all things, and giving us faith to take hold of the blessing. Precious for opening a new and living way into the holiest of all by his own blood: a channel of communion between us and the Father-Fathera name by which the Deity could not have been addressed but by this blessed medium, Christ. But faith in Christ gives us access into this grace wherein we stand, and by it also we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. We are allowed to go to him as his own children and tell him our wants, and receive all we want with the utmost freedom; nothing to do but ask, and who would not do that? He will not come forth to meet us armed with vengeance. The curse is removed. Keep an eye, poor timid believer, on the words just considered-"no condemnation." Blessed be God, his word admits of no medium between condemnation and justification! He who believes in Jesus is justified from all things. Justification supposes satisfaction: it involves all the blessed consequences known by the various names of "pardon," "peace," happiness, " &c. The words which express it are most sweet. They read thus-viz. "Justified freely by his grace." that There remain yet, within this great and exhaustless subject, considerations which our cramped-up minds can never reach. As the lungs by exertion pant for strength, so the mind (even assisted by the blessed Spirit of truth in his common manifestations of Christ) seems to say to itself, when it has followed him to the cloud which received him"Here I must stop short of certainty about him." It can only say much of Christ which comes within the compass of knowledge and expression. The mind can by no means rightly conceive of sin, therefore it cannot conceive of bearing its punishment. How, then, can the sufferings of Christ be known to man? But, oh, the thought! "He is gone into heaven!" "Well," says the believer, "His dying did not merely free me from condemnation. My union to him is vastly more extensive. He prayed the Father, that where HE was I might be also. My union to him also more than supposes the fact-it certifies it! 'IN CHRIST.' I am a portion of his mystical body. I must ascend up to him. Exalted as is his situation beyond mine, I must be exalted in his exaltation. The head cannot say to the foot, 'I have no need of you;' my absence would cause a schism in the body. My absence would be the first introduction of disorder into his heavenly kingdom, because I am a believer in Jesus, he having pledged his honour not to lose one of his little ones. Although eye hath not seen, nor ear heard of what is laid up for them who love him; yet the fact of my loving him proves it mine. It is written for my comfort that God has stooped to call me a son; and something conceals that which follows, so that I know not what I shall be; yet the fact of my having an humble boldness at a throne of grace, whereby I dare call God, Father,' establishes the fact that I am a son, and therefore expect to share in that great unknown something which is to follow. There is a mansion for me in the skies, prepared by Christ himself. I have no knowledge of its size, or of my future capacity to fill it." One more consideration presents itself, bearing upon this great subject. It is, perhaps the weightiest of all. It is found in one of our blessed Lord's last prayers to his Father, after having prayed that his people be with him where HE was, he introduces the reason as follows-"That they may behold my glory which thou hast given me." John, xxii. 24. If we are called upon while here to do all to the glory of God, and having done that little all within our reach of doing, and then are ashamed of it, it is so little; and we sometimes fear, because God is jealous of his honour, that we have mixed up some ingredient of our own with it : what must be that "excellent glory" of Christ in heaven, surrounded by an innumerable company who were once like ourselves, but now glorified with him? But, reader, we must leave our glorified Lord with our departed brethren, and turn our attention a little longer to the present scene of tears till a few more days, and He will wipe them away, and take us there. When faith is in exercise, and we can soar aloft, the intrinsic excellence of Christ unfolds itself, and we peep after him into our future home. Would that these sweet seasons knew no interruption; but, alas! a messenger of Satan steps forward, shooting out the lip, inquiring, 66 Are you the dupe of these pretensions? So full of faith you pretend, and of love to Jesus Christ, with your expectations all in exercise. Why, to-morrow, perhaps, you will be all in the dark." Then he retires. But the believer throws himself back upon the promises, and prays for some enjoyment from the word considered. "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus." A future paper, God willing, will contain some thoughts on the words immediately following. Cossey, August 12, 1840. MODERATUs. REGENERATION. O MYSTERY divine!-that mortal man, Who from the womb was cursed, ere he began Jehovah's love enjoy, and heavenly truth believe Redemption have from sin and all his woes Salvation gain through Christ, and freedom from his foes! Nor renovated powers, nor intellect refined, Nor human aid the enfetter'd will unbind : These, powerless as the voice to still the raging sea, The " W. G. SHALL WE TOLERATE POPERY? POPERY! Popery! Popery! how do we detest its abominable system; and did we not discover its baneful-its bewitching-its Satanic encroachments, how gladly would we let its name perish, and consign it to that oblivion into which, blessed be God, it shall ere long fall, never again to rise! Oh, glorious morn, whose rising dawn shall usher in such an auspicious day! But can we be silent when we discover so treacherous and destructive a system as Popery making such wily, yet effectual approaches, as the general aspect of things in the religious world (so called) proves to be the fact? Shall we despise the name of "troublers in Israel when we see the peace and welfare-not the eternal security-of Zion is at stake? Shall we lay down the weapons of our warfare, and, for the sake of a good name, take refuge under the hypocritical garb of a mis-called charity, when the whore of Babylon, with all her artifices, is at our very door? No, no! God helping us, we never, never will; but, as long as we have breath, so long will we continue to use that breath in the exposition of Popery! After our August Number had gone to press, we asked ourselves the question, "Have we done violence to the Roman Catholics?" We submitted it to a minister of the Gospel, whom we believe God has raised up in this dark day, boldly to resist the encroachments of the scarletcoloured foe; his reply was, "Is Popery, as some please to term her, 'our erring sister?' or is she, what Scripture declares her to be, the whore of Babylon? The question set our minds at rest; and our sincere desire is, that we could re-echo the question from one end of the earth even to the other, "Is Popery merely an erring sister, or is she the whore of Babylon, with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and with whom the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication?" This is not our language, but the language of Scripture; and if the Bible is the word of Godthe word spoken through the prophets by himself—we ask the professing world at large, who would tremble frankly and openly to confess that they dispute any part of that most sacred book; -we say, upon what ground do they palliate, make light of, or countenance, a system, or the steps of a body of men advocating a system, which God has declared he will destroy by the breath of his mouth? We have been led to make these remarks more particularly from a circumstance which has very recently come to our knowledge, and for the truth of which we can vouch, having ourselves been personally acquainted with the parties. When yet quite a youth, we several times went as a spectator to a Sunday-school, in which some of the elder branches of our family were teachers; when there our attention was often directed to a young man who took an active part in that school, and whose outward deportment and general conduct were such as to make us wish that, should we ever arrive at manhood, we might resemble him. (Vain, proud, dangerous wish we admit !) In a word, we never saw one of whom we thought so highly. Many years have rolled away since then, nor have we, that we are aware, seen him during those years. But a few weeks since we were informed of the following circumstance: -Notice of a public meeting, in the place to which we refer, having been given, for the purpose of holding a discussion between Protestantism and Catholicism, at which two chairmen were to be present, some difficulty was experienced in obtaining a chairman for the Catholic side of the question. But one individual interested himself very much on their behalf; and while calling upon one and another to solicit them to take the chair upon the occasion referred to, a friend said to him, “Mr. do you know what you are about, and whose cause you are advocating?" His reply was, "I think the Roman Catholics have been an injured people; and I don't know but I shall become one myself." Not many weeks after, that very individual was found in one of the outbuildings of a house of ill-fame, whither he had resorted upon finding himself seized with sudden illness. The fact was this, he had taken the cholera from the wretched character with whom he had cohabited; and was shortly after carried home a corpse! The reader, doubtless, anticipates the sequel: it was the very young man whom, in our younger days, we had set up as a pattern of all that was excellent. Should this meet the eye of his respected family, we trust they will pardon us for the narration of the painful circumstance. As we have given no names, nor referred to any place, it is not likely that many will recognise it. We therefore introduce it as a matter of principle; believing that such things, though apparently done in a corner," ought to be published for the good of the church. And we pray that God, if his blessed will, would sanctify it not merely to the members of the family referred to, but to such members of the Lord's family universally as it may come within the hearing of-more especially those to whom our attention is principally directed-namely, the halting, hesitating, and undecided, upon the subject which we have under consideration. Reader, whoever thou art, we say unto thee as the prophet of old said unto the multitude by whom he was surrounded, "Choose ye this day whom ye will serve. If Baal (or this mystic Babylon) be God, or of God, serve it; or if the Lord be God, serve him.” It is no time for parleying. Away with your hesitating, undecided, half-and-half principles, if principles they are worthy the name. 'Tis in vain that ye plead with us a thousand paltry excuses. They may pass current with the vast majority among whom thou art associated; and thou mayst, in thine own estimation, be sailing to the port of heaven with a fair wind and a flowing tide; but throw aside the mask-let conscience speak and see if, after all, a fair name—a high profession-and a smooth-tongued charity towards all mankind, are not the sum and substance of thy religion. Will it stand the test, thinkest thou, of a sick-bed and a dying hour? Thy minister may visit thee, and a multitude of friends attend upon thee, but the parting hour must come, and 66 thou must, by thyself and for thyself, enter the invisible world; and what dost thou imagine will be thy feelings at first beholding Him whom thou hast here "mocked" with a profession of a holy zeal and attachment; what will be thy surprise-thine agony-when, in answer to thy meritorious works and the "labours of love" in which thou hadst professedly so long been engaged, the omniscient Jehovah-Jesus shall say, Depart from me-I never knew thee;" and what will be the extent of thine anguish if thou shouldst hear him saying of thee, as the fruit of thy countenancing and helping on the anti-Christian foe, "Bring this mine enemy that would not that I should reign over him, and slay him before my face?" We say not this to frighten thee. God knows we speak it in love. We would have thee pause, consider, and pray for grace to examine the ground upon which thou art standing. sands in the present day of great profession have chosen a mistaken road -a road which will end in ruin rather than in that happiness and joy which they contemplate. For thou But does the reader inquire what this has to do with Popery? We answer, A great deal. For we believe that while Infidelity will destroy its thousands, Popery will, ere long, destroy its tens of thousands.* We wish to be plain upon the point; we desire to clear ourselves of the blood of our readers, and not remain silent upon a subject of such momentous importance: for, we believe, to remain silent, when our eyes are open to the eventful periods to which we are fast hastening-which have long been foretold by some of the most highly-favoured, best of men, and in which we shall all be deeply concerned-we say, to remain silent, would amount almost to a sanction and an approval. We repeat that our present remarks have to do with Popery because she is, now-a-days, exercising more of her specious craft than ever. She is introducing herself in a cunning, serpent-like way. She is winning over to herself the good opinions of the vast majority of mankind, because she is uniting herself with the "temperate," the "philanthropic," and the "pharisaical." To join herself to the former of these two classes may be all very well in its place; but if by such hypocritical artifices we are, like the fox in the fable, to open our door and admit the foe that, finding himself once securely housed, shall tear, and rend, and destroy us; we say, let the door remain bolted, and keep the fox out. But we know that for such a mode of reasoning, we shall be called poor silly enthusiasts; we shall be told that we are a century behindhand in our arguments; that the people of England in the present day have too much light, understanding, and discernment to be "gulled" again by Popish superstitions. Ay! but how can the people of England help themselves when, by their "charitable" concessions, they have step by step placed themselves under a dominion which rests not contented in a subordinate position; which says that her power is supreme; that to dispute her authority is to be guilty of a heresy which death-the most painful and ignominious-only can appease? Reader, is this the spirit of Popery or is it not? Is she altered, or does she *See Rev. xiii. 16. |