and more, in successive generations, influenced by the same circumstances. But who gave the fish this variability? The Creator! Natural selection could only continue it. And in those cases where beauty is concerned in the variation of species, but not utility, the principle ceases to apply. Mr. Darwin denies that beauty for its own sake can be an end or object in organic forms. "This doctrine," he says, "if true, would be absolutely fatal to my theory." So much the worse then for the theory. It could scarcely have been credited that an accomplished naturalist, walking through God's world with his eyes open, could be blind to the fact that beauty, enjoyment, and moral goodness were, each in its own place, the aims of that bountiful Creator, who beheld all that He had made, and behold it was very good. The Duke of Argyll confronts him with that magnificent family of the Humming Birds, in which ever-varying beauties of form and colour run through four hundred species. The feathers of the crest, the throat, the tail, are decorated in turn with lavish ornament and changing hues for no conceivable end but that of beauty and variety. Those of our readers who may have examined the splendid collection of these birds presented by Mr. Gould to the Zoological Gardens at Regent's Park, will think this matter needs no discussion, for seeing is believing. Any good collection of butterflies affords an equally strong argument against a meagre utilitarianism. These beautiful creatures are as much designed for appearance as the paintings of the National Gallery, and their lustrous hues may ever remain the envy of the artist. Mr. Gosse thus describes the Brazilian Morpho:"Great butterflies larger than a man's open hand, with the lower surface of the wings adorned with a pearly iridescence, and concentric rings, while their upper face is of an uniform azure, so intensely lustrous that the eye cannot gaze upon it in the sun without pain."

These beauties were not given merely for man's sake.

"Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air:"-

yet the colour and the fragrance are not wasted in God's view. There are tiny creatures in earth, and air, and sea, decked out with charms that meet no human eye, because of their extreme minuteness, unless the microscope is used to reveal them. Yet He does not count them beneath His care; they are not left to blind chance; some crumbs are dropped from His table for their sakes. Such are the "exceeding riches" of His Providence and grace! Why should any view of the grand machinery of nature lead us to fear lest our least interests might fall crushed between the wheels? It is all another name for

our Father's care! All things in heaven and earth are delivered into our Saviour's hand; all things present and to come are ours, if we are Christ's.

"It is an unspeakable comfort that, when we come to close quarters with the vision of Invariable Law seated on the throne of nature, we find it a phantom and a dream. . . . . The laws of nature come visibly from one pervading mind, and express the authority of one enduring kingdom. As regards the moral ends they serve, this, too, can be clearly seen, that the purpose of all natural laws is best fulfilled, when they are made, as they can be made, the instruments of intelligent will, and the servants of enlightened conscience."

THE WORD OF GOD CONSIDERED IN SOME OF ITS
MAIN FEATURES.

PERMANENT, abiding doubt, we have seen in a former paper, is not a condition or state of mind in which a reasonable being ought to be content to pass his days. Yet how shall he escape from it? He looks around him, and beholds a multitude of strange and saddening facts, which he knows not how to reconcile with each other, or how to arrange or comprehend in any consistent system of belief. He is ready to exclaim with Pascal,

"When I see the blindness and wretchedness of man, and the astonishing contrarieties of his nature; when I behold the universe silent, and man without light, abandoned to himself, and lost as it were in this corner of the universe, without knowing who has placed him there, or what he is come to do, or what will become of him after death; I feel panic-struck, like a man that might have been carried asleep to some desert island, and wake without knowing where he is, and without any means of escaping from it. And then I wonder how it is that one does not despair at so wretched a state. I see other persons near me of a nature resembling my own. I ask them if they are better informed than I am; and they say, No. And then these lost creatures, having looked around them, and seen pleasant objects, give to them their attention and their hearts. for me, I cannot repose in such a state: nor rest secure in the mere society of persons weak, wretched, and ignorant as myself. I see that they will give me no assistance to die rightly. I must die alone. I will act then as if I were alone. I will not embarrass myself with the tumultuary occupations of the world; or aim, as my great object, at the applause or esteem of my fellow-men. One thing only will I strive for; and that, the discovery of the truth."

some

A.s

But how shall "the Truth" be discovered? Select the noblest specimen of the human race; surround him with the most favourable circumstances; and desire him to give his

mind, even through a long life-time, entirely to the investigation of the all-important question, "What is God, and what are His purposes towards man?"-how, in the absence of a Revelation, shall he find an answer? The difficulty is insuperable; the question has a thousand times been asked; the investigation has a thousand times been undertaken, and always without result. Higher intellects than those of Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle, the world has never known; better opportunities for enquiry than those possessed by Cicero, the human race could not possess. But the answer-not once but constantly repeatedhas always been, "The world by wisdom knew not God"; "unless He himself shall grant light, unless He shall grant a Revelation, men may resign themselves to sleep, or to despair;" -a solution of the question they never will discover.

This necessity, however, is conceded by some, who immediately seek to render the concession ineffectual and unmeaning. A revelation of Himself, made by God to man, is allowed to be needed; but then it is immediately added, that such revelations are by no means uncommon; for that Zoroaster, Confucius, Socrates, and many others, have been enlightened by the Spirit of God in different ages; and ought to be classed with Moses, Samuel, Isaiah, and St. Paul, as alike in kind, if not equal in degree. We reply, without hesitation, that this claim is a fictitious and unfounded one; that there is no substance or reality in it; for that, while we have in the Bible the inimitable and living Word of God, we have of the inspiration of Zoroaster, Confucius, and other would-be prophets, no proof whatever, nothing, we mean, which any reasonable man can allege, with deliberation and earnestness, as the result of the teachings of God's Holy Spirit. .The Bible exists, and reigns in the hearts of myriads ;-but as for the Vedas, the ZendAvesta, the Koran, or the book of Mormon, they are alike intrinsically contemptible; and, among men of any competent knowledge, are universally held in light esteem. We print and circulate the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament by millions in each succeeding year; and we prove their power, in the hands of God the Holy Spirit, in raising multitudes "from darkness into marvellous light, "-in spreading the knowledge of salvation to the ends of the earth. If those who tell us of the inspiration of the Vedas, or of the Zend-Avesta, or of the Koran, are sincere in their belief, let them "go and do likewise." But they will not be guilty of an act of such exceeding folly. To support their theory by a course consistent with it,-to print and circulate the writings of Zoroaster and Confucius, the Vedas or the Tripitaka, as if such publications could benefit the world,-would, they well know, only cover them with ridicule and contempt. In spite of their absurd attempts to

rank the "Sikh Gooroos," or the writers of the "Rig Veda," with Moses or with David, they are conscious in their own hearts that the Bible after all stands absolutely alone. If we have not "the Word of God"-His revelation to man-in that volume, we are left without one, for elsewhere it is useless to search.

We are brought, then, at last, face to face with the Bible itself. We have seen that the deepest thinkers that the world has ever known have arrived at the conclusion that man cannot by searching find out God." We have seen also that they have argued from man's deep want, and from God's power and goodness, that a revelation, a message from heaven, might be expected; since, without such a revelation, there was nothing left for man but absolute despair. Next, acknowledging the fact that the Bible assumes to be such a revelation, we have asked, whether it stands alone in this pretension? and we have found that there is no other document, of any country or any age, that can maintain any claim to any rivalry or partnership in this great office. Thus while, without a revelation, we can have no knowledge of God, we find that, outside the Bible, we have no such revelation. Our choice, therefore, is practically this :-Christianity, resting on the Bible as its proof and its law; or else, a state differing little from that of the brutes that perish. "If the dead rise not," to meet the Lord in judgment, "let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die!" If we cannot accept the faith of the Bible as explaining the past, and foreshowing the future, nothing but the present remains to us. Like Epicurus, we must get all the enjoyment we can in the passing hour; for as to what is to follow, we know no more than the beasts of the field or the fowls of the air.

But the Bible lies before us, and before we "betake ourselves to sleep or to despair," we are bound, as reasonable beings, to give a patient consideration to its contents and to their teachings. We take it up, then, as if for the first time, and, in examining its character and its claims, we must proceed in the course which a sincere but undecided inquirer would naturally take.

And, first of all, our attention is arrested by a circumstance of a peculiar kind. This bundle of old writings, we learn, was produced by the pens of nearly fifty different writers, and during a period of fifteen hundred years. These numerous writers differed from each other in many respects. Some were great and mighty men; others, insignificant persons. Some were men of extensive learning; others, herdsmen, fishermen, mechanics. Concert between them there could be none. What could we expect, then, but a jumble, a chaos of discordant materials; a mass of inconsistent and conflicting views?

Yet, when we examine this collection of writings, what do we find? The opening chapter of the book gives us the first page of man's history. Omitting all needless and useless details of former conditions of this planet, the narrative commences with that one great week, when the earth was prepared and made ready for man; and when man was called into existence and placed upon it. And what if the whole human race had been asked to express a desire, what could they have asked more, without presumption, than to be told just when, and how, and why they were created?

But now we turn to the other end of the book. As the first page told us of the first day and hour of man's existence, so the last instructs us how man's history on the present earth shall close. Thus, in a single volume, which men carry in their pockets, the whole human story, in its main outlines, is comprised. Can anything be imagined more like an unity of mind, plan, and purpose, than this? And let it be remembered that this book is the only book in all the world which offers to us either of these things. Not one of all the great philosophers of ancient days has even proposed to supply us with anything of the kind. There is no other history of the earliest past than this-there is no other prediction of the future. The Bible tells us exactly how and when the human race began, and how it shall end. Not another book in the world is there, which even professes to offer us any information as to either the one or the other.

We have said that the books of the Bible were written or compiled, during a period of fifteen hundred years, by nearly fifty different writers. Perhaps it will be advisable, before we proceed further, to give a brief outline of this part of its history. We say, then, that the several books of the Bible are deemed by competent judges to have been written about the times which we have affixed to them below: