dicted the birth-place of Christ. His words were read by the chief priests to Herod, when he "demanded where Christ should be born." Amos spoke of the cutting off of Israel, and the bringing in of the Gentiles. Nahum, as quoted by Paul in his letter to the Romans, proclaimed the scattering of messengers on the mountain, with good tidings of salvation, publishing peace. A passage in Jonah's life, when he was three days and three nights in the belly of hell, is made by our blessed Lord a type of his descent into the grave. Zephaniah utters God's call, in the Gospel, to the impenitent, to turn and live. Jeremiah is full of Christ. Paul quotes him in all the strength of his statements about the new and better covenant that God would make with his people in the latter times. Habakkuk proclaims the great truth of Justification of Faith. Daniel closes up the probation of the race, and sets forth in solemn words. -made more solemn as cited by Jesus-that there shall be two resurrections-the one to life, the other to damnation. Haggai, Ezekiel, Obadiah, and Malachi, are cited in the New Testament, with their testimony for Jesus. Truly the holy men of God spake by the Holy Ghost, and by them God has taken care of his own honor and his own word. No link in the chain of evidence, from Eden till now, is wanting. No ancient work is so well attested as the Bible. No one can prove that Homer lived, or Plato wrote, with a thousandth part of the evidence that can be brought in favor of the truths of the prophets. No history is so confirmed as that of the Old Testament. Not only are all the prominent historic events approved

and used in the New Testament, but their truth is confirmed in a marvelous manner. Buried cities are unearthed, and seas, and tombs, and national records, come daily to light, to vindicate the Word of God. Judah still abides, a wonder and a monument. She survives and worships as in the days of David. She worships the God of her fathers as he was worshiped in Zion. She holds the same Scriptures that were read by Jesus, at Nazareth, to which he appealed to prove his divinity, and from which the apostles proved that Jesus was the Christ. She still rejects the Son of God, and hopes for the Redeemer; keeps the Sabbath of her nation, and lifts up the cry today, “Come, Elijah, and bring redemption." Librarians of the Christian Church, she has for eighteen hundred years held in her own hands the proof that Jesus is divine. Christians can knock at the door of every synagogue of the Jews, in all lands and climes, and, from the Scriptures read by these people from Sabbath to Sabbath, prove that Shiloh has come, and that the seed of the woman has been born.

IX.-CALVARY AND THE HOLY GOSPELS.

"Through David's city I am led,
Here all around are sleeping;
A light directs to yon poor shed,
Where lonely watch is keeping.
I enter-ah! what glories shine!
Is this Immanuel's earthly shrine?
Messiah's infant temple?"

PECULIAR was the condition of the world when God sent his Son to redeem it. It was a remarkable era, known as the "pacific age." One vast power ruled all the civilized world. It held war and peace in its hands. The great war temple of Janus, opened when war raged in any part of the world, was closed when the Prince of Peace was born. God held the passions of men in his hands. He subdued the lust. of conquest while he ushered his blessed Son into the world.

"No war nor battle's sound was heard the world around,
No hostile chiefs to furious combat ran;

But peaceful was the night in which the Prince of Light
His reign of peace upon the earth began."

No such age was ever before known. A mighty prophet of God was expected. We have a fine illustration of this in the temple on the day of circumcision. Among the dwellers in Jerusalem was an aged man, Simeon by name. He was devout. His equal in the public estimation had not been seen

since the time of Moses. He was held in great repute as a learned doctor of the law. He walked with God, and had this testimony, that he should not die till Christ came. According to the sacred books, the time for the coming of the Messiah was at hand; the time foretold ages before and long waited for. One desire burned in all hearts. One prayer was breathed from all lips: "Let the Messiah's day be in my day. Let him spring from my house." For his coming,

"Kings and prophets waited

And sought, but never found.

Prophets and kings desired it long,

But died without the sight."

When the parents of Jesus "brought in the Child, to do for him after the custom of the law," Simeon, guided by the Holy Ghost, came into the temple. He knew Mary and Joseph well. The Word of God and the events in Bethlehem were familiar to him. He was a type and the first fruit of his nation. In his withered arms he took the babe and blessed God, ready now to die, for his eye had seen the salvation of God.

At no time other than that which marks the Christian era could Christ have come into the world. With great care God has guarded the Gospel from the advent of his Son to now. History, sacred and profane, writers Christian and heathen, run the history back to the exact time when the prophets said the Messiah would appear. All concede that we have now a sect called Christians. They are counted by millions. They are found in all parts of the

world. As Napoleon said of them at Helena: "Millions of men would die for Christ to-day." These people have sacred books which profess to hold the life, teachings, miracles, success, sufferings, and death of their exalted Head. This sect existed in the tenth century, for the Crusades were commenced, to rescue the Holy Sepulcher from the hands of infidels. In the year 300, Christians had a position and a name among the nations of the earth; for Constantine, the Emperor of Rome, became a Christian. In the year 200, Christianity ran through all the Roman empire, as Gibbon admits, and "spread into every city." In the year 176, Celsus wrote. He undertook to show from the Gospels themselves that Jesus ought not to be received as a divine teacher. He quotes from all the Gospels, and calls them by name. He calls Jesus "the man of Nazareth," says he "was followed by a dozen fishermen or sailors," and was "put to death by a Roman judge." These sacred books must have been in existence at that early time, or Celsus could not have cited them against the Church. In the year 107, Pliny, in doubt what should be done with the numerous Christians in Judea, all violating the law of Rome, wrote his celebrated letter to Trajan for instructions. The Christians were guilty in that they "worshiped a man whom the Jews had put to death." He states their number; speaks of their godly life; how they worshiped Christ as God, and sang hymns to his sacred name; exhorted one another to obey the law of the land, and to lead pure and holy lives. He could not find it in his heart to harm them. In the year 54, Nero lived. His persecutions are mat