If we believe in Christ that we have salvation, the echo of that sentiment is awakened in our own hearts. Faith in Christ is daylight; full assurance of faith is sunlight. Faith in Christ is Christ's life on earth; assurance of salvation in Christ is the earnest of Christ's life in heaven. And when there is impressed by a Divine Teacher upon every heart this blessed truth, that I am a Christian, that I am a child of God, that I am an heir of the kingdom of heaven, the very desert will smile and blossom like the rose, and for the fir tree there will come up the myrtle tree, and it shall be to the Lord for a name, and a sign that shall not be cut off.

And in order thus to feel, and thus to be guided, let us seek the presence of the Holy Spirit of God. When he is to us the Spirit of truth and comfort, we shall learn, not to be weary of life, but to make use of it; to " run the race set before us- with patience," that is, not wearying of it, "looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith; who, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame;" and looking at all things in that light, we shall regard the blessings that are given us below as types of richer blessings that remain above; and the happy moments that we experience upon earth, as earnests of the happier moments we shall experience in heaven; we shall be satisfied that we are spared in life because not yet ripe for heaven, and that we shall not live one moment longer than makes us meet for the inheritance of the saints in light, and ready to be transplanted to that better rest, where we are neither weary of life, nor weep, nor sorrow, nor grieve, but where all former things are passed away, and we are for ever happy with and in the Lord.

CHAPTER XVIII.

FAITH AND FRUITAGE.

"Do something, do it soon with all thy might;
An angel's wing would droop if long at rest,
And God inactive were no longer blest.
Some high or humble enterprise of good
Contemplate, till it shall possess thy mind,
Become thy study, pastime, rest, and food,
And kindle in thy heart a flame refined.
Pray Heaven for firmness thy whole soul to bind
To this high purpose; to begin, pursue,

With thoughts all fixed, and feelings purely kind,
Strength to complete, and with delight review,
And strength to give the praise where all is due."

"Now then, whatsoever God hath said unto thee, do."

WHAT God hath said unto you do, is an appropriate sequel to the subject which we have already considered, namely, “I have learned by experience that the Lord hath blessed me for thy sake." We have investigated experimental religion. We will now consider practical religion. According to the first, I have learned by the inward experience of my heart that religion is true; according to the other, I prove by the outward action of my life that it is power.

The words we are considering were uttered by Rachel, and addressed to Jacob. It is about this time that we shall find the patriarchs, who occupy so prominent a place in sacred history, grow in beauty and in excellence of character,

as they approach the vale of years, and their final departure from this present world. We discover in Rachel and in Jacob heretofore latent proofs of excellence we did not previously anticipate-springs of living water in the rock in the midst of the sandy desert, that are as refreshing as they are beautiful. On occasions when we might least have looked for it, we find traits in Jacob's character, like patches of blue sky on a cloudy day, that show us that there was an inner life underlying painful and exceptional features, holy, beautiful, divine. This teaches us the very useful lesson, that if we are to judge of man's character at all, we ought to take the largest possible mass of it, in order to form a correct judgment. If we take the exceptional, and view it as the standard of the man, we treat him unjustly. If we judge of the man's whole life by what he has been, and what he now seems to be, we judge fairly and properly. And many a character's worst traits are on the outside, while the best and the holiest lie slumbering in the silent recesses of his heart, and only come out when some great emergency demands it, or when some mighty temptation is to be overcome, or some deed of disinterested beneficence is to be performed in the sight of all mankind. found grains of gold in the worst character; and if we knew all of every man, we should learn to be slow to judge, ready to pray for the bad, and to be thankful for the good. We read the history of Jacob, and find his earlier faults drop off and disappear, and the long hidden beauties of his character begin to emerge into light and develop themselves; and if we see in his earlier days that painful proof of the awful fall which man has undergone, we can trace in the closing periods of his life how truly the grace of God can transform the most thoughtless, and it may be hopeless, into one characterized by whatever things are beautiful, and just, and true, and honest, and of good report.

There will be

Let us notice here what must have struck all in "the perusal of every chapter of these most interesting patriarchal biographies, how God is recognized at every step, and viewed as the chief Agent and Director in all that was good or adverse that befell them in their chequered and remarkable careers. Even after they had sinned, their sins brought them to God for forgiveness; after they were prospered, their prosperity brought them to God in thanksgiving anticipating in this respect the prescription of an apostle long after, "Is any among you afflicted? Let him pray. Is any merry? Let him sing psalms; and thus, a Christian's sunshine and a Christian's clouds will equally bring him to God, either in adoration, thanksgiving, and praise, or in prayer and supplication. We, too, in looking back at our biographies, have as good reason to recognize God in them as ever Rachel, Jacob, and Isaac had to recognize God in theirs. It is not true God was, but has now retired into the depths of silence, and left this orb to work its way as it best can to its destiny; but God's name is Jehovah, who was, who is, and who will be, or is to come. God is as truly in my life as he was in Jacob's. He is as truly in the midst of those who statedly meet together for worship, as when the bush blazed with flame, and Moses took off his shoes, because he was on holy ground. He manifested his presence, then, by signs, and tokens, and proofs now obsolete. The man who can make up his mind either to deny a God, or who is so blind that he cannot now see, and never has seen God, is an object very much to be pitied indeed. I cannot conceive the possibility of the atheism of the intellect; we do frequently meet with the atheism of the heart. He who can intellectually conclude that monstrous negation, that freezing denial, "No God," believes there is a chain stretching from the depths of infinitude; that worlds or orbs are clustering on every link,

and that it has no staple to hang by above, and no restingplace to touch beneath. Such a man supposes an effect without a cause, an end without a beginning. Intellectual Atheism is in my humble judgment so absurd, that I wonder that an Atheist is not even afraid to tell his dog that there is no God, lest the instincts of the brute should rise up and rebuke the irrationality of the man. Jacob, and Rachel, and Leah, and all the patriarchs, recognized God, and acted as they that felt his presence to be a reality. They could not say, "No," when all nature around them said, "Yes;" they could not deny God when every winding, and turning, and current in their history proclaimed that he had been there. I see God, not only in great things, but also in little things. Some persons will admit God to be in great events, but they doubt whether he is in minute events. But such forget that the minute events are the hinges on which magnificent results turn. In a watch, the smallest link, chain, or ratchet, cog, or crank, is as essential as the mainspring itself. If one fall out the whole will stand still. It is so in our biography. The existing fact that you are in that house, or that you are married to that husband, or to that wife, looks, when you trace it, the merest accident that could possibly bubble up from the depths of chaos; but when you know what has followed it, what is dependent upon it, you must be constrained to admit that if God was not there, and if that marriage was not made in heaven, there is no God on earth, and no hand governing and controlling the destinies of mankind.

But the recognition of these patriarchs not only extended to the fact of the existence of God, but also to the no less precious truth that God had revealed himself to them. Because Jacob had no written Bible, we are not therefore to conclude that Jacob had no revealed will of God. In these days of ours the written Bible is all, and any attempt