measure of its bliss and glory, will be the measure of the blessing achieved. Every creature in the infinite circle of celestial life, will be a debtor to the one Mediator. Angels will owe to Him their existence; their continuance in a state of obedience; their confirmation in holiness, and their most joyful and grateful views of the infinite and invisible God. Saints will be indebted to Him for their natural life; for their souls redeemed from guilt and condemnation, and their bodies raised from "the bones and dust of a universal ruin," and for their safety even in heaven. One feeling will therefore pervade and rule that happy world. The one event that shall be celebrated in that scene of eternal delight, will be the Redemption of the cross the one song that shall awake and express the glad harmonies of that universe, will be the song of Redemption.

The eternal misery of hell will have a manifest connection with the measure of Redemption. The condemned angels will suffer the wrath of the Lamb. If their original apostasy did not grow out of the constitution of a mediator, their guilt, it is manifest, will be greatly enhanced by means of it. They are not ignorant of the peculiar manifestations of God in Christ. Already they "believe and tremble." Their rebellion from first to last, is against mediatorial sovreignty. Their character, in every principle and element of it, has been formed under the mediatorial system. The guilt of their first sin is light, compared with the guilt of their attempt to defeat the work of Redemption. The discoveries, forever making, of what they have rebelled against, and what they have lost by rebelling, will only serve to increase their malignity and self-torment. As the cause of human apostasy; as the tempters of God's people, and of Christ himself; as the bitterest and most active enemies of the church redeemed, and as the irreconcilable enemies of the cross of salvation, they will be dealt with and punished. And all this and much more will be true of lost men. Their great sin-the sin which will give character to their depravity, will be their rejection of Jesus Christ. All their guilt will have direct relation to the cross. And so will their punishment. The entire system of rewards and punishments will, therefore, be the result of Christ's mediatorial work. His infinite sacrifice to honor the Divine law, and secure the highest end of good government, will give an authoritative sanction to that system of mingled grace and justice, which nothing else could give, and against which none will be found to rebel.

As that system of things will endure forever, so the glory of Redemption will never cease to shine, though suns loose their lustre as there will be an endless progression in the heavenly state, and a sinking deeper and deeper down of the world of sin and wrath, so will there be an endless augmentation of redemp

tive influence and glory. Eternal Redemption by Jesus Christ! It will be the wonder of wonders-the theme of themes-the glory of glories. The everlasting song of the new creation, giving utterance to the glory of the Cross, and the harmonies of heaven, and the wailings that shall come up from the depths of infinite ruin, responsive to the infliction of an every where triumphant law, will make an impression wide as the range of intelligent existence, deep as the depths of moral being, and enduring as eternity.

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Redemption is the science and the song
Of all eternity. Archangels, day

And night, into its glories look. The Saints,
The Elders round the Throne, old in the years
Of Heaven, examine it perpetually;

And every hour, get clearer, ampler views,
Of right and wrong; see virtue's beauty more;
See vice more utterly depraved and vile:
And this, with a more perfect hatred hate;
That, daily love, with a more perfect love."

Such is the glory of Redemption. It is the chief delight of the Infinite Mind; the joy of angels; the bliss of mankind; the central sun and moral bond of the universe.

As the theatre of this Redemption our world is honored above all worlds. Though little in itself, its relations are with the universe. Though in itself an obscure corner of creation, it is made the centre of highest interest, and the world of chief attraction. The attention of angels is drawn to it. A moral force is gathering in it to uphold the universe in love and obedience. It is Heaven's laboratory, in which are to be worked out the great principles which are to exist in and rule God's kingdom. It is. the battle-field of the universe, on which holiness and sin, truth and error, life and death, Christ and the Devil are to wage their one great and decisive warfare.

"History may record her eventful eras, when all the powers of earth were drawn up in hostile array, and all its interests suspended on a single conflict. Such may be regarded to have been the case, when the great question was to be decided by a single blow, between Greece and Persia, whether freedom or slavery should be the future inheritance of mankind; when the victory of Constantine determined, whether Paganism or Christianity should hold the throne of the Roman empire; when on the plain of Tours, it was decided whether the Crescent should prevail over the Cross in the west, as it had in the east; whether Imposture should drive the Truth from the earth; when, on the event of the Armada, it was to be decided whether Popery or Protestantism should prevail, whether the earth should belong to Christ or to Antichrist;"" and when on the plains of Waterloo the

'Harris' Com.

armies of Europe decided the fate of "the man of destiny," and changed the current of human affairs. But Time is a more eventful era, in relation to Eternity. The spiritual powers of the universe are met on this earth in hostile array; for nearly sixty centuries has the conflict raged already, and it will continue to rage we know not how long. And who can conceive the extent of the interest at stake in this warfare? The honor of God, the maintainance of law and order, and the happiness of all worlds are involved. Our highest conceptions of the grandeur and importance of this contest, fall amazingly short of the reality. There is a breadth of purpose, a depth of meaning, a height of glory, and a fullness of love and blessing in this work of Redemption, which eternal ages will hardly disclose.

It is a great priviledge to live in a world thus honored, and be permitted to help forward so glorious a work. There is an interest and a responsibility attached to human existence, which belong not even to angelic. We may do for God, and for the cause of universal happiness, what no other order of beings can do. In what a blessed glorious work is every Christian minister, and Christian disciple engaged! The tears which he sheds, the prayers which he offers, the toils which he endures, the sacrifices which he makes for the cause of Christ, what fruits are they to bring forth!

The glory and dignity of the Church are hereby discovered. She is the centre of this stupendous system of moral dispensations, conquests and rejoicings. Her relations to the one glorious Mediator are most peculiar and honoring. To redeem and purify her unto Himself by an infinite sacrifice, He assumed the office of mediator, and has henceforth reigned over nature and providence. The stars were kindled to illume her path. Angels were created to minister to her wants and celebrate her glory. And heaven was fitted up with glorious mansions, to be her appropriate and eternal residence. And yet men are ashamed to belong to such a body; excuse themselves from sharing in the labor, and glory, and reward of such an enterprize.

The subject has other interesting and important practical relations which we have not space to note.

ARTICLE IX.

BIBLE ETHICS.

By Professor TAYLER LEWIS, L. L. D., University of New York.

Religion Teaching by Example, by RICHARD W. DICKINSON, D. D., New York, ROBERT CARTER, Canal St., 1848.

The author of this book is entitled to our thanks for its title, even if it had possessed little of any other merit. Religion has in modern times, been taught in almost every other way, than by an exhibition of the rich and instructive examples furnished by the records of revelation. It has been presented, both in books and from the pulpit, in the form of philosophy, of metaphysical analysis, of abstract theological dogmas, of dry argumentative discussion, of a lifeless and casuistical morality, or of a prattling sentimentalism. The work before us adopts a method quite different from all these. It is one, however, familiar to religious writers and preachers of past centuries, although in their hands accompanied with a quaintness, and apparent affectation of style, which the author of this volume has happily avoided. At the same time, there is an equal freedom from that affectation of an opposite kind, which so naturally results from certain very prevalent modern views respecting the Bible, and the moral position of the earlier characters whom it presents to us. The most sacred truths, as found in connection with the living and life-like examples of the Scripture, are exhibited without any compromise of their importance; at the same time, without any false refinement upon the simple outlines of revelation, and without any appearance of forced accommodation to an ethical standard assumed to be in advance of the rude morals of the ancient periods of sacred history. There is no resort to any mythical drapery, to cover up whatever may seem offensive to some species of rationalism. The Abraham, and Moses, and David of the work before us, are very different from those imaginary characters of Herder, to whom revelation comes speaking as unto infants incapable of appreciating the first elements of moral truth, and for whom, therefore, it is supposed to clothe itself in the spirit of natural phenomena, or in the accommodations of a pictorial and traditional mythology. They are the same Old Testament worthies to whom we have been accustomed from the days of our primers and catechism. There comes from them, in our author's hands, the same impression of holiness, of faith, of communion with God, which so fills the young mind with an indes

cribable awe, forbidding the thought of the moral inferiority of these ancient saints, as dishonoring to the God who walked with them from day to day, and who made known to them his will through such near and frequent communion. And yet, without any compromise of the true Scriptural representations, the author has drawn from them a depth of morality, and a light for the conscience, which would in vain be sought in the pages of either a philosophical or a poetical rationalism.

We may say, therefore, without further introduction, that the writer has furished what may truly be regarded as a rare thing in this age-an admirable book of practical religion. It is a species of writing, which seemed to have almost gone out of use. We have had the philosophy of religion, the philosophy of redemption, the philosophy of salvation, the philosophy of holiness. We have plenty of casuistical morality, of reforming philanthropy, looking to periods, and masses, and great movements of humanity, rather than to common individual duties, and the cultivation of the individual conscience. It almost seems, that in our great efforts in behalf of an abstract humanity, and in our extravagant conceptions respecting the superior light and reason of the age, it had become settled that we have little more to do with the antiquated Scriptural examples, and especially such as are taken from the Old Testament. There is getting to be an impression, (and that too among some who would not pride themselves in the name of rationalists,) that there is but little now to be learned from those old-world saints, who may have been burning and shining lights in their day, or when the apostle put them upon his list of elders, who pleased God and obtained a good report, but who would be rather dim amid the moral, and religious, and philosophical splendors of the present period. They have "fulfilled their mission," it is said by some, and thought by others. From the stand, it is alleged, of a higher morality, we see their imperfections and their unfitness as models of imitation, either in respect to faith or works.

The same feeling has prevailed, and is prevailing, in respect to books on experimental religion. In this age of bustle and outward effort, works of inward examination are regarded in a great measure, as unnecessary. They have, accordingly, become extremely scarce, except where they remain as relics of a former period, and of a style of religious feeling very different from that which now prevails.

To the rectification of both these habits of thought, the book under review, we think, is admirably adapted. It will disturb this self-complacent taking for granted, that means once most available for the cultivation of experimental religion, in former times, are not suited to present spiritual wants. In the reading