at the alleged great increase of infidelity in the rising generation, and at the gradual alienation of the intellect of the country from Christianity as it is most frequently set before them. If this be true, ought we not to ask ourselves whether it may not be owing to the exceedingly effeminate tone of much of our popular teaching, and whether the time has not come for the preaching of a manlier aspect of our faith? Ought not fathers of families to give heed, and teach their sons a religion which is not afraid of the light of day, and help them to distinguish between the faith or loyalty to the Son of God by which men are saved, and inherited notions and opinions which, whether they are believed or not, have no tendency whatever to make us wiser or better men?

I will not believe for a moment that there is anything in true religion which is necessarily distasteful to intelligent men; for whatever the deceitfulness of the human heart may be, and however difficult it may be to act up ourselves to our highest standard of what we know to be right, I never remember having met with any one who did not admire what was good and pure and self-denying in others, whenever it is seen to be the genuine thing; and it in no way follows, because a man has no patience to listen to feeble platitudes and defective logic, that the love of Christ may not be shed abroad in his heart. But although men may be willing to admire goodness in the abstract,

it is often very difficult to induce them, especially when they are young, to devote themselves to the conquest of their besetting sin; and it really seems as if affliction were absolutely necessary to chastise our rebellious spirit, and force us to pursue the things which belong to our everlasting peace. This is no mere theory, but a matter of common experience, and yet how few really believe it till they have tried it! Therefore, whenever our time comes, let us bear in mind the apostolic advice (for the experience of mankind in the method of drawing near to God is surely as much worthy of study as any other form of wisdom), and let us take it as at the hands of One Who chastens not for His pleasure, but for our profit; and although there may be much to perplex us whenever we think of the relation of God to the world in which we live, we shall find that the course of it is really and truly, so far as the education of our souls is concerned, so peaceably ordered by His governance, that those who seek to live as His children are able to serve him joyfully in all godly quietness, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

XXIV.

The Harm of Pious Frauds.

"What man is like Job, who drinketh up scorning like water?.. For he hath said, It profiteth a man nothing that he should delight himself with God."-JOB Xxxxiv. 7, 9.

I NEED scarcely say that it is not known by whom the Book of Job was composed, nor at what period it was written; but from the fact that the great question debated in it is, how to reconcile the sufferings of good men with the justice and goodness of God, it looks very much as if it was composed at some period of Jewish history when men were beginning to discover that the traditional theory, that national or individual suffering was the consequence of national or individual sin, was often in glaring contradiction to the facts of their experience, and that it was quite possible to conceive instances of the greatest affliction in men or nations whom it would be gross injustice to pronounce sinners above all other men or nations on whom no such calamities had fallen. No doubt the fortunes of a people are very much bound up with

their character and conduct, and in its general tendency it is evident that godliness must have the promise of this life as well as of that which is to come; but it is a very different thing to assert, in the spirit of those who inquired, "Lord, hath this man sinned, or his parents, that he was born blind?" that the outward fortune accurately corresponds to moral desert in the life of each individual, and that the righteous or God-fearing man or nation shall be specially and supernaturally protected from the ordinary accidents and trials which belong to our lot in life, and which are manifestly necessary to call into action the hidden resources of our nature, to train us in fortitude and patience and resignation, to put us upon our metal, and compel us to organize victory out of the materials of defeat.

Now that life and immortality have been brought to light, and we have actually before us the example of a Divine yet human Being, Who for our sakes descended to the lowest depths of human misery in order to show us how the worst evils that men have to endure may be more than conquered in the power of Him that loved us, and Who is training us to partake of His own nature, it is comparatively easy to console ourselves with the thought that God loves where He chastens, and that although no chastisement for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous, nevertheless afterwards it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness to

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them which are exercised thereby;" but when good men suffered in ancient days, before the light of the gospel had shone upon the world, it must have been very difficult indeed for those who trusted in God, and believed in Him as the Rewarder of them that diligently seek Him, to know how to reconcile their afflictions with the government of the All-wise, Allrighteous, and All-powerful Being on Whom they had been taught to depend.

In the person of Job, therefore, we are presented with the picture of a good and upright man, who had all his life long endeavoured to serve his Maker to the best of his ability, persecuted with the very greatest sufferings and misfortunes through no fault of his own, and goaded almost to madness by the exhortations of his would-be pious friends, who had so much reverence for the traditional theories about God's method of governing the universe, that they were unable to perceive the refutation of those theories that was actually going on before their eyes, and in the name of piety required the sufferer to do violence to his sense of right, and ignore the most palpable facts of his own experience; in short, to tell lies for God, lest they should be reduced to the dilemma of not knowing what to say about the government of the world, nor how to justify the ways of God to man.

I would ask you to observe that the picture held up to our contemplation is that of a man who, according