the earth, and under the earth, are heard in aried but harmonious joy, may be read as a al of it.

I may add, there was a great exhibition of this , a purchased and a redeemed possession, in the Israel. In the land of Egypt, the people themwere ransomed, or purchased, or at a full price ed from the claims of Divine righteousness by God Himself, for none other could, satisfied His mand; for he appointed the blood, which turned ord of judgment aside. And, then, in due time, e people, God's Israel, were redeemed by power, the hand of Pharaoh, by the arm and strength vah, at the Red Sea (Ex. xii. and xv.).

as the people themselves, so their inheritance. d promised to their fathers, the land already y Divine gift (upon the forfeiture of it by its possessors, who had filled up the measure of their redeemed by strength of arm out of the hand of aanites, in the day of Joshua. And this was e ground and warranty of a previous purchase, ption by blood (see Ex. xv. 15, 16).b

all this, as from many and many another illusf the same, I might take occasion to say, How es Scripture maintain its unity.- Prophets and Psalms, Epistles, Evangelists, and the Apocatriarchal and Mosaic words, telling out the same. of God, in harmonies that are beautiful as well

how let me add, that nothing in the coming nothing in this Palingenesia, or world to come, we are speaking, will be lost; all that was once the old creation and in the present world will evred od

eation itself, the work of God's hand, will be d abroad, in all its order and departments, as of eaven and its earth in their varied provision and

s in Rev. v.- for there we find "the Lamb that was be one with "the Lion of the Tribe of Judah," when ance is about to be redeemed by power-thus recogtruth, that redemption by blood had preceded.

furniture-but all will be secured and not exposed: redeemed, reconciled and glorified. Instead of being subject to vanity, it will be "delivered from the bondageof corruption, into the glorious liberty of the children c God." It will stand in the strength, and shine in the beauty, of the risen Lord.

The vegetable world shall then rejoice. The ground itself shall be delivered from the curse. Instead of the thorn, shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the brier the myrtle tree. The wilderness shall blossom as the rose. The field shall be joyful and all that is therein, and the trees of the wood together. And with these the sea in its fulness, the floods and the hills. So sing the Psalmist and the Prophets.

The cattle on the mountains, and the beasts of the forests, shall be among the subjects of this universa dominion, this wide-spread sovereignty of the Son o Man. The lion shall eat straw like the ox; the wolf and the lamb shall feed together; the leopard shall lie down with the kid the calf, the young lion, and the fatling shall be together, and the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice's den.

The heavens of that world shall be there also, in their forms of beauty, and in their service of fertilising and enriching the earth. As we read of the Lord of thos days, how He will make the outgoings of the morning and evening to rejoice; how He will visit the earth, and water it as with the river of God, blessing the spring and the harvest, crowning the year with His goodness, ti.. the pastures clothed with flocks, and the valleys covered with corn, shout for joy and sing together (Psalm lxv. Nothing shall then hurt or destroy in that holy mous tain of the Lord; and He will hear the heavens, and the heavens shall hear the earth; and the earth shall hear the corn, and the wine, and the oil; and the corn, and the wine, and the oil shall hear Jezreel (Hos. ii.). What sights in the visions of the Prophets are these! And yet still, and still further. We learn that not only will all the materials of the whole creation thus re appear, but the systems of the old world will be

produced also. Of course, in purified and perfected onditions of wonder, joy, and honour; but still the 'stems of the old world, as well as the materials of the d creation, will be reproduced.

The nations, all the earth over, shall be settled in their veral homes and inheritances again. And they shall o service to the King in Zion, all people calling Him essed; the knowledge of His glory covering the earth the waters do the sea. The daughter of Tyre shall be nown there, and so the kings of Tarshish and the isles, e kings of Sheba and Seba-and some shall come from r, and some from the north, and from the west, and me from the land of Sinim.

The people of Israel shall be set again in their own land, nd again distinguished among the nations as of old, the ead and not the tail, of whose skirts, men of all lanages of the nations shall take hold, while they say, We will go with you, for we have heard that God is ith you.'

Jerusalem shall shine again, as in the presence of the ord in the day of her glory. It shall be the throne nd the sanctuary of the God and King of that orld to come, the witness of a world's worship, the ome of the children of the kingdom, the seat of ghteous, peaceful government, and the happy, honoured entre of the earth, in the days of the Palingenesia. Surely it is a great and wondrous sight to see to, great theme to meditate and to talk of Our oughts might well be rapt into wonder and thankfuless while we ponder it. But I ask, Is there not moral monition for us in it also? Surely there is. If the onement of the cross of Christ be the sure foundation of is "world to come," and our only title to it, how ould we now triumph in that atonement, and in that aly! And if this same cross of Christ tell us of the aracter of this "present evil world," reminding us of s rejection of that blessed Lord, on whom all our hopes st, how should we be dead to it, and take our place in oral separation from it! Surely this is so. But the eart knows its own humiliations-how coldly it exults the one, how feebly it gains its victories over the

her.

And I would not close this meditation without observing one other truth. The old creation was not allowed to pass away, till man, God's original workmanship in beauty and perfection, was vindicated to the full glory of God's blessed and holy name. This was done, in the person, character, and life of the Lord Jesus. He stood in the midst of the old creation, a stainless sample of humanity, adorned with all moral glory in and for the eye and delight of God-the only such, but the surely such-the perfect immaculate Image of man according to God. But having been this, having thus stood in the midst of the ruin, in which all beside had involved themselves, He died under the judgment of that corrupted thing-meeting its doom, and righteously answering for it, by reason of His personal dignity, being God and man in one Christ, and in one sacrifice. And having done this, as risen from the dead, the triumphant Christ He laid the foundation of that new creation of which we speak. He has stood where Adam fell; He has conquered where Adam was overthrown. He has broken the gates of hell; and in Himself and in his victory, has founded a kingdom that never can be moveda new, a redeemed creation. This is the secretThe Lord God is the Foundation, as well as Builder of this mighty, unimpregnable system. In the stead of a world committed to the issue of a trial of man's allegiance, it is a world sustained in unassailable strength, i and in unfading glory, by the accomplished and celebrated victory of the Lord of life and salvation.

"The grass withereth, the flower fadeth, but the word of our God shall stand for ever."

Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness. Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God. wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat?

Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.

Wherefore, beloved, seeing that ye look for such things, be diligent that ye may be found of him in peace, without spot, and blameless.

E BRUISED REED AND THE SMOKING

uised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall uench, till He send forth judgment unto victory. And ame shall the Gentiles trust."

attention to the above passage, believing that, rwell the commonly received interpretation of it mport with the true idea of the grace of the Lord, lse interpretation, both as to the persons it refers also to their condition.

popular thought is, that the bruised reed is a

a person broken and contrite in heart, and that king flax is a soul in which the fire of divine life kindled, or, at least, in which grace is operating, is yet but feebly and dimly; and that the Lord break the one, nor quench the other. This fails erpretation, because the Lord is to do both when er time arrives;-the words are "till he send forth unto victory" But will he ever break the broken He was sent to bind it up (Is. lxi. 1). Will He nch the operations of His own grace? We need er the question.

ed is used in Scripture as an emblem of weakin several places for a nation, as in 1 Kings xiv. he Lord shall smite Israel as a reed is shaken in ," etc.; and 2 Kings xviii. 21, where Egypt is he staff of a bruised reed;" also Ezekiel xxix. 6. as, moreover, put into the right hand of the One, in derision of His claim to sway the sceptre gdom.

ither of the figures in the passage do I look xpressing a good or desirable condition which was to cherish; but a bad condition which He inly judge, though not until a certain time. e bruised reed expresses, I believe, the external