can ye believe which receive honour one of another, [or, who make idols one of another,] and seek not the honour that cometh from God only?" The very small remnant who are sincere lovers of truth, are those who seek the honour that cometh from God only," for such honour can only flow to man through the truth.

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CCCXC.

It is wonderful that some persons who regard with sincere indignation the selfishness of pride and vanity, of covetousness and meanness, of domineering and oppressing, yet do not see in themselves the selfishness of self-will, consisting in preferring their own will, because it is their own will, to the will of others, contrary to justice, which requires an equal, and to generosity, which dictates a greater deference to the will of others, in cases where yielding compromises no principle of truth or good. The mischief arising from the indulgence of the selfishness of self-will, is beyond all calculation. It is the principal use of politeness, that it induces the habit of checking this indulgence. But this is but an imperfect substitute for a religious regard to the apostolic injunction, "In honour preferring one another;" and "Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God."

CCCXCI.

When the feelings are distressed by a sense of injury or offence, it would be a useful exercise to examine how much of the pain (for although it appears otherwise, this pain is made up of mixed sensations) arises. from a just estimate of the injury, and how much from a feeling of resentment against the cause of it. In ordinary cases, no doubt, the latter forms by far the larger proportion. Nor is such discrimination uncalled for, because, so much of pain from the injury, so much of infirmity; and so much of pain from resentment, so much of sin; and so much of sin, so much need of repentance; and until the repentance for the sin takes place, there can no healing balm come from above for the infirmity; because sin, unrepented of, intercepts all heavenly supplies, except, indeed, the ability to repent.

CCCXCII.

A similar relation exists between religious doctrine and practice, as exists between science and art; and as it is notorious that defective science begets defective art, so should it be believed, that defective religious doctrine must lead to defective practice. Well, then, might the Lord counsel us, saying, "Take heed how and what ye hear."

CCCXCIII.

Those who are prompted to administer praise or blame, should

remember that praise, unless the receiver of it be unusually diffident or apprehensive, goes to increase the sense of his own merits, which, probably, may be needless; and that blame is almost always attributed to the want of justice in him who administers it. An act, therefore, which is likely to cause individuals to think too well of themselves, or undeservedly to think ill of another, should be performed with caution. CCCXCIV.

When the thoughts are so painfully agitated by a sense of injury, that it is found difficult to disengage them from the doer of it, it would be well to try to remember, that as disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ, we have nothing to do with individuals, except to will and do them good. This will probably compose the feelings, and give a new and heavenly direction to the thoughts.

CCCXCV.

The sting of ingratitude is keen, in proportion as self originally entered into the acts for which gratitude is thought to be due; and in the same degree regret is felt that those acts were performed. Acts done altogether as unto the Lord, are never regretted; and if met with ingratitude, this is deplored solely for the sake of the ungrateful party.

CCCXCVI.

As the members of a truly spiritual church advance in years, they must needs become increasingly objects of sympathy with those who are really their brethren, because their temptation-sufferings must necessarily increase, on the principle, that as every one is tempted according to his ability to endure temptation, advancing years, because they bring advancing states, will render the aged more liable to the deeper trials of faith and patience than others.

CCCXCVII.

A. B. receives a letter from his friend, saying, "Rumour attributes to you, and apparently on no slight grounds, proceedings (describing them) which naturally excite indignation." To this A. B. replies, "Did not the conduct you describe excite your indignation, I should indeed have formed a wrong estimate of your character; but you will rejoice to learn that the rumour alluded to, is altogether groundless."

K. L. receives a similar communication from his friend, to which he warmly replies, "If you think me capable of such conduct, you cannot have that respect for me which I consider a real friend must and ought to entertain; all future intercourse must therefore cease between us." Which of these supposed cases best agrees with a genuine love of

good? Can it be doubted, that humility and charity are exhibited by A. B.? or that pride and self-love are manifested by K. L.?

CCCXCVIII.

He who has the fullest conviction that without the Lord he can do nothing, has also the fullest assurance, that he can do all things required of him through the Lord strengthening him.

CCCXCIX.

The greatest distrust of self in moral respects, is the state most compatible with the fullest trust in the Lord for strength and guidance, and thence with the actual exercise of the truest courage and selfpossession. Whence it appears, that there is nothing in genuine humility of the nature of fear; and that timidity of feeling, and humility of principle, are totally distinct and different things.

CCCC.

He who from the natural ground of self-respect, can say, "Under any circumstances I can trust to my own sense of rectitude, that I shall act rightly," may often safely be trusted. His good is of a low order, and therefore not being able to resist any strong interior temptation, is not exposed to it. Good of this character, with educated persons, may be defined as the good of natural intelligence concerning the science of life, which is good of a Gentile order.

CCCCI.

He who is in interior good, looks to the Lord for states of mind adequate to meet, and spiritually improve, whatever circumstances may occur; while he who is in exterior good, cherishes a trust in Providence for such circumstances as he thinks may bring him into good states. Thus, also, the interior mind strives after the heavenly state, that he may be in heaven, while the exterior mind hopes to become heavenly merely by being admitted into heaven. To look to states in the first place, is to look to the Lord; but to look to circumstances chiefly, is to look away from the Lord.

CCCCII.

Those who are spiritually-minded, take the idea of "human life" from states within, and not from things without; and being enlightened to perceive that no circumstances are really bad which are made the occasion of eternal good, and are indispensable to the attainment of that good, they are comparatively indifferent as to what may occur; they say inwardly, "The Lord will provide," and they mean, that he will provide either states of peace, or, in their absence, states of trust;

thus, whatever circumstances may happen, good must arise by means of them.

"If nought avails thee, then, but WHAT THOU ART, all the distinctions of this little life are quite cutaneous,-foreign to the MAN!"

CCCCIII.

It is really astonishing to what an extent the cultivation of theological knowledge may proceed, in company with the barest culture of moral knowledge. This is owing to the hereditary Philistine principle,-the tendency to trust in faith only. The remedy is found in an earnest reception of the doctrine of the heavenly marriage of goodness and truth. Where this doctrine is duly and practically regarded, there will not be found to exist an indifference to moral knowledge.

CCCCIV.

Those who cultivate self-esteem in order to obtain what they deem a proper confidence, are in danger of a greater evil than that which they seek to avoid. Nothing can guard a man from a false estimate of himself, but lowliness of heart; for every one is naturally prone to have a good opinion of himself, and this actually increases in the same degree that he does not deserve it!

CCCCV.

If in meditating any new step, the question were to be asked, "Whose happiness will it promote?" how many mischievous or worthless acts would be left undone by really well-disposed persons, whose error it is, that they do not regulate their impulses by taking thought of their consequences!

(To be continued.)

PASSAGES OF THE WORD EXPLAINED.
(In compliance with Queries in page 80.)

JOHN Xvii. 9, 10. "I pray for them which thou hast given me, for they are thine; and all mine are thine, and thine are mine." These words are fatal to the idea of the Son being, in any sense, either Tripersonal or Unitarian, personally separate from the Father. Verse 9 speaks of a transfer of the saints, or the church, from the Father to the Son, as having taken place; verse 10 states that notwithstanding such transfer, whatever belongs to the Son belongs still to the Father; and that all that belongs to the Father belongs to the Son. This could not possibly be the case if the distinction between the Father and the Son were that

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of Personal Individuality, or if the Lord Jesus were a separate Divine Person, as imagined by Tripersonalists, or an ordinary human person, as taught by Unitarians. This transfer to the Son, to be understood at all, must be regarded as the transfer of the church, as it were, from the invisible God of the Jews to the manifested God of the Christian Church; for the God of the Jews having become incarnate, and the Jewish worship having been abrogated, the worship of the succeeding, or Christian Church, was necessarily changed from the previous worship of an invisible Being, to the worship of the same Being as no longer invisible, but as God manifest in the flesh." But inasmuch as the Lord Jehovah, who had become incarnate, was the Soul, or Father," of the Humanity, or Son, named Jesus Christ, and consequently was One therewith (even as soul and body are one in man), therefore, notwithstanding such transfer, the church equally belonged to the Father as it did before; it belonged equally to the Father and the Son on the same principle that all a man possesses is a possession in which both his soul and body equally participate. In verses 20, 21, 22, the Lord adverts to the great truth, that his Divine and Human (the Father and the Son), are thus a One, in consequence of which the Humanity comes to possess all the infinite riches of the Divine Essence; and he prays (in his character as a man) that, in like manner, with each of his disciples, in all ages, the internal and external may become a one, in Him (or, us," including, that is, the Divine and Human in one, as "One Lord"), by receiving his spirit of Love and Wisdom, proceeding from his glorified Humanity, which is the "glory" given by the Divine to the Human, and by the Human to the church, whereby the external man, with those who are of the church (by nature destitute of all good), will become, by its regeneration, enriched with all the spiritual excellences of the Internal Man, which in its nature is spiritual. Before this union of the Internal and External can be accomplished, there must be much strife between them, "for the spirit and the flesh are by nature contrary the one to the other." (Gal. v.) But through the Lord's aid, in consequence of the Divine and Human having become One in Him, and the Human having thus acquired "all power in heaven and in earth," the faithful Christian is enabled to bring the "flesh," or External, into subjection to, and thus union with, the "spirit," or Internal. This is the accomplishment of the Lord's prayer to the Father in this chapter.—(See I. R. for 1844, page 377.) John xii. 40. "He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart; that they should not see with their eyes, or understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them."

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