Christ to suffer, and to rise again from the dead, that so repentance and remission of sins might be preached in his name, among all nations." They soon learned, that the same event, which they once regarded as fatal to their Master's cause, was itself the corner-stone of his kingdom. The apostles were not made to understand, during the personal ministry of Christ, that the blessings of the gospel were to be extended to the Gentiles. Their Master had said to them, on one occasion, "Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not; but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." And although he directed them, at the last, to "preach the gospel to every creature;" yet they were led, for a time, to confine their ministry to the Jews. But after the descent of the Holy Spirit, their views on this subject were enlarged and corrected; the middle wall of partition was shown to be broken down; and the wondering disciples exclaimed with joy, "Then hath God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life." Another thing, which the disciples did not understand, and which indeed was not clearly revealed, till after the descent of the Holy Spirit, was the true import and meaning of the Jewish ritual. The Jews, in general, and the disciples of our Lord among the rest, regarded the bloody sacrifices of the ritual, as having some inherent efficacy. They trusted in them to make an atonement, and to secure the pardon of their sins. They supposed, doubtless, that these rites and sacrifices would be permanent-that, as God had appointed them, they would continue, till the end of time. But when the Spirit had come, and his enlightening influ

ence had begun to chase away the darkness of their minds, they were led to see, and to teach, that the rites of the Jewish religion were but a shadow of good things to come-that they all looked forward to the sacrifice of Christ-and that by his death, he had taken them out of the way, nailing them to his cross. Thro' the teaching and inspiration of the Divine Spirit, the apostles were enabled to furnish a key, by which the riches of the Jewish ritual are unlocked, and by which Gentile believers, in all ages, have been instructed and benefited. From the instances here given, we see it to be matter of fact, that our Lord did not disclose the truth so fully to his disciples, or impress it so deeply upon them, as he intended it should afterwards be done, by the ministry of the Spirit. He taught them such things as they were then capable of receiving— such as the circumstances of time and place required, in the best and plainest manner,; but he left it for the Spirit to shed around them a clearer light, and to perfect the work in which he had been engaged. "I have many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit, when he, the Spirit of truth is come, he shall guide you into all truth. The Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you."

It will be seen that the proposition, which has been discussed and established, places the inspiration of the apostles, and the authority of their epistles and other writings, on high ground. No part of the inspired volume, not even the declarations of our Lord him

and expressly calls it a mere flattery and mockery of the Deity. And there is reason to fear, that many who profess to believe the truth and divinity of the Bible, entertain a similar opinion in respect to prayer, and fondly imagine that they can pray internally and sincerely, while they cast off fear and restrain verbal prayer before God. It ought to be understood, that meditation and prayer are different duties, and that the former cannot be a substitute for the latter. How many are more willing to meditate, than to pray ? and how many do often meditate, that never pray? But some, who wish to be excused from verbal prayer, may still ask, 'Cannot men make what are called ejaculatory prayers, without using words? It is evident they cannot. There is as essential a difference between meditation and ejaculatory prayer, as between meditation and audible prayer. This may be illustrated by a single instance. When Nehemiah was admitted into the presence of the king of Babylon, to make his request to go to Jerusalem, he says, "Then the king said unto me, For what dost thou make request? So I prayed to the God of heaven. And I said unto the king, If it please the king, and if thy servant have found favour in thy sight that thou wouldest send me unto Judah, unto the city of my father's sepulchres, that I may build it." The prayer which Nehemiah made on this important occasion, he made in the presence of the king, and therefore it was an ejaculatory prayer, verbally, though not audibly, offered up to God. He not only had such thoughts and desires in heart, but expressed them to God. Had he not expressed his thoughts and desires in words, they would not

For the Christian Magazine.
POLYGAMY.

MILTON, in his lately discovered "Treatise on the Christian Doctrine," advocates, among other wild and erroneous opinions, the lawfulness of Polygamy. In an elaborate Review of this Treatise, in a late number of the "Christian Examiner," attributed to Rev. Dr. Channing, of Boston, we have the following remarkable expressions relative to the subject. "No part of his (Milton's) book has given such offence, as his doctrine of the lawfulness of Polygamy; and yet no where is he less liable to reproach. It is plain that his error was founded on his reverence for Scripture. He saw that polygamy was allowed to the best men in the Old Testament; to patriarchs before the law, who, he says, were the objects of God's special favor; and to eminent individuals in subsequent ages; and finding no prohibition of it in the New Testament, he believed, that not only holy men would be traduced, but scripture dishonored, by pronouncing it morally evil. We are aware that some will say, that the practice is condemned in the New Testament; and we grant it is censured, by implication, in these words of Christ, "Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery.'

which I send you for publication, if you shall think it proper to insert it in your work.

Heb. xi. 35. "Others were tortured, not accepting deliverance ; that they might obtain a better resurrection."

"When the whole verse is literally translated from the Greek, the English reader will immediately discover it," (the meaning of a better resurrection.) "The whole verse, then, is this: women, the widow of Sarepta and the Shunamite, received their dead by a resurrection: and others were tortured, not accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection; i. e. a resurrection better than that before mentioned. For the children whom the aforesaid women received by a resurrection, were by the prophet restored to live a dying life in this world. But the martyrs here spoken of, looked for a resurrection to an eternal

life in another state, which is bet.

ter than a resurrection to live in this world."

FILIAL DUTIES.

As the duty of obedience flows from the necessary power of the parent, in relation to the ignorance and weakness of those who are new to life, and therefore need his guidance, the filial duties of another class flow from the benefits conferred by the parentbenefits greater than can be conferred by another; since to them is due the very capacity of profiting by the benefits of others. Of how many cares must every human being have been the subject, before he could acquire even the thoughtless vigor of boyhood; and how many cares additional were

necessary, then to render that thoughtless vigor something more than the mere power of doing injury to itself! They whose constant attendance was thus necessary to preserve our very beingto whom we owe the instruction we have received, and in a great measure, too, our very virtue, may have sometimes, perhaps, exercised a rigour that was unnecessary; or abstained from affording us comforts which we might have enjoyed without any loss of vir. tue. But still the amount of advantage is not to be forgotten on account of some slight evil. We owe them much, though we might have owed them more; and owing them much, we cannot morally abstain from paying them the duties of those who owe much.

They should have no wants,

while we have even the humblest superfluity ;-or rather, while want is opposed to want, ours is not that of which we In should be the first to think. their bodily infirmities we are the attendants who should be most assiduous round their couch or their chair; and even those mental infirmities of age which are more disgusting-the occasional peevishness which reproaches for failures of duty which were not intended-the caprice that exacts one day what it would not permit the day before, and, what it is again to refuse on the succeeding day; we are to bear, not as if it were an effort to bear them and a sacrifice to duty; but with that tenderness of affection which bears much, because it loves much; and does not feel the sacrifices which it occasionally makes, because it feels only the love which delights in making them. Lovely as virtue is in all its forms, there is no form in which it is more lovely than in this ten