GROUNDS OF HOPE.

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rate them from all their risks, to transform the rugged path they are treading, into a broad, smooth, level causeway, is of course impracticable. The primeval curse is not to be annulled, and man must still live by the sweat of his brow. But the case of the merchant is not, therefore, a hopeless one. If we cannot remove all the obstructions from his path, we may a part. If we cannot shield him from every danger, we may from some. If we cannot clothe him with infallibility in resolving questions of duty, we may place in his hands a standard to which he can refer such questions with the confidence that it will not deceive him. The equipment he needs, the only equipment which will at all meet the exigencies of his position, is true religion. The chart he requires, the only chart which defines with accuracy the reefs and quicksands, the treacherous shoals and vagrant currents of the sea which he is traversing, is, the word of God. THE BIBLE IN THE COUNTING-HOUSE: - this is the only specific which will at all meet the moral necessities of the businessworld, or which can make it expedient for men to plunge into the perilous excitements of a life of traffic, who have any serious purpose of ever getting to heaven. To bring about this end, to inaugurate the BIBLE as the controlling authority in the marts of commerce, the acknowledged arbiter in matters of

casuistry, and the test by which every usage is to stand or fall, this, surely, is an object worthy of the best exertions of all who desire the prosperity of religion and the welfare of their fellow-men. The humblest effort in this cause may claim to be received with indulgence; nor will it have been put forth in vain, should it serve only to call the attention of abler moralists to this luxuriant and neglected field of practical Christianity.

There may be those who will regard this as delicate ground. The pulpit has itself moulded a public sentiment by which it is watched with a jealous eye, lest it should] venture upon themes that lie beyond its jurisdiction. Curiously enough, the territory which it is sought to sequester from all the aggressions of the sanctuary, is that which embraces the actual application of the Gospel to no small portion of the daily avocations of men. Upon the paths which men are treading for six days out of every seven, upon their husbandry and their handicraft, their shops and their warehouses, their hoarding and their disbursing, their legislation and their jurisprudence, there is impressed the brand of a secularity so flagrant that the pulpit cannot venture into this arena, without contracting the taint of a grievous defilement! A pastor may, indeed, so far approach the boundary of this quarantined region, as to lanch the denuncia

CRUDE CONCEPTIONS OF THE PULPIT.

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tions of the violated law against all and singular of its busy tribes who transgress its high requisitions; but he must not go to them, to explain what the law demands of them, and how they are to keep within the line of its prescriptions. He may arraign the manufacturer or the trader on the broad score of dishonesty, and set forth the penalty a retributive justice has attached to his misdeeds; but the sacredness of his office forbids him to take the Gospel and go with it into their mills and their counting-rooms, and aid them in applying its divine precepts to their respective avocations. And so it comes to pass, that when a Christian minister propounds for discussion one of these tabooed topics, he is quite likely, on the one hand, to wound the sensibilities of certain sincere and excellent people, who tremble to think of his degrading the Gospel into a mere scheme of morals; and, on the other, to disturb the equanimity of certain careless and somewhat unscrupulous devotees of mammon, who think he had better confine himself to his own sphere and leave them to theirs.

Now, if the occasion called for it, it would be easy to show that these views proceed upon a radical misconception of the functions of the ministry. Undoubtedly, the main office of the pulpit is to illustrate and enforce the great doctrines of revelation, and the duties of repentance towards God and faith in the

Lord Jesus Christ. There is a pregnant meaning in that declaration of the apostle, "I determined not to know anything among you save Jesus Christ and him crucified." A crucified Saviour-redemption by the blood of Christ, and regeneration by the Holy Spirit -as it is the grand, central theme of the New Testament, so it must be the burden of every preacher who would save the souls of men. Nor is this essential only in respect to its connexion with forgiveness and spiritual renewal. It is no less indispensable as supplying the only solid basis and effectual guarantee of a holy life. Those persons who, in their prejudice against theological disquisitions, would restrict the pulpit to the inculcation of charity, forget that you cannot build a house without a foundation, or that if you do, it will as certainly tumble down as do so many of the fragile structures which cupidity and recklessness run up in our cities. The χαριτας of the Bible that divine love which clasps the whole human family in its embrace, and would wellnigh emulate the Saviour's benevolence and "lay down its life for the brethren" - draws its being from the TRUTH, lives upon the truth, rejoices in the truth, conquers by the truth, and will yet bring the nations back to their allegiance to Christ through the truth. To attempt to array it against the truth, to argue in favour of preaching love as contrasted with preaching

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doctrine, is as preposterous as it would be to contrast a stream with its fountain, or the fruit of a tree with its roots and sap. You may garnish over a bad character, or embellish an amiable one, by inculcating charity; but to expect in this way to transform a man into "a new creature," is as unphilosophical as it is contrary to Scripture. There can be no intelligent piety where the understanding does not lead the way. Believe, and thou shalt be saved.

But if morality is not to be preached without theology, neither is theology without morality. If Christianity makes its first appeal to the understanding, it does not rest there. If it reveals a heaven, it does not, like the god of the Epicureans, hold itself aloof from all fellowship with earth. It is a religion to live by, as well as to die by. As it challenges the homage of all mankind, so it exerts its prerogative over all human pursuits, and proffers its benign assistance to men of every character and occupation. The New Testament is one of the most practical of all works. Those who are so zealous for confining the pulpit to a stereotype round of subjects, to what be defined as religious subjects, would do well to consider the generous commingling of moral precepts with the doctrinal utterances of the Saviour and his apostles. It may be worthy of their inquiry whether the Sermon on the Mount would fall within the sweep

may