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trated; the condescending goodness of the Divine Being towards man has filled reflecting minds with astonishment and gratitude: "What is man that thou shouldst magnify him? says Job, "that thou shouldst set thine heart upon him? and that thou shouldst visit him every morning, and try him every moment?" chap. vii. 17, 18. "Thou hast," says David, made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour; thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet: the sheep, the oxen, the beasts of the fields, the fowls of the air, and the fish of the sea," Ps. viii. 5-8. All this shows him to be God's vicegerent upon earth; which is the highest honour he can possibly possess previously to his being raised incorruptible, and placed on the throne of his Lord and Saviour:-" To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am sat down with my Father in his throne." Rev. iii. 21.

By right of sovereignty, such a Being demands the homage of his intelligent creatures; but man, in a peculiar manner, by virtue of obligation and gratitude, should render this to his Maker, his Preserver, and his Redeemer ;-obligation, the utmost man can receive; and the greatest that even God himself can confer; the gift of his Son, and through him, the throne of his glory.

The proposition states, that every intelligent creature should give such a Being adoration and worship."

By adoration, we are to understand that reverence that is due to the highest and best of Beings. The original word, adoratio, signifies that act of religious worship which was expressed by lifting the hand to the mouth, and kissing it, in token of the highest esteem, and the most profound reverence and subjection. It implies a proper contemplation of his excellencies, so as to excite wonder and admiration; and of his goodness and bounty, so as to impress us with the liveliest sense of his ineffable goodness to us, and our deep unworthiness. It implies the deepest awe of his Divine Majesty, while even approaching him with the strongest sensations of filial piety; a trembling before him, while rejoicing in him; the greatest circumspection in every act of religious worship; the mind wholly engrossed with the object, while the heart is found in the deepest prostration at his feet, The soul abstracted from every outward thing-no thought indulged, but what relates to the act of worship in which we are engaged; nor a word uttered in prayer or praise, the meaning of which is not felt by the heart; no unworthy conception of such a Majesty permitted to arise in the mind, the same worshipping in spirit and in truth. No carelessness of manner, no boldness of expression permitted to appear -the body prostrated, while the soul, in all its powers and faculties, adores. No lip-service, no animal labour allowed to take place. Nothing felt, nothing seen, but the supreme God, and the soul made by his hand, and redeemed by his blood.

2. Worship, or worthship, implies, that proper conception we should have of God, as the great Governor of heaven and earth, of angels and men. How worthy he is in his nature, and in the administration of his government, of the highest praises we can offer,

and of the best services we can render! Every act we perform should bear testimony to the sense we have of the excellence of his majesty, and the worthiness of his acts. Speak, Lord! thy servant heareth, is the language of the true worshipper:-he seeks to know the will of his Lord, that he may do that will. Every prayer is offered up in the spirit of subjection and obedience; and in the deepest humility he waits to receive the commands of his heavenly Master, and the power to fulfil them. He feels that he cannot choose he knows that his Lord cannot err. Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven, is not an unmeaning petition while proceeding from his mouth. His soul feels it-his heart desires it. Obedience

is the element in which his soul lives, and in which it thrives, and increases in happiness. In his sight God is worthy of all glory and praise, and dominion, and power, because he is not only the fountain of being, but also the source of mercy. He waits on his God; and he finds that this God waits to be gracious to him. He finds also that this God who is his friend, condescends to be his companion through life; therefore his heart is fixed; nor is he afraid of any evil tidings, for he trusts in the name of the Lord. He draws nigh to God in every act of worship, and has communion with the Father and the Son, through the Holy Ghost. He is kept in perfect peace, for his mind is stayed upon God, because he trusts in him. All his powers are sensible of this truth-Thou God seest me: and his experience proves that God is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him. In such persons, Jesus sees the travail of his soul, and is satisfied. But oh, how far are Christians in general from this adoration and worship! All acknowledge that there is a God; all acknowledge that this God is, as is before described :—but who worships him aright? We have the language of praise, and the language of prayer, but who has the spirit of these duties? In most solemn assemblies, how little of the spirit of this devotion is found? We are struck with anything but God? and feel anything but his presence. We do not worship him aright, and therefore we know little of his power to save. Oh, when will it be that man shall live in commerce with his Maker, and in every act of adoration and worship, receive the end of his faith, the salvation of his soul!-However this may be, the conclusion is indisputable, that "seeing life, breath, and all things come from, and depend on him; every intelligent creature should give him adoration and worship."

CHRISTIAN ECONOMY.

Gather up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost. JOHN vi. 12.

HAD these words been uttered by some care-worn miser or fretful housewife, there would have been something like a just pretence for treating them with disregard. Though, even in such a case, it would be our wisdom and duty to consider the thing said, rather than the

person by whom it was spoken: for the wise are always ready to admit what is true and useful, and to receive instruction from any quarter. But in the present case, the two things desirable for impression,-weight in the matter, and dignity in the speaker,-are happily united for the sentiment, when duly pondered, will be found to be of great importance, and he who uttered it was "a greater than Solomon." He who created and upholds all worlds, whose is "the earth and the fulness thereof," who had now, in the exercise of his almighty will, caused the substance of "five barley loaves and two small fishes," so to multiply in distribution as to satisfy to the full the hunger of five thousand persons. He it was, who concluded this wondrous act of power and beneficence by saying, Gather up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost."

I. It is the will of Christ that nothing be lost."

There is a sense in which nothing can be lost. So wonderful are the arrangements and machinery of the material world, that there is no annihilation. That which disappears, is not lost; it has only changed its form. The very things that decay become the germ of reproduction. In the present instance, had the gathered fragments been suffered to lie on the ground, they would have perished as food for man, but they would have become the means of increased fertility to the soil. Still, in the sense intended by our Lord, they would have been lost.

1. That is to be considered as lost which is perverted from its proper use. Bread is the food of men. Had these remnants remained ungathered, they might have been fed on by the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air; but these animals can be sustained by other, inferior food, unfit for human sustenance. "It is not meet to take the children's bread and cast it to the dogs." This would be a perversion of it from its proper use, a causing it to be "lost;" and therefore unmeet, and contrary to the will of Christ. And yet how much of the very food that is designed and prepared for human beings, which would satisfy the hungry and nourish the feeble, is daily given to pet animals, in the houses of the luxurious. And are not some who "name the name of Christ," guilty of this disobedience to his will, while many poor around them hunger for bread or languish in health for want of proper food? Will he, who had compassion on the multitude, and fed them in the wilderness, over-look this? No: and especially not, if his own poor be neglected; for then will he say, in that day" Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me."

2. That, also, is to be regarded as lost, which is not applied to its desired purpose. The fragments were to be collected, not merely to save them from animals of prey, and then to be stored up; for in that case they would have mouldered. But they were to be used for the support of the disciples and of others that had need. There may be care to prevent waste; but the fruits of that care may not be applied to their proper end. What doth it profit if the savings of carefulness be all laid up, and God and the poor are denied their share? This is not Christian economy, but heathen avarice; it is that covetousness which is idolatry, and which shuts out from the kingdom of God. All its savings are "lost."

But there are those who watch against the waste of fragments, not that they may hoard what they save, but that they may "consume it on their lusts." It is expended in "the pride of life;

in show of equipage and dress, in elegancies and gentilities. This is worldly thrift; carnal frugality for carnal ends. But what is so saved is "lost; " for the bread saved is not given to feed the hungry; and the money saved is not employed in clothing the naked, instructing the ignorant, or sending the Gospel to the perishing. These economists are "lovers of their own selves; and if any of them are found among evangelical professors, who, though they abstain from the grosser forms of worldiness, are yet devoted to its more refined but costly gratifications-let them not deceive themselves with a vain confidence, for they are essentially "lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God."

II. In order that nothing be lost, it is the command of Christ, that remaining fragments be gathered up.

"The Lord from heaven," "The Lord of all," here condescends to teach his disciples a lesson of economy-to be practised from dutiful imitation of his example and affectionate obedience to his will, and therefore, to be distinguished, and properly named, Christian economy. Let us examine it.

1. Christ enjoins gathering up of fragments. These were the broken pieces and crumbled portions that fell as the people ate; such as many scorn to collect and preserve; therefore the "same mind is not in them that was in Christ Jesus." What are such trifles worth? they contemptuously ask. God will answer that question, probably in a way they think not of-in the day when they shall want what they now despise. Though the great time of reckoning is reserved to the last judgment, yet numerous instances of a righteous retribution may be observed in the present life; instances in which the punishment is such as conspicuously to mark, and compel to be remembered, the sin which provoked it. Among the homeless, the wandering, the ragged, without settled occupation or means of subsistence, how many might be found who once had plenty or sufficiency, which they thoughtlessly spent or wickedly squandered, in disobedience to the wise and gracious precept of the Saviour. In the squalid cots of poverty, how many a mother sees with aching heart around her, the half-fed childern, to satisfy whose hunger she would now be glad of those very fragments which formerly, while a servant in the house of plenty, she wilfully wasted or shamefully cast to the heap of refuse.

Some have a mind to prevent waste, but they want the hand. They are not indifferent to the diminution of their substance-perhaps they fret at the sight of it but they need the activity which is necessary to preserve it. In a word, indolence is a great foe to economy. Hence the Scripture saith, "He also that is slothful in his work, is brother to him that is a great waster;" though he thinks not so: but God, in his Word, often classes together characters who fondly flatter themselves that they are far distant from each other; and He will cause it to be seen at last, that they whose conduct has produced the same effects must suffer the same condemnation. The slothful and the

waster being brothers in sin, will be brothers in punishment. Therefore, it is not enough that we do not cast away fragments; we must " gather them up." If we would escape the doom of the "wicked and slothful servant," we must be diligent and persevering in our economy, acting from a conviction of duty, an abiding principle, which operates punctually, steadily, constantly, to the end; a principle which not only forbids us to be guilty of wastefulness ourselves, but which prompts us to disallow it in all others over whom we have authority or influence, and which leads us to exemplify in ourselves the advantages and excellence of an active, uniform, Christian economy.

(To be concluded in our next.)

REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES.

THE HISTORY OF THE LONDON MISSIONARY SOCIETY, Comprising an Account of the Origin of the Society; Biographical Notices of some of its Founders and Missionaries; with a record of its Progress at Home, and its Operations Abroad. Compiled from Original Documents in Possession of the Society. By WILLIAM ELLIS, Late Foreign Secretary of the Society, and Author of "Polynesian Researches," &c. Vol. I. 8vo. 579 pp. JOHN SNOW.

NUMEROUS benevolent societies honourably distinguish our age and nation, and, by some of them, the benign influences of civilization and religion are extended to the most distant parts of the globe. Among these, the London Missionary Society sustains a very important position, exciting the admiration of the churches of Christ, in our own country and in foreign lands. This Society has just completed its fiftieth year; and has recently held, in the metropolis, its Jubilee services; some of which we have been privileged to attend. Similar services, have been held in several of the principal provincial towns, and, are to be held all over the country.

This

The operations of this important Society have extended to, the islands of the South Seas, South Africa, Madagascar, Mauritius, Corfu in the Mediterranean, the East and West Indies, and China. At the present time it has, One Hundred and Seventy European Missionaries, and nearly Five Hundred Native Teachers. Society has had, and still has, among its Missionaries, men whose, arduous apostolic labours, heroic Christian courage, patient endurance of sufferings, and, glorious successes, have excited the astonishment and admiration of all who are acquainted with the services which they have rendered to the cause of Christ. Others of its Missionaries have been eminently distinguished as linguists; and have rendered invaluable service, to literature, and, the interests of truth and religion, as philologists, lexicographers, translators of the Scriptures, and authors of valuable religious treatises. The grammars, and dictionaries, of languages, previously entirely unknown to Europeans, which they have