ing through the world! Was that dying? Was it not

rather to live?"

With these words Napoleon ceased; but General Bertrand making no reply, he added, "If you do not know that Jesus Christ is God, I have been wrong in calling you general."—Archives du Christianisme.

FROM "THE NIGHT OF WEEPING."

BY REV. H. BONAR.

Ir is very remarkable, that the Apostle Paul fixes upon affliction as the mark of true sonship. Truly, he makes it the family badge. Nay, he makes it the test of our legitimacy, "What son is he, whom the father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards and not sons.' Strong language this! Had any but an inspired Apostle used it, there would have been an outcry against it as absurd and extravagant. Let us, however, take it as it is, for we know that it speaks the mind of God. Chastisement is, then, really one of the chief marks of our lawful and honourable birth. Were this characteristic not to be found on us, we should be lacking in one of the proofs of our sonship. It might be said, that God was not recognizing us as His true-born sons, and that either He had never received us as such, or had rejected us. There must be the family badge to establish our claim of birth, and to be a pledge of paternal recognition on the part of God our Father. It is a

We

solemn thought. Flesh and blood shrink from it. look around to see if there be no way of escaping, and ask if it must be so? Yes, it must be, as we shall shortly see, and the attempt to shun it is vain. Yet it is also a blessed thought. It cheers us under trial, to remember that this is the Father's seal set upon His trueborn sons. Oh! how it lightens the load, to think that it is really the pledge of our divine adoption.

We need not, then, count upon bright days below, nor think to pass lightly over the pleasant earth, as if our life were but the "shadow of a dream." Joy within

we may expect, "joy unspeakable, and full of glory," for that is the family portion. But joy from without, the joy of earth's sunshine, the joy of the world's ease and abundance, the joy of unsevered bonds and unweeping eyes, is not our lot in this vale of tears.

Still, in the midst of the ever-wakeful storm through which we are passing to the kingdom, there is peace, deep peace, too deep for any storm of earth to reach. In the world we have tribulation, but in Jesus we have peace. “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you." Nor need we hide our peace, any more than we should hide our cross. Let the world see both, and learn how well they agree together. For it is the cross that makes this peace feel so sweet and suitable. Amid the tears of grief, peace keeps her silent place, like the rainbow upon the silent spray of the cataract; nor can it be driven thence so long as Jehovah's sunshine rests upon the soul. "His work of righteousness shall be peace, and the effect of righteousness, quietness and assurance for ever."

HYMN FOR A CHILD.

I'm not too young for God to see,
He knows my name and nature too,

And all day long He looks at me,

And sees my actions through and through.

He listens to the words I say,

And knows the thoughts I have within,

And whether I'm at work or play,

He's sure to see it if I sin.

When those we love are standing near,

It makes us careful what we do;

Then how much more we ought to fear

The Lord, who sees us through and through.

Then when I wish to do amiss,

However pleasant it may be,

I'll always try to think of this,—

I'm not too young for God to see.

NOTICE TO CORRESPONDENTS.

We have received the communications of M. P.; T. V.; C.; P. S. L. ; J. J. B.; L. S. R.; A Layman; and some Questions on the Gospels.

THE GOSPEL PREACHED TO THE POOR.

OUR blessed Lord appears to have declared to the disciples of John the Baptist, that the favour and mercy which He especially bestowed upon the poor, was one of the clearest signs and proofs that the true Saviour of the world had come. After reminding them of the miracles He did, to heal the sick, and cure the maimed, He added, "and to the poor the Gospel is preached." This is therefore to be looked upon as a true sign that He was the Son of God; and as an assurance to convince us of the blessed fact that the Son of God loves the poor, and makes them His peculiar care. And from this we easily conclude that the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of heaven and earth, regards the poor with the same marked and tender compassion: "for Christ and the Father are one." It is impossible to make too much of this most comforting assurance, or to think upon it too often. The case and circumstances of that very large number of our dear fellow-creatures who are afflicted with poverty, are deeply distressing to every compassionate heart. By far the greatest number of our fellow-creatures are in that condition, that it is only

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by labouring constantly that they can obtain what is necessary for their living. Not that we consider this a hardship, or a very great misfortune, to have to labour for daily bread. It may be the happiest kind of life to those who are able by strength and health to endure

But the trying time, and the suffering time to that class of our brethren is, when they cannot do the work from which all their earthly hopes of a living are derived, when either they can get no work to do, or are prevented by sickness or other infirmity from pursuing it. Then it is that their case becomes truly pitiable, and truly hard. Those are the miseries of poverty, and its unspeakable trials. The strong and healthy labourer rises in the morning, and beholds a family around him, whom he loves, whose wants are always before him, and whose bread he longs to earn with the sweat of his brow, and with the last effort of his strength; but he has no work: he cannot labour, although he would; he can earn nothing wherewith to supply that day's consumption, and his soul sinks within him, almost to despair. He must go in debt for bread: or they must want. If he should get work in time, yet all his wages are required, and more than required for every week's necessities. This is his situation. What are his feelings during all the idle hours when he is compelled to sit over a borrowed fire, and to eat bread not his ownand both fire and bread are insufficient for comfort, barely enough for life! To be poor is to be sometimes in this condition! Or it may be there is sickness in the poor man's house-that bitter trial, which requires all the consolations of sympathy, and all the numerous comforts which money can produce, to smooth the weary pillow, and to avert the worst miseries from the afflicted family. If no Christian friend is nigh, nay, if untiring charity is not exercised, and unremitting care from day to day, the sufferer endures not only the pains of sickness, but many a dreary thought of melancholy foreboding worse than pain itself. He knows what he wants, and what would do him good, but he cannot have it. He pities his wretched wife and helpless little ones from his heart; but he sees that he must leave them

alone in the world without their natural guardian, perhaps without a friend. He is poor, and therefore he cannot command the remedies of the physician; or they come too late, for he was obliged to work till disease had become incurable. This picture of the circumstances of poverty is not overdrawn: it would be impossible to overdraw them: but if we undertook to speak of that dreadful affliction as it is felt in countries which are not Christian even in name, we should be unable to accomplish the task. We could not enter into one tenth of the sufferings of the poor. Yet this is an evil which constantly exists in the earth, and in almost every land. A good and gracious God permits it. The poor shall never cease out of the land. This is the dark side of the picture we are attempting to contemplate. Has it no other? Until the Saviour came, it could scarcely be said to have another. But He is the Redeemer of the poor. Born into the world as one of themselves, as poor, and having no other but the same precarious mode of living as them; having no place where to lay His head, He accomplished a salvation which now He offers them more freely, more especially, more graciously (if possible), than to any others of the children of men. "To the poor the Gospel is preached." It is theirs, not exclusively, nor to the rejection of the rich, but with this peculiar addition, that it is more easy to them to enter into the kingdom of heaven than to the rich. This is their privilege and their compensation for the trials of a mortal life. "Blessed are ye poor, for your's is the kingdom of heaven." Where is this said of the rich, or of the great, or of the powerful, or the wise? But if we ask in what consists the difference with respect to the hope of salvation, we answer that it is not in the way of life itself. That is the same to all. Repent ye, and believe the Gospel." "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved." "Look unto me and be saved, all the ends of the earth."

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The difference is not in the strait and narrow path. It is strait and narrow to the poor man's feet as well as to the rich and many of them are found in the