case; and he certainly talked very religiously, as demons sometimes do. It is however, rather doubtful if all his words were true. Learned men question if Saul died on the morrow! However, he said enough to show Saul his wretched condition, and make him feel, that indeed, Heaven and earth were against him; and thus he was punished on the spot. Once more. This woman of Endor was a "necromancer." A necromancer is not one who really converses with the dead, but one who "pretends to converse with the dead!" A person may pretend to converse with the dead, and yet be deceived by diabolical appearances.--Ad. Herald.

Fast Living.

"Lord Byron," says Leigh Hunt, "used to go about humming all the morning, and reserved his serious work for the night." He said himself in a conversation with Lieut. Medwyn, that he largely used "the inspiration of gin" to keep up tired and flagging nature. Schiller resembled him in both habits. What was the consequence? Byron died at 36. Schiller lived on to 60, but with a broken constitution and shattered energies. The fire of genius blazed with intense and wasteful brilliancy in both, but soon burned itself out. Night labor and the inspiration of gin will make short work with the most robust constitution.

Doubtings.

By E. GOODRICH

WHILE there are some who seem as naturally constituted to doubt and despair as plants to absorb every other color and reflect only the green; and while there are those who are ready to swallow down every thing presented to them until their confidence is bitterly betrayed when they will run quite as far in the opposite extreme; there are others more happily disposed, whose eyes separate the light from the darkness and whose feet are almost always planted in a sure place. Nevertheless there are times when the most courageous heart is filled with terror and the stoutest faith and fall under the cross that is laid upon them.

While the light of divine truth is shining full and clear upon us and the powers of darkness are held in check, there is little danger either of stumbling, of losing our way, or of being taken captive by our enemy. But when the light becomes immediately obscured and our pathway, which up to this point was straight and plain, is lost in apparent windings, and added to all the rest, we are beset with a host of clamorous passions, 'tis then that doubts will force themselves upon us in a manner and with a power not easily resisted by the most experienced Christian.

While the evidences bearing upon any given question array themselves all on one side, speaking the same things, there is little or no fear that we shall decide wrong; but when the witnesses do not agree and the case seems equally balanced between positive assertion on the one hand, and direct testimony on the other, no one will say that it is easy to conclude concerning either doctrine or duty. At all such points as these, the probability is that we will either refuse to act at all, or else we will follow our own blind prejudices. But there never was a night so dark as to be utterly devoid of light to the healthy well-trained eye; and there never was a question so doubtful (morally speaking) as not to have a safe side to it. And whenever we have any doubts, there can be no doubt that it is our duty to always give the benefit of our doubts on the right side of the question. On the side of innocency, on the side of liberty, on the side of piety and virtue, on the side of love and humanity, and on the side of faith and hope.

Then let the rains descend upon us, let the floods come, let the winds blow and beat upon us, we are safe. And if in the end we find we were wrong in judgment, we were right in our action and no upbraidings of conscience or wailings of despair can reach us.

Would the man who is moderately sick have any doubts as to his proper course of action, if there were standing ten bottles upon one shelf all apparently alike, yet nine containing infallible remedies, and one a deadly poison? Would he hazard the one chance of being poisoned for the sake of securing the nine of being cured? Certainly not. And we may regard it as a safe rule, that it is always criminal to act on the wrong side of any question, where there is a single doubt standing against us.

And what a crowd of instances illustrative of this truth occur to our minds, as we refer to the gaming table, the grog shop, and house of ill fame, all of which places are filled with their thousands of reckless and abandoned victims, whose history of vice and crime dates back to the first misstep impeded only by a single doubt. Had they heeded this one reasonable doubt on the side of honesty, temperance and chastity, all would have been well.

But we sometimes labor under a mistake in applying this rule to the wrong side of the question. And when a truth or duty is presented we wait and wait to see all its bearings and results; and as perhaps that time never comes, we never embrace the truth or discharge the duty. But would the man lost in the woods on a dark, rainy night, if he knew, from the point at which he entered the woods and the general appearance of the land, that home was somewhere at the right of him, sit down and perish with the cold, waiting for the noonday sun to shine upon him? Would he not rather exert every nerve to find his way out, although he had nothing but some winding stream and an occasional flash of lightning to guide his weary footsteps?

And as it is with the light, so it is with the truth. Whenever it shines upon our minds we should follow it, though a thousand doubts should weigh against it. And although at times the most devout Christian has his doubts, and though even the objections urged against Christianity should be admitted, yet there is no doubt that the morals and faith of the Scriptures are sublimely superior to any thing elsewhere to be found, and that the religion of the Bible has done infinitely more to elevate and bless mankind than all the other systems of religion (both positive and negative) put together.

Hence at the very lowest point of our faith we may reasonably exclaim, "Lord I believe help thou my unbelief."

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