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their nature; to bring out the good that is in them; and to be just and kind. This preaching is plainly right as far as it goes, and it is easy to be understood. But it is not enough. It leaves out the vital and essential substance of the Gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. However excellent some of the individual characters which embrace it, may be, it is unable to raise up the fallen, or to reform, renovate and sanctify sinners; nor is it sure to secure the help from God which is adequate to do it. This is the testimony of those, who, having slowly travailed through years of experiment with this method, have afterwards themselves been "born again," and "justified by faith," and have put to trial the evangelical doctrine as the instrument of converting and saving sinners.

The celebrated Dr. Chalmers made an actual, though undesigned experiment of the self-reforming system, and subsequently of the evangelical, and his testimony is entitled to very great weight. For twelve years he made it the ultimate object of his administrations to expatiate on the meanness of dishonesty, on the villany of falsehood, on the despicable arts of vice, and on all the deformities of character, and to press, with his grand powers of persuasion, the reformations of truth, honor and integrity among his people. The utter failure of this policy can be found in a former article of this Review, Vol. I. p. 19. Thus it is everywhere. A ministry which preaches only social and moral virtues, is barren not only of conversions, but of healthy reforms.

A similar testimony may be cited from Dr. Thomas Scott, the distinguished commentator of the Bible. He entered the ministry a Socinian, discarding mysteries from his creed, and regarding with sovereign contempt those who believed them. He has told us that his motives for entering the ministry were a desire to procure an easy living, and ambition to advance himself in the literary world, together with a natural fondness for reading and study. For several years he sustained the charge of precious souls committed to him, yet aiming only to inculcate successfully the moral virtues upon those to whom he preached. He was content to see people regularly frequent the church, listen attentively to what was discoursed, and lead moral and decent lives. By the grace of God he was after

wards led, through an experimental conflict, to understand the evangelical doctrines and to perceive that fallen man, both body and soul, is indeed carnal, sold under sin, not subject to the law of God, and that man must be renewed in the spirit of his mind, new created unto good works, born of the Spirit of God. This doctrine he ever after preached with good effect in opening the eyes of sinners, and turning them from darkness unto light and from the power of Satan unto God. He says:

....

"I had scarce begun this new method of preaching, when a new and unexpected effect was produced by it. Application was made to me by persons in great distress about their souls; their conscience being awakened to a sense of their lost condition by nature and practice, they were anxious in inquiring what they must do to be saved. I see the powerful effects of these doctrines continually among those to whom I preach; experience the power of them daily in my own soul; and while by meditating on, and rejoicing in the cross of Christ, I find the world crucified unto me, and I unto the world; by preaching Jesus Christ and him crucified, I see notoriously immoral persons influenced to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts, and to live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world."

Such men testify that which they have known and seen. There is no lack of similar testimony at hand, from present and past

ages.

Another confirmatory evidence in support of our faith which we must not overlook, is furnished in the religious wants of the soul. God has revealed the doctrines to fit these spiritual wants. The heart has certainly been impure, unholy, unthankful, selfish, lost. This is felt to be true by every serious minded sinner, however free his life may have been from scandalous vices. Tell him to honor his nature, and develop it, and be good, and then he will be saved by his goodness-alas, it is to mock his weak will and disordered nature; it is to feed his ever craving aspirations and his hungry heart with husks.

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There are some who may say that they are conscious of no such wants, and that their necessities are met by other systems. They feel no deep sense of depravity, and are conscious of no need of an atonement for sin, and no need of regeneration by the Holy Spirit. This may be true. They are missing the light, and are struggling under the law, and a veil is on their

hearts. But as soon as they consider their spiritual condition with real earnestness and come to themselves, their souls do hunger for the bread which gives life to the dead. The testimony of Christian experience now and at all times establishes the point that the convicted conscience stretches out its hands for the grace which can renew ; it finds no real rest except in an almighty Saviour and a quickening Spirit. From all human comforters, from all rationalistic gospels, from all cold, barren schemes of naturalists and moralists, it turns away despairingly, and comes for its hope and help to the foot of the cross, to the fountain of living waters, of which if a man drink it shall be in him a well of water, springing up into everlasting life. In the fountain where the Christian first found life, he continues, lifelong, to obtain it, and to derive from it peace, joy, charity, strength for all good works. Thus the Gospel doctrine is practical; it is the basis, and the root, and the inner life, of all the vital Christian practice in the world.

ARTICLE II.

TO IDAHO AND MONTANA: WANDERINGS THERE: RETURNING.

BY WILLARD BARROWS, Esq., davenport, Iowa.

IN the month of July, 1862, a Mr. George Fairweather and brother with another man, were hunting for gold mines on the Yellowstone and Gallatin's Rivers, they being the head waters of the Missouri. The Blackfeet Indians were hostile to the whites, and the party being discovered by them were pursued. Fairweather and his company fled toward the grounds of the Bannack Indians, on the sources of the Stinking-water* River, hotly pursued by the Blackfeet for several days. The miners at last

To this unfortunate name for a river we are compelled to add the following in this Article: Horse-prairie Creek, Grasshopper Creek, Bitter-root Valley and Snake River. The territories are abundant in this nomenclature. We suggest that the local authorities change all this with the least delay. Names wholly Indian would be vastly preferable.

found a resting place on a small stream now called Alder Gulch, a branch of the above, the Indians having given up the chase. Late one afternoon, one of the brothers wandered from the camp down the creek with his spade and pan, and actuated more by curiosity than a knowledge of the existence of gold, he dug a small hole on the bank of the creek, some five feet deep, and came upon a rich deposit of the precious metal. The party were in an unknown country, and their provisions nearly exhausted; but they prospected the gulch until satisfied of the richness of the ground, and the extent of the mines.

This was the original discovery of the gold fields of Idaho. The claims of Fairweather and Company are still being worked with great success, and are located on the east bank of the creek, about two hundred yards up the stream from the foot of Main Street, Virginia City, now Montana Territory. The news soon spread of the discovery of gold in this region, and miners from Boisce, Nevada, California and Salt Lake, Colorado, Utah, and even the States, began to pour in to the newly discovered mines, until by the first of December over two thousand people were in search of gold in and around where Virginia City now stands. Discoveries were soon made at Bannack, Bevins' Gulch, Summit and other points. The nearest market for provisions was Great Salt Lake valley, from whence supplies came in and were sold at extravagant prices. Game was plenty, and the inhabitants, thus suddenly thrown together without sufficient supplies for the winter, were furnished at most fabulous rates.

Thus were the gold mines of Idaho discovered and opened, and have steadily increased in their development, until they are now worked by ten thousand miners, and the average yield of gold is over a half million per week in dust.

In the spring of 1864, the love of adventure and travel induced the writer to make a trip to Idaho and back, the experience of which, with a residence there of a few months, will constitute this paper.

With an outfit of ten mules and four horses, attached to wagons that would carry from thirty to forty hundred pounds each, we left the Mississippi River at Davenport, on the twenty fourth of March, 1864, and crossing the beautiful State of Iowa, we

arrived at Omaha, Nebraska, on the fifteenth of April. Here we completed our loading of supplies and freight, taking with us such articles as would pay best on our arrival at the mines. Our route lay up the north fork of the Platte for the first six hundred and fifty miles. This is one of the most singular streams in America. Traversing a vast plain with no undulations, but few tributaries, a universal sameness in width, current and color, it rolls on in one never tiring, ceaseless course, the same turgid, muddy, sandy, boiling, shallow stream, dangerous to cross on account of quicksands, and to all human appearance but of little value to man, as there are no fish in it, and the soil on its banks too poor, in general, for cultivation.

After leaving the main branch of this river, the Loup, about one hundred miles out from the Missouri, there is no timber until its source is reached in the Rocky Mountains. In passing the first range of the mountains, called the Black Hills, a few stunted cedars are found clinging to the sides and even the summit of the hills, but the wild sage, artemisia, and grease-wood is all that the eye can rest upon, while traversing this vast plain. But of this country so much has been said and written, that it is well known to the general reader.

Of the Indians who inhabit this portion of the route to Idaho, something may be said of interest. The first tribe met with after leaving the Missouri River, is the Pawnees, whose main villages are on the Loup Fork, and although the title to their lands has been conveyed to the United States, they still linger upon their old hunting grounds, being peaceable and friendly with the whites. They are poor, and live mostly by begging from the emigrants, being afraid to hunt the buffalo any distance from home on account of their old enemies, the Sioux. Many are now beginning to labor on farms for the settlers, for which they receive remuneration. They are badly located, being hemmed in by the Sioux. They are very expert horsemen and good warriors, but, like most other tribes, inveterate thieves. They have never taken any part in the robberies and murders on the plains, nor do they form war parties and go in pursuit of their enemies.

We next enter upon the lands of the Sioux tribes, whose territory extends from near Fort Kearney, about two hundred

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