an extent as to leave the flock no other alternative than that of conniving at his sin or abandoning their desecrated place of worship?'

Some part of the fence must have been left imperfect to admit of the wolf so freely re-entering a fold whence he was expelled, as it was hoped and intended, for ever.'

'Remember, too, that what we vainly struggle to keep out is an Antichristian invader, that the system seeks to dethrone the Lord Jesus Christ, and to usurp his place. Abetting this, we are traitors to our heavenly King, and the doom of a traitor must at last be ours. Oh, my dear niece, when I mark how little is spoken, how little contended for, in the name and on behalf of HIM, the Prince of the kings of the earth, my heart fails me for fear. We have each our own party to act with; each our own opinions to maintain, each our own objects to pursue; but I want to see all else cast to the four winds, and a noble stand made, in the alone Name of the LORD JESUS CHRIST. I want more direct dealing with him, and for him and to see human systems falling into their right places, far below the footstool of His eternal throne. The articles say this, and the homilies say that-the Westminster confession pronounces thus, and the Assembly's catechism propounds so and so. Away with such standards, where the battle of the faith itself is to be fought against the Son of Perdition revived to resist us! "To the Law and to the Testimony:" there must be the last appeal, and he is the safest who makes it his first. We raise the enclosing walls of our respective Church-systems so high that we can scarcely catch a glimpse of our truest brethren over

their towering battlements; and, too often, is the throne of the Lamb itself hidden by their obtrusive mass. Lower them, that we may one and all fix an unimpeded gaze on Him, and the consequence will be the removal of many a bar that unnaturally divides us from each other.'

And so will the prayer be fulfilled of Him who never asked in vain: "That they all may be one, as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.'"

THE

CHRISTIAN LADY'S MAGAZINE.

DECEMBER, 1844.

WAR WITH THE SAINTS.

CHAPTER II.

THERE is yet a needful caution to be observed, when investing any community with the name and character of the Lord's witnessing Church. We must not lose sight of the cautionary parable which instructs us, that when a field has been sown with pure wheat by the hand of the divine husbandman, the enemy will watch his opportunity to mingle as plentifully as he can, the worthless and deceptive tares that equally grieve and perplex the Lord's faithful servants. These are not, in the general course of God's providential dealings, rooted up at once, but are left to the great day of separation. And not only in the parable but in other parts of scripture, we are warned of the existence of such incongruities in the composition of what, as a distinct body, we are justified in calling a truly spiritual church, with a pointed reference too to the prominent position to DECEMBER, 1844.

2 I

be occupied by that protesting and suffering congregation. Thus in Daniel, "And they that understand among the people shall instruct many; yet they shall fall by the sword, and by flame, by captivity and by spoil, many days. Now when they fall, they shall be holpen with a little help, but many shall cleave to them with flatteries. And some of them of understanding shall fall, to try them, and to purge, and to make them white, even to the time of the end."

And again, our Lord repeats the warning: "Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you; and ye shall be hated of all nations for my Name's sake. And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. And many false prophets shall arise, and shall deceive many: and because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold."

Such, alas! has been, and such ever will be the case while Satan remains at large, with power to exercise his subtle craft, by transforming himself into the semblance of an angel of light, and his ministers into ministers of righteousness. Is there a congregation among ourselves that would not, if individually called over, and examined with the keen eye of a scrutinizing foe, furnish some instance of unholy living, accompanied with a practical denial of truths formally confessed by the lips, and affording a sample sufficient to condemn the whole company if it could but be proved that all his fellowworshippers resembled him? When the faithful preacher addresses himself to impenitent sinners, bardened rebels, or hypocritical pretenders, who yield a lip-service in which their hearts have no

part, is he ever able to persuade himself that even amid the limited numbers then present before him, no conscience will bear secret testimony to the justness of such description? If it be thus in a land of full spiritual freedom, and where the light of revelation encounters no intercepting clouds to bar its free course, what must we expect to meet with, in records penned by adverse hands, purporting to be those of a poor limited company of witnesses against the wicked spirits who then ruled in all the high places of the earth? Even a child may discern at a glance that the policy of Satan was obviously to put forward some rank tares in the field of wheat, and to obtain a judgment of his own suggesting, not only on their individual quality, but on their perfect resemblance to all that grew around them; as a justification of the sentence that doomed them to be all cut down together in one premature, indiscriminate harvest of death. A vast deal of learning and laborious research have been expended in controversial investigations of this subject: which is, after all, only to be rightly apprehended by admitting freely the pure light of divine truth into an arena where the respective combatants are too ready to assail each other in the dark, with weapons as carnal as the hottest forge of persecuting cruelty could make them: what else are the annals of superstitious monks, mercenary apostates, and sanguinary inquisitors, from which are drawn the particulars of this fearful epoch?

From such doubtful disputations we, however, mean to stand aloof. Our business is to deal with facts, We find a nominally ecclesiastical ruler, sitting in the seat, and invested with the power and