up to glory at the last day. What then to him, whose faith can grasp things hoped for and unseen, are all the passing ignominies, and pangs, and insults, which now afflict the follower of the man of sorrows, the Lord of life and glory? Every revolution of the earth rolls on to that fullness of adoption, "when this mortal shall put on immortality, and this corruption shall put on incorruption, and shall be brought to pass this saying, Death is swallowed up in victory;" when these eyes now so dim and soon to be closed in dust, shall behold the face of God in righteousness; when these hands, now so weak and stained with sin, shall bear aloft the triumphant palm, and strike the golden harp that seraphs love to listen to; and these voices, now so harsh and tuneless, shall swell in harmony ineffable to the song of Moses and the Lamb, responsive to the Trisagion, the thrice holy of the angels. Yes, beloved Master, we see thee, "who wast made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor;" and thou hast promised that we shall share thy glory and thy crown!

"Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ!" "Us!" And who are included in that sublime and multitudinous plural? "Not to me only," says the apostle, "but to all them that love his appearing." (2 Tim., iv. 9.) Ye shall share it, ancient believers, who, from Adam to Christ, worshiped by figure, and under the shadow! Ye shall share it, ye prophets, who wondered at the mysterious promises of glory following suffering! Ye shall share it, ye mighty apostles, though ye doubted when ye heard of the broken tomb! Ye, martyrs, whose howling enemies execrated you, as they slew you by sword, and cross, and famine, and rack, and the wild beast, and flame! And ye, God's humble poor, whom men despised; but of whom the world was not worthy, God's angels are watching, as they watched the sepulcher in the garden, over your obscure graves, keeping your sacred dust till the morning break, when it shall be crowned with princely splendor! Yes, thou weak one, who yet hast strength to embrace thy Master's cross! Thou sorrowing one, whose tears fall like rain, but not without hope, over the grave of thy beloved! Thou tempted one, who, through much tribulation, art struggling on to the kingdom of God! Ye all shall be there, and ten thousand times ten thousand more! Hark! the trumpet! The earth groans and rocks herself as if in travail! They rise, the sheeted dead; but how lustrously white are their graments! How dazzling their beautiful holiness! What a mighty host! They fill the air; they acclaim hallelujahs; the heavens bend with shouts of harmony; the Lord comes down, and his angels are about him; and he owns his chosen, and they rise to meet him, and they mingle with cherubim and seraphim, and the shoutings are like thunders from the throne. -thunderings of joy: "O Death, where is thy sting! O Grave, where is thy victory! Thanks be to God which giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ!"

Christian, death is before us. The graves are thick around us. There lie many dear-dearer because they are dead. We must soon lie with them.

I do not say, Suffer not-Jesus suffered. Faith teaches no stoicism. But suffer like men valiant in battle, whose wounds, when they smart the most, are incentives to new courage, and earnests of future honor. I do not say, Weep not-Jesus wept. But sorrow not for the Christian dead. They are safe and blest. Weep for the sins that unfit you to follow them.

I do not say, Shudder not at the thought of death-Jesus trembled when he took the cup into his hand, dropping with bloody sweat. It is human nature to shrink from the grave. But I can say, Fear not. Now it is your duty to live. When death comes, you shall have grace to die. Look through the dark avenue. Think of the good who are awaiting you at home, in our Father's house; think of the precious ones for whom you weep; but who weep no more. Fear not to leave behind you the living, whom you have commended to Jesus; he will remember your trust. Be ready to go where you shall not be unwelcome to your Father, your Saviour, and the family around the throne. There await the resarrection morning, when the family shall be complete "no wanderer lost."

But O! be sure that you are in Christ; that you are covered by his atonement; that you have indeed received the spirit of adoption, and have put on the whole armor of God. Then may you be sure of the victory.

But O, my God, what shall I say to those who have no faith in thee, no repentance, no consideration? They are going down to death and the grave; yet they live and laugh on, as though they were to live here forever! How shall I tell them of the sting of death! The victory of the grave! The sting of eternal death! The grave of everlasting fire! Speak thou to them, O Holy Spirit! O merciful Saviour! O Father, pitiful of thy children! Turn them, draw them, compel them, to come under the wings of thy pardoning love! Spare them from a hopeless death, an unsanctified grave, judgment without an advocate in Christ, and the bitter pains of body and soul in hell forever!

DISCOURSE XXIV.

ALONZO POTTER, D.D., LL.D.

BISHOP POTTER was born in Dutchess county, New York, July 10th, 1800-the son of a farmer (Joseph Potter), whose ancestors came from England and settled in Rhode Island. Joseph emigrated from Rhode Island to Dutchess county, in 1795, and represented that county in the Legislature, two or three terms. He also served in the army of the Revolution. The son was confirmed and admitted to first communion by Bishop White, early in 1819, in Philadelphia, and received his academic education in the Dutchess Academy, Poughkeepsie, and graduated at Union College, Schenectady. He was ordained in 1822, and the same year became Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy, in Union College, where he had been previously tutor. In 1826 he became Rector of St. Paul's church, Boston, and resigned on account of ill health, in 1831. He then became Professor of Moral Philosophy, and acting Vice-President of Union College, where he continued till 1845, when he was elected Bishop of Pennsylvania. He had, previous to this, been elected first President of Geneva College, and in 1838, Assistant Bishop of Massachusetts, and afterward Rector of Trinity church, Boston; all of which offices he declined. Similar overtures were made, formally or informally, from the Dioceses of Western New York, and of Rhode Island, on their first organization—also from St. Andrew's church, Philadelphia, church of the Ascension, New York, etc., etc. Bishop Potter is the author of a work called "The School," being the first half of a work entitled "The Schoolmaster;" also a volume entitled "Science and the Arts of Industry," and another entitled "Political Economy." He also edited, with Introduction and Notes, "Paley's Natural Theology," "Bacon and Locke's Essays," "Lieber on Property," "Philadelphia Lectures on Evidences," etc. Notwithstanding his numerous official engagements, he has for many years interested himself deeply in the educational operations of the country. His efforts in this direction are all highly appreciated by the educators of the land, and are widely influential for good.

In any assemblage of men, Bishop Potter of Pennsylvania, would be remarked for his personal appearance; and should there be occasion for the encounter of mind, it would be found that his stature was no mean index of his intellectual power. He is over six feet high, strongly built, and naturally gifted with a vigorous constitution, which has been tasked to the uttermost by unremitting literary and episcopal labors. His head is massive; his hair iron-gray; his forehead broad and well developed; with a physiognomy indicative of firmness. His bearing in the pulpit, and in the discharge of his functions, is unaffected and dignified; and even in social life there is something of reserve mingled with simplicity and court

esy of manner.

As an effective speaker, he holds the first rank in the House of Bishops, and his argument in the General Convention of 1836, in behalf of the late Bishop of Pennsylvania, has beer characterized by competent judges, as worthy of Daniel Webster in his best days.

Bishop Potter gives one the idea of a man who neither trifles, nor is to be trifled with; who unites large sympathies to large experience of life; and for whom Terence's words might stand:

"Homo sum; tumani nihil à me alienum puto."

The discourse which Dr. Potter has furnished for this work, is a fair index of his pulpit productions; clear, solid, finished, and effective. It contains some thoughts which are quite original and striking, upon a subject of great and vital importance.

THE INTERNAL CREDENTIALS OF THE BIBLE.

"All Scripture is given by inspiration of God."—2 TIM., iii. 16.

THE Bible was never more widely or industriously circulated, and yet never perhaps was its proper influence and authority in more imminent danger. Among its most subtle and untiring foes are many who call themselves Christians, and who add to zeal the most fervent, consummate ability and learning. Not they alone who deny altogether the inspiration or credibility of the Bible are to be met. They who admit it to a partial but divided sway; they who would supersede some of its records by the teachings of science or the conclusions of a speculative philosophy; they again who would exalt to the same divine honors the teachings of the church-all these are to be encountered. Assumptions which, sixty years since, might be regarded as part and parcel of the Protestant mind in every Anglo-Saxon land, can not be so regarded now. These assumptions in behalf of holy Scripture, are arraigned on one hand at the bar of a high philosophy; on another, at the bar of venerable tradition, so that he who would match himself against some of the mightiest leaders of thought in our time, leaders whose writings are spread abroad with indefatigable industry, will have to go back more than ever to the uncorrupted Word. He must review it in the light of these new assaults upon its integrity and supreme authority. He must remember how insidiously it may be undermined, through a skepticism which clothes itself in the guise of reverence and voluntary humility, and how this most captivating form of unbelief is even now going forth under the auspices of a great communion, which we fondly desire, but can hardly hope, to see reformed. From the ranks of our own clergy, and from those of our Anglican mother, that communion recruits its decaying strength with minds of no mean capacity, and it is not to be

doubted that the prevailing attraction, with most of them, is the fond desire to add to the unerring word an unerring interpreter. The work of defection still goes on, and who shall stay it but they who have gained for themselves, that they may impart to others, clearer and stronger views of the claims, credentials, contents, and capabilities of that one book, which in each of these respects, is high and paramount above all other oracles, written or oral, living or dead?

For the Bible has the strongest credentials, even from its enemies, in the impotence of their attempts to overthrow its credibility and divine authority. No book ever had so many points of contact with the human mind as Scripture; and if false, therefore, none was ever so vulnerable. Miscellaneous in its contents, the work of many different minds who were unconnected and unacquainted with each other-composed in dif ferent languages, and at periods that stretch back from St. John to Moses, through sixteen hundred years-embracing history, jurispru dence, ethics, poetry, prophecy, with manifold allusions to the physical and topographical state of different countries and of the earth at large, it seems to invite the scrutiny of every class of scholars and philosophers. It can be compared with profane history. It can be compared with the story told by moldering ruins. It can be compared with the inscriptions on half-defaced medals. It can be compared with the sculptured or painted figures on towering pyramids, with the disinterred remains of buried cities; with the cemeteries of dead races that encircle the whole earth, with calculated motions of the sun, moon, and stars. Have these comparisons been made? Have they been made by men, able, acute, learned, and in many instances hostile to revelation? In each case, where any thing like a full and fair conclusion was reached, has it been on the whole favorable to this depository of our faith? Then may we cherish the assurance that what has been, will be. New investigations shall result in new and independent verifications. Philology, Ethnology, Archæology, Numismatics, Physiology, History, Physics, each by its own proper methods shall reach conclusions which tend more and more to corroborate revelation, so that the time shall at length come, when through an improved biblical interpretation on the one hand, and more thorough critical and scientific exploration on the other, Science and Scripture shall become clearly accordant, and the strains that go up from the temple of nature shall mingle and blend sweetly with those that go up from the temple of grace, and all be lost in the one swelling chorus, "Great and marvelous are thy works, Lord God Almighty; just and true are thy ways, thou King of saints."

But let us examine now the Contents of Scripture, as evidence of its divine origin. The history of its canon, the judgment of the church, the consent of ages and nations most eminent for intelligence and virtue, and the futility hitherto of all attempts to overthrow its authority, or per manently to arrest its progress-these may proclaim that it comes from