venly Canaan is gradually brought to view. The Gentiles begin to be gathered into the Church of CHRIST. By Faith, they proclaim themselves Abraham's children, and are declared to be the true heirs of God's promises made to that Patriarch. Behold, therefore, all hath been long since fulfilled! MESSIAH hath come in the flesh, (and verily He took not on Him the nature of angels; but He took on Him the seed of AbrahamTM :') while they that are of faith, (Abraham's true descendants,) are grown numerous as the stars of Heaven, or the sand upon the sea-shore for multitude. The whole of GOD's ancient Law, as far as we are permitted to understand it, partakes of the same hidden spiritual character. Those many sacrifices all pointed to the one Sacrifice of CHRIST: the Paschal-lamb set forth, in a most remarkable figure, the actual manner of His Death. We have no difficulty in understanding that the bitter herbs with which it was to be eaten, represented the mortification of the bodily appetites ; while all are aware that the unleavened bread prescribed, sets forth the sincerity and truth which GOD requires in those who keep the greatest Festival of the Church. Who remembers not m Heb. ii. 16. the Divine words of our Easter-anthem? 'CHRIST our Passover is sacrificed for us, therefore let us keep the Feast not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth".' Such then was God's ancient Law. It was spiritual throughout and the purest among the people were doubtless guided so to regard it. They knew that to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams°:' that the oblations of sinners are vain in GoD's sight, and their incense an abomination; but that bread dealt to the hungry, and a shelter provided for the houseless, is the Fast which GOD hath chosen that the hands of him who would go to God's altar, must be washed in innocency' :' and that while the prayer of the just is the most fragrant of incense, 'the lifting up of their hands' is the true evening sacrifice".' All this, and much beside of a like character, was doubtless well known, and fully recognised by GoD's ancient people. And standing as we do to-day on the threshold of a new year, shall we not do well to remind ourselves that the Divine Law : • 1 Sam. xv. 22. • Ps. cxli. 2. retains its ancient character, in this respect, unaltered? that the Christian Covenant is spiritual, not carnal; and that there is ever the greatest danger of our overlooking the inward reality of its ordinances, while we reverence the fair exterior of its worship, and conform strictly to all its outward requirements? The Conversion of St. Paul. GOD'S INSTRUMENTS. 1 COR. XV. 8, 9. Last of all He was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time. For I am the least of the apostles, that am not meet to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the Church of GOD. THE remark which so often presents itself on the Church's Festival-days, namely, that they are very unlike one another,-recurs with unusual force to-day. The Festival of the Conversion of St. Paul stands alone. We shall speak of the singular event commemorated, by and by: let us first take notice of the extraordinary person to whom the Church this day invites our special attention. If any one could have behield our REDEEMER walking in Galilee, attended by the twelve men whom He had chosen out of the world, he might have been tempted to declare that he had seen the Twelve Apostles of THE LAMB that he was acquainted with their names; and, since their : number was complete, that he knew also that no one else could ever by possibility be added to their society. He would have been surprised indeed, on being shewn Matthias,—(a humble disciple who constantly followed our SAVIOUR, beheld Him with adoring eyes,)—to be told that he was destined hereafter to become one of the Twelve. However when the Divine gift of Pentecost had sealed the faithful Eleven, and St. Matthias with them, surely it might have appeared that the names of the Twelve greatest Apostles were finally known! These are the Apostles of JESUS CHRIST,' (it might have been said ;) 'the Twelve Patriarchs of the spiritual Israel. No more 'apostles,' in the same sense of the word, can by possibility arise hereafter.'-This might have been urged with every appearance of reason. certainly, if any one had suggested that a greater Apostle than any was destined shortly to arise,— that he was to become God's special instrument for the conversion of the gentile world,-and that he was to prove the greatest instructor of the Christian Church to the end of Time ;-any one who could have hazarded such a conjecture, would have been set down as hopelessly foolish and unreasonable. And |