Once again-let us all, young and old, learn anew to see God ever present in His works; to look through nature up to nature's God; and to trace His wisdom, power, and love in all the scenes of beauty or of sublimity that surround us.

Whatever is, seems formed indeed for us as steps-or as "a scale," as Cowper calls it-by which the soul "Securely, though by steps but rarely Mounts from inferior beings up to God; And sees, by no fallacious light or dim, Earth made for man, and man himself for Him."

her? Cannot we trust our heavenly pardoned, loved a repentant soul; Father in the same way and on the but He is unchanging; therefore He same grounds as she did her earthly will receive, pardon, love, repentant parent? In the continuous and me." unchanging cataract I had been tracing the ever-existent and unchanging Deity, and it was but one and an insignificant manifestation of that characteristic attribute of which the constant day and night, summer and winter, rain and harvest, are larger manifestations. We shape our every-day life and plans on the instinctive expectation and unreasoned belief that what He has done He will do, what He has been He will be. Surely, then, we may argue from these material and seen to the spiritual and unseen characteristics of the Deity. His nature, His feelings, His affections, To cultivate this spirit will give us His motives of action-if we may a greater interest in the many use such words reverently-are at lovely scenes with which earth least as unchanging as His natural abounds; will give us nearer apand mundane laws. Scripture proach to and closer intercourse teaches us "in him is no variable- and communion with God; and ness, neither shadow of turning;" will many a time strengthen our and shall not the unresting rush of the cataract teach us to understand this Scripture, and strengthen our belief in it?

So, then, faith has this firm basis and foundation: He hath given to me before, therefore He will give to me again. He hath received,

trod,

wavering faith, or quell some anxious fear, when we are able to reason from our past experience, and argue. like the little Scotch girl of my story, "Father has given it to me before, and so he will give it to me again!"

C. C. P.

SOMETIME.

Some time when all life's lessons have been learned
And sun and stars for evermore have set,

The things which our weak judgment here has spurned,
The things o'er which we grieved with lashes wet,

Will flash before us amid life's dark night,

As stars shine most in deeper tints of blue;

And we shall see how all God's plans were right,
And what most seemed reproof, was love most true.

And we shall see how, while we frown and sigh,
God's plans go on as best for you and me—
How, when we called, He hoeded not our cry,
Because His wisdom to the end could see;

And e'en as prudent parents disallow
To much of sweet to craving babyhood,
So God, perhaps, is keeping from us now
Life's sweetest things, because it seemeth good.

And you shall shortly know that lengthened breath
Is not the sweetest gift God sends His friend,
And that sometimes the sable pall of death
Conceals the fairest boon His love can send ;
If we could push ajar the gates of life,

And stand within, and all God's working see,
We could interpret all this doubt and strife,
And for each mystery find there a key.

But not to-day. Then be content, poor heart!
God's plans like lilies pure and white unfold;
We must not tear the close-shut leaves apart-
Time will reveal the calyxes of gold;
And if, through patient toil we reach the land
Where tired feet, with sandals loosed, may rest,
Where we shall clearly know and understand,
I think that we shall say, "God knew the best."

NEWS OF THE CHURCHES.

THE Rev. T. G. Rooke, B.A., of, has been recognised as the pastor Frome, has accepted the presidency of the church in Romney Street, of Rawdon College, which had been Westminster; the Rev. G. J. vacated by the removal to London Knight, late of Lowestoft, of the of the Rev. Dr. Green.

church in Lower Sloane Street, Chelsea; the Rev. J. M. Jones, late The foundation stone of a new of Haverfordwest College, of the chapel has been laid at Lower Nor- church at Builth; the Rev. A. wood, under the auspices of the Braine, late of Winchester, of the London Baptist Association.-The church at Chard, Somerset; the chapel at Farsley, Yorkshire, under Rev. S. Skingle, of the church in the care of the Rev. E. Parker, has Wakefield Road, Stalybridge; the been re-opened after extensive alter- Rev. J. Harper, late of Horsforth, ations. A new chapel has been of the church in Westgate, Rotheropened at Fleet, Lincolnshire, for ham; the Rev. E. Morley, of the the ministry of the Rev. T. W. At- church in Halstead, Essex; the kinson.-A new chapel has been opened at Umberslade, near Birmingham, for the ministry of the Rev. G Sear.

The Rev. H. Tarrant, late of the Metropolitan Tabernacle College,

Rev. G. F. Edgley, of the church at Bow; the Rev. T. Haydon, of the church at Gillingham; the Rev. E. B. Shepherd, of the church in Albert Street, Newark; the Rev. J. Williams, B.A., of the church at

Hereford; the Rev. F. A. Charles, shire; the Rev. W. H. Tetley, of

of the church at Brookside, Darlington; the Rev. J. Lewitt, of the church in Sansome Walk, Worcester; the Rev. J. Blaikie, of the church in Irvine, N.B.

Coleford, to Albemarle Chapel, Scarborough; the Rev. J. Baillie, late of Bristol College, to Manvers Street,. Bath; the Rev. O. D. Campbell, late of Rawdon College, to Charlotte Chapel, Edinburgh (after MidThe following reports of MINIS- summer); the Rev. H. B. Robinson, TERIAL CHANGES have reached us of Chatteris, to Ely Place, Wissince our last issue :-The Rev. E. beach; the Rev. S. Pendred, of Mason, of Attleborough, to London Swanage, to Droitwich; the Rev. Road, Lowestoft; the Rev. H. T. H. Smith, of the Metropolitan Davies, of the Metropolitan Taber- Tabernacle College, to Shefford, nacle College, to Ottery St. Mary, Beds; the Rev. W. H. Elliott, of Devonshire; the Rev. N. Rogers, East Ilsley, to South Side, Glasgow. of the same College, to Upper The Rev. J. T. Roberts has resigned Stratton, Wilts; the Rev. J. Bloy, the pastorate of the church at West of the same College, to Forncett, Retford, Notts. The Rev. J. C. Norfolk; the Rev. G. Barr, B.A., Thompson has resigned the pasof St. John's College, Cambridge, torate of the church at Helston, and late of Rawdon College, to Cornwall. The Rev. W. White has Middleton-in-Teesdale; the Rev. resigned the pastorate of the church W. T. Miller, of the Metropolitan at Dunchurch, Warwick. The Rev. Tabernacle College, to Hillesley, A. E. Seddon has resigned the pasnear Wootton-under-Edge, Glou- torate of the church at the Brook cestershire; the Rev. J. H. Atkin- Mission Chapel, Liverpool. The son, of Walworth Road, Hitchin, Rev. H. H. Bourne has, on account to Friar Lane, Leicester; the Rev. of continued ill-health, been comW. Wootton, of Dawley, Shrop- pelled to resign the pastorate of the shire, to Coalville, Leicestershire; church in Victoria Street, Windsor. the Rev. E. Watkins, of Pontypool The Rev. L. B. Brown has resigned College, to Ryeford, Herefordshire; his pastorate at South Street, Hull, the Rev. J. W. Comfort, of Bra- and is about to sail for New Zeabourne, Kent, to Ossett, near Leeds; land. The Rev. H. Bright has the Rev. J. Pidston, of Ottery St. resigned his pastorate at Earl's Mary, to Hemyock and Saint Hill; Colne, Essex. The Rev. C. Stovell the Rev. J. Meridith, of Pontypool has closed his pastorate at Mint College, to Kensington, Brecon; Lane, Lincoln. the Rev. S. Peacock, late of Caerwent, to Barrowden, Rutlandshire; the Rev. A. Forth, of Chilwell College, to Kirkby and Kirkby Folly; the Rev. H. Rowson, of Eccleshill, near Leeds, to Redditch, Worcester

We regret to announce the death of the Rev. R. Smart, for more than nineteen years the pastor of the church in Freeman Street, Grimsby, at the age of sixty years.

**As "News of the Churches" was unavoidably omitted last month, the above record contains all the information received up to the time of going to press, since the publication of our December number. It may be well to take the opportunity of saying that our large circulation obliges us to go to press early, so that no article of News can be inserted which does not reach us. at the latest, by the seventh of the month.

MARCH, 1877.

THE WORD MADE FLESH.

NOTES ON ST. JOHN'S PROLOGUE TO HIS GOSPEL.

BY THE REV. JAMES CULROSS, M.A., D.D.

No. III.-John i. 4, 5.

THE Evangelist has already told us that the Word was in the beginning, that He was with God, that He was God, and that all things were made by Him; and he now adds, carrying our thoughts forward into a new region, "In him was life."

This evidently means more than that He lived-which in this connection was a mere truism. To have life was His characteristic. Life was that which existed in Him, and of which He was full. In our case life is derived, is dependent, is placed under limitations, is continually changing, must be nourished and sustained by fit supplies: in Him it exists as in its eternal and exhaustless fountain.

The Evangelist's statement at first glance appears simple in the extreme, and we are in danger of slipping over it without much thought; but, if we pause and look, it broadens out and deepens under our gaze all but immeasurably.

Let us, first of all, look into the meaning of the word "life" itself. It is not to be resolved into "happiness" or "salvation," far less into mere existence; all such paraphrases are an emptying of it. It is one of the great words which we meet so often in John's writings, which are used without being defined, and which indeed could not be made more intelligible by verbal explanations. Including its cognate "live," it is found more than fifty times in his Gospel alone, and nearly as often in his Epistles and Book of Revelation. It is the antithesis to death," as is seen, for example, in the passage, "He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.” Our order usually is life and death; we reckon "from the cradle to the grave; we begin with life, and trace it from its dawn onwards throughout its manifold vicissitudes till it ends with the last breath; in John, on the contrary, the order is death and life-answering to which order, for example, is the name which Jesus takes upon Himself: "I am the resurrection and the life;" implying that He begins by dealing with death.

To know the scope of the word, we begin with life in its lowest and simplest forms, as it is seen in the Arctic moss or the ooze brought up from the sea-depths by the Challenger. Even in such lower forms the physiologist cannot tell us what life is, nor the microscopist, nor the chemist, nor the wisest philosopher. They can tell us the signs

VOL. XX, N.S. III.

of it, and the laws according to which it is continued or extinguished; but that is about all. From the lowest and simplest we pass upwards, through one order of being after another, till we come to man, in whom life reveals itself so much more marvellously, in sense, intellect, emotion, conscience, will. We mark how different a thing it is in different cases; to the unlettered peasant and the man of profound and various culture; to the playful child and to the grey-haired saint, ready to enter the perfect kingdom of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. In this passage the term "life" is not to be restricted to any single province, wide or narrow, "physical," "moral," spiritual," or "" eternal," but is to be taken in the whole breadth of

its significance.

Besides the marvel and mystery of life in its nature and infinitely various forms, there is also its immensity of volume-its quantity-its amazing amplitude of extent -all that is, all that has been, in air and earth and sea. So far as our comprehension is concerned, the sum of it is absolutely boundless. As an illustration of the impossibility of dealing with this aspect of the case, a single fact may be selected from the microscopic researches of Ehrenberg: one cubic inch of the hardened clay called tripoli he found to contain between forty and fifty thousand millions of the silicious fossil shells of infusoria. In presence of such a fact our minds are utterly helpless to conceive the extent of life even in this little globe that we inhabit.

All the life of creation, so vast in its sum, so wonderful and glorious, from the life that lasts only a summer evening to that of the archangel who bows before the eternal throne and adores, all that life, the Evangelist tells us, was in him." He is the Fount whence it has all proceeded. Being in Him, the outcome was a necessity. If there is life in the vine, it comes out in branch and leaf and grape cluster. So with the life that was in the Word: it has come out in the vast and varied life of creation. Because in Him was life, therefore this is a living world, and not a mere material and ponderable ball or a world of automatons, destitute of understanding and volition. All the life of which we have any knowledge is the out-blossoming and fruiting of the life that was in Him.

ness.

This "life," the Evangelist proceeds to tell us, "was the light of men." The order of thought is the same as in Psalm xxxvi. 9: "With thee is the fountain of life; in thy light shall we see light." Light is another of the great words of this Evangelist. Its antithesis is darkJohn's usage as to both words is shown in such passages as the following: "This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil; "He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life;" "I am the light of the world; "Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you."

The terms belong primarily to the sphere of nature-the light of day and the darkness of right. But in every instance in which they