sary to attract him by love and nothing less was sufficient, than that greatest exhibition of it in giving his only Son to die. As love begets love, if this fails to awaken love in man and attract him back, there is but little hope. Now the church must be formed, and man must be educated that he may be prepared for the scheme of redemption. God works by the development process. A child learns the alphabet before he learns trigonometry. The patriarchal dispensation was organized, and when man was sufficiently advanced the Mosaic dispensation was instituted and the law given from Sinai. In process of time wisdom, science, and philosophy were found insufficient, and then the Jewish dispensation was confined to one nation, and was only temporary, as it could not save one soul. It was seen that the entire human family would be forever lost unless something better was inaugurated, that something must be done for the entire family of man, not only to fit him for time, but likewise to prepare him for eternity. Do you ask if the patriarchal and Jewish dispensations were imperfect, I answer, no, no more than a child's alphabet is imperfect; they were only intended for the preparatory depart

forms and take the Bible and the Bible alone without note or comment. The reformation for three hundred years had been leading to this. God's finger was in it, it was reached by the development process, the fittest always survives and in 1804 they were back at Pentecost learning of Peter. The change like the rose from the bud, was imperceptible. It was fit that the Presbyterians were the first to raise the standard, their motto was, "the Bible without note or comment. The Christian world was waiting for some grand development. "Coming events cast their shadows before"-as they did eighteen hundred years ago when the angels informed the shepherds of the birth of Jesus, Jew and Gentile were looking for some wonderful event. Just before that occurrence a Gentile poet living fifteen hundred miles away

wrote:

"A holy progeny from heaven descends,

Auspicious be his birth, which puts an end
To the iron age, and from whence shall rise,
A golden state far glorious through the earth,

By thee what footsteps of our sins remain
Are blotted out, and the whole world set free."

The

It was then in the spiritual atmosphere. world was looking anxiously when the church of Christ was born. And when it condemned in

to that part of the scriptures that professes to be the word of inspiration. The Bible is composed of the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms. Law, History and Poetry. If good men had been the authors of all they indited, they would gladly have claimed the authorship. It then remains that God must be the author. We should always judge a tree by its fruit; we do not gather figs of briers, nor peaches of thorn trees, nor walnuts of buckeyes, nor does a bitter fountain send forth

sweet water.

A want of faith in the divine authenticity of the scriptures may generally be traced to ignorance of them. Lord Littleton and Gilbert West may be taken as two good specimens. They were disbelievers and agreed to write books against the Bible's inspiration. In studying the scriptures and the history bearing on that subject, they became convinced of their divine authenticity, and Lord Littleton wrote to show that Saul of Tarsus was converted as recorded in the Bible. And Gilbert West wrote a book to prove that Jesus of Nazareth arose from the dead according to the scriptures. I have been reading their arguments with much interest.