The Boy of Many Dreams.

HE Boy of many Dreams was the grandson of the Boy of Promise-one link only uniting them both-the son of the latter being the father of the former.

JACOB, the father of this boy, was a man whose history, like that of his grandfather Abraham, fills up a large portion of the pages of the early sacred records. His father Isaac was forty years old when he took Rebekah to wife, the daughter of Bethuel the Syrian of Padan-aram, the sister to Laban the Syrian. Twenty years did Isaac also wait ere a son was born to him, and then the mother bare twinsEsau and Jacob. And the boys grew: and Esau was a cunning hunter, a man of the field; and Jacob was a plain man, dwelling in tents. And

Isaac loved Esau, because he did eat of his venison but Rebekah loved Jacob. Esau, being the firstborn, held claim to the privilege of birthright, which, one day, returning hungry from hunting, he sold to Jacob for a mess of pottage. Thus Esau despised his birthright.

When Isaac was old and his eyes were dim that he could not see, the mother aided her younger son to deceive his aged father and obtain the blessing of the firstborn; which, when Esau knew, he hated Jacob, and threatened, on the death of his father, to take the life of his brother. This being told to Rebekah she said unto her favourite son, Arise and flee thou to Laban my brother to Haran. And then making excuse to Isaac that Jacob had better go and seek a wife of her kinsfolk instead of taking one of the idolatrous daughters of the land of Canaan, Isaac called Jacob unto him, repeated the blessing he had already given, and then sent him away.

Jacob now hastened from Beersheba to Haran, a journey of several hundred miles, all alone, a solitary man, without companion or friend, with no guide but the sun and stars, and no directions but such as his anxious mother could give of the objects and places by the way-there a mountain would rise before him, and here a stream would run on his path, but he must hold on his course to a point in the horizon a little above where the sun rises.

The lonely young traveller lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there all night, because the sun was set; and he took of the stones of that place, and put them for his pillows, and lay down in that place to sleep. And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it. And, behold, the LORD stood above it, and said, I am the LORD God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest,

to thee will I give it, and to thy seed; And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of. And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely the LORD is in this place; and I knew it not. And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven. He then took the stones and set up a pillar, and called the place Bethel the House of God; and he vowed a vow that the Lord should be his God.

This wonderful vision of the angels, accompanied by assurances of Divine protection, inspired the youthful fugitive with confidence and