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practise whatever the blessed gospel inculcates. If our Lord has laid upon us many duties; if he has prescribed the observance of various ordinances, the reason is, that the exercise and the effort which they require are necessary to the development of our spiritual strength. Be constantly employed in discharging your duty to God be constantly employed in discharging your duty to your fellow men be constantly employed in regulating your own feelings and desires, conformably to Christ's word; and your progress will resemble the morning light, which groweth more and more unto the perfect day.

Once more, mutual assistance is necessary to the growth and vitality of the members of Christ's body.

Let us again look back to the physical constitution of man. We have seen that the due exercise of every arm and limb is necessary to the promotion of its growth, and the increase of its strength. But there is another fact connected with the body which requires our consideration. Not only is it true that every limb requires to be exercised for its own sake, but it is also true that each limb requires to be exercised for the benefit of the rest. Nay more, the advantage of each limb in particular is best secured when it co-operates for the general good. The harmonious development of the whole body requires the action of each part for the benefit of all; and each attains its own greatest strength when its efforts are not limited to itself. The exercise of the arms promotes the strength and growth of the arms; but it also promotes the strength and growth of the whole body. The exercise of the limbs promotes the strength and growth of the limbs; but it also promotes the strength and growth of the whole body. Moreover, to secure the full development of the arm, it is not enough that the arm be moved when some purpose of its own is to be served, but it must be ready to

perform whatever services it can render to any part of the body. Were the arms to refuse moving, or the limbs to refuse moving, unless some special advantage of their own were to be gained, not only would they do irreparable damage to the whole body, but they would dry up the fountain of their own strength. Under the blighting curse of selfishness, they would become shrivelled and weak. The idea of not troubling themselves for the advantage of others, would be quite suicidal.

But if any

Now, the same holds good of the body of Christ, which is his church. The members of Christ's body are all connected with one another; and whether one member suffer all the members suffer along with it, or one member be honoured all the members rejoice with it. There should be no schism in the body, but the members should have the same care one for another. Undoubtedly it is the duty of each individual Christian to look well to his own growth in grace; and he should be constantly occupied with the use of those means which have been appointed for this purpose. Every Christian grace it should be his endeavour to maintain in vigorous exercise. man confine his attention to himself, even to his own spiritual improvement, let him labour with ever so much zeal, he is acting in contravention of the fundamental principles of the Gospel. The substance of the decalogue, that we love the Lord with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our strength, and with all our mind, and our neighbour as our selves, continues to be the substance of Christian duty. Every member of the body of Christ is bound to consult for the good of the whole. We are to look, not simply every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. A generous spirit is pre-eminently the spirit of the Gospel. Where the love of Christ has been truly felt, it

will prompt to persevering efforts for the conversion and improvement of others. The genuine believer, catching a portion of that matchless love which throbbed in the breast of Christ, will be ready to make all sacrifices, and to undergo all labours, that he may promote the advancement of the Gospel.

And this readiness to labour for the benefit of others, serves, as in the case of the body, two most important purposes. In the first place, it promotes the extension of the church. It promotes the spiritual health of the whole body of Christ. When believers take a generous interest in each other's welfare, they are employing the most direct means for strengthening and elevating the whole Christian church. And their labours and sacrifices should have a respect to the different spheres of Christian duty. When a stone falls upon the placid surface of a lake, one circle after another, with ever widening circumference, is seen to move over its waters, until they are lost in the distance; an emblem of the different spheres of duty with which every believer should consider himself surrounded. As connected with some family circle, it is the duty of each of you to labour, with unwearied zeal, for the spiritual good of all who belong to it. As connected with a particular Christian society, it is your duty to contribute liberally to its support, and to take an interest in all its plans of usefulness. As connected with a widely-extended Christian denomination, it is incumbent upon you to consult the advantage of the whole body, and to aid in supporting every institution connected with it. And as members of the church universal, it is your duty, both to pray that Jerusalem may become the praise of the whole earth, and to employ every suitable means for extending the triumphs of the Gospel, that Jesus may reign over the subjugated nations of the world. And were all who bear

the Christian name to act faithfully upon these patriotic and self-denying principles, who can tell how speedily the bright visions of prophecy might be realised, and the mountain of the Lord's house fill the whole earth? The active co-operation of each individual member is necessary to the full and harmonious development of the whole body.

But, further, the exercise of the large and generous spirit which I have described, is necessary to the growth and health of the individual member himself. Who is the Christian that will make rapid progress in all the graces of the Gospel, that will speedily become meet for the inheritance of the saints in light, that will shine like a star in the firmament of heaven? The man who confines his attention almost entirely to himself,

whose bosom scarcely ever throbs with a generous emotion, from whom it is like pulling a tooth to procure any help for a Christian object? As well might you affirm that, in the body, that would become the strongest arm which was never lifted from the side for the benefit of the body, but only moved when it had some purpose of its own to serve. No, be assured, the most direct method of promoting your own spiritual good, is to labour for the spiritual good of others. There are some professing Christians who wrap themselves up in a cloak of selfishness, who are concerned, it may be, about their spiritual state, who spend their days in seeking comfort, but leanness continues the characteristic of their souls. They are not the men of whom it can be said that their profiting appears to all. Let them open their hearts to the generous emotions of the Gospel; let them select some walk of Christian usefulness, and be of service in their day and generation; let them gather the neglected young around them in the Sabbathschool; let them contribute both time and money to the support of

benevolent and religious objects; let them consult for the good of Christ's whole body; and these labours, flowing from the love of Christ, and fostering the love of Christ, will do more to strengthen their faith, and to infuse joy into their hearts, than a lifetime of solitary meditation. Far

be it from me to substitute these labours in the room of the private exercises of religion. The Saviour's maxim here finds a most appropriate application: "These things ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone." While you are to seek your own spiritual good by efforts specially directed to that purpose, you are, at the same time, to seek the spiritual good of others; and the combination of these two objects will both produce the greatest amount of good to the Church at large, and the greatest amount of good to your own souls.

Oh, what an intimate bond is it by which believers are united to their Lord, and to one another! Every follower of Christ is the brother of every other Christian that breathes. They may be strangers to one another while pursuing their several courses upon earth; but they are animated by the same spirit, the same life-blood flows through their souls,

the same God is their father, and the same Jesus is the elder brother of them all. They form one great family, actuated by similar views, exposed to similar dangers, and destined to dwell for ever in the same happy home. Who should love each other, then, if not the followers of Christ? Who should take such an interest in each other's welfare? Who should sympathise with each other with such a depth of emotion? Surely a love that is to outlive death, and to flourish with augmented power in heaven, should have free scope given to it upon earth, that it may treasure up for future enjoyment many pleasing recollections of benefits given and received during the day of conflict and probation. When companions in arms have retired from the scene of battle, will not their hearts be the more knit to each other, and their pleasure in each other's society be increased by every recollection of help either given or received amid the dangers of the field? So, in heaven, the happiness and love of the saints will be augmented by the remembrance of every cup of cold water which they may have given in the name of Christ to any Christian soldier wearied with the burden and heat of the day.

BOTANICAL THEOLOGY. THE BEING OF GOD. No. III.

BY THE REV. DAVID SMITH.

IN further illustration of the argument for the being of God from the constitution of vegetable bodies, we would refer to the mechanical organization for the nourishing of the plant. The provision for the nourishment of a vegetable body is, in nature, something analogous to that which, in art, is made for the reparation or enlargement of a material fabric. It is, in fact, just a provision for supplying the wastes of time and accident, and for promoting and securing the natural growth of the plant. In this point

of view, the evidence of design will appear obvious and striking. When a house requires to be repaired or enlarged, there are certain mechanical contrivances which are put in requisition for this purpose. Scaffolding is erected, inclined planes are laid, and windlasses are fixed, in order that the materials for building may be raised, and the workmen have a place on which to carry on their operations. Such provisions, viewed in connexion with their obvious end, suggest at once, even to the most

unreflecting, the presence of a designing mind arranging and disposing all in intended subserviency to the reparation or alteration of the structure. Now, in every plant, which is just a vegetable structure requiring reparation and renovation every year, we have mechanical contrivances of the very same character; that is, contrivances for collecting, conveying, and disposing the materials of nourishment,—with this difference, that instead of being rude and clumsy, they are of the most delicate and artificial kind; and, instead of being mere temporary expedients, they are a permanent part of the constitution of the plant. They are chiefly twothe root and the foliage, which are connected together by the vessels of the trunk.

In referring in a former paper to the root as a mechanical organization for fixing the plant, we remarked, that it answered this purpose as completely as if this had been the sole end of it. We may make the same remark now in reference to it as an organization for nourishing the plant. It is, in every respect, so admirably contrived for drawing from the earth that kind of nourishment which the soil is fitted to yield, namely, water, more or less loaded with vegetable and animal matter, and the several gases with which it may happen to be charged, that it could not have been more perfectly adapted to the purpose, though no other end had had to be served. Observe, first of all, how admirably contrived it is, by its form and position, for collecting moisture. Instead of striking perpendicularly down, and in a single root, it spreads and ramifies itself in every direction immediately below the surface, just where there is most moisture and earthy matter to collect, till it has covered all round, to an extent, in every case proportioned to its size, with a thick net of fibres. No system of drains could have been laid out with more obvious skill to

draw to a point all the water in a field, than is a system of tree roots to draw to the tree all the nourishment within the circle of its influence. But, observe still farther, how admirably contrived it is for extracting and conveying the moisture with which it comes into contact. The countless fibres of the root, the small as well as the great, are literally just so many capillary tubes, bored and hollowed as visibly for the purpose of transmitting the moisture to the trunk, as are pipes for the conveyance of water; and not only so, but each of these fibres is armed, so to speak, at its extremity with a sponge-like apparatus, by means of which it imbibes the varicd nutritive juices inherent in the soil, so that we may justly regard the radicles or small roots, many of them not larger in size than a hair, as so many mouths, through which the plant sucks in its nourishment, and answering the same purpose in the vegetable which the mouth and throat do in the animal. That we rightly interpret the design of the contrivance in question, has been satisfactorily demonstrated by experiments. Two carrots were placed in water— the one immersed, the other only brought into contact with the water by its extremity; and the result was, not only that water was absorbed in both cases, but that equal quantities were absorbed. But there is still something more in the root, considered as a contrivance for furnishing nourishment to the plant. It appears, we would add, to be endowed with a strange mysterious power, something almost like instinct, of seeking out for itself the nourishment it requires; so that it will push its fibres in the direction in which nourishment is to be obtained, while it will withdraw them from the contrary side. Thus, when a tree which requires much moisture, has been planted in a dry soil in the vicinity of water, it has been observed that the larger proportion of its roots have

been directed towards the water. A remarkable instance of this kind of vegetable instinct is mentioned as occurring in the valley of the Earn, in Perthshire. A tree planted in a scanty soil by the bank of a stream, over which, in its immediate vicinity, a foot bridge covered with turf had been erected, taking advantage of this circumstance, pushed its roots through the dead turf of the bridge, till they fastened in the fertile soil, which happened to be on the other side of the stream; and then strengthening and swelling its new organ of communication, drew sufficient nourishment from this source to supply all the wants of

nature.

By these remarkable properties of the root, some of the disadvantages arising from the stationary character of plants, which cannot, like animals, move about in quest of food, are partially overcome. But it is obvious they are so only within a very limited extent. The nourishment contained in a few square yards of surface, for such is the narrow range of an ordinary tree root, must soon be exhausted. How, then, is this want to be supplied, and the plant continue to be supported-for what are the most exquisitely constructed organs without materials on which they can be exercised? Now, this is effected by two expedients, which serve very remarkably to enhance the evidence of creative forethought or design. The first is the attraction which plants have for moisture. Though they cannot go abroad like animals in search of it, they can do what is the next thing to this; they can, to some extent, bring it to them. "Trees," says the Journal of a Naturalist, "have long been noted as great attractors of humidity. A strongly marked in stance of this was witnessed by myself. The weather had previously been very fine and dry, and the road in a dusty state; but a fog coming on, an ash-tree hanging over the

road was dripping with water so copiously, that the road beneath was in a puddle when the other parts continued dry, and manifested no appearance of humidity." What, however, is especially to be remarked here is, that the provision for receiving and distributing the moisture attracted is so contrived, that that moisture is first and principally made to descend where it is most needed, and will be most immediately taken in by the roots. We have already stated that the extremities of the roots are the absorbing organs; and as the extremities of the branches correspond to those of the roots, the one just answering in extent to the other, it will appear obvious, that the moisture from the branches falling, as it will, from their outer extremities, will drop most profusely on the extremities of the roots, that is, the line of a tree's absorbing powers, and the line of its drip will be always the same. But water is not the only kind of nutriment which the roots of a plant need. A tree requires to be manured as well as refreshed. The substances which are taken from the ground must be returned to it, or else it will yield no further nourishment. And, accordingly, the great object of agricultural cultivation is just to do this

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to bring to the plant or place within its range such a supply of material as natural means cannot furnish it with in the situation where it grows. But what shall do for the plants of nature, that which man does for the cultivated kinds? they left helpless? No. Their Creator has provided them with a remedy. What man does for the cultivated plants, the wild plants do for themselves. Shedding their leaves all around them, and thickest where their roots lie, they become self-manured; and no manure, physiologists inform us, is better for a plant than its own produce. Liebig mentions that a poor vine-dresser in Germany, being so poor as to be unable to pur

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