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Creasury of Good Chings.

THE PSALMS OF DAVID.

AMONGST all compositions, these alone deserve the name of sacred lyrics. These alone contain a poetry that meets the spiritual nature in all its moods and in all its wants, which strengthens virtue with glorious exhortations, gives angelic eloquence to prayer, and almost rises to the seraph's joy in praise. In distress and fear, they breathe the low, sad murmur of complaint; in penitence, they groan with the agony of the troubled soul. They have a gentle music for the peace of faith; in adoration, they ascend to the glory of creation, and the majesty of God. For assemblies or for solitude, for all that gladdens and all that grieves, for our heaviness and despair, for our remorse and our redemption, we find in these divine harmonies the loud or the low expression. Great has been their power in the world. They resounded amidst the courts of the tabernacle; they floated through the lofty and solemn spaces of the temple. They were sung with glory in the halls of Zion; they were sung with sorrow by the streams of Babel. And when Israel had passed away, the harp of David was still awakened in the Church of Christ. In all the eras and ages of that Church, from the hymn which first it whispered in an upper chamber, until its anthems filled the earth, the inspiration of the royal prophet has enraptured its devotions, and ennobled its rituals.

And thus it has been, not alone, in the august cathedral or the rustic chapel. Chorused by the winds of heaven, they have swelled through God's own temple of the sky and stars; they have rolled over the broad desert of Asia, in the matins and vespers of ten thousand hermits. They have rung through the deep valleys of the Alps, in the sobbing voices of the forlorn Waldenses; through the steeps and caves of Scottish highlands, in the rude chantings of the Scottish Covenanters; through the woods and wilds of primitive America, in the heroic hallelujahs of the early pilgrims.

Nor is it in the congregation, alone, that David has given to the religious heart a voice. He has given an utterance, also, for its privacy-for the lowlying invalid-soothing the dreariness of pain, softening the monotony of heavy time, supplying the prayer or the promise, with which to break the midnight or the sleepless hour; for the unhappy, to give them words of sadness, by which to relieve their disquieted and their cast-down souls; by which to murmur between themselves and God, the holy sorrow that heaven alone should hear: for the penitent, when the arrows of conviction rankle in his breast, when the light of grace would seem departed, and the ear of mercy closedthen David gives the cry of his own impassioned deprecation, in supplication and confession. And when contrition has found repose, and the tempest of Jamentation been stilled by the assurance of peace, he gives the hymn of his exultant and of his grateful praise.-Sharp's Magazine.

DIALOGUE ON PREDESTINATION.

"I hope you will not be offended," said a gentleman, "if I declare, notwithstanding all you advance, I do not, I cannot, believe in this doctrine of predestination." "And I hope," rejoined Mr. C., "that you will not be offended if I declare, I am quite of opinion you do believe in it."

"I beg, Sir," said the other, "you will explain yourself."

"If you will favour me with the short answer of Yes or No, to a few explicit questions I shall take the liberty to propose," replied Mr. C., "I have little doubt but I can prove what I have affirmed."

"It will afford me great satisfaction," said the other, "to comply with your proposal."

Mr. C. then began, "Are you of opinion that all sinners will be saved?” "By no means," said the gentleman.

"But you have no doubt," added Mr. C., "it will be formally and finally determined at the day of judgment, who are to be saved and who are to perish?"

"I am certainly of that opinion," replied the stranger.

"I would ask, then," continued Mr. C., "is the great God under any necessity of waiting till these last awful assizes, in order to determine who are the righteous that are to be saved and the wicked who are to perish?"

"By no means," said the other, "for he certainly knows already."

"When do you imagine," asked Mr. C., "that he first attained this knowledge?"

Here the gentleman paused, and hesitated a little, but soon answered, "He must have known from all eternity."

"Then," said Mr. C., "it must have been fixed from all eternity."

"That by no means follows," replied the other.

"Then it follows," added Mr. C., "that he did not know from all eternity, but only guessed, and happened to guess right; for how can Omniscience know what is yet uncertain?"

Here the stranger began to perceive his difficulty, and after a short debate confessed, it should seem, it must be fixed from eternity.

"Now," said Mr. C., "one question more will prove that you believe in predestination as well as I. You have acknowledged what can never be disproved, that God could not know from eternity who shall be saved, unless it had been fixed from eternity. If then it was fixed, be pleased, Sir, to inform me who fixed it?" The gentleman candidly acknowledged he had never taken this view of the subject before, and said he believed it would be the last time he should attempt to oppose predestination to eternal life."-H. Bonar.

LET HIM ALONE.

Let him alone! Methinks it should startle thousands, if it could meet them in their dream of bliss and contentedness with this world's good. Ephraim is wedded to idols; he has chosen the world for his portion, and likes it; he has set his heart upon the things of time and sense, and finds them sufficient to his happiness; his cup is full; his spirit is sated: he drinks it eagerly, and does not wish for more. Let him alone-do not rouse him from his dream to tell him it is no reality-do not disturb his conscience, or ma his pleasures, or wake his fears, or check his hopes: he has made his choice, let him have it, and abide it—I have done with him. O God, rather than pass such a sentence on us, pursue us for ever with thy chastening rod! If we have an idol that we love too much, better that it be dashed in pieces before our eyes-better that the scorpion-sting of sorrow chase from our bosoms every thought of blissbetter, far better, that we be the wretched and miserable of the earth, than that we be left to such a prosperity-a happy dream, from which the only waking will be eternal misery. While he deigns to correct us, there is hope in the very zenith of our folly. While he pursues our sins with punishment, mocks our wild hopes, mars our mad schemes, and blights our expectations, there is hope that he will save us from the eternal consequences of our folly. But when he lets us alone-when. the careless conscience feels no pang, the stupified conscience sounds no alarm, all on earth goes well with us, and no warning from heaven reaches us-when, in the enjoyment of this world's good, the Giver is forgotten, and no evil comes of it-when the laws of our Creator are broken and disregarded, and no punishment ensues-when we prefer time to eternity, and earth to heaven, and sin to holiness, and remain happy withal, start not our bosoms at the thought? He may have said of us, as he said of Ephraim, "Let him alone!"-Caroline Fry.

VICE CHANCELLORSHIP OF DR. OWEN AT OXFord.

"The presiding mind at this period, [1652,] was Owen himself, who, from the combined influence of station and character, obtained from all around him willing deference: while associated with him in close friendship, in frequent conference, and learned research, which was gradually embodied in many folios, was Thomas Goodwin, the President of Magdalene College. Stephen Charnock had already carried many honours, and given token of that Saxon vigour of intellect and ripe devotion which were afterwards to take shape in his noble treatise on the 'Divine Attributes.' Dr. Pocock sat in the chair of Arabic, unrivalled as an Orientalist; and Dr. Seth Ward taught mathematics,

already noted as an astronomer, and hereafter to be less honourably noted as so supplé a time-server, that, amid all the changes of the times he never broke his bones.' Robert Boyle had fled hither, seeking in its tranquil shades opportunity for undisturbed philosophic studies, and finding in all nature food for prayer; and one more tall and stately than the rest, John Howe, might be seen now amid the shady walks of Magdalen College, musing on the 'Blessedness of the Righteous,' and now in the recesses of its libraries, 'unsphering the spirit of Plato,' and amassing that learning and excogitating that Divine philosophy which were soon to be transfigured and immortalized in his 'Living Temple.' Daniel Whitby, the acute annotator on the New Testament, and the ablest champion of Arminianism, now adorned the roll of Oxford-Christopher Wren, whose architectural genius has reared its own monument in the greatest of England's cathedrals-William Penn, the founder of Pennsylvania, and the father of the gentlest and most benignant of all our Christian sects—John Locke, the founder of the greatest school of English metaphysics, to whom was to belong the high honour of basing toleration on the principles of philosophyWilliam South, the pulpit-satirist, whom we alternately admire for his brawny intellect and matchless style, and despise for their prostration to the lowest purposes of party-Thomas Ken, the future bishop of Bath and Wells, whose holiness drew forth the willing homage of the Puritans, and whose conscientiousness as a nonjuror was long after to be proved by his sufferings in the Tower-Philip Henry, now passing to the little conference of praying students, and now receiving from Dr. Owen praises which only make him humbler, already delighting in those happy alliterations and fine conceits which were to be gathered from his lips by his admiring son, and embalmed in the transparent amber of that son's immortal Commentary-and Joseph Alleine, who, in his Alarm to the Unconverted,' was to produce a work which the Church of God will not willingly let die, and was to display the spirit of a martyr amid the approaching cruelties of the Restoration, and the deserted hearths and silent churches of St. Bartholomew's Day."

MATURITY OF GRACE.

Flavel, in his meditations on the harvest-season, gives the following three signs of the maturity of grace.

1. When the corn is near ripe, it bows the head, and stoops lower than when it was green. When the people of God are near ripe for heaven, they grow more humble and self-denying, than in the days of their first profession. The longer a saint grows in the world, the better he is still acquainted with his own heart, and his obligations to God; both which are very humbling things. Paul had one foot in heaven when he called himself the chiefest of sinners and least of saints. 1 Tim. i. 15; Eph. iii. 8. A Christian in the progress of his knowledge and grace, is like a vessel cast into the sea, the more it fills the deeper it sinks.

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2. When the harvest is nigh, the grain is more solid and pithy than ever it was before. Green corn is soft and spongy, but ripe corn is substantial and weighty. So it is with the Christians; the affections of a young Christian perhaps are more ferverous and sprightly; but those of a grown Christian are more judicious and solid; their love to Christ abounds more and more in all judgment. Phil. i. 9. The limbs of a child are more active and pliable; but as he grows up to a more perfect state, the parts are more consolidated and firmly knit. The fingers of an old musician are not so nimble; but he hath a more judicious ear in music than in his youth.

3. When corn is dead ripe, it is apt to fall of its own accord to the ground, and there shed; whereby it doth, as it were, anticipate the harvest-man, and calls upon him to put in the sickle. Not unlike to which are the lookings and longings, the groanings and hastenings of ready Christians to their expected glory. They hasten to the coming of the Lord, or, as Montanus more fitly renders it, they hasten the coming of the Lord; that is, they are urgent and instant in their desires and cries to hasten his coming; their desires sally forth to meet the Lord; they willingly take death by the hand; as the corn bends to the earth, so do these souls to heaven. This shows their harvest to be near."

THE

PRESBYTERIAN MAGAZINE.

JULY, 1851.

Miscellaneous Articles.

OUR COUNTRY AND ITS WANTS.

GOD, who reigns over earth and sea, has distributed the territory of the globe for the growth of nations. The inheritance of our own country is goodly in present possession and in future hopes; and the men, to whom is assigned a position of so great honour and power should be able to work out the destiny which Providence seems to have in view. A few thoughs of privilege and duty are worthy of consideration.

I. Our COUNTRY is a land eminent in natural advantage. Without designing to put forth extravagant pretensions, we may not withold lawful acknowledgments from Providence for the beneficent distribution of its gifts. In the isolation of our position God foreordained the United States a great and prosperous nation. The colonization and whole history of our Christian republic indicate divine guardianship and careful contrivance. European shores would never have witnessed a Revolution such as ours, successful. No memorials of our freedom, no trophies of national disenthralment, would have found a place for their quiet glory on the soil of the old world, amidst the banners of kings and the armouries of despotism. The interval which God placed between two continents was for the good of both and the distinction of ours. Our isolation is on a great scale. The extent of our territory, perhaps relatively as great in old times as now, is becoming greater and greater. It is vast as a continent and in position world-centering. Our Pacific acquisitions give us the liberty of both hemispheres-the key to the commerce and the possession of the globe. Our territory is great in physical capacity. Its rivers, traversing degrees, climates and States, afford unwonted facilities of intercourse, bear away in their channels the freight of VOL. I.-No. 7.

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diversified industry, and like their water which returns in the cloud to fertilize anew the land it drains, bring back to the inland settlements wealth, knowledge, civilization, and religion. Our soil is rich and inviting; the climates generally salubrious; the mountains full of mineral ore, producing coal and iron, out of whose flames arise, in Phoenix-like strength, manufactures and the arts.

The country of our heritage possesses an eminence in institutions as well as in natural advantages. The craft of kings, a privileged aristocracy, and a Church and State connexion are, in many respects, the blight of nations. They injure social life, repress the stimulants of industry, and interrupt the power of religion upon the soul. Our free institutions, on the contrary, nurture mental and physical vigour, and educate into manhood the capacity of the nation. Above all, they invite the friendly approaches of religion, and give free course to the heralds of her sacred truth.

With natural advantages and institutions of so genial a character, our country possesses an eminence in progress whose description defies language. The human mind, which calculates with precision the movement of stars and systems, had no element of knowledge to trace the pathway of American destiny. The 13 States have, at the beginning of this half century, corrected the type set up in Franklin's day, and have transposed their numerals of power into 31. Within a generation the wilderness has been fought back by our warrior pioneers, until its lurking places beyond the Mississippi and Missouri, are known to few besides Mormons and Indians. În the farther West, the shores of the Pacific have become the landmarks of recent achievement. Every thing is instinct with progress. Our country, probably far beyond any other, is advancing in the career of national prosperity, and possesses the active elements of higher development and glory.

Under such circumstances the United States must be eminent in influence among the nations of the earth. Long ago our republican institutions became the dread of kings, and the people's hope. America is the Emigrant field of the world. Hither are many eyes wistfully turned; and here many footsteps come with the homage of the weary and heavy-laden. No darkness of despotism can now conceal the light of truth. Even the Chinese have heard of Washington, and think him a remarkable man. Our country is becoming more and more known through its commerce, manufactures, literature and missionary effort, and is receiving the respect of the civilized world.

Our political, social and religious influence, already great, will become greater in the expanding power of a general progress, and greatest with the increasing illuminations of truth and the conquests of righteousness.

II. The WANT of our country is to secure, under God, a generation of men suited to unfold its true destiny. The question then is, How shall our country fulfil its mission in the raising up of men. competent to the service required?

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