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another, thus give utterance to their astonishment and reverence: Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of Hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory." Such ascending to the highest of all subjects of meditation is not forbidden even to man, if his only motive in prosecuting such an inquiry is to glorify God, and promote the enlightenment and improvement of men. They who approach this subject with such desires have no reason to apprehend the frown of God; they may rather cherish the assured confidence, that the more earnest and sincere their anxiety thus to honour Jehovah, the more abundant will be the outpouring of His Holy Spirit to guide them in the way of all truth: for "if any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not: and it shall be given him." (James i. 5.)

The history of this world, written by divine inspiration, would be a history of order, regularity, and mathematical exactness; and not, as frequently presented to the mind when wandering through the mazes of man's records, a mass of moral confusion. The mighty rivers which flow through the continents of the earth in their course onwards to the sea, cannot be more certainly traced up to their sources-the rippling streams wending their way down the lofty mountains-than the great streams of human life and action can be traced to their sources, in the thoughts, the feelings, the desires, and purposes of men all at work, but all in mysterious subserviency to the great purpose of Him who rules over all. Just as the rivers are confined to their particular limits in their course, and the lines marked out along which flow the tributary streams, until they reach the point of junction with the great current of water,

so are the times and the seasons, and the course of all human events appointed and regulated. All the while the waters ceaselessly flow, unconscious of the law, obedience to which they are rendering: so mankind, with a light to guide unerringly, in all matters of present duty, flow down the stream of human events, unconscious of the particular point which they occupy, and the special ends which they are accomplishing in the complex scheme of Divine Providence.

Such views of man's probationary state should awaken in the human mind the most exalted and ennobling conceptions of God; and they should overawe every man with a deep sense of his tremendous responsibility. Individuals of the human family have been placed in circumstances so fraught with solemn consequences, that the conflicts passing in their minds, have, in their results, affected the destinies of millions of their fellowbeings yet unborn. This is not the place to digress into an essay upon the influence which mind in union with matter, as in the person of man, does exercise upon others of his species. Enough is known in these days of great discovery, to prove that man can, by summoning to his aid the electric fluid, communicate his thoughts to the most distant regions of the earth with the swiftness of lightning. May there not then be, unknown to us, a process of influence in operation throughout all the world of spirits, not excluding man, a system of intercommunication so complete and perfect, that every thought of every heart, as well as the public act of individual life, have their direct and particular bearing upon the destinies of the world at large, and the effects of which eternity alone can unfold.

No man, however far removed from public observation

in his sphere of action, is so obscure as to have no place assigned him in the comprehensive purpose of God. The new born babe, which may scarcely have breathed after its entrance into this world before departing to another, even it, in its short career, has contributed its share of influence in completing the links in the chain of Providence. The rich, the great, and the noble, need not despise the poorest in the land. God is no respecter of persons. The only distinction which he will recognise is distinction in character. He will distinguish only between those who serve Him, and those who serve Him not. A wondrous sympathy runs throughout the social system; there is a close connection between the sighs, the groans, the hardships, and sorrows of the suffering and neglected poor in a community, and the thorns. which strew the path of those, whose duty it is personally to acquaint themselves with their cases, and minister to their wants. There is a law of righteous retribution steadily at work in the Providence of God, which, without any miraculous interpositions, confronts its transgressors, and inflicts upon them the merited penalty. The teachings of providence plainly intimate that every man is his brother's keeper; and that is a wise and beneficent arrangement which makes the wellbeing of a whole community dependant upon the wellbeing of its individual members. Some events take several generations to ripen; others come to maturity in a similar number of years. In every case the general event comprises the workings of multitudes of individual minds; and in the course of these workings, each individual mind has its allotted portion as complete and perfect in itself, as if isolated from all the rest.

That was a period of this world's history pregnant

with solemn results, in which Eve's allegiance to her God wavered; and that was a fatal moment when she willed to take the forbidden fruit. That one act of disobedience was fraught with grave consequences to innumerable myriads of the human family. She herself knew not the baneful effects of what she had done, and probably none may ever be able even to imagine the mighty interests which were involved in that conflict, and the solemn consequences that have resulted from her first yielding to Satan's temptation, and Adam afterwards partaking of the fruit at Eve's solicitation.

Satan's success gave him a usurped dominion over this earth and all its inhabitants, which, but for God's gracious and merciful interposition, would have placed every member of the human family, throughout all eternity, in the same attitude of hostility towards God that he himself will ceaselessly occupy. The fall and ruin of Adam and Eve, and in them the fall and ruin of the whole human race, was only accomplished; the curse was not formally pronounced by God against our apostate progenitors, until He formally made known His purpose to save and redeem mankind. How affecting and solemnizing the spectacle. Satan had scarcely time to exult over his unholy triumph. Man had incurred the righteous penalty of his disobedience, and only waited God's announcement of everlasting banishment from His presence and favour,-when, lo, in pronouncing Satan's doom, God declared a purpose, and gave a promise of redemption; making Satan's very success the ground-work of his defeat; overruling Satan's purpose of ruin, for the accomplishment of a glorious purpose of salvation; making the very wisdom and power displayed by Satan, in seducing our first parents, an incontrover

tible evidence of his ignorance and impotence, when he ventures to oppose himself to the wisdom and the power of God.

It is difficult to repress a feeling of sincere pity, that a being so great and wise, should be so wicked. That he who at one time came nearest his God in created resemblance to the invisible Jehovah, should, by sin, have changed his nature, into actual and eternal enmity against his Creator. Although a creature and dependant, yet, of his great wisdom and power there cannot be the shadow of a doubt. The boldness of character manifested by him in his attempt to usurp God's throne on this earth, has been well sustained throughout all his subsequent procedure in our world. His course has been one of untiring and persevering opposition to God at every point; and we know it will continue to be so until the appointed time come when God has determined effectually to destroy his power. The scene in the garden of Eden, faithfully represents in miniature, what has since been wrought out in detail in the history of mankind; all of which is but an unfolding of the fulfilment of God's word, when He said, "I will put enmity between thee and the woman, between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel." (Gen. iii. 15.)

Satan's supremacy over unregenerate men, and his power to persecute the chosen seed while they remain in this world, are incontrovertible truths. Satan's power and authority in either case, are limited by the sovereign purpose of Jehovah; he is only permitted to exercise either to the extent of its subserviency in promoting the glory of God, and preparing the way for his final overthrow in the complete redemption of the world. The