"the laws of nature," and frequently forget that they are the evidences of the presence of God. But prophecy is not liable to this objection: it is a miracle of accumulative power. The evidence becomes stronger every day of the origin and inspiration of the Bible: one brings a city like Nineveh, pale and ghastly from its grave; another discovers some great phenomenon in distant lands, or another brings from science some new and hidden fact that men have never detected before, or discovers some new medical power that bears a relation to the curse, and seems to be an instalment of the day when that curse shall be transformed into a blessing-we have all these growing and accumulating proofs of the authenticity and inspiration of the Bible, and that holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. And thus the longer the Bible continues to give, by the fulfilment of its prophecies, accumulating evidence of the inspiration of God, the clearer will be our convictions that the Bible is true.

Another reason, perhaps, why the prophecies were given, is to show the perfect harmony between the Old Testament and the New. Read the records of Daniel which he wrote in Babylon; read the Apocalypse of John recorded by him in Patmos, and you find that the facts, the historic facts that they preintimated, are substantially the same: and that Daniel and John were both taught from the same wisdom, inspired by the same God, and spake as they were moved by the same holy influence.

Another reason why God has so largely depicted in Daniel, so minutely described in the Apocalypse, and so vividly sketched in the Epistle to the Thessalonians, the great Papal power that was to arise, was that "forewarned, we might be forearmed." And, if ever there was a day when it was needful to disclose a system whose spires sparkle in the rays of rising and of setting suns, but underneath which are dungeons so dark and dens so cruel, it is surely in a day when the rush and current of the religious movement of the age seems all to be rolling and hastening toward Babylon. I heard Mr. Newman, the most distinguished convert that Rome has recently made, arguing, and in eloquent and impressive terms, with those who are called Anglicans; and he assumed the ground which the Church of Rome has so repeatedly marked out, maintaining the doctrine of a perpetually visible

church, which might fall into incidental errors, but by no possibility into absolute apostasy; and I declare that if I believed that dogma, I should, after having heard his argument, feel it my duty to leave the Church of Scotland or the Church of England, and to join the Church of Rome. His reasoning, as addressed to Messrs. Maskell, and Bennet was irresistible. There is no ground that you can stand on but this-Evangelical religion, the Christianity of the Bible, the religion and the cement of the saints of God, or, the Church of Rome-not a corrupt church, but the Babylon of the Apocalypse, the great apostasy that is delineated. here and in the Epistle to the Thessalonians. If the Church of Rome be only a corrupt, reformable church, the reformers ought to have remained in it and tried to make it better: but they felt it what Luther maintained it to be, that it was the Babylon of prophecy, and heard sounding in their ears the commission of their God, "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her plagues." I do not wonder that the Church of Rome practically prohibits the perusal, or at least the interpretation of the Bible. It contains her own picture so plainly, so vividly, so unmistakably sketched, that if she allowed the Bible to be read, he that runs would read that picture, and fasten the brand where the spirit of God has fastened it eighteen centuries ago—on her. Take care then, in these days, of any approach to that system. Your dogmas of apostolical personal succession-baptismal regeneration—a perpetually visible church—these are the postulates that Mr. Newman asks. Grant him these, and the pope will hold Saint Paul's and Westminster Abbey in a few very years. I repeat it again, my dear friends, the only ground on which we can stand, is this, that the Bible alone is the rule of faith-that justification by faith alone is the article of a standing church—that regeneration by the Spirit of God alone is the article of a living Without this justification by faith, there is a fallen church. Without this regeneration by the Spirit, there is a dead church. Concede these, and you may, without any great sacrifice, and consistently enough, concede all points besides. Never forget, then, my dear friends, that the great safety of the people of God is cleaving to the Bible; and that the great secret of the apostasy of Rome is, the elevating of human authority into the

place of God. Here is just the whole spring and source of the mischief. Remember this, that neither the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, nor the House of Commons of Great Britain, nor the Convocation, is any authority with me as to what I am to believe. Neither the Bishop of Exeter in the one, nor our own beloved and gracious queen in the other, constitute the rule of faith. It is not the Bible explained by the bishop, nor the Bible explained by the presbytery, but the Bible alone, that is the rule of faith of all true Christians. Once concede that you are to look at the Bible through the lens of the presbytery, or through the telescope of the bishop, and you give up your great and strongest citadel, and you are sure to fall into the hands of the enemy. Cleave, then, to that blessed book as your only rule of faith-the arsenal of the soldiers of Christ-the armoury of the saints of the Most High. The oracles of God are as fresh and beautiful as when first taken, like a leaf from the tree of life, and committed to the nations. The Bible is a lamp ever bright, a light ever sure. And be not satisfied with holding the Bible in your hand; hold it also in your heart. We are strong, not by possession of the Bible as a book, but by the embodiment of the Bible as a living, plastic, regulating faith. It is God's truth within us, not God's truth without us, that is the strength of Christians, the safety of the saints of God. Show, then, to the Church of Rome-show to the world at large, that we have a succession that never fails-the succession of the sons of God; that we have a religion which is ever beautiful, and mighty to make us holy and to make us happy-a religion that is not meat, nor drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. Seek to show your missionary spirit by diffusing this faith; and leave not the sisters of charity, so active in our streets, or the long-robed priests of the Oratory, so busy in every place. into which they can gain admission, to eclipse or excel you in ministering to the wants of your fellow-men, and in spreading this blessed gospel among those who are ignorant of it. great defence against Puseyism and Popery is-living religion. Be Christians, and Rome will feel it. Be orthodox in head, but cold and unsanctified in heart and inactive in life, and Rome will not only rejoice, but gain. Let us bless God that we know this

The

-that however that dark system may spread for a little, its mightiest triumphs are the precursors of its greatest downfall. God's judgments on Rome have already begun-Babylon is now drinking of the cup of the indignation of God; and all her boasted triumphs are but the instalments, as it were, or foretokens of her speedy downfall. She is only gathering together all her forces, till the earth shall explode from beneath, and the heavens rain floods of fire from above, and great Babylon shall perish like a ship foundering at sea. We rejoice not at the suf ferings of any but yet we cannot but join with saints that are in heaven and angels that are round the throne, in giving glory to God that the great waster of the earth is about to be removed; and that the Jews, his ancient heritage, have heard his voice and are soon to come back; and that the fulness of the Gentiles has nearly arrived, and "the kingdoms of this world are soon to become the kingdoms of our God and of his Christ, and he shall reign for ever and ever." Amen.

"I beheld till the thrones were cast down, and the Ancient of days did sit, whose garment was white as snow, and the hair of his head like the pure wool: his throne was like the fiery flame, and his wheels as burning fire. . . And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed... Until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given to the saints of the Most High; and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom... But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end. And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him.”—Daniel vii. 9, 14, 22, 26, 27.

THE first fact that is here worthy of notice is the consumption, or the wasting away, of that power which is called the "little horn." I have identified this power with the Papacy, by, I think, irresistible evidence. There is here a clear intimation, that in the first instance it shall be gradually wasted or consumed till it is all but exhausted by the wasting influence of a power without it; and next, that after it has undergone a series of successive wastings or consumptions, it shall then be utterly and signally destroyed, and its body given to the devouring flame. In this description of Daniel, one cannot but notice the basis of the predictions of St. Paul respecting the man of sin, and so far the evidence of his acquaintance with the book of Daniel. In 2 Thess. ii. we have a description of a power that should "sit in the temple of God, showing himself as if he were God:" that power which he calls "the mystery of iniquity," which was so soon to be developed, and of which he foretells the end.