of redemption, are so written on the front frame-work of God's administration-written on the face and the whole body and structure of society-written on the imperishable tablets of the very soul of man by the finger of his Maker, that he is an imbruted fool who always needs an argument, and then cannot believe. The fool has said in his heart "there is no God;" and the same sort of fool undertakes to say a good many other things in these last days. But what he says meets voices against it from above and all around -from the book of God, the great book of nature, and the living book of the soul.

3. It is suggested, in this connection, that the preacher should have confidence in the truth he is entrusted with, and should utter it with the strength, and unshrinking and unqualified style of declaration, this confidence begets. The subjunctive mood has rather a small place in the grammar of his sermons. Not, that it may be so, but direct and authorative, it is so. Much of this ancient preacher's power, doubtless, was in his bold, unqualified utterance-not perhaps, but, in forty days Ninevah shall be overthrown. "But would you not have men modest and cautious? Would you set them to denouncing and dogmatizing; a course very uncharitable and very unlovely."-We would do no such thing; the remark leads to no such thing. John was the beloved disciple; his character the prototype of the mild and gentle. But hear him -"We know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness; and we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in Him that is true, even in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life." There are certain things we know, we do not guess; we do not merely believe, we know them. When the preacher says so, in the proper tone and spirit, there is no more dogmatism in it, than when it is said, at noon-day, we know the sun is in the meredian, and shining in his strength. He opens the inspired Book and reads it; not as a book of myths and enigmas, but as a book from God; not sent to puzzle and mock him, but as a revelation; all its essential things most plainly written; he reads and takes the clear, the obvious meaning; the meaning the language bears; the meaning all serious readers, of all ages and Christian denominations, have taken; the meaning, all who have believed God, and truly prayed and wrought righteousness, have received and rejoiced in, and here he finds it, again and again, with all clearness, that the whole world lies in wickedness, the whole race depraved, every member of it in utter moral ruin by transgression-that Christ, the eternal Son, has come to save, that His death was vicarious, and made an atonement, that every one must be born again, be justified by faith in Christ, and sanctified through His truth and Spirit, that there is to be a death and resurrection of the body, a day of judgment at the end of the

world, an eternal blessedness to the righteous, and an eternal punishment to the wicked; when now the preacher comes forth, with God's Book in one hand, unquestionably declaring these things; with God's commission in the other hand, to preach these things, shall he come with apologies, and doubts, and queries; speaking faintly, half-heartedly? No. We believe, therefore we speak. With confidence we speak, for God gives the truth; with authority we speak, for God gives the commission; with earnestness we speak, for infinite interests are at stake.

4. The case before us legitimately assigns a high importance to penalty as a motive in preaching. There is, however, a great deal said against it at the present time; strong efforts are made to raise a prejudice against it. It is sometimes called preaching terror. It is said by many, "we do not hold to this frightening people into religion." And how was it with Jonah? So far as it appears, he preached nothing but terror-utter and speedy ruin, with no indicated way of escape; and the effect was universal and simultaneous-a humbled and reformed nation. It was a true message, written in their very hearts, that they were guilty, and that a fearful retribution was before them; hence the effect these words had upon them.

Punishment, as the desert of sin, and its sure award, is to be preached because it is true-it is in the Bible. If it be not hereif God's statute-book holds not forth penalty-the positive infliction of punishment upon the evil doer, then no statute-book has it; nor can any reach or combination of language get out the idea, that a wicked man shall be punished for his wickedness. But the question comes round: why preach it? Because God reveals it, and commands the utterance. "Preach the preaching I bid thee." Why preach it? Because men are made with fears, and the doctrine in question starts those fears, and stirs up their souls to think about an escape from the impending ruin. There is a part of man's nature, which nothing else will reach-here, of course. a work, nothing else will do. Let the preacher throw away this consideration, this stern feature of truth, this crowning sanction of Heaven, or decline to use it, and his authority, his power, his hold upon godly men goes with it. Preachers do tell us, as matter of experience, that this is the doctrine, this terrible aspect of truth is the one, which awakens the sinner, whenever he is awakened; he begins to consider by beginning to be afraid. It, certainly, cannot be expedient to drop this disturbing element, and hush every whisper of a reckoning to come, as a threatened doom. Then, there is nothing left but promise, and the cry of peace; peace to the wicked-every road ends in heaven-all kinds of conduct alike crowned with glory and blessedness. Will this do? In a world like this, of high-handed wrong, peopled everywhere with the daring and the vile, and where the tendency

of all hearts is to evil, is there a sober man who believes it will do, to blot out penalty and cover up the pit? Then you may do what you please-commit any crine in the long and gory catalogue; only keep clear of human justice, there is no other to fear; and if, perchance, you are too hard-pushed by the human avenger, and are likely to suffer, you can take the friendly steel and open the vital passage, and your imprisoned soul shall go clear, and go up where the Being who rules over all awaits it, and who will open heaven to your blood-stained spirit, and kindly say, "thou persecuted one, come in hither, I will protect you, for I am the friend of liars, and murderers, and adulterers, and all such." Is God such a being? Is such a message true? Will it do good? Will it restrain men? Will it humble them and make them feel that sinning is bad business, and that sin is an abominable thing, and bring them to repentance, and reform them, and make them holy? There is no need of any words on this point. There is power in fear-in the fear of hell: and ministers must be allowed to preach the doctrine of hell, or all their preaching will be vain and nugatory. Let it be done in the just proportion; above all, let it be with the right spirit-a tender spirit. The denouncing prophet ought to be a weeping prophet; his warnings and uttered woes accompanied with his tears; then will there be a melting and subduing efficacy.

5. We are now brought to the pre-eminence of the gospel as a store-house of influence-a system of reform and redemption. It is perfect-absolutely complete. The gospel does not drop the motive of fear; it keeps it, and adds thereto the motive of hope. The danger abides. Hell is not abolished, but burns still. But the way of escape is opened, and made clear and adequate for all who will go in it. Here are good news; the Saviour come; atonement made; the love beyond degree; the free invitations; the great and precious promises; fields of hidden wealth; pearls of greatest price; unsearchable riches, victories, kingdoms, and crowns of eternal glory-all spread out and attracting, one would think, with resistless force. Here the whole Deity is known; here the whole plan is unfolded; here the whole man is addressed, not one motive, but all motives that can have power on character or conduct, meet and press him. Here the Christian preacher's privileged position; and what might not we expect now, as the result of his reasonings and appeals? If the one message of wrath bore down those guilty myriads, what will not be the case in these days, when that message of wrath comes strengthened and doubled by the added voice of mercy? If he who spake from earth, was so heard, how will not he be heard, who now speaks from heaven?

It were easy here to turn and charge upon the great mass now living, an unwonted obduracy, hearing the gospel as they do and

still repenting not. They repented at the preaching of Jonah and, behold, a greater than Jonah is here." They repented under an unmixed message of condemnation, when they knew not that repentance would avail to deliver them. You have been addressed -have been apprized of the coming ruin, and assured of the full and overflowing redemption; and, yet, you have not repented. They had but a single warning-the same, bare, gloomy iteration -"forty days and ye perish ;" and they repented. Ye have had line upon line, precept upon precept, argument linked with argument, motive piled on motive, sermon coursing sermon, for years upon years of Sabbaths, and still have not repented.

And here we strike upon one of the great difficulties of preaching, on these old foundations. It lies in the fact, that preaching has been so long, and frequent, and faithful. Jonah's was a new message; uttered in unaccustomed ears; at the first sound of it, those ears were eager and erect, and those limbs shook with the fear of the coming woe. It was so well adapted, and all so fresh, that the people were arrested and most deeply affected. But, now, truth, which came down divinely arrayed, has grown threadbare from age and use, is cast out and goes begging. The people have had so much of it that they do not care much about it; they have come to hold it very cheap. They, have heard it, till hearing is mere habit, or decency, or ceremony. It has been heard, till it has lost much of its power to interest and amuse the mind. That oft-used phrase-gospelhardened, is, perhaps, rhetorically barbarous, but it is terribly significant-gospel hardened! hardened by such an instrument, by such a manifestation, a revelation of love, God's solicitude for the soul, His invitations and earnest wooings to win it, His melting influence upon it, how could these harden but by perversion and resistance? The guilt of such a course, who can tell? And the condemnation, who can describe or indicate its severity and weight?

ARTICLE VII.

SICKNESS IMPROVED.

By REV. JONATHAN BRACE, New Milford, Conn.

Sickness Improved. American Sunday School Union, Philadelphia, 1848.

We have been interested, and we hope profited, by the perusal of this little volume. It is intended for the chamber of sickness,-to dispel the gloom which often shrouds that place, by letting in the light of heavenly truth.

We have felt the need, which this book, published by the American Sunday School Union, is fitted to supply. Often have we cast about in vain, for some appropriate evangelical treatise which we might put into the hands of sick and convalescent ones. As trouble is the lot of mortals, as man is born unto it, so is he born to illness. Few there are who have never known what sickness is, few who have never been taken from their business and pleasures, and prostrated upon a bed of pain; while many of the children of men, are "all their lives long subject" to those "woes, which sickly flesh and shattered nerves impose;" and to such, a volume adapted to their case, will prove a welcome, and by the aid of Divine grace, a blessed visitor. It is not, however, every one who can write such a volume. In addition to other qualifications, the writer must have been himself a patient,-experimentally known what it is to have had "days of illness and wearisome nights appointed unto him,"-have a disciplined spirit, chastened, refined, and exalted by suffering. For the truth which meets the deep yearning wants of a sick chamber, must come from such a chamber. "They breath truth that breath their words in pain."

"There is a great want," says the pious McCheyne, "about all Christians, who have not suffered. Some flowers must be broken or bruised, before they emit any fragrance. All the wounds of Christ sent out sweetness,-all the sorrows of Christians do the same. Commend me to a bruised brother, a broken reed,-one like the Son of Man. To me there is something sacred and sweet in all suffering-it is so much akin to the "Man of sorrows." And we may add, that it is these, these bruised ones, who have acquired experiences which health fails to impart, who are alone qualified to address seasonable words, to those exercised with sickness.

It is a fact, that God's most devoted people do suffer, and have, from the time that Lazarus-" he whom Christ loved was sick"until the present hour; nor can it be doubted, that wise and good purposes have been subserved by their sickness. As there is something of good in the worst of men, there are likewise advantages in the worst of evils. No evil is so unmixed as to be without an attendant blessing. A great law of compensation runs throughout the universe. Afflictions and losses have their corresponding returns, are balanced by more or less benefits. This is true of the couch of disease and pain. Even from thence often flows good, and great good to the suffering patient, and to others. There are advantages of sickness; and it will comport with the design of this brief article, to mention what these advantages are.

1. God, then, designs by sickness, to reveal to us our true character as sinners.

There would have been no sickness, had there been no sin. Jehovah whose justice is inflexible, and whose benevolence is boundless, would not afflict His innocent creatures. He afflicts not those