getful of the precept, "Children, obey your parents in all things:" the servant winces to bear his inferiority to his master; despising the command, "Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters, with fear and trembling, in singleness of your heart:" the subject scorns subjection to a ruler, trampling under foot the commandment of God, "Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers."

It is the duty of all who seek to instruct others, whether they are pastors, masters, teachers, or parents, to take especial care that they duly inculcate, and earnestly enforce, whatever the circumstances of the times peculiarly call for. If any sin is common, the more diligence and zeal are requisite to oppose and to avoid it. Custom and fashion, instead of recommending a wicked disposition, should only make it the more hateful in our sight. For God always punishes the most signally that which prevails the most extensively.

Perhaps there is nothing now prevailing generally in society which is so commonly excused and connived at, or forgotten to be contrary to the whole teaching of the Bible, as the spirit of independence and hatred of control, which all classes seem to partake of nearly equally. No doubt the state of men's minds on this subject has arisen in part from the wicked and unscriptural doctrines concerning the "Rights of Man" (as they were called), which the agents of rebellion so diligently spread abroad in the troublous times of about forty and fifty years ago. Those doctrines were soon found to be false and dangerous, and were at last generally scouted by all sensible persons. But they were not by any means entirely removed from the minds which had foolishly entertained them. They influenced the feeling of the rising generation to a very considerable extent, and have done lasting injury to the whole character of the nation.

From this cause it has come to pass that so little progress has been made in the practice of true obedience to those scriptural precepts which require us to "render unto all their due, honour to whom honour is

due, fear to whom fear." The natural pride of the human heart is the same at all times; but the prevalence of those errors has prevented that instruction being sufficiently enforced which exhorts us to be "subject one to another, and to be clothed with humility."

May not this be partly the reason why, when so much knowledge abounds, there is so much less of a truly Christian spirit in proportion: because "God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble?" This is quite enough to account for the painful fact, that there have been ages of comparative ignorance, when there was more faith, more love, more self-denial, and a more ready spirit of obedience to the truth, than is now to be seen in the Christian Church. "God resisteth the proud;" and this character is now so common, and the sin of pride is so little regarded, that the grace of God can have no place. "He giveth grace to the humble," but every thing now tends to make men proud, and even to foster that evil spirit in the hearts of children themselves. How few endeavour to root out that sin from the hearts of their little ones; because they will not go through the troublesome method of education which would tend to restrain it. Indulgence of every kind makes it grow and increase, and the neglect of strict watchfulness over all their actions will surely bring them at last into a state which cannot be controlled. Unless submission is taught in childhood and youth, it will be very difficult to enforce it afterwards. The first authority to which submission is required is that of the parent. From this all others seem originally to spring. The king or ruler is but the father of the whole family of the nation, placed over them for good by the great Creator and Governor who is in heaven. The spiritual pastor is the father, with regard to all spiritual things, of the flock placed under his charge. The magistrate is the father of a smaller portion of the community than the sovereign. Whoever, therefore, is suffered to remain a disobedient child, will be almost sure to prove unruly and disobedient in other places; because the same spirit of mind will lead to rebellion in all instances. Besides this, it often happens that even when persons

become serious in religion, they pay somewhat too little attention to certain duties of submission required of them towards their fellow man. It is, perhaps, a hard lesson, but it ought to be learnt. We cannot "adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things" without it. Any thing like a spirit of pride, or self-will, or rebellion, will prove the most serious blot in the Christian character, and a great stumbling-block to others. The apostles had need to enforce this very frequently upon the early Church. They knew that the "liberty of the gospel might be abused and mistaken; and that Christians might be tempted to think themselves "too good" to obey magistrates and rulers who were inferior in character and in knowledge to themselves. So also with regard to servants towards their masters. They were commanded to submit themselves "not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward;" and with regard to those that believed, not to despise them because they were brethren, but to serve them the better on that account, because they were "faithful and beloved, partakers of the benefit.' If these instructions were necessary for them, how much more so are they for us! How earnest, how diligent, how zealous, should parents, teachers, masters, and mistresses be to teach these duties of submission and humility to all who are under them— not as the command of man, but of Christ! How anxious should every Christian be to approve himself as `an humble and obedient servant of God in all those duties in which he is required to respect authority, and to submit himself "to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake!"

EXTRACT FROM MY FAMILY BIBLE.

MATTHEW xvi. 13-19.

E.

CESAREA PHILIPPI, a city at the foot of Mount Hermon, is made famous by the following important things mentioned in these verses-the question put by our Lord to His disciples, "Whom say ye that I am?" and Peter's remarkable answer. It is of the first importance, that Jesus Christ, who gave Himself out as the Saviour of

our sinful race, which was doomed to die eternally, should be able to do that which He proposed to do; and of course it is necessary that they who were asked to believe in Him should have a clear understanding of His power to do all that He professed. Some of the most learned heathen of olden time felt the corruption of human nature, and grieved over the fact, that so noble a being as man should be so lowered by sin; but remedy they could find none for a disease so plain and yet so sad. Our Lord comes, declaring Himself the Physician of the souls of men. Then it was natural and right for men to ask themselves, Who is He that is able to do this astonishing cure for so long and so frightful a disease? and as naturally would they form different notions as to who He was. One man taught of God (and it appears all others who thought upon the subject came very wide of the truth) declares that "He is the Christ. the Son of the living God." Here then was gracious news brought to the mind of a poor frail creature like St. Peter. Here was gracious news told through him to you, and me, and all sinners, and it appears that it was a wondrous favour of God to St. Peter, the revelation of this precious fact, that Christ was the Son of God. "Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona," or son of Jonas, "for flesh and blood hath not revealed this unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven." It had been declared, at the bap tism of our Lord, as you, my dear family, will recollect, that Christ was the Son of God. A voice from heaven had said so (Matthew iii. 17), but for all this, men did not see Him to be the Lord; but here, with a hearty faith, the fruit of the teaching of God, a man openly declares our Saviour to be God. Glorious and merciful God, so to redeem, and so to teach us to believe of our Redeemer! Oh! my family, how can we sufficiently adore Him, and live to His honour, who has so loved and honoured us, by clothing Himself with our flesh, and by teaching us to see in the poor and humble Jesus, "the everlasting Father," our "Lord and our God." This is a doctrine that can only be taught to the heart by God Himself; 66 no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, except by the Holy Ghost," and by comparing

these two passages, you find that the Father and the Holy Ghost are one. Our Lord says, His heavenly Father is the teacher of this great doctrine. St. Paul says it is by the teaching of the Holy Ghost that we learn it. (See 1 Cor. chap. xii. 3). He that goes to Christ in any other way than as to the Son of God, goes to Him uselessly, for the purity and holiness of God could not have been satisfied with any thing short of a perfectly holy person as an offering for sin; and where, either in heaven or earth, could such a being be found, but God has been pleased so to condescend as to come in the flesh, and to make it perfectly sinless by His gracious abode in it, that thus we may have a Saviour indeed, exactly fitted to the necessity of the case? May the Lord teach you, and all who call themselves Christians, yea all the world, as He taught St. Peter, the doctrine that Christ is God. This doctrine is the rock upon which His Church is built. It is the foundation of the Christian religion. Unless this is believed, man can have no Saviour; and against them that believe it and love it, the gates of hell shall not prevail. It is the rock of everlasting truth, upon which all true Christians take their stand, and bring forth all the good fruits of the Spirit; and Satan knows that they who are founded upon this rock, and thus upon the rock of Christ, are in the hands of God, yea of the whole Trinity, God the the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, and that neither he nor man can pluck them out of God's hand. A Layman.

EXTRACT FROM AN ORIGINAL SERMON ON DEUT. viii, 3. "And He humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna (which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know) that He might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live."

SINGULAR and remarkable as to some it may appear, God has seen fit to deal on the same mysterious principle with all whom He loves and is educating for heaven. We shall not find the same events happen to them all, nor are they all in the same circumstances of