ty, approaching the judgment seat of God. No; these are inferior motives. They go to hear a frail fellow creature, like themselves, speak with elegance, show his powers, and send them away amused. They think the gospel of Christ, the revelation of God's mercy to sinners, the doctrine of immortal life, not worth a hear ing, unless it come to them in a polished style. The day of judgment, heaven, and hell are in their view fine topics for eloquence, and they refuse to attend to them unless portrayed in the colors of a warm imagination. They hear their duties, not that they may sit in judgment on themselves, but that they may criticise the preacher. The sanctity of his office, the purity of his intentions, the soundness of his understand ing, and the excellence of his character, are often no shelter from severity of censure, and unfeeling ridicule. Perhaps he has grown grey in his Master's service; and, instead of venerating the aged servant of God, who speaks to them as it were from the borders of a better world, they are offended because he wants the fire and energy of earlier years, I may have spoken with warmth on this subject, because I consider the influence of religion exceedingly diminished by the habit here condemned, and because I cannot easily represent to myself a scene more offensive to God, than an assembly of sinful and ying creatures listening for a musement to his awful threatenings and merciful promises, and admiring the elegance with which their sins are confessed and deplored. Were this practice injurious only to the minister, it might be easily pardoned; but I fear the insult falls on an infinitely higher Being. Did the persons of whom I speak indeed reverence God and his word, they could not enter into the services of religion with this light and frivolous mind. A conviction of their own infinite interest in his gospel, a conviction that the salvation of their souls depends on the fidelity with which they receive and apply his revealed will, would awaken them to seriousness and devotion. What, let me ask, is the language of their present conduct? It is this, that the great design of the gospel is to gratify their taste-as if Jesus endured the agony of Gethsemane, and shed his blood on the cross, only to amuse them. They ought to look forward to the time, when this august deliverer will be revealed from heaven in glory, when rais. ed from death by his power, they will stand before his judgment seat to receive from his lips the sentence of eternity. Do they intend, at that solemn hour, to offer this plea to their Judge, that his gospel was not preached in flowing periods, and with a striking eloquence, and therefore they would not hear? Let us beware lest a fastidious taste de stroy our souls. Illustrations of passages in the New Testament, which refer to sentiments &c. of the Jews, in the time of our Savior. 39. Luke iv. 33—36. "In the synagogue was a man which had a spirit of an unclean devil, which cried with a loud voice," &c. VENERATING, as we do, the translators of the common version of the New Testament, and desirous, as we are, that every new translation should be made upon the basis of the old, we may be permitted to remark, that a few changes of translation might be adopted, in which we believe that all christians, who can examine the originals of the evangelists and apostles, could, without much discussion, unamniously agree. In the text, for example, and in many other passages, no hesitation, we think, could be felt, in substituting the term demon, for devil. A substantial reason for such a change, we believe will be obvious to all our readers, who will reflect upon the fact, that although possessed persons are so very frequently mentioned in the gospels, they are not there in any instance said to have, or to be possessed by, the devil. They are without exception described as having, or being possessed by, a demon, or demons. But what is a demon? The Jews borrowed this word from the Gentiles, or heathens, with whom it signified a divine being; though not one in the highest order of divinities. They thought that the spirits of departed men became demons; and were, according to Plato, an intermediate order between God and mortals. Says the dialogist in Lu "What An cian, "what are men?" The answer is "mortal gods." are gods? Immortal men." idea of what the heathens thought of demons, may be obtained from the expressions of the Athenians concerning Paul. "He seemeth," said they, to be a setter forth of strange gods, because he preached to them Jesus, and the resurrection." (Acts xvii. 18.) They supposed the former, that is, Jesus, to be a male, and the latter, that is the ressurrection, to be a female divinity; for it was customary with them to deify even abstract qualities, making them either gods or goddesses, as suited the gender of the name.-The ancient heathens attributed diseases in general to the anger of the immortal gods, and advised with their priests and prophets, we do with the physicians; and Hippocrates wrote his treatise on epilepsy, to show that this disorder, which was usually ascribed to the agency of demons, was not more divine, or more sacred, than other disorders; and that like other disorders, it was to be cured, not by charms, but by medicine. They believed both in good, and in evil demons; and to good demons, pagan priests and priestesses attributed their inspiration. Demons were also called Pythons, from Apollo Pythius, the chief of all the prophecying demons, whose priestess, at the famous temple at Delphi, was from him called Pythia. But though pagans generally used the word demon in a good sense, it was never so used by the evangelists. The Jews believed that demons were departed human spirits, but they did not believe that any of them were good. Josephus says, "demons are the spirits of wicked men, who enter the living, and kill those who receive no help;" and again, "demoniacs are they, who are possessed by the spirits of wicked ' men." But the Jews believed that all demons, and Beelzebub, their prince, were in subjection to Satan; or, as he is more frequently called in their books, Samael, the prince of the devils. It was on the ground of this popular sentiment, that when the seventy returned with joy to our Lord, saying, "even the demons are subject to us through thy name, he answered them, I beheld SATAN, as lightning, fall from heaven;" (Luke xviii. 10) and that when the Pharisees accused him of casting "out demons by Beelzebub, the prince of the demons," he said to them, "if saTAN CAST OUT SATAN, he his divided against himself. How then shall his kingdom stand?" (Matt. xii. 24. and seq) During his possession, the demoniac himself was supposed to be silent, and that it was the demon which spoke in him; and whatever was done by the former, was attributed to the latter. When demoniacs could speak of their disorders, they even regarded themselves, as speaking and acting under the influence of the spirits, by which they were supposed to be possessed. Hence demon, and demoniac, were often confounded; and the same act was referred indifferently to either. So the acknowledgment of demoniacs, that Jesus was the Messiah, is called the acknowledgment of unclean spirits. It is worthy of remark, that whatever demons and possessions were, there is no instance in the New Testament, in which they who were possessed, appear to have been instigated to crimes, by the agency of the possessing demons. And this circumstance, we think, is a strong indication, that the devil had, in fact, nothing to do with these possessions. Among the Jews, Kordicus was the name of a demon, and of a Madness and epilepsy were disease; of the demon who rulpeculiarly attributed to posses-ed over those who drank too much sions, because the brain was supposed to be the residence of those demons, which entered the bodies of men.-A distinction is made between diseases supernaturally inflicted, and possessions. Leprosy was deemed by the Jews, and over all the east, a divine infliction, but not a possession; and they only were thought to be possessed, whom evil spirits entered, and actuated; occupying the seat of the human soul, and performing its various functions. wine, and of the effect produc- evangelists used the popular language of the age and country in which they lived; and this language was founded in the supposition of the reality of possessions by demons. To have departed from the accustomed modes of speaking on this subject, they must have formed a new language concerning it. This eustom of speaking and of writing, is common among ourselves, and is frequent in the scriptures. Who hath bewitched you?" says Paul. (Gal. iii. 1.) and, says our Lord, "ye cannot serve God, and Mammon." (Matth. vi. 24.) In the same manner we speak of necessity, fate, and destiny. It was from the symptoms of a disorder, the ancients inferred that a person was possessed; and if it was a universal practice, by the phrase, having a demon, to describe certain outward symptoms, why might not our Lord and the evangelists use the same phrase, in the same sense? [Jos. Mede's Works, pp. 29, 30, and 625-636. Lightfoot on Matth. xi. 24, and on John xii. 31. Farmer on Demoniaes. Josephus de Bello Jud. B. 7, c. 6. §3. Simpson's Essay on Satan. Campbell's Diss. 6; and his translation of the gospels. Macknight on the Epistles. v. 3. p. 474.] ON THE IMPORTANCE OF CHRISTIAN EDUCATION. Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it. SECTION I. FOR what purpose was this text inserted in our Bibles? Was it not to enjoin duty, and afford encouragement? What less can be its import than this. That a virtuous education has a tendeney to produce virtuous characters, and that early habits usually have a lasting influence? That education has some influence on the human character, no christian perhaps will deny. But the degree of influence which it may have, and does really have, is, we fear, but little considered. If we have obtained a correct view of the subject, there is not any other of superior importance; and as we shall probably attach a greater share of importance to a virtuous education, than what has been generally admitted, we must solicit the can6 Vol. III. dor of our readers, and request them to suspend their judgments, until they shall have heard what we propose to offer on the subject. hension, we now state in general, But to prevent any misapprethat we understand the text, as and the natural tendency and expressing the duty of the parent, common effect of a truly virtuous education. When it is said, that dealeth with a slack hand; Prov. x. 4. "He becometh poor but the hand of the diligent maketh rich," we do not suppose that the meaning is, that every one who "dealeth with a slack hand" does in fact become poor; nor that every "diligent" man becomes rich. We do not deny the power of God to make a man rich who is even "slothful in business," and to make another such maxims are founded on the poor, who is truly diligent. But general tendency of the conduct to which they relate. As diligence is recommended as the course in which divine providence generally bestows the blessing of wealth; so a virtuous education is enjoined as the way in which God usually produces virtuous characters. "What!" exclaims the parent, "is it in our power to make our children virtuous and godly! Not so; this is the work of God, and he alone can do it." Be not too hasty in your conclusions, lest you reject the counsel of God to your own ruin, and the ruin of your children. If the text now before us is the word of God, its meaning is too important to be explained away to excuse our negligence; and it is but a poor method of attempting to honor God, to deny the truth of his declarations, or the propriety of his instructions. Supposing he had prescribed a mode of conduct for preserving the lives of your children, and encourag. ed you to a compliance, by a promise that your children shall live to old age:-Should any one press on you this duty, would it become you to find fault, and to represent such preaching as dishonorary to God-as taking the work of preserving life out of his hands, and placing it in the hands of the parent? If God in any manner directs us what to do, to preserve the lives of our children, then blesses the means of his own appointment, and makes them subservient to the end proposed; he is as truly the preserver of life, as though he had produced the same effects without our agency. It is not the object of this es say, to diminish a sense of your dependence on God, in respect to the formation of virtuous characters: but rather to lead you to reflect on the means which he uses, and which he requires you to use for that end; and also to make you sensible, that you are as dependent on God for success in every other case, as in your attempts to save your children from vice and perdition. Your children are not less dependent on God for their daily bread, when it is provided by your prudence and industry, than the Israelites were when they were fed by Manna directly from heaven. Nor is the man who has acquir. ed riches by diligence less dependent on God for his wealth, than if it had been acquired by drawing a prize in a lottery; nor less than he would have been, had his money been coined in heaven and sent to him by the hand of an angel. It is God who maketh rich in whatever way, or by whatever means the blessing is bestowed. So he is as strictly the author of virtue and salvation, if they are effected by the means of his appointment, as he would be, if they were effected by miracles. Both in the natural and in the moral world, it may be said with truth, one planteth and another watereth; but God giveth the increase. And we may safely add, that his agency and blessing are as necessary to the growth of corn in our fields, as to the growth of virtue in the hearts of our children. All our sufficiency is of God; and it is by his favor that appointed means produce beneficial effects. This is as true in |