go out, as would the lights of the city by turning off the gas at the fountain.

But the reception of the influx into human minds is a very different thing from into other things. For it flows into all other things somewhat as into machines, setting the wheels of the Universe and all nature to work, by sure and certain laws. But, in human minds, it comes into free and rational recipients who have an agency in its operations, and are therefore responsible for its use or abuse. For, though man cannot originate any substance, God being the only Creator, yet he can work upon the substances given, according to the free exercise of his will and understanding, whether those substances be material or spiritual; whether to build a house, or a mind.

Now, by the abuse of man's freedom, he has so adulterated and perverted the goods and truths given him, that the mental world is filled with spiritual substances of every quality, from the best to the worst. And these varieties of spiritual principles are before men as common property, free for all minds to accept or reject whatever they please. Men are hearing them preached, reading them in books and papers, giving and receiving them in conversation, and are endowed with rationality and freedom to decide what is true and what is false, and to choose for themselves. Every mind has some of them of some quality, and all minds want to give them to anybody that will receive them. Every one wants to give to others his own wisdom or folly. to think and feel as he does.

He wants others

True, God's own immediate presence is with us in our inmost being, giving us, individually, our inmost life; but that life alone does not reach our external mind so as to rationally feed and build up our soul. But it does hold us in perfect freedom to shut the door of our mind against the influence of either good or evil spirits, and also against what is true or false from men and books. It gives us power at all times, to look either to the Lord and His Word for help, or to go to men and spirits, or to go our own way.

Thus the heavens and the hells stand in opposing attitudes with regard to us, and we are in freedom between them. Therefore our regeneration is through a warfare in which good and evil spirits are engaged; on one side for, and on the other against, our purification. But feeble as we are, and dependent as we are upon the Lord for life and power, yet the result of this battle depends somewhat upon ourselves, because we are free to join either army. God and the angels will assist us to keep down the evil hosts, but they cannot do it against our wills. They can fight our battles only through us; because our own mind is the battle-ground. If the hells prevail, evils will fill our hearts, and we shall love them. If the heavens prevail, we shall be filled with heavenly principles, and love them. We are sure of a glorious success in this warfare, only as we go into it in good earnest, looking to the Lord and yielding to the spirit of the commandments in opposition to our self-love, shunning all evils as sins against God.

The eternal law of humanity is that men are free to choose their own associates, and to form their own characters and tastes. Without this privilege, there could be no man or angel. Therefore, though in bodies of clay, we are in the midst of spirits and angels of every caste and character. Our Heavenly Father gives us His Word, and holds us in freedom to choose our own companions, and thence to form our life and character, either for the society of the good or of the evil. And, the society from the other world, which we now choose to help us to build up and establish our character, and the quality of our soul's affections, will be the society of our choice when we put off the body. And we shall enter into that society and dwell with it, be it good or be it evil.

And this will be from no partial spirit of the Lord; no predestination from Him; no spirit of choice in Him towards individuals; no spirit of condemnation or unkindness; but from the great law of universal mercy and love towards all His creatures; giving to every one the very best he will

receive; permitting each to have, in the end, the society of those most like himself; the society to which his life in this world has adapted him, whether it be as pure as the celestial angels, or as corrupt as the most depraved spirits of our

race.

A. S.

THE NARROW WAY.

NEARLY two thousand years ago, there was a man living in this world of whom it had been declared, by a prophet, They shall call His name Emmanuel, which, being interpreted, is God with us."

But in His humble life, spent in teaching and preaching to the people, healing the sick, and helping those who were in trouble, the people, who were still looking for the promised Messiah to come with outward power and glory, could see nothing to attract their love and belief. He Himself repeatedly declared that God was His Father; yet, although the people saw Him raise the dead and heal the sick by His touch, calm the raging storm by His word, and feed thousands of people with a few loaves of bread, they were angry when He said to them, "I and My father are one," and would have killed Him because He made Himself "equal with God." When He had lived here about thirty-three years, He was condemned to death, and crucified, His accusation being that He had tried to make Himself a king; but this was not accomplished until after He had said to Pilate, in answer to his question, "Knowest thou not that I have power to crucify Thee, and have power to release Thee?"... "Thou couldest have no power at all against Me, except it were given thee from above." Even after they had crucified Him, and He was laid in a sepulchre, He rose again, appearing to the few humble disciples who had followed Him, sincerely believing Him to be, as He had said to them, the Christ whom the prophets had foretold, and told them, with few and simple words, to do and teach what

He had commanded them, and that He would be with them always.

We have been taught to believe that this man was, as He said, the Christ. We have a record of His life, what He did and what He said, in the Bible, the sacred book of all Christians; but something more than this is necessary before we can really belong with those who are His true disciples. We must believe, in our inmost hearts, that He is our Lord Jesus Christ, the God of heaven, who came into this world, and lived the life that we must live, that He might be able so to help us live the life that will bring us into heaven. We must feel sure of His presence with us in our daily work, of His constant care and love for each one of His children; and this assurance can only come with some effort to keep His commandments. As soon as this effort

is made, as soon as we begin to feel the assurance that our Father can and does help us, we begin to be His disciples as truly as they who listened to His words, and followed Him in His life so long ago. The only difference is, that we must be His disciples in spirit, as they were outwardly.

They followed His footsteps, and He abode with them. We can do the same; not in an outward way, but by cherishing inward desires to do His will, and He will abide with us. They listened to the words that He spoke to them, and remembered, though they might not always comprehend their full meaning. We can listen to His words, spoken no less to us, though their utterance be inaudible among the sounds of this world. They saw Him raise the dead, heal the sick, and perform miracles which no other man could do, while they wondered and were amazed. We have only to look within our own hearts to find a similar multitude waiting His healing touch. The maimed, the sick, the dead are there, in our wrongly-directed thoughts and feelings; but we have only to bring them to Him in simple faith, and the miracles of old shall be continued in

us.

So shall we be His disciples; and just before us, in the

way of our daily life, may we see Him continually, if we only look for Him, marking with His own footsteps, made visible by the record of His life here, the way that we should take. And we may know how " He shall feed His flock like a shepherd," and gently lead those who are willing to accept His guidance, making even "the crooked straight, and the rough places plain."

He said to His disciples, "Enter ye in at the strait gate for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat; because strait is the gate and narrow is the way which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it."— Matt. vii. 13, 14.

The disciples saw no gateway such as Jesus described, into which they could enter; but they listened to His words, and tried to obey all that they could understand, believing Him to be the Christ, and thus, without knowing it, they were really entering into "the narrow way," and shunning the broad one.

These same words are repeated for us every day of our lives; and if we give any heed to them, if we think of them at all, we probably think there can be no doubt which way we should choose. Does any one suppose, that if he should see the two ways before him the narrow gate and the broad one side by side, and hear, in audible sounds, the voice proclaiming, "Enter ye in at the strait gate," that he would deliberately choose to go in the "broad way," which leads to destruction? Probably not. And yet which way have we chosen to-day? Let us look into our own hearts, and see!

To live is to walk spiritually, because by our daily living we are carried on from one condition to another, just as our bodies are carried, by walking from one place to another; and every action in our daily living is a step in some spiritual direction. God gives us His commandments in the Bible, and they are so simple that any child may be made. to understand them-"Cease to do evil; learn to do well," is the meaning in all of them—and he says, "This is the

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