it has fled with the necessity for its employment. We have no longer any gifted Apostles with supernatural powers, in order to establish the divinity of their commission: the evangelists of the present day are those only who expound the word of God to perishing sinners; and although the Bible and Missionary Societies, by their exertions, have almost imitated-not to speak it profanely-the gift of tongues; yet we do not expect that their translators will proceed in their work, under the unerring influence of the gift of the Spirit, without the labour of previous study, and careful translation, collation, and revision, again and again. We no longer expect these circumstances, which were for a given purpose, to proclaim the infinite power and essential Divinity of the incarnate Saviour, and to effect the miraculous extension of his kingdom. These have ceased with the apostolic age.

Now in the same class of agents which the Supreme has deigned to employ, are dreams; but we should no more expect that the Almighty would now employ the latter than the former. And since no one would at this day receive the commission of an Apostle; but since every one would treat the assumption of such power with discredit, and would throw

the odium of imposture or insanity upon those who assumed to be sent on an especial message from God to his creatures, and who pretended to miraculous powers in support of their message; so no one at this period of the Christian day ought to appeal to dreams, as evidence of a communication from the Almighty Disposer of all things.

CHAPTER X.

The same subject continued.-Dreams commissioned for the discovery of crime;-application of the author's principles to the history of W. Corder;-agency of the Devil in the production of dreams and various errors:-vision of angels, &c. &c.

THERE are some particular forms of dreaming, which should be just noticed in this place: and, first, that which we are often told has been commissioned for the discovery of crime. In these cases it is assumed, that crime-for the most part murder-has been for a time successfully concealed; but that detection haunts the footsteps of the criminal: and that an impression of circumstances is revealed to some individual during sleep, which leads to the disclosure of such a chain of evidence as may terminate in the conviction of the murderer. This train of reasoning proceeds upon the assumption, that God is a righteous Governor, and

will not suffer a murderer to live; but that "whosoever sheddeth man's blood, by man shall" actually, as well as injunctively, "his

blood be shed."

Now if it were true that the present is the final state of retribution, there would be good ground for this reasoning. But it is to be recollected, that God is merciful as well as just; and that, though he is angry with the wicked every day, he defers his wrath, and delights to be long-suffering, and to extend the day of grace, the hour of returning to him to seek the pardon of sin and when we reflect, that if God were strict to mark iniquity,—that is, if justice were his only attribute, the infliction of punishment would follow the commission of sin, and that we could have no hope of acceptance with him, we see that this pursuit of the criminal is not a necessary consequence of this attribute: on the contrary, that in his dealings with his sinful creatures, he willeth not their death, but rather that they should turn unto him and live.

Further, this is not the day of retribution, but of proffered pardon, if it will be accepted in Christ Jesus. Here on earth, we daily see crime successful, and virtue suffering; the one caressed, the other in poverty, obscurity, and

neglect; the one surrounded by friends and affluence, the other in indigence and destitution; the latter constantly suffering injustice from the oppression of the former. This is not the coming period, when the righteous shall be for ever blessed, and the wicked shall be for ever miserable. There is now an inequality in their lot, which will only be rendered right at the last great day of account; so that here again it is shown not to be inconsistent with the dealings of the providence of God, that the wicked should escape punishment in the present life.

Moreover, this assumption proceeds upon an idea of the justice of the Almighty requiring the punishment by the hand of man, of certain very great offences. But then it has happened, and that not unfrequently, that the innocent have suffered; that is, that they have been innocent of the particular crime for which they were executed: and this is another proof that errors are permitted here, and that we must cast our eye forward to hereafter, for the full display of the retributive justice of God. In fact, the circumstances of the innocent having suffered in the place of the guilty, while the latter have escaped, would, on any other supposition, impugn the attribute of justice in