passes that of the child who hears the rivulet babbling by its own door.

If men would examine the teachings of Revelation and Science, with this large comparison of all their subjects, and with childlike docility, there would be masters in Science, and masters in the mysteries of Redemption, who would be free from the narrow views of the bigot on the one hand; and on the other, from the poisonous and chilling imaginings of the infidel. No mind can ever rise to the glory of which it is capable, till it can cheerfully submit itself to all the teachings with which God has surrounded it.

ART. II.-The Bible considered as Cause to an Effect; or Means to an End.

OUR argument here will not be with Atheists, but Theists. The doctrine of cause and effect is intuitive to the human mind. It is among the first developments of human thought. Nor does time nor culture add much to the strength of this original perception; and it is upon this original and intuitive perception of reason that the human mind bases its necessary ideas of a Creator. Cause and effect considered, not metaphysically, but in fact, constitute a large portion of the ideas and knowledge of mankind. All Divine and Natural causes have three invariable qualities. They are: permanent, efficient, and adapted to the end. But, if this be true throughout the material universe, is it equally true in regard to the Bible? We assert that it is so, to the utmost jot and tittle. Wherever the Bible goes, its uniformity, efficiency and adaptation are as manifest in its effects as any thing can be. And if, by a necessity of reason, we attribute the operations of Nature to an infinitely wise, powerful and good God, by what perversion of judgment are we to refuse or to avoid the same conclusion in regard to the Bible? If the laws and operations of Nature lead us back to a Divine origin, then also, and inevitably, we are conducted by the same argument to the same conclusion in regard to the Bible.

We have, then, a plain argument. Uniformity, efficiency, and adaptation of means to ends, are the proofs in Nature of Divine origin. But the Bible has the same proofs, and must, therefore,

be attributed to the same cause. It is upon these fixed principles of Nature that the hopes of the husbandman, the success of commerce, the triumphs and perpetuity of inventions, discoveries, and the whole utilitarian progress of mankind depend. A change in any one of these great natural causes would overthrow the whole. Instability in the operation of cause and effect would stop the plowman in the furrow, the fleets of commerce in mid-ocean, or tie them up to rot upon the shores of the world. The discoveries and inventions of to-day would be worthless upon to-morrow; all motives depending upon the permanence of the laws of Nature would pass away, and the world would either come to ruin or to a dead stand-still. The colors would fail on the brush of the painter, and the needle, in the nightly tempest, would no longer prove faithful to its trust. The printer could no longer depend upon his liquid die to impart the usual impression to his page. Food, and air, and water, and light, would fail in their reviving qualities, and possibly turn to pains or poisons. The steam-horse, that now proudly dashes past all competitors, would be heard no more. The telegraph, that greatest and most wonderful of all monuments to human sagacity, would pass away as the memory of a dream. How little do men think of what and how much they owe to the stability of the laws of Nature!

The permanence of these not only leans to, and assists the great inventions of the world, but it secures the perpetuity of all the gains of the arts, sciences, discoveries, inventions, and philosophies of all ages. No good can be lost which is based upon the changeless decree of natural law. This is the method in which God speaks to man through His works.

Another well known law in Nature is, that similar causes produce similar effects, physical causes produce physical effects, and intellectual causes produce intellectual effects, and moral causes produce moral effects; and all these have their special and well defined boundaries. Hence the deep philosophy of the question, "Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?" Hence, also, "the blood of bulls and goats could not take away sin." And upon the same inexorable law, water-baptism can not take away sin, the cause and the effect being totally dissimilar. The cause being physical and the effect being spiritual, it is impossible to be in the nature of things. It is reversing the laws of Nature, contradicting the testimony of Scripture and of facts,

when men make water-baptism either a direct cause, or an essential and invariable accompaniment of regeneration.

The dream called "Apostolical Succession," is of the same nature. Unflawed succession, if it could be proved, does not stand in the relation of cause and effect to the Church of God. Christ himself stands in that relation, and just as he is in the Church, and is head over all things to it; so is it a true Church, whether it is Presbyterian, Episcopal, or what not.

The Universe around us is a great system of laws, causes and effects, adapted to our material nature; while the Bible is a great system of laws, causes and effects, adapted to our spiritual nature. And we here claim that, in the proof of Divine authorship, the material works of God have no superiority over the Bible. The one is not more nor better adapted to our material nature, than the other is to our moral nature; that the laws of the material world are not more permanent, more efficient, or better adapted to their object, than the laws and spirit of the Bible are to their object. And as a great moral cause, producing great moral effects, the soul can no more dispense with the Bible, than the body can with the solid world.

But let us look into some of the effects of which the Bible is the cause. And as we pass along we will see whether, in its operations, it is uniform, efficient, and adapted to its professed object. And first, it is the only book or thing in the world that imparts a correct and adequate knowledge of God's moral and natural attributes. The Bible is full of this grand necessity. It is just such a revelation as none but God himself could give. The names, the attributes, the descriptions, the character, are all such as to prove their Divine origin. Even the nightly heavens scarcely declare the glory of God so fully as does the sublime and majestic language of the Bible. Nor does the Divine Word deal with us in terms of sublimity and grandeur alone; nor does it leave us to stagger and tremble amid the hights and depths of immensity. This light illuminates our way where no other light could reach us. It gives clearness and safety to our path into the presence of unoriginated existence. But from that hight, whose terrors, vailedand unvailed, stand in terrible numbers and nearness to the soul. we are borne along in the mighty sweep which brings us to where God and man unite in the glories, and wonders, and reconciling harmonies of redemption. On this great central spot of Grace the

soul stops in its flight from the regions of the dark, the mysterious, and the terrible, to survey the distant but hastening light of the Sun of Righteousness. And how glorious is that light as it rises from the eastern skies upon the soul! How sweet and how enrapturing are the words, "God is Love;""Peace on earth and good will to men;" "Our Father who art in Heaven;" "Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world!" Life and joy leap out from every word of these Divine sentences. Alarm and terror take their flight from their presence. Faith sets up its throne within the heart, and hope spreads its light on every hand. God, as the object of supreme love, spreads His unutterable glories every-where.

It has been remarked, with truth and point, that while the ancient Jews were greatly inferior to the ancient Greeks in things literary, philosophical, and architectural; yet, as to the knowledge of God, and all things theological and moral, the Jews were, beyond all comparison, superior to the Greeks. As to the temples made with hands, and other architectural prodigies, the Egyptians and Greeks have astonished all succeeding ages.

The poetry, the history, the oratory, the criticism, the mathematics and philosophy of the subtile and inquisitive Greeks have been the study and admiration of all the great scholars of the world down to the present times. Yet this people had their Lords and their Gods many. By wisdom they knew not God. And in all theological matters they were scarcely above the common herd of idolators. They stand out among the gloomy wastes of idolatrous superstition, and as an amazing monument to the necessity of Divine revelation. They testify, beyond all doubt, that the natural man knoweth not the things of the spirit; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. If any polish or attainments in scholarship; if any elegance or refinements in taste; if any superiority in arts, oratory, or statesmanship; if depth and acuteness in thought; if splendor and power of genius, and if works of the highest eminence in literature could have morally enlightened and regenerated any people, then the Greeks, beyond any and all other nations, would have proved it. If ever there were a people capable of throwing off the thick masses of superstitious lumber, and of tossing idolatry to the moles and the bats, that people was the ancient Greeks. And here we see in the light of one of the clearest demonstrations, that all men mor

ally drivel like idiots where God's Word does not enlighten them. And the character and condition of all men, in all time, without Divine Revelation, put to scorn and confusion the idea, that without it, any high or general moral excellence can be reached. And let those who dream the dull and idiotic dream, that learning and intelligence are to regenerate the world, look at what amount of regeneration was accomplished by Greece. Let them look at the difference, theologically and religiously, between David and Socrates the former born near eleven centuries before Christ, and the latter not five. The Hebrew King and Prophet soars amid the upper clouds, and in the light of great and Divine knowledge, while the great Grecian Teacher and Philosopher is seen buffeting the stormy waves of doubt, perplexity and fear. And yet Socrates was the greatest and the best of all the pupils ever made by uninspired thought and intelligence. And what the bright and keen dialectics of Greece could not do, we are very sure, is not going to be done by the pretentious Naturalists and sham Philosophers of modern times. Nothing short of Divine Revelation can teach us our duties, and nothing short of this can supply us with motives of sufficient power and authority to do them.

Ignorance of God lies at the foundation of all moral errors. And just as the Bible shines into the understanding, so does it dissipate moral falsehood, and purify, enlighten, and benefit the soul in every way. What a magnificent specimen of a man would Socrates have been, had it been his lot to live under the shining light of Divine Truth! The noblest man upon earth is the man whose soul is all aglow with the fire, and all luminous with the light of the Divine Word. Such a man, however humble, is ast much superior, in all things of God, and in all things of duty to Him, as the temple of Diana was superior to a mud-hovel. Man, without that knowledge, which is found alone in its fullness in the Bible, is, at his best earthly state, but a wanderer in a weary waste, homeless and hopeless, ever seeking rest and finding none.

THE BIBLE ALONE CAN IMPART TO MAN THE TRUE KNOWLEDGE OF HIMSELF.

For such knowledge, it is in vain that we look to any other source. Without the Bible, even the origin of our race is lost amid the dim confusion and absurd traditions of the world. When we want a clear and rational account of our own origin, we have