that can blow upon us, every wave that can threaten us, is completely subject to His power. He has shown both His power and His love in the past; let us trust both in the future. Our Saviour slumbers not, nor sleeps. He is always watching over us for good. He is always almighty, always compassionate, always near; and He loves us to trust in Him. Let us seek, by His grace, to rise above our fears. Let not "little-faithed" be our name any more.

Loaded with Fetters.

IN bygone days it was one of the cruel aggravations of imprisonment to make the chains that bound the prisoner so heavy that the weight of them was galling and wearisome almost beyond endurance. The same set of fetters was thus at once both a burden and a bondage; a burden too heavy to bear, and bonds too strong to be broken. In modern times, and in civilised countries, justice is now content with the safe keeping of the prisoner, and the fetters that bind him are made no heavier or stronger than is necessary for that purpose. Yet there are still many who experience a burden and a bondage more cruel and terrible than ever did captive at the hand of the cruellest tyrant. It is sin that constitutes the burden which they have to bear, sin which forms the bonds that enslave them; for sin is a burden. Thus the Scriptures represent it. "Mine iniquities," says the Psalmist, gone over mine head; as an heavy burden they are too heavy for me."

are

John Bunyan, who himself knew well, from his own experience, the terrible weight of sin when it is lying unpardoned on the conscience, pictures Christian, the hero of his "Pilgrim's Progress," as setting out from the City of Destruction with a great burden fastened upon his shoulders, the burden of his sins. Do what he might he could not get rid of it, until at last he came to the cross.

There, as he

gazed, his burden loosened from his shoulders, fell into the grave of the crucified Saviour, and he never saw it more.

Sin is a burden. Assuredly, one single sin is too heavy a load for any human soul to bear, for one single sin condemns the soul to death, and can crush it to destruction. It needed only one sin to ruin the world at first. If one link of this accursed chain is too heavy for any soul to carry, what then of the ever-lengthening chain of sin for days, and weeks, and months, and years, till the links are beyond all numbering?

Who can bear the weight of a burden such as this? None. And yet it was a burden heavier by far than this that Jesus had to bear, for "the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquities of us all." Our sins were laid upon Him. He bore the mighty load, and hath taken away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. This the Word of God assures us; and the man who truly knows and believes this, loses the burden of his sins, as did Christian at the cross.

But sin is a chain as well as a burden, a chain forged by ourselves.

It is told of a famous smith of medieval times, that having been taken prisoner and immured in a dungeon, he conceived the idea of escaping, and began to examine the chain that bound him, with a view to discover some flaw that might make it easier to be broken. His hope was vain, for he found, from marks upon it, that it was one of his own workmanship, and it had always been his boast that none could ever break a chain that he had forged. And now it was his own chain that bound him.

It is thus with the sinner. His own hands have forged the chain that binds him, a chain which in endless and evermultiplying coils is around his soul, and which no human hand can break. Yet is there a hand can break it-the hand of Him who brings "liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound."

It was an ancient Roman mode of punishment to chain the murderer to the dead body of his victim. By day the prisoner could not open his eyes but they fell on the ghastly

visible in the Under such a

face of the dead; and by night it still was phosphorescent light of its putrefaction. terrific figure it was that the Apostle Paul conceived of sin, and wrote of it to the Roman converts. And he has placed on record the great and bitter cry of his anguished soul under a sense of his sin: "O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" He did find deliverance, where alone it can be found, in Jesus Christ; and the same hand that penned the cry of his anguish has put on record his deliverance: "The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." 2

Let the sinner bound by the chain of evil habit, an evil life, evil companionship, evil thoughts, evil words, evil deeds, by a past of sin, and a future of terror, and who yet would fain be free, cry unto Him for deliverance. Let him, with an earnest purpose, cry, "O Lord, I beseech Thee, deliver my soul," and that cry will not be in vain; the chain will be broken, and the bonds will be loosed.

My friend, have you felt this burden? Have Have you known anything of the bitterness of this bondage? Have you known what it is to be the slave of an evil habit? Have you felt the tide of sin within you sweeping away your best purposes, and ruining your best plans? Have you found your efforts to do good in vain, and that your utmost endeavours only revealed the strength of the bonds that held you? Have you known the misery of besetting sin, and of victorious temptation striven against in vain? Have you found, in your bitter experience, that whenever you were at your weakest, temptation took advantage of you, and wound another coil of sin around your soul? If you have, then know this, that there is only one way of deliverance for you. Jesus can break the yoke that binds you,-Jesus alone! Seek His help in your need, "Jesus, Master, have mercy on me!" "If the Son make you free,, ye shall be free indeed."

1 Romans vii. 24.

R. R. T.

? Romans viii. 2.

No help was near, and all alone
I cast me down beside a stone,
With one low wailing cry.

For strength was gone, and hope was dead,
And heavy was my heart as lead;

I only thought to die.

When lo! Behold a sudden ray,
A sudden brightness as of day,
A glorious Presence nigh!
And then I heard a voice that said,
"O, weary wanderer, lift thy head,
For I have heard thy cry.

"No longer dread the darksome night,
The wintry blast, the tempest's might;
Fear not, for it is I."

I raised my eyes, and saw Him stand;
He touched me with a pierced hand;
He looked with pitying eye.

It was my Saviour come at length,

His look gave life, His touch was strength;
On Him I now rely.

With Him I go 'mid brightening day,
Unto a land that's far away,

A home with Him on high.

Come with us to that land so fair;
Come, God will bid you welcome there;
To Him, O sinner, cry.

Tell Him your sorrow and your sin;
Tell Him, and He will take you in,

And all your wants supply.

R. R. T.

Na pretty country village in one of the midland counties stood a small but well-stocked general shop, its shelves containing a miscellaneous assortment of drapery and provisions. It was the favourite resort of most of the poorer women dwelling