a time when, in the exuberance of As a friend of ours once said, our youthful zeal, we emulated the “ There are some sticks in the spirit of the indignant servants in Lord's forest that have a natural the parable of the Tares, and were crook." Let us not quarrel with disposed to root them out, and cry, nature, or with God's allotments, “Away with them to the burning!" if indeed “God hath made them But we have long since learned that so." If it be said that the question many of these “ crooked sticks," is not what man is by nature, but after all, are “ rooted and grounded what he ought to be when grace in love," and that underneath the has touched and transformed him, rough bark of a repulsive character, we reply, there are some things that there is the real sap of spiritual life. even the grace of God is not to be That gruff, glum, coarse, cross, expected to do for a man. One of contrary, and apparently utterly them is, as somebody has well said, unlovely professor of religion, after to give him common sense. Another all, perhaps, is a real Christian. is to eradicate entirely his natural Many men are worse than they taste and temperament. Whether seem, while many men are better. sanguine or desponding, taciturn Just as there are wolves in sheep's or talkative, reserved or confiding, clothing, so there are sheep in out yielding or tenacious, before his ward seeming very much resem: conversion, the man, to some bling wolves. To seem and to be extent, will be so afterwards. The are very different things. There is tendency of grace, it is true, is to often ice on the surface, while, away to modify these natural traits, down beneath it, is a stream of especially to soften down asperities, living water; or, to use another and give to the whole character figure, quite as readily compre- symmetrical and beautiful develophended in these days of speculation, ment; but never till the “ earthen there may be little show of any- vessel” has been broken on the thing of value on the surface of the wheel of death, and moulded over soil, yet a moderate expenditure in | by the “ Potter's ” skill into a form boring and pumping will develop of celestial loveliness, will the old inexhaustible resources.

characteristics entirely disappear. Thus have we sometimes suc- Those who are naturally genial, ceeded in breaking through the ice, and gentle, and tractable, know and have discovered a wellspring little of the fiery trials through of life; or the Lord by some search which many of God's own dear ing process, it may be by some fiery children have had to pass. trial, has pierced the superficial While it is true that many have rocky stratum of a character so thus a natural crook, it is also true unlovely that we have been almost that many have got a crook in disposed to deliver over its possessor the course of their development. to Satan “ for the destruction of Could you know all the circumthe flesh," and then, such hidden stances of that man's condition, or treasures of grace have been all the events of his history, it is brought to light, as have made us more than probable that your profoundly ashamed of our former indignation would be changed to hasty and uncharitable judgment. pity. Instead of wondering that

We are none of us sufficiently he “ crooked" so much, you would disposed to consider the peculiar be astonished that he “crooked” no circumstances that may have con- more. You would as little think of tributed to warp the character and being provoked on account of his give the stick its unsightly crook. I ugly crook, as on account of his

grey hairs, or a curvature of his he should be kindly regarded, and spine. While we would not, in our put in position. Perhaps he may anxiety to apologise for the class yet be straightened. Perhaps there of Christians of whom we have is some useful place to which his been speaking, relieve them of very crook makes him exactly moral responsibility, or acquit them fitted. entirely of blame, we insist that Some of the most valuable church they shall not be put beyond the members of our acquaintance are pale of fraternal fellowship and of this description. We lately sympathy, and that we exhibit in heard a celebrated reformer assert our treatment of them that “charity that all the bones in the foreleg of that suffereth long and is kind; the horse were crooked but two, that hopeth all things, believeth and that these two, were not set all things, endureth all things;” straight. “And,” said he, “if this and especially that “is not easily were not the case, the horse could provoked.”

never go.” It is equally true of A great and good man once said, many of our churches, that their "I have learned by domestic positive, progressive, aggressive experience, that genuine religious power, as well as their proper conprinciple may co-exist in the same servative restraints, depend upon bosom with much that is unlovely the crooked sticks that are in them. in natural disposition. My wife is Let us exercise towards them à really Christian woman, and I a generous forbearance, while we am satisfied from what I know of make the most of their capacity for her that the grace of God may be usefulness. Considering our Own engrafted even on a crab-tree." very manifold defects of character,

Let us remember, too, that there let us learn to be charitable towards may be uses even for a crooked our brethren. Let us “bear one stick. Instead of avoiding him, another's burdens, and so fulfil the therefore, because he is crooked, law of Christ."

THE EBB OF LOVE.

A LOVE that wanes is as an ebbing tide,
Which slowly, inch by inch, and scarce perceived,
With many a wave that makes brave show to rise,
Fails from the shore. No sudden treasure turns
The long-accustomed loyalty to hate,
But years bring weariness for sweet content,
And fondness, daily sustenance of love,
Which use should make a tribute easier paid,
First grudged, and then withholden, starves the heart ;
And though compassion, or remorseful thoughts
Of, happy days departed, bring again
The ancient tenderness in seeming flood,
Not less it ebbs and ebbs till all is bare.
O happy shore, the following tide shall brim

Thy empty pools, and spread dull tangled weeds
In streamers many-coloured as the lights
Which flash in northern heavens, and revive
The fainting blossoms of the rocks; but thou,
O heart, whence love hath ebbed, art ever bare !

NEWS OF THE CHURCHES. A new chapel has been opened at The following reports of MINISDumfries for the ministry of the TERIAL CHANGES have reached us Rev. G. W. Tooley.-The memo- since the preparation of our last rial stones of a new mission-room issue :—The Rev. H. Webster, of have been laid at New Humber- Manchester, to New-lane, Oswaldstone, Leicester, in connection with twistle; the Rev. G. D. Cox, of the church in Charles-street, Lei. Sittingbourne, to Melton Mowbray, cester.--The chapel in Baxtergate, Leicestershire; the Rev. G. Hirst, Loughborough, under the care of of Rawdon College, to King's Sutthe Rev. E. Stevenson, has been ton; the Rev. H. L. Overbury, re-opened after restoration and re- formerly of West Gorton, to Everypair. --The chapel in Peckham Park- street, Ancoats, Manchester. The road, London, under the care of Rev. H. S. Brown has intimated the Rev. H. Knee, has been re- his intention to resign the pastorate opened after renovation and repair. of the church in Myrtle - street, - The foundation stone of a new Liverpool, after thirty-three years' school has been laid in connection ministry, the resignation to take with the chapel at Malton, York- effect in March next. The Rev. shire, under the ministry of the H. Winsor has resigned his pastoRev. J. Rigby.

rate at Beeston - hill, Leeds, the

resignation to take effect at the THE Rev. M. H. Whetnall, late end of the year. The Rev. J. H. of Ulverston, has been publicly Dearsly has announced his intention recognised as the pastor of the to resign his pastorate at Forestchurch in Montague-street, Black - road, Dalston, London, in March burn; the Rev. O. Owens, late of next. The Rev. L. Nuttall has Pontypool College, of the church resigned his pastorate at Hoghton. at Porth; the Rev. T. Williams, street, Southport, having accepted late of Dowlais, of the church at an invitation to Graham's Town, South Stockton; the Rev. W. W. South Africa. The Rev. R. T. Sole Sidey, of the church at Cupar Fife, has resigned his pastorate at Milton N.B.; the Rev. W. Powell, late of Hall, Camden Town, London ; Pontypool College, of the church the Rev. T. Watts, of the church in at Sion, Ebbw Vale, Monmouth- Dagnall - street, St. Albans; the shire ; the Rev. C. M‘Alpine, M.A., Rev. W. Jones, of the church at of the church in Long Wynd, Beaufort, Brecon ; the Rev. W. R. Dundee; the Rev. A. E. Greening, Waters of the church at Redwick. of the church at Hunslet, Leeds. I

November, 1880.

STUDIES IN THE LIFE OF JACOB.

BY THE REV. T. GRAHAM TARN.
V.-The Pilgrim's Night Vision. :

GEN. xxviii. 12–15. WHEN God desires to make known His will to a human spirit, He is at no loss for a suitable method. He who fashioned man's soul can approach it through various avenues, and speak to it “ in divers manners.” He revealed Himself to our lonely pilgrim by means of & night vision. Gradually the sloping hillside and the twinkling stars faded away into indistinctness, as the hand of sleep gently closed his heavy eyes; but when the material world was thus shut out from view, the scenes of another world brightened to the spiritual vision, the midnight darkness became radiant with heavenly splendour, and the solemn silence of the wilderness was broken by the voice of the Eternal. “And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven : and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it. And, behold, the Lord stood above it." It is now generally understood that the vision was not of a ladder, in our acceptation of the term, but rather of a large stone staircase piled up to the very heaven, traversed by angelic messengers, and reaching to the throne of God.

The thing of chief importance, however, is not the form the vision took, but the truth which it conveyed. The vital question is, “What was its inner meaning ? What was its significance to Jacob ? Had it reference only to the patriarch, or does it contain any eternal truth for us? When the vision vanished, what was left behind, to him and to us ?” Through this vision an unseen world was opened up to Jacob, and he was deeply convinced of the existence of a spiritual realm, beyond the apprehension of the senses. He may have had some previous conception of this truth, but now it stood before his mind, not vague and nebulous, but distinct and welldefined. Henceforth he regarded himself as an inhabitant of two worlds, encircled by two sets of forces, every act recording itself in both the seen and the unseen. This vision, by presenting spiritual verities to the patriarch, must have materially quickened and developed his spiritual capacity. The vision did not create the capacity, it only revealed its existence and its functions. Those spiritual faculties may have stirred in him before, but during this eventful night they were aroused and called into lively exercise, and lifted to

YOL. XIII. N.S. XI.

a position of importance in his nature they had never before occupied. The vision penetrated into the inmost recesses of his being, unlocked its secret chambers, and brought from thence powers which discerned and responded to the realities of the spirit world. Now he was no longer bounded by the objects of time and sense, he would hold communion with the invisible, and revel in the infinite. After this dream he would never think of denying that there is a spirit world, for it was attested to him by the unmistakable evidence of his consciousness.

Farther: he learned that there was communication between the two worlds; that the material was surrounded and intersphered by the spiritual. He was not alone, as he sadly fancied. All day long be had journeyed, and at night he lay down to rest with a strange feeling of utter loneliness troubling him, not knowing that bright angels attended his path, and that his father's God was with him. Now his eyes were opened, and he beheld a scene as wonderful as that which greeted the eyes of Elisha's servant, when, in answer to his master's prayer, he beheld within the beleaguering hosts of Syria a circle of celestial defenders, standing round them like a belt of fire. There, gazing down upon him from the excellent glory, was the God of Providence, interested in the poor, helpless sleeper, watching over his prostrate form with unwearying vigilance, ministering to his necessities by angelic messengers of mercy. What a joyful surprise ! Wbat a splendid experience! To lie down with a feeling of forsakenness verging on despair ; to rise up with the assurance of a Heavenly Protector and angel guards! There was now a surrender, more or less complete, of his life to God, and a thankful appropriation of the Divine Being; he was lifted to that happy condition in which he could say, " My God," and realise that a vital personal relationship existed between them.

The heavenly voice confirmed the impression which the vision had made, and perfected the comfort it had already yielded. The basty interpretation of the vision which flashed across the patriarch's mind was not mistaken; for ero the brightness had faded, these words of assurance and of promise fell upon his thirsty ears like rain upon the mown grass : “I am the Lord God of Abraham, tby father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed. And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south ; and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land ; for I will not leave thee until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of." His father's blessing was now stamped with the seal of Deity ; it bore the attestation of the Most High. Despite his crooked dealings, he was still the heir of promise. Forgiven by his father, he was now forgiven by God. The promise