from us would only weaken the impression of the text. Fathers, ye, perhaps, can sympathize in the subject; O remember then that as ye would thus act towards a returning son, the Father of spirits waits to express his pity and affection over you so long absent from his fellowship and his family. "Father," says he, "I have sinned,"-stop! says the parent, would not suffer him to mention what he intended about hired servant, it is enough, "Bring forth the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet." We challenge history, ancient or modern, any author, or poet, to produce any description of the like kind so exquisitely touching as this representation of our Lord. The Bible itself presents one like it in the narrative of Joseph, but it is not equal to this. The robe, the ring, the shoes ordered were equivalent to a public restoration of him to the same rank, and immunities, and respect, he before held in his father's household. How astonishing, when we consider that this is intended to convey the act of heaven towards the returning sinner, and to figure the garments of salvation, the best robe which Jesus wove in deepest humiliation, pain, and blood, the garment of the Spirit, the shoes of the Gospel of Peace, which he confers on Nor was this all, but a feast and a rejoicing is ordered: "Bring hither the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat;" a provision made only to honor a distinguished guest, and kept for that purpose, as you read Gen. xviii. 7. man. merry." This shows the "And let us eat and be design of the parable; here its intention is opened; it was to show the joy in heaven over the publican and sinner that is rescued and restored: "There is joy," says our Lord, "over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons." How amazing is this grace! O! where is the sinner in this congregation that is proof against this! I once heard a distinguished minister in the west of England say, "Kindness is the key to the heart;" but if so, there can be no breast, but this parable will unlock it, and admit the Saviour. 119 THE PATIENCE OF HOPE. Remembering your patience of hope.- WE fear that the greater portion of unbelievers in the Gospel of Christ consist of persons so light and careless, that whilst they retail with wonderful fluency some objections which they have heard from enemies of the truth, will give little pains themselves to weigh either what is said for or against it; but to the thinking mind, which has unhappily imbibed a prejudice against the salvation revealed in the volume of inspiration, we offer a point for calm investigation:-whether the picture of man in his present state, which is drawn in the Bible, does not accord with the general experience of mankind. We are not obliged to have recourse to Scripture, to show that man is thrown upon life, as upon a sea of troubles, where he is tossed from wave to wave, constantly surrounded with dangers, and half a wreck; we need not repeat declarations of this book to prove that man stands in his present state, expecting or actually sustaining the attack of winds, and floods, and tempests, or that he finds his life a weary journey through burning sands, and over barren mountains, and near the dens of beasts, and through unknown roads, and amid a thousand cala mities of other kinds. Why that restlessness of men in their present condition? Why that too frequent envy of others as better situated than themselves? Why does the poor man desire the rich man's lot?-and the wealthy that they were noblemen?—and noblemen that they were kings? -and kings that they wore the universal diadem of the earth, and without controul? Does it not speak this language? Our present condition has its evils, and we desire to be emancipated. It is a spirit of heavenly origin in a world where sin has entered, and filled with sorrow, and it wonders at its wretched abode, and blind to the cause, flees from one state of life to another, thinks there is some rank and some station here where it may be free from pain. It might save the chase;-behold a Xerxes at the review of a million of his troops, and at the pinnacle of power and grandeur, weeping an evil which he could not alleviate ;-see an Alexander, when he had conquered the world, in tears;see a Cæsar, in the height of his triumphs, grasp what he had toiled for, and in dissatisfaction exclaiming, Is this all? In wealth and wisdom, and temporal ease and power, Solomon was first among the eastern monarchs. Why wrote he a whole book upon human life, the epitome of which is this: "All is vanity and vexation of spirit?" Death and sickness, and the loss of friends, and vicissitudes, and innumerable other ills, can be shaken off by no rank of society, but may be endured by every one. Is not this a suffering state? Does it not express the sentiment of Scripture: "Man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward." That he who is born of a woman, is of few days, and full of trouble, that the cup of which we drink is a cup of mixture, some little portion of which is pleasant, the rest chequered scenes, trying moments, and distressing dispensations. Seeing that the acknowledged resemblance of the Bible representation of fallen man, to his actual state, is so strong, can any thing be conceived more adapted to such a being than the blessings which here flow from the cross, and are offered to soothe and alleviate endurance, impossible! You think that the wheel that has this hour thrown you up trouble, may the next turn up joy; yet if all is chance, how can you know this? Is not the probability as much on the side of accumulated woe? "If there is nothing but chance," says Lucretius, "then may we expect instead of the order we perceive in nature, that fishes will change their element the next hour, and land beasts plough the sea, and corn grow in winter, and frost appear in summer, and the race of men become extinct: indeed so far from comfort, the wildest disorders of the universe, and the perpetual affright of the mind must arise from it? Can our patience be induced by the Deist's doctrine of annihilation at death. This may suit the licentious, the impious man, who, lost to the glories of his nature, walks in all the fullness of sinful indulgence. Is it surprizing that the man who, if there is a God, must feel his hottest vengeance,-and if a G |