been and continues to be carried on free of charge, except for postage, by a small committee of brethren, three of whom do the work of reading, revising, correcting the press, and determining as to the admission. or not of any article sent for insertion. The number of readers is not equal to what the institution deserves, and the conductors of the periodical might reasonably have expected. Its literary qualities are far superior to many serials of higher pretensions, and inferior to none of similar size and price. It ought to be patronised by local preachers, as the work of their own brethren; but especially by those who are members of the Association. It affords mental food for readers of almost any class in society, being real Christians. Private Christians might profit by the perusal of its pages, and Sunday-school teachers might glean from them much that would aid them in their important work.

The Association, so much dreaded in some quarters, soon after its origin, because of its liberal spirit, and so much doubted because of its extreme generosity to its poor, has accomplished so much, adhered so faithfully and undeviatingly to its Christ-like enterprise, that suspicion and distrust seem now to have given place to sympathy and confidence. It has paid over £20,000 to the sick, over £7,500 for funerals, and more than £25,000 to annuitants, whose hearts it has filled with joy and gratitude, because of its smoothing the ruggedness of their passage through poverty to the grave. The widows and orphans whose tears it has gently wiped away and whose hearts it has `comforted might be enumerated by the thousand. The smile of God is upon it, and it is destined to prosper. A nobler charity than this cannot be. If it is a noble work to build places of worship, to visit the sick and afflicted poor in ordinary life, and to sustain Christian enterprise of any kind, it is still more noble to relieve the poverty and distress of men who have spent their lives and their energies in the great work of preaching the Gospel" without money and without price." No one will have cause to regret in the hour of death, having countenanced and helped au institution such as this. If there be regret when quitting this life, one element of it may perhaps be the fact of having left Christ's faithful workers to pine away in poverty and die in destitution. Happy they to whom the King of Glory in the last day will say, "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto Me."

REVELATION ANTICIPATING SCIENCE.

[THE Editors of the LOCAL PREACHERS' MAGAZINE cannot commit themselves to an unqualified approval of all the opinions expressed in the following essay, nor to the use made of every text of Scripture quoted by the writer. The Bible is not a book for the teaching of natural science, beyond the fact and order of creation; but is a revelation of the mind

and will of God, and a true history of the human race, and of God's dealings with men individually and collectively. It treats of sin, of grace, of salvation, of future misery and bliss, of moral principles, of spiritual life; of domestic, social, and political life; of the invisible and eternal, as well as the temporary and visible realities. It deals with men's

motives and conduct. It dominates in the higher region of human nature and its relations. Natural science, on the other hand, deals mainly with the material universe; its immensity, its constitution, and the relations of its systems and of their distributed members; and especially with the constitution and physical history of our own globe. Much has been ascertained upon these and kindred subjects; but much more is still secret. Students of nature have been far too bold in their speculations and assertions; and Bible students have been far too prejudiced against scientific inquiry, because of the unscientific dreams in which some professed scientists are prone to indulge. The poetical imagery of Scripture should be regarded in its relation to theology and religion, and not as interpreting natural science. There is so much, however, that is valuable in this Essay, and adapted to awaken useful thought and to stimulate inquiry, that we willingly place it before our readers.]

NoT from vain or egotistic motives do men claim for the nineteenth century pre-eminence. We may well be proud of the progress made in our times, and justice prompts the truthful assertion, "No days were as ours." Some periods of the past have been called the "dark ages." Then mind, in its bearing upon religion and nature, seemed to stagnate; now we have motion everywhere: man increases in knowledge; he leaps forward, and each bound brings him nearer to a millennium. These forward strides are not chance-plunges after truth, aimless and exhaustive; they rest upon a better basis than speculative philosophy: they are laid upon a firm foundation of fact; "here a little and there a little;" theorised in the silent study, tested in the scientific laboratory, and then successfully applied in practical benefit to the whole human race, credulous man has unbelief chased away; he accepts the work and blessing, then leech-like cries out, "Give, give."

This craving for more is not confined to the corporeal man; the spiritual nature must also be suitably fed. Though not desiring to forsake old truths, or to despise former theologic landmarks, yet we are not satisfied with the same spiritual meat, served in the same way as our ecclesiastical "pastors and masters gave to true Christians of by-gone days.

Man is not a mere machine. It is his duty to progress, turning out better work than his predecessors; or else, Huxley would not be far from the mark when he says, "That man is a bungle," and that “he would be glad to be turned into a sort of clock, and wound up every morning before he got out of bed," on condition "that he should always think what

is true, and do what is right;" but even with this proviso, I prefer my free agency. There is life within man; and that mysterious principle has no more uniform an aspect in the spiritual, than in the political or the natural world.

Man by searching cannot, to perfection, find out God; but he may find out "parts of His ways." God will not do for man what he ought to accomplish for himself; therefore He gives some essential truths in full statement by revelation, and by the same means He gives bare hints, which must be followed out, matured, established; a skeleton to be clothed by man, and presented to his followers by a system of theology, confirmed by science, which is God's revelation also to industry and genius.

Revelation, therefore, never anticipates science by formulating a system, which man has only to apply, and beneficial results follow: revelation anticipates true science, chiefly by allusions, the mystery and interpretation of which become clear as man increases in knowledge; and by never contradicting it. Revelation is truth directly communicated by God: perfect science is truth indirectly communicated by God; man and nature being the media: the two, therefore, when rightly understood, cannot be at variance; for truth does not contradict truth; man's explanation of both may be false or partially so; hence discrepancies arise; then fierce bigotry keeps up unkindly war between some Christians and scientists.

In this struggle (no matter which side is to blame) how shall we act? Before I answer this question, let us look, First, at a few instances in which the Bible was right, but by Christians was interpreted wrongly; which led some men of science sceptically to assert, that revelation was a myth; though when properly explained, it really anticipated science: Secondly, contrast with this, man's false interpretation of God's teaching in His Word; and, Thirdly, in His works.

Plato, Aristotle, Pliny, and Plutarch believed the world had always been; and in Christian faith the words, "In the beginning" (like the mythical commencement of many Eastern creeds, and the existence of their gods on earth), were held to mean some indefinite past period.

Chronologists wished to fix this time. Such men as Usher and Hales arose, who spent years of toil, and ably classified the biblical generations of men, and their years. Their science and theology agreed; the world and man were pronounced 4004 years older than the Christian era.

At the commencement of the present century, however, the new science of geology brought confusion to these erroneous opinions. Men reason rightly from God's nature-mode of working now, about his mode of operation ages ago. Hills are ground to dust by climatic action, and the rivers wash them down to the valleys, where the sandy layers gradually accumulate in position (like the leaves of a book), awaiting other, generally volcanic, action to tilt their edges to the surface. There is this slow deposit going on with other rocks besides sandstone, even though, like

chalk, it be composed of the incalculable millions of the remains of living creatures (as many as ten millions in a cubical inch) which lived, sported, died, then fell to the bottom of the water, slowly, very slowly, building up the earth. Think how long it would take for a few inches of rock thus to be formed; certainly many years, and for the whole of the strata this period of time must be multiplied by millions. Now, good Christians, what becomes of your 4004 years B.C.?

Perplexity, fearfulness, doubt, mistrust, much anxiety, and at last the bold champions of the 4004, declare "geology to be a science from the devil," which unbelievers in these latter days cultivate, that by it they may uproot the faith. Men of eminence even regarded the new science as an enemy to revelation: but do we now? No. We have been taught to re-interpret, and we see that the Bible anticipated science, by "in the beginning," meaning cons upon eons back, when as some one says, "Once in obedience to the Almighty fiat, our wondrous and mysterious globe, now so perfectly developed, was first called into existence, and comprised only the rudiments of a world."

Again. Our days are twenty-four hours each; therefore, said some, how plainly Scripture asserts, that for the world's formation there were allotted six days like ours, and that on the sixth, man was created, and marched forth lord of a perfect world. But this is not consistent with the now accepted facts. The opinion was then started, that an infinitely long period passed before the first day's work commenced, and then six literal days followed. Doctors Chalmers, Pye Smith, Buckland, and Professor Sedgwick once held this; yet Hugh Miller says, "it might do as a theory in 1814, but not in 1839 ;" and he, with Knapp, of Germany, Barrow, of America, and others, attempted to establish, that Moses did not understand it as days of twenty-four hours each; but as figurative of an indefinite period, which he wished to teach us also; in fact, as picture stages of creation passing before the eye. But this theory has been found to have too many difficulties; so that Hitchcock and more modern geologists regard the WHOLE language as symbolical; and that Moses may have thought of a literal day, as perhaps the prophets did in their utterances.

Now, we are quite willing to let geologists extend the day from twentyfour hours to as many years as their science requires; and neither infidels nor believers think revelation is wrong, but only our interpretation of it; we remember that "a day is with the Lord as a thousand years." Again. The order of creation, as unfolded in the first chapter o Genesis, is a marvellous anticipation of science and though it has been there for so many centuries, yet only lately has man's faith been established by personal examination of evident facts.

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Moses speaks of the earth's "being without form and void;" which corresponds to the time of igneous fluidity: this passed into a chaotic, muddy, watery waste, which shut out life and light, until the Spirit

"brooded" upon the waters, and "Let there be light," with its opposite darkness, were the work of the first day.

On the second day, God created and called the firmament heaven ; which, with its cloudy atmosphere, veiled the heavenly host.

On the third day the land emerged, and plants of all sorts were created, each having "seed in itself," the birthday of those vast ferny forests, which form the strata of our coal beds. This rank vegetation in a heated, humid, atmosphere, was at length acted upon by the direct rays of the sun; the steamy mists rolled away; the earth's encircling clouds dispersed; and then could have been seen the glorious host of heaven; for on the fourth day God made "two great lights," and "the stars also."

On the fifth day, God created " great whales," or monsters of the deep," and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind :" this was the period of the moving or creeping creatures, sea monsters, gigantic reptiles, and giant fowl; whose time-origin the science of geology today confirms, even presenting to us model structures, which seem of fabulous size, yet answering to the Bible expression, "great whales ;" some model casts of which may be seen in the Crystal Palace Gardens, dwarfing our pigmy race of to-day.

You know on the sixth day "God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind." This next step in the world's progress, the introduction of mammalian quadrupeds, is placed last also by geology: they had no existence here until ages after the oviparous or reptile egg had produced its mighty brood. This was the work of the early part of the sixth day; and now, as the beneficent Creator had launched this law-ruled world into being, it was ready for the monarch MAN; so that "male and female created he them;" and after blessing them and giving them dominion, God "rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had created and made."

This creation of man last is one of the best established facts of geology; and though there are some details of these periodic-days which geology disputes, yet the generalities are true: these facts which Scripture, anticipating geology, reveals, may be summarised in Professor Hitchcock's words, being of deep interest, and now taught by science.

"The world is represented as invisible and unfurnished, beneath a dark ocean. The light is brought in, the land emerges and plants are created. After a time animals follow of higher and higher grades, with man at the head."

In this brief review of revelation anticipating science in the work of the eon-days, those who at first hailed geology as man's deliverer from Biblical superstition, as they called it, were considerably non-plussed when able critics proved the harmony of the two. But there was still left one weighty scientific stone for infidel hands to cast at believers; viz., That geology proved there was life before light, as remains of fishes have been