better now as well as when he was on earth; and he can, for he has made John better." Many things that deeply interested his parents were uttered by him, but we cannot notice them here. We must follow little Benjamin to the chamber of affliction and death.

It was on Wednesday, the eleventh of October last, that he seemed to have a cold upon him, and complained of feeling tired and poorly. On Friday, he was worse, appeared better again on the Saturday, but about ten o'clock in the evening he became much worse, and the doctor was sent for, who pronounced him dangerously ill with the croup. Now the parents began to be really alarmed, having already lost one dear boy by the same complaint, at about the same age. Their worst fears were soon realised; Benjamin found no relief, but continued getting worse, till the Sunday night, when it was quite plain the struggle must soon end in death. The throne of grace was the only resort of the agonising parents; unknown to each other, they were pouring out their hearts to God in separate rooms, both intently begging the same thing, even that he would open the lips of their dying child, and help an infant to speak of divine things for their comfort and confirmation. The weeping mother first arose from prayer, where she had, like Jacob, heard her Lord, saying, "I will not let thee go until thou bless me;" and once more she approached her dying child, she looks on him, his eyes are uplifted, his countenance is solemn as death, and, with all his remaining energy, he cries out, "Save! save!" Yes, darling," said the fond mother, "Jesus will save you." He looked at her with an expression of doubt on his countenance for a moment. With firm assurance she repeated, "Jesus will save you." His countenance at once brightened up with confidence, and, with a smile, he replied,

"Yes, yes; soon,' After this he wished her to read to him; and, taking her New Testament, she repeated the words of Jesus: "Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not; for of such is the kingdom of heaven." He said, "That is where I want to go." She replied, "You will be there soon, darling." "Yes, ma'," was his reply. At this moment his father entered, having been pleading with God in another room, and begging of Him to open the lips of his departing child, that the bereaved parents might be comforted and confirmed under this heart-rending trial. Just as he entered the room the dear little fellow, with considerable emphasis, repeated, "Tell father I am going soon.' After laying quiet a few moments, he asked for the Testament; and, on his mother putting it into his hand, he pressed it to his lips, and kissed it with the greatest affection; then raising his head as well as he could, he placed the book on his pillow, pressing it close to his cheek. His mother, who eagerly watched every movement, now expected that he would expire with the Word of God under his head; but he revived a little, and, smiling, said, "I see him; I see him!" His mother asked, "Whom do you see, darling; Jesus? "Yes, Jesus," he replied;" but no black thorns! all bright! all bright!" He had often looked at the plate in his book, where Jesus was represented with a crown of thorns, which he called black thorns. But he now saw his Saviour with a crown all bright. Once or twice after this he calmly said, "I want to get away; I want to be gone;" and so, sweetly fell asleep in Jesus. Thus died little Benjamin; but he lives in a brighter world. May the reader of this touching narrative know and love that Saviour which was so precious to him, and who still welcomes the little ones. J. NORRIS.

"CASTING all your care upon Him, for he careth for you."

God's providential care is general and special.

The greatness of Him who cares for us: his knowledge, infinite; wisdom, infinite; power, infinite.

Let us cast our personal care on him, he makes our individual, our relative, our everlasting wants his care.

Temporal cares; spiritual cares; family cares; church cares-yes; "casting all."

What concern about the body! "What shall we eat, etc." We want to provide sufficient to carry us through. But who is to determine just what it will take? The barrel of meal already provided may be enough.

"Take no thought for raiment." The next garment needed may be the shroud.

223

exclamation and says, any old woman could say that." That which shocks the common sense and feelings of mankind is very poorly answered by the flippant remark, any old woman could say that." Yes, and they will say that, and from their intense love of truth will despise and loathe the horrid doctrine of the sinlessness of lying, propounded by the author of this sermon, whether under the name of "good lies" or the modified form of "lawful evasions."

The sermon under review is an attempt, a very lame one we confess, to defend a former sermon by the same author, which led Mr. Foreman and Mr. Collins to refuse to preach the opening sermons at the new chapel built for the author. These gentlemen, with the sixteen protesters, are charged with "jealousy " at the popularity of Mr. Wells. What on earth could make them jealous we are at a loss to divine. As godly ministers of Jesus they rejoice in the prosperity of their brethren; and from any lower motive Messrs. Foreman and Collins are fairly exempt by local distance; the one quite at another extreme of London, and the other eighty miles away from the sphere of Mr. Wells's labours. Have his own principles so darkened and bewildered his mind, that he can see no higher motive than miserable green eyed jealousy in the noble protest these brethren have made against a soul destroying, God dishonouring, jesuitical, and dangerous heresy? Does he really believe that they had no higher motives? Or does he merely attempt to break the force of their protest by assuming motives which he knows do not exist? Is this a good lie, or is it a lawful evasion?

Vulgarity. Mr. Wells says, p. 339, Many coarse and vulgar sayings have been attributed to me; sayings which I have never uttered or thought of uttering." We readily admit it. But are there no vulgar sayings in the sermon Mr. Wells attempts to defend? He evidently mistakes and confounds vulgarity with obscenity, as the context shews, hence because he has not been obscene, ergo he has not been vulgar! Is not this vulgar?" Now then, you hypocrites, get your piety ready for I am going to shock it a little." Is that language becoming a minister of Jesus Christ or the pulpit ? or, Any old woman could say that; or stigmatizing the protest as a "Purity dodge." Again, in a

sermon

preached some years since, "I like a man to hold his opinions and I'll hold mine. Let him build his wall and I'll build mine, and if I can build mine higher than his,

I'll stand on the top and crow, crow, crow." Is not that low and vulgar in the extreme? Is not that "Slang?" Many of his best friends were alarmed and disgusted. Why then so sensitive at the charge of vulgarity? And are these rare instances? Mr. W. must know that such like are neither few nor far between.

Good

Lawful evasions. Mr. Wells wishes now to substitute this milder term, for "good lies." Never did any criminal break down more thoroughly than he has in this attempt. It is like the poor silly ostrich hiding her head, while her whole body is open to attack. He is so utterly beaten that he sees he must alter his tactics. lies" cannot stand, they must be given up, the universal church cries shame, and echo answers, shame, "I'll give up the name," says he, "but not the thing.' Everybody knows that Rahab told lies and, so do I; others condemn, I defend them; but I must christen them "lawful evasions." I gave the sentiment an "airing" a little too soon; the air was too strong for the weakly diseased thing. I must put a thick wrapper on her, she will look better in the blanket of "lawful evasions," and so they wrap it up. (Micah vii, 3.)

"I will," says Mr. Wells, "name the faults and give my answer to them."

"That I hold a good lie is better than a bad truth. Now I did not in that sermon explain what I meant. I meant that under certain circumstances, lawful evasions -for that is the term I shall apply this morning; I will observe that there are evasions which may be lawfully used; and that I would rather use lawful evasions to save a friend, than I would ignorantly, like the fool, utter all my mind and betray my friend. But, unhappily, I put this my meaning, into unguarded language. I said, that telling a truth that would injure the people of God, would be worse than telling a lie that would not injure them. If I had said, what I should have said-and I suppose you will allow me to repent, you will allow me the privilege of repenting. I repent that I used the unguarded language. I did not know that we should be so looked after. I did not know that I was of so much importance. I did not know that half-a-dozen sentences from an unpretending individual like myself would open the mouth of a volcano, whose elements had been for some time restlessly seeking an outlet.*"

* Does Mr. Wells really believe this gross libel, or does he make the injurious assertion in reckless anger?

it

This is the most comical and ludicrous repentance we ever heard of-the repentance of a thief when caught and his larceny detected. "I did not think I should be so sharply looked after; when I rob next time I'll be more guarded." Repentance indeed! And of what does Mr. Wells repent? Why, that he had not wrapped his horrid doctrine in more guarded language! Does he repent of the thing itself? Does he repent that he has scandalised christianity and common humanity by justifying falsehood and lying? Does he repent that he has defamed the Holy One of Israel by assuming divine sanction to lies, or the suspension of moral law, to make lies truth, and evil good? Does he think the christening of a black man will make him white, or by calling the thing he formerly called a "good lie" by the new name "lawful evasion," can take away its blackness or turpitude? When the Jews said to Christ "Is it lawful to give tribute to Cæsar or not?" Had he said yes, would have been construed by his enemies into servility; had he said no, it would have been treason against the government. Hence, he said, "shew me the tribute money;" and they brought him a penny, and he saith "Whose is this image and superscription?" They say unto him "Cæsar's." Then saith he unto them, "Render unto Cæsar the things which are Cæsar's, and unto God the things that are God's." (Matt. xxii, 17-21. Here is indeed a grand example of lawful evasion, but not the slightest approximation to falsehood, literally, morally, or spiritually. Turn it round and view it at all points of the compass, and not the shadow of a shade of deviation from truth is found in it. Weigh it in the balance of the sanctuary, and it will be found full weight,-solid, unmixed truth. Let the moral alchemist test it with every test in his laboratory; not one can touch it,-it defies them all-it is the pure gold of truth. But how different the conduct of Rahab! She was brought up among idolaters and liars. She had much yet to learn of that blessed Being in whom she believed, and probably thought little of those lies, she then, in her partial ignorance of his character told; but God accepted her faith, and pardoned her sin. Long ago has she been, permitted to sing the heavenly song, "Unto him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood," &c. But if redeemed saints in heaven could weep, surely Rahab's cheeks would be belewed with tears to find the Holy One of

23

Israel charged with complicity in her crimes; suspending the moral law to make them virtues, and giving his sacred sanction to deception and lies. It might mitigate her grief that the ministers of Christ, and private christians of piety and intelligence, almost to a man, have recorded their solemn protest against such a God-dishonouring and blasphemous doctrine.

Jesuitism,-Mr. Wells' lawful evasions, alias "good lies, are the very essence of Jesuitism. The history of the Jesuits,"

says Cramp, "reveals scenes of knavery, vice, and treason, unparalleled in the annals of any country nnder heaven. Their entire policy is based on the assumption that the end sanctifies the means, and thus, the most atrocious villanies are excused, and even applauded." (p. 327.) The papist Maguire, in the celebrated Dublin discussion, asks the very question that Mr. Wells does. "Now, sir," says this wily papist, "I ask you if it was as bad for her to tell an officious lie-that the spies were gone out at the gates, as it was to deliver them up to death. I ask you, would God reward her for perpetrating a damnable sin ?" The difference between Mr. Wells and the papist is, that the papist believes it was a venial sin-not a mortal sin; while Mr. Wells believes it to be no sin at all,- -a cardinal virtue,-a lawful evasion, a good lie. Gregg, the protestant answers thus, "The hiding of the spies was a good act; but she told a lie about them, and in that respect she sinned; yea, was guilty of a mortal sin, for every sin is mortal . . She should have told the truth and left the consequences to Him who dried up the Red Sea, and made her nation tremble, and had a thousand ways of saving His Servants without the assistance of Rahab's officious lie. "Will ye speak wickedly for God?" Gregg. p. 265, Charnock, says, the holiness of God is injured when men study arguments from the holy word of God to colour and shelter their crimes. When men seek a shelter for their lies-in that of Rahab, as if because God rewarded her fidelity, He countenanced her sin The Jesuits' morals are a transcript of this. "On the holiness of God," p. 511. Dr. Guyse, says, Rahab's falsehood in relation to the spies was the effect not of her faith; but of her sinful dread of the king's wrath in loc. Dr. A. Clarke, says, "But was not Rahab rewarded, etc. ?" "Yes, for her hospitality and faith; not for her lie." Dr. Gill, says, "it was a downright lie Her lies are not to be justified; evil is not to be done.