hath found to do, let me commit all to Thee, both for time and for eternity. Make me wise unto salvation for myself, and wise to win the souls of one and all of my family.” P. xxxvi. "My God, let not the social virtues monopolise all my moral regards or reverence: I pray that Thou wouldst invest me with the beauties of holiness and plant within me a resolute, sensitive, and high-toned recoil from all that is impure or unholy." P. 169. "Among my graver offences, I have been vastly too negligent of what may be called the petite morale of religion, as well as the petite morale of society..... Aaron and his sons offered in this instance for themselves, and so laid their own hands upon the head of the bullocksignifying the transference of their own sins to the victim. I would confess my sins, O God, over the head of Him who is my propitiation, of Him on whom Thou hast laid the iniquities of us all; and in whose blood I would wash out my sins." Pp. 169, 170. We have seldom read a simpler or more natural confession than what we are about to cite. When we came upon it, we felt as if we had got a new illustration of that affectionate simplicity of character for which Dr Chalmers was so distinguished, -an illustration finer and more vivid than any thing we had got before. We have no doubt it will strike many in the same light. Its extreme naturalness is very affecting. “And let me not forget that there is a second table of the law as well as a first; and that unless I have that love of my neighbour which fulfils the one, neither have I the love of God in me by which the other is fulfilled. I cannot now pray that God would help me to honour my parents, no longer upon earth; but forgive, O Lord, all the dishonour and disobedience I have ever been guilty of towards them. I have much here to confess and to deplore; and do help me, O God, so to walk before my children as to be worthy of a parent's honour from them.” P. 149. Here and there we have glimpses of the author's views on particular points, as, for instance, on the gospel and its freeness. There is not very much on this topic in the present volume, but what we do find is precious. In one of his Sabbath exercises, he thus comments upon a passage in the Epistle to the Hebrews: January 17.-I know no passage in Scripture that gives a clearer and more decisive warrant to a simply objective faith, than Heb. vi. 17-20. The hope is grounded, not on aught that is within, but on that which is independent of us, and external to us-the truth of God, the immutability of His counsel, the faithfulness of His promise, strengthened by this double guarantee, that He has not only said it but sworn it. We do not steady a ship by fixing the anchor on aught that is within the vessel. The anchorage must be without the vessel; and so of the soul, when resting, not on what it sees in itself, but on what it sees in the character of God-the certainty of His truth, the impossibility of His falsehood. Thus may I cast the anchor of my hope on the Foundation which God Himself hath laid in Zion-laying hold and taking refuge, not in the hope that I find to be in me, but in the hope that is set before me. I know that there is a legitimate hope, too, in the consciousness of a work of grace within me; but the primary hope, the beginning of our confidence, is of altogether an objective character, and respects God in Christ reconciling the world, and not imputing unto them their trespasses. Simplify and strengthen this confidence; and make it every day more sure and steadfast, O my God." Pp. xxx. xxxi. Again, in remarking on one of the scenes in Abraham's life, in which God reveals himself to the patriarch, there occurs this observation: “GENESIS xv. 1–6.—This is an exceeding precious and truly evangelical passage. It gives a full warrant to the appropriation of faith as distinct from that of experience. I am thy shield and thy exceeding great reward. What should, after this, stop the reunion of God with man? Abraham is our great prototype, and we are required to walk in the footsteps of his faith, as being the father of the faithful. Let us lay confident hold of God as our friend, even as he who was called the friend of God did. There is an offer of friendship on His part, let it be accepted. on ours; and the acceptance lies in our firm reliance on the honesty of the offer. Let us not stagger at a privilege so infinitely above our merits and our hopes being brought so wonderfully nigh unto us; but against hope, against all the likelihoods of nature and experience, let us believe in hope. Such faith, even though we thereby arrogate to our own sinful selves the greatest and highest of all blessings, has no arrogance and no presumption at all in it. It has another character altogether. It is yielding a due honour to one of the divine attributes, even the attribute of Truth-so that the stronger the faith, the greater is the glory we render unto God. What a precious harmony is this, that our greatest peace and God's greatest glory are at one-that in counting Him faithful who has promised, we do that which at one and the same time most advances His honour and most tranquillizes our own fears. Rebuke away, then, from us, O God, all the doubtings of unbelief as well as its disinclinations." Pp. 24, 25. His regard for the Sabbath is very frequently and very strongly expressed. Indeed he never seems to lose an opportunity of stating his views upon this subject. And in the present struggle upon this momentous question, it is interesting to observe the decision of Dr Chalmers' opinions regarding it. "Let me drink the spirit of all that is here said about the Sabbathan observance as much distinguished from the temporary and ceremonial law of Moses as any other in the Decalogue. Let me never lose sight of the sign or memorial first of creation and then of redemption. Let it therefore be upheld as part and parcel of a perpetual covenant-a day of holy rest, and the delighted observance of which is one of the most decisive tests of a renewed and godly nature. And let it not be a fatiguing, but a reposing cessation from the toils and cares of the every-day world. And let such be my meditations and exercises that I may not be exhausted, but strengthened and refreshed thereby." P. 175. "Let my Sabbath not be a working-day; and even in the things of sacredness, let me not so exercise myself as to violate its character as a day of rest." P. 182. "Lastly, among these duties of Thy first Table, may I never forget Thy Sabbath, but remember its place in the Decalogue. And there seems not a permission only, but a commandment to do my own work in the six days; not to be idle but industrious-not slothful in business. May Thy Sabbaths be my delight; and let me take cognisance of the Sabbath-keeping of all under my roof. Give me to hallow Thine own sacred day; and in the reason which Thou hast assigned for this observance, may I learn not to explain away the narrative of creation, but bear respect to the literalities of the Book of Genesis." P. 149. "There is here a striking historical testimony to the sacredness and divine obligation of the Sabbath law. Let it not be lost even upon us in our modern day. We are now told, to be sure, that it was not instituted for its own sake—although the Jews perhaps were trained to the observation of it more on the principle of its being a Divine appointment than of its subserviency to the spiritual good of man. We should be still more religiously observant of this day-seeing that, additionally to the first principle still in force, we have had the second more distinctly announced to us in the memorable saying, that the Sabbath was made for man. "To make the Sabbath observance a duty which should terminate in itself, and without regard to its moral influences, is a specimen of the same senseless superstition which would attach a mysterious virtue to the mere opus operatum of sacraments and church forms. And the same is true of the imposition of fringes-good as memorials of duty, but utterly superstitious and vain if the mere wearing of them were made the terminus ad quem of the observance. It is in kind accommodation to our corporeal nature that such an institution was devised; but separated from its end, it is but an empty ceremonial-even as the Sabbath is when separated from its end.-Let us not forget, O Lord, that the flesh is unprofitable and vain, and that all Thy words are spirit and life.” P. 281. Occasionally there are striking remarks introduced in connection with the evidences of Scripture. With a mind casting itself abroad over every topic, and finding materials every where, Dr Chalmers is ever throwing up suggestions as he passes along,suggestions which could only have occurred to a mind of full equipment and vast fruitfulness. On Genesis ii. 18–25, he gives us this reflection :— "My only remark on this passage is on the quotation made from one part of it in the New Testament; and on the immense intercommunion of strength and security which the two great departments of Scripture give to each other-the Old Testament by its prophecies mightily confirming the divinity and inspiration of the New; and the New by its manifold quotations, extending to almost every separate book, conferring on the earlier record the whole benefit of its own appropriate and distinct evidences. The number of independent witnesses, though contemporaneous and living together in the same place, forms a strong security against aught like a deceitful collusion or conspiracy amongst them. How much stronger when the witnesses are separated from each other by whole centuries, and lie scattered along the line of many generations. Could an imposture have thus descended as it were by bequest from one age to another? And what can we infer from the sustained consistency of a progression so stately and regular as that which runs through Scripture history, but that one great presiding Spirit, even the spirit of Him who knows the end from the begiuning, actuated the whole of it ?" Pp. 4, 5. And again, on Gen. xiv., we have the following consideration presented to us in reference to some infidel objectors: "At this rudimental stage in the history of the world, the kingdoms were small; and those who governed them, though dignified by the name of kings, were very petty chiefs. We recollect an infidel jest of Voltaire's on the insignificance of the district of Judea-from whence he would insinuate how unlikely it is that a place so limited should have been the real theatre of transactions and events which, if authentic, are far the most important that ever took place for the destinies of our species. There is something in our view highly unphilosophical in such an observation—as if the same play of essential interests and feelings, and the same manifestation of highest principle, the same lessons, the same moral, could not be as effectually exhibited within the limits of a narrow as within those of the widest materialism. There is no country which, apart from revelation, has bequeathed greater examples or done more for the civilization of our race than ancient Greece-yet look to the smallness of its territory, and see how all that is greatest and most imposing in secular history, was condensed there within a space far more contracted than was the land of Judea or the kingdom of Scotland, which last may, in her Church contests and by the doings of her Church, give forth lessons which may influentially and most importantly tell through the whole of Christendom." P. 23. His taste often gives expression to itself throughout. No one could know him even slightly without having opportunity of noticing this feature in his character. His admiration of the seemly and the beautiful he gave frequent vent to. He carried it into every thing, natural, moral, and ecclesiastical. It was in him an irrepressible instinct of his being, which was continually coming into manifestation. It found scope for itself in every object and in every department of study. Do not the following verses truly describe his characteristic ? "With my own burning thoughts it burned, Its silence stirred to speech divine, Its lips my glowing kiss returned, Its heart in beating answered mine. The soulless had a soul to me, My life its own life lent to all." On Exod. xxxvii. 17-29, he thus writes: "In the description of these various articles, it is well to observe that there are parts not for use only, but parts which serve no discernible purpose, save that of ornament. The candlestick would practically have answered all its mere utilitarian purposes as well as though there had been neither knops nor flowers; and so too might our vegetable structures without so rich an efflorescence of gay and variegated blossoms. It is pleasing to contemplate such exhibitions of beauty, as are designedly set forth by God to regale the taste and the eye of man. Even our Saviour dignifies this object of the Divine workmanship-when he says of the lilies of the field, that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these." Pp. 188-9. His philosophic spirit manifests itself ever and anon, Sometimes it is the mathematician that speaks, sometimes the political economist, sometimes the metaphysician,-but in all it is the man of God, calmly interpreting and devoutly meditating on the Word of God. Let us take specimens of these at random. "By the work of the sixth day God hath imprinted still more manifold traces of His hand in the evidence of collocation. Let me make this use of the information that God made man in His own image. Let it cure me of the scepticism which distrusts man's instinctive beliefs or perceptions. Let me recollect that in knowledge or understanding we are like unto God, and that in His light we see light. He would not practise a mockery upon us by giving us constitutional beliefs at variance with the objective reality of things, and so as to distort all our views of Truth and of the Universe. We were formed in his image intellectually as well as morally; nor would He give us the arbitrary structure that would lead us irresistibly to believe a lie. When men deny the objective reality of space or time, I take refuge in the thought that my view of them must be the same in kind at least, though not so perfect in degree, as that of God-or of Him who sees all things as they are, and cannot possibly be the subject of any illusion. "God saw all to be very good. But all has since been transformed. We may learn from the curse upon the ground, that there has been a change even in the materialism of the world—but a change far more deteriorating on the moral and living department of creation-for how lovely still are Nature's landscapes-how coarse and revolting the aspects of human society." Pp. 2, 3. 1+799 "I may here state a single error of Mr Cunningham in his scientific chronology, who founds on the number of intervals between one event and another, which are divisible by 7 or his powers. He does not consider the immense number of intervals furnished by a given number of chronological events. Eight hundred such would furnish x799319600 intervals-whereof by the doctrine of probabilities there is the chance of 45657 being divisible by 7, and 6522 being divisible by 49 or 72 and 932 by 343 or 73, &c. And yet still he tells us of a recondite wisdom in the whole scheme of Providence and Prophecy, because of so |