If any justification of the enterprise in which we now embark, is necessary, we can only say, that we have long believed that there was need of such a work as we hope to produce; that there was a wide field not covered by any of our periodicals, which it was important should be occupied. In this belief we have the concurrence of respected friends, in whose opinions we have greater confidence than in our own. When we first spoke of our wish to commence our publication, we found that several of our brethren had already conceived a similar idea. Without their advice and encouragement the present work would not have been undertaken. We may have mistaken the public want. We may have mistaken our ability to supply it. In either case our enterprise will fail. We are willing to run this risk for the chance of success; for the hope of contributing our mite to the religious progress of the community.

We have already, in our Prospectus, given a general outline of the purpose and intended character of our publication. We are not prepared at present to describe it more particularly. We cannot, indeed, minutely lay out our future course, for it will depend on the circumstances of the community and the course which our convictions shall take upon the questions to which the condition of society shall give rise. We hope that our work will partake of the spirit of progress, and that, if it shall be permitted to live, it will become better than we can now venture to promise. We sympathize deeply with the prevalent and increasing desire of beholding purer and brighter manifestations of the spirit of the Gospel in individual character and the condition of society; we hope and believe that such manifestations are at hand; we hold that they are to be effected, not by patient waiting, but by earnest expressions of thought and feeling, by the fervent prayers and persevering efforts of those in whose hearts this hope and faith burn. At the same time we are aware of the dangers with which this spirit is beset; the danger of mistaking what is new for what is good, and of assuming that every change is necessarily for the better. Against this danger we would carefully guard. We would prove all things; but we would hold fast only that which is good. Our readers may infer from this account of our present sentiments, that we shall assume the position of conservative reformers. Perhaps we could not better describe ourselves than by that term.

The editorial articles will of course express the opinions of an individual. We do not intend to exclude from our pages all opinions to which we do not give a full assent, or to make ourselves responsible for every thing we publish. Neither do we propose to open our pages, without restriction, to the discussion of all controverted topics. We must reserve to ourselves the right of judging in what cases and to what extent, such discussions are consistent with the object of our work.

JESUS

A MANIFESTATION OF THE FATHER.

In

THE words of Jesus are a manifestation of the Father. In the Gospel we have a more complete disclosure of the purposes and will of God, than was ever before made to our race. the Gospel, God converses with his children more freely and fully than ever before, respecting the end for which he created them, the immortal life for which he has destined them, and the pure and perfect happiness for which he has created them. He instructs them more fully in his will; what he would have them be and do; that is, he teaches them a deeper morality, a more spiritual service, a more thorough devotion of the whole soul to himself. On these momentously interesting subjects, God speaks to us in the Gospel of his Son. Those who listened to the instructions of Jesus, heard the words of God. For the word which they heard, as he himself declared, was not his, but the Father's which sent him. As the Father had taught him he spoke these things. Those who heard him, received the fullest disclosure of the divine mind which has ever been made to man. So do we who read them in his recorded Gospel.

The miracles of Jesus are a signal manifestation of the Father. How wonderful the authority he exercised over the powers of nature-over the elements-over disease-over death itself. The winds and waves were rebuked into silence by his word; sickness and decrepitude fled from his touch; the dead heard his voice and awoke. His miraculous powers were distinguished from those of all other divine teachers. They seem not to have been granted, like those of Moses, for example, only occasionally, and to meet some great public exigency,

but to have resided in him perpetually, and to have been used at his discretion. The power which he thus exercised, was the power of God. So Nicodemus understood it, when he said that no man could do such miracles unless God were with him. So thought the multitudes who witnessed the raising from the dead of the young man of Nain, when they exclaimed that God had visited his people. And so Jesus himself declared it to be, when he said, "the Father that dwelleth in me, He doeth the works." Those then who saw the miracles of Jesus, saw the hand of God at work. They witnessed a peculiar manifestation of the divine presence and power. Imagine yourself standing by the grave of him who had been dead four days; that you saw the stone rolled away; that you heard the voice which commanded the dead to come forth; and that you saw the dead come forth in obedience to the command; would you not have seemed to have a feeling of the divine presence? Would not God be brought as near to your senses as it is possible the invisible God could be?

In the character of Jesus, we have a complete manifestation of the character of God. God is a being of absolute moral perfection. Holiness, righteousness, and goodness, are essential attributes of his character. In him they exist in the highest possible degree, and act with almighty power in an infinite sphere. In Jesus we have an exhibition of perfect goodness, acting in the same sphere, and with essentially the same powers, as ourselves. Now all true goodness, in whatever moral being it resides, whether it act in a greater or less sphere, is the same in its nature. That goodness which, relatively to the being to whom it belongs, is perfect, is therefore a complete representation of the infinite perfections of God. The goodness of Jesus was thus perfect, and therefore in his character we may see in what degrees, in what harmony, in what proportions, all the elements which compose absolute moral perfection, exist in the character of God; there we may see in what spirit they may be expected to act, and what we have to hope or fear from their operation. No impurity or darkness in his soul prevented it from perfectly reflecting the Father's moral glory. He was

at once the image of that glory and an example which showed to men what they should strive to become; and in this sense, as as well as by the circumstance that he was the bearer of a message to us from God, he was a mediator between God and

man.

We would illustrate in a few particulars, how the character of the Father is manifested in the life and actions of the Son. In the character of our Saviour's miracles, we see an illustration of the character of God. What was the spirit of Jesus' miracles? Love-untiring, boundless love. They had for their object the production of happiness, the healing of the sick and infirm, the supply of temporal wants, relief from danger, the restoration to afflicted hearts of beloved objects, who had been torn from them by death. The design of the Gospel was to confer on the soul the most precious blessing it can receive, and the miracles which accompanied its promulgation, conferred on the body its greatest good. Whilst those words were uttered, that ministry performed, that character unfolded which were to be the power of God unto salvation, and a source of ever increasing blessings to all future generations of mankind, thousands of individuals and of families in the Holy Land were gladdened by the physical health, strength, and life which followed in the train of the healing spiritual influences of the Gospel. In this benevolent character of the miracles of Jesus, we read, more impressively than words could declare it, that God is love. We cannot conceive that the messenger of any other than a God of infinite goodness, of tender mercy, of melting compassion, would have fulfilled his mission in such a spirit. He was in the bosom of the Father, partook of his counsels, received without measure of his spirit; we conclude, therefore, that in thus doing he acted in the spirit of the Father, that he used his powers in a manner agreeable to the divine will. Again, consider the conduct of Jesus towards the repentant sinner. On one occasion, whilst he was a guest at the table of a pharisee, a woman who had been a sinner, but who had been brought to repentance, perhaps by the preaching of Jesus, or perhaps, as has been conjectured, in consequence of having

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