DISCOURSE LXVIII.

WILLIAM ADAMS.

DR. ADAMS was born in Colchester, Connecticut, January 25th, 1807, and is now consequently in his sixty-seventh year. His parents removing to Andover, Mass., in his infancy, he received his education at Phillips Academy, then presided over by his father, John Adams, LL.D., who was known as one of the most eminent classical authorities of the day, Yale College, and the Andover Theological Seminary, under the Rev. Drs. Stuart, Woods, and Porter. He graduated at the last-named institution in 1830. His degrees of Doctor of Divinity and Doctor of Laws were received respectively from the New York University and Princeton College.

At the age of twenty-three he was settled over the Congregational Church of Brighton, Massachusetts, where he continued until 1834. Visiting New York for medical advice for his wife, he was induced for a time to supply the pulpit of the Pearl-Street Presbyterian Church, which was then vacant, and soon after he was called to the pastorate of the Central Presbyterian Church.

Under the pastoral charge of Dr. Adams, the Broome-Street Church flourished apace, until, in the year 1853, there was a general feeling that seemed to require a new church organization in what was then considered the upper part of the city. The imposing structure now known as the Madison-Square Presbyterian Church, situated at the corner of Madison Avenue and Twenty-fourth Street, was therefore erected. The new church was dedicated in December, 1854, and from that time until April 13, 1874, Dr. Adams has been its pastor. During this period he has been best known to the public outside of his own congregation by his published works-" The Three Gardens," "The Conversations of Christ," and "Thanksgiving" (which latter work won for him the title of "the Washington Irving of the pulpit "); by his long efforts for the reunion of the Old and New Schools of the Presbyterian Church, which was consummated at Philadelphia in 1870; and by his eloquent address of welcome at the late opening of the Evangelical Alliance. In his case his advancing age has appeared to prove a strengthener of his powers. It is an old New-England idea that a minis ter's best years are from forty-five to seventy, and it is true that within the last six years Dr. Adams has produced the finest results of his cultured eloquence, and that the grandest works of his lifetime have been achieved since he reached the age of sixty. Dr. Adams is now the President and Professor of Sacred Rhetoric in Union Theological Seminary-the office to which he was elected twice before and declined.

THE FAITHFULNESS OF GOD.

PREACHED IN 1865, AFTER A SOLAR ECLIPSE.

"Forever, O Lord, thy word is settled in heaven. Thy faithfulness is unto all generations: thou hast established the earth, and it abideth. They continue this day according to thine ordinances: for all are thy servants."

ON Thursday morning last there occurred in this longitude one of the most interesting of all celestial phenomena. The sun, the source. of all light to our earth, was partially eclipsed by the interposition of the moon. Such occultations of the orb of day are suggestive of varied reflections. The ox did not lift his head to gaze upon the wonder; and some men plodded on heeding the shadow only with a stupid stare. Others of our species beheld the spectacle with the opposite emotions of superstitious fear and scientific delight. As the line of annular eclipse touched the earth, the uncivilized tribes in the path of its progress were smitten with terror, screaming and thumping to scare away the monster fish, who, as they imagined, in their ignorance, was devouring the sun. While superstition was terrifying the ignorant with its own dark shadows, "star-eyed science," from her heights of observation, was watching the anticipated conjunction with a gleam of rapture. It is the first thought which the occurrence suggests the changes which have been wrought in the domain of ancient superstition by true science. Astrology has given place to astronomy. The shapeless forms which peopled the realm of "chaos. and old night" have fled, and the eternal laws and truths of Nature have been disclosed in their beautiful order and harmony. Comets are no more regarded as harbingers of disaster; nor eclipses as the precursors of portentous woe. The eccentricities of the heavenly bodies, through a better solution, become the strongest confirmations. of nature's regularity, and it is this thought which gives to the phenomenon itself its greatest interest-without which it were a mere show; the thought, indeed, which justifies any reference to the event at this time and in this place, because it is connected immediately with religious truths of the highest import; even that the spectacle upon which millions gazed in the heavens, with whatever emotions of fear, wonder, or delight, was the most signal illustration of the undeviating accuracy, the exact precision, the changeless stability of the works of God. Consider how much is implied in the astounding fact that the movements of sun, moon, and stars are so absolutely accurate and exact that all their conjunctions and relations for centuries past and centuries to come can be computed without the deviation of a single second of time. This very eclipse, for example, was foretold, computed, and described years and years ago. The very minute it

would begin and the very minute it would end, in our latitude and longitude, were fixed by science before we were born; and at the very minute announced it actually began, and at the very minute assigned it actually ended. Nor is there a place to surmise that, when the reports of scientific observers shall reach us from different parts of the country, in the line of this recent occultation of the sun, that there will be found the slightest-not even an infinitesimal departure from the point of accurate calculation.

Such precision in calculation were an utter impossibility were it not for the actual precision of the planetary movements themselves. Let there be deviations and uncertainties in the orbits of the heavenly bodies which are reducible to no law, and demonstrations would give place to conjecture, and figures would lose their ancient truth and exactness.

Thus are we brought to the topic with which we are now to be occupied. Admiring the constancy, the regularity, the undeviating uniformity of the works of God, we are bidden to remember that all this is but a confirmation of the still greater faithfulness of his Word. We are not now to be occupied with a mere matter of scientific investigation. Following the guidance of inspired Scripture, we borrow from every quarter-from the heavens above, the earth beneath, and the waters which are under the earth-whatever may illustrate the stability of those religious truths which involve our personal salvation. Nature and Revelation proceed from one authorship. Visible phenomena attest the truthfulness of the one, and that truthfulness confirms the faithfulness of the other. This appears to be the sentiment pervading the verses which I have read as the theme of our reflections. "Forever, O Lord, thy word is settled in heaven. Thy faithfulness is unto all generations: thou hast established the earth, and it abideth. They continue this day according to thine ordinances: for all are thy servants." The allusion sometimes, as it would seem, is to the stability of Nature, and sometimes to the stability of Truth; yet so blended and intermixed that it is difficult to separate them. They form one common sentiment. Resolved into our own idiom, the meaning of the passage is, that the truth of God's promises, in his fidelity to his engagements, is secured by the same divine perfection which created the heavens and the earth, and has caused them to stand fixed and firm on their eternal foundations. How many there were who, as they recently gazed upon the shadowed disc of the sun with scientific instrument or rudest implement, from the top of astronomical observatories, in the crowded street, or furrowed field, that ever thought what confirmations and signs were thus given by the heavens of the veracity and faithfulness of God, we cannot say: but some we know there were who rejoiced most of all in the sublime testimony which was given from the skies, to the certainty of those

promises of God upon which they have built their hopes for eternity The astronomer we will suppose was at his post of observation. He had calculated by diagrams and logarithms, what conjunctions were about to occur. Sir Isaac Newton, who died one hundred and thirty eight years ago, made the calculation that in such a year, and such a day, and such an hour, and at such a minute, an eclipse would occur. The hour was approaching: the heavens were serene and cloudless. His instruments and assistants were ready. Would Nature be true to herself? or would Science be falsified? The chronometer announces that the second of time has come and at the very instant the telescope reported that the penumbra of the moon had touched the limb of the sun. I know not how many of the class there were whose religious adoration was kindled by the lights of Science; or how many who verified in their own case the familiar words: "An undevout astronomer is mad." But had they all, when their scientific observations were concluded, and the phenomenon itself had passed, lifted up a song of praise, and a prayer of confidence to the Almighty Being who has placed a foundation of eternal rock beneath the feet of all who trust in his faithfulness, they would, as we believe many did, have rendered only a reasonable tribute to the greatest of all sciences, the highest of all philosophies-an undisturbed belief in the Word of God. The point before us is that the precise and accurate movements of Nature are corroborations of the changeless constancy of revealed Truth. The moral is higher and greater than the natural. The handiwork of God furnishes but the theatre for the display of his eternal wisdom and love. This visible world is the instrument, the mechanism by means of which the Supreme accomplishes his great moral designs. The verities of Revelation present the vast and worthy end for which the worlds were made, and to which all that is made is subservient; and no one has yet learned to study and collate the works of God aright, who does not regard them as auxiliary to the grand purposes of his Word. The Son of God has carried this idea to its highest form of expression when he said: "Heaven and earth shall pass away but not one jot or tittle of my Word shall fail." The truthfulness of nature will be falsified long before the truthfulness of Scripture. The confidence which man reposes in the stability of the earth and the regularity of the heavens will be disappointed, before any disappointment shakes the faith of those who trust in the Word of their Maker. The stars will break from their orbits in wild confusion, and the earth will be moved out of its place, before there is detected any deflection, uncertainty, or irregularity in that eternal Law and Gospel of God for which the stars and the earth were created.

I know not any truth which, fully conceived, is more fitted to

blanch the cheek of doubt or unbelief with terror, or impart to religious faith a sublime serenity, than those illustrations which Nature gives to the eternal faithfulness of the Almighty. The substance of Revelation is presented to our faith as "the eternal purpose of God, which he hath purposed in himself before the foundation of the world." Redemption by Jesus Christ was no afterthought. It was no expedient resorted to in an emergency for the correction of an accident. It was a design which had eternity for its birthplace, "that in the dispensation or the fulness of time, God might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are in earth." This is revealed as the one object which gives use to creation, importance to time, dignity to nature, consummation to the world's history. And this mystery of His will, hid from ages and from generations, has been in process of revelation, in the august revolutions of Providence. Talk of the wonderful conjunctions of the heavenly bodies; what are these for accuracy and faithfulness compared with those pre-determined combinations of events by which the work of Redemption has been gradually and constantly evolved! They were subject to no human prescience. Man never computed the order of their occurrence. But God announced at the beginning the programme, progress, and catastrophe of the world's history; and revolving cycles of time have brought about, at the appointed place and season, the promised result. Boast of the accuracy of astronomical predictions! What will you say of inspired prophecy! By the mouth of his chosen servants, God foretold many varied events connected with the life of his Church-the advent of his Son, the progress of his Kingdom; and this with a minuteness and speciality which admit of no interpretation save that of a fixed purpose, and lo, advancing ages have verified every promise, and responded unto every expectation. Prophecy! and its fulfilment ! How they throw into shade all the calculations of astronomy; because they relate not to the movements of inert masses of matter, but to what man always regards as the most uncertain and contingent of all things, the actions of men themselves: nevertheless, the plan of God meets and works such signal conjunctions, that the very freedom of man, uncoerced and unconstrained, has so combined at the very moment with the design of his Maker, as to give to Redemption its historical development. From the observatories of Pisa and Paris, from the cloisters of Prague and Oxford, astronomy has forecast and foretold the conjunctions of sun, moon, and stars; and we are amazed at their accuracy: but from the watch-towers whither the Spirit of God had led them, in Ur of the Chaldees, on Sinai and Moriah, on Tabor and Carmel, by the river Chebar and by the Jordan, the old prophets foretold, not in the way of happy and sagacious conjectures, but with minute details of names, places, and times, the advent, the birth, the