its beauties-beauties which he who follows in the path of commentators and paraphrasers must not hope to enjoy. The Chart will have fulfilled the least part of its object, if its use should be limited to the refreshment of the memory on the dry details of those pedigrees which it includes. Its aim is rather to suggest a mode of dealing with sacred genealogies, than to be a standard vade-mecum on such matters. It seeks to change mere readers of the hallowed volume, into those who mark, learn, and inwardly digest it. It seeks to impress on the self-sufficiency of a superficial generation the fact, that there is no royal road to that knowledge which some think is grasped when it is looked at. It seeks, by an example of persevering and somewhat novel drudgery, to intimate that the commentator on the whole Bible ought not to be implicitly trusted by the individual student. It would fain be, to those who may deem it not useless, what it is expected to become to its author-a step towards greater and better things on the same subject. At the same time it is hoped that the Chart will be no unacceptable companion to the most uninstructed searcher of the Scriptures. At all events, it is presumed that its price will be no bar to its circulation among all classes who take delight in the inspired pages. At the smallest charge that affords its spirited publisher even a remote chance of reimbursement, the Chart presents to the student's eye whatever pedigrees of the royal tribe of Judah are named and reckoned in the Bible. He will find one pedigree of that tribe accompanied in its progress by the names of potentates, whose greatest strength was often tried in vain against the Daughter of Zion, when her weakness seemed hardly to require a blow for the extinction of her name and race-Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian, Median, Persian. What trophy now endures of those victories which laid prostrate so many nations? With these the tender plant, the blossom out of a dry ground, contrasts its lineage in the Chart. Assyria fades, but Judah has still a remnant-Nineveh and Babylon are swept away, but a full end is not made of Judah-the myriads of Persia leave not a wreck behind, but the vital principle yet animates the SEED. It may not be crushed, for its Defenders are not flesh and blood —it cannot wither, for its preservation has been decreed by Him who lifteth up the low and debaseth the high, who removeth kings and setteth up kings. A guard more vigilant than the Greek or the Roman is set over it; and in all its reverses (and they are many), and in all its calamitous days (and they are numberless), the SEED is cared for by Him that sleepeth not. Nation after nation seek to perpetuate their names and their might. Alas for their folly! They but mark the epochs of the

seed-they but indicate the phases of its eternal orbit! Behind the clouds of heaven, below its horizon, or high in its firmament, the SUN is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. And though every other branch is lopped away, and the trunk itself is withered, one bud of promise remains to expand, to bear leaves, to blossom, and to bring forth fruit in its appointed season. Abraham, about to slay the child of his hundredth year -Jacob, crossing Jordan in his solitary flight—David, as a partridge among the mountains, and a royal fowler pursuing— Joash, the infant, saved by a woman, and hidden six years, when every other male of the seed royal was slaughtered. Hezekiah, childless and dying, rises from his bed, and, during the fifteen years which are added to his prayers and tears, Manasseh is born!-a birth that would but poorly repay the miracle which gave new life to his father, were he other than the LINK which connects two of that chain which binds the hope of the promise. Why to secure a respite for such an one's birth was Hezekiah's doom arrested? Why for such a criminal were the warriors of Sennacherib so terribly smitten? "He is come to Aiath, he is passed to Migron; at Michmash hath he laid up his carriages." One blow only is wanted to finish the catastrophe of Judah--to put out her glory-to bring over her throne and her generations the oblivion of Hamath, Arpad, and Sepharvaim. Its extinction was opposed to an everlasting covenant to bless mankind; and therefore the foot that would have trampled it down, and added its subjugation to that of Calno, Carchemish, Damascus, and Samaria, is paralyzed on the very threshold of victory.

No weapon was then wielded by the race of Jacob! The time had passed, never to return, when their beloveth city was the capital of a realm extending from Tipshah to Azzah, and from Dan to Beersheba. Cooped within the limits of their last refuge, sat a famished, degenerate, and despairing handful— their monarch in sackcloth, with only the resource of the helpless-an appeal to the Invisible One, who, in every vicissitude, had not failed his people. On one, perhaps, of all his providences, the most signal, in the evidence it affords that its sole object was the conservation of a pedigree at the very crisis of its destiny, it may be permitted to the genealogist to ponder awhile.

Assyria's trust is in his tens of thousands, in the terror which his very name inspired, and in the pitiable weakness of his rival. On he marched against the devoted city. "In the high way of the Fuller's Field," within speaking distance from their unguarded walls, his battle is arrayed. Who shall deliver Israel from the host of the oppressor at their gates? "I will

deliver thee and this city out of the hand of the King of Assyria, and I will defend this city, for mine own sake, and for my servant David's sake." The Almighty's purpose awaited but the night for its accomplishment; and where is the fury of the oppressor?

The flush of his triumph and the din of his hostility are changed to a dreadful calm-the field of his anticipated victory is transformed to a sepulchre. The night hath departed. Why stirs not the universal conqueror? Why sleep his warriors in their tents? Why do his lines delay to encompass Jerusalem -to make ruinous heaps of the city that hath shaken her head at them? Why smoke not the red swords of his least captains, in retribution for the laughter of Zion's daughter? It is the morning! Has their rest been broken by the foe? Has an effort of despair brought panic to their mighty ones? Hath Hezekiah the Hebrew set an example to the Spartan Leonidas? Not so their camp wears no evidence of disorder. Their instruments of violence are unsullied, or the stains of former prowess alone are on them. The guardians of the beleaguered city are yet in their strong-hold-their dejected courage unassured by their prophet's benediction! The spirit of fear and bondage is upon them! Samaria's fall is new in their recollection!

"O death, how terrible art thou in a guise like this!" There is silence in the tented field, as though the fatigue of so many triumphs had prolonged the sleep of the mighty: without vigour to rise, they throng the earth, an easy prey to the insulted foe. But the foe is not there! Heaven has avenged its own cause! The God of the promise hath vindicated his own controversy! Jacob's trust in Pharaoh's chariots and horses, and Sennacherib's confidence in the arms which prevailed against all other lands, are here shown to be vanity altogether! Egypt's shadow has afforded no refuge to Abraham's children, for the sword, the spear, and the shield of their fierce adversary (though not vilely cast away), are idly scattered where their owners lie smitten by the angel-"beaten down," according to the prediction of the son of Amos, by "the voice of the Lord!"

The revival of Assyria's glory under Esarhaddon-the precarious position of Judah among nations more vigorous and flourishing, till it suited the mightiest of them to slay or carry captive its surviving members-the destruction of Jerusalem and of Nineveh-of the oppressed and of the oppressor-within a few years of each other, would be demonstrative of the uselessness of Judah's preservation from Sennacherib, but for the

light which that dispensation borrows from the genealogical records yet extant in the archives of "the remnant." One hundred and eighty-five thousand corpses were sacrificed, not for any national purpose of aggrandizement, but to secure deliverance for the SEED, and to punish the blasphemer who had vaunted that Jehovah was on the side of one who warred against the

covenant.

Let us trace the future positions of these belligerents. The name of Assyrian gradually vanished from the world. The captives of Judah transmitted theirs to all future generations. From the era of the siege which was so marvellously raised, the line which commences with God in St. Luke, and with Abraham in St. Matthew, was continued for about seven hundred years, and from the end of the Babylonish captivity for more than five hundred years. About three years from Sennacherib's discomfiture, Manasseh was born-the only link by which the integrity of our Lord's male descent, from David and Solomon, could be perpetuated.

Here then we pause, for the present only, should the pledge which the Chart affords of devotion to this study be thought to outweigh the imperfections of this hurried and unconnected sketch; or finally, should it meet with inadequate acceptance. Other and less undistinguished hands are wanted in this labour. A year spent in pondering and comparing those genealogical records, which were probably "oral" from Adam to Moses, and "written" from his day to that on which Joseph and Mary went to be taxed at Bethlehem, because "he was of the house and lineage of David," would afford larger returns of real and accurate knowledge of the Bible than the most matured acquaintance with the soundest of commentators. Attaching, it is hoped, no undue importance to questions of words and names, and diffident of the claim to a favourable notice, which the Chart may present, it is trusted that the latter will not be pronounced useless towards the elucidation of the former, without being accompanied by the admission of it as an unexceptionable testimonial of an inclination to shrink from no toil, and to evade no drudgery, however humble and mechanical, that can afford a chance of supplying facilities for the prosecution of more interesting labours in that field, which, barren, and rugged, and unpromising, as it seems to "the many," has already compensated one cultivator at least, whatever discouragement may await the effort now submitted to the candour of all who desire to know more certainly of such matters.

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ART. IX.-A Plea for the Poor.

By the Hon. and Rev.

BAPTIST NOEL. London: Nisbet. 1841.

2. A Counter Plea for the Poor. London: Ollivier. 1841. 3. Cheap Bread and its Consequences: a Plain Statement. London: Painter. 1841.

THANKS to that gracious Providence which has watched so long over our beloved country, the danger that threatened us lately is for the time averted. The cry of "cheap bread," raised by a Liberal Government in the agonies of its dissolution, has recoiled upon its authors. We have now a Ministry pledged to maintain, on their ancient foundations, our institutions in Church and State. Those liberal patriots who are glad at calamities, and were exulting openly that "the seasons had done their work," have been premature in expressing their detestable joy. The fears of the Church have been averted, and its prayers answered, by returning sunshine, and the promise of at least a moderate, and perhaps a plenteous harvest.

But while thankfulness is due for the past, vigilance is needed for the future. The poison of false theories and ignorant hopes is still working deeply around us, and our late Ministry have bequeathed us a parting legacy of agitation and strife. The repeal of the corn laws is henceforward to be the watchword of that numerous party who are " given to change." A fresh impulse is thus to be given to the deadly fever of trade, and a fatal blow really aimed at the stability, independence, and peace of our nation. The names of Religion and Benevolence are pressed into the service. The Lord's Prayer is perverted and profaned into a party cry. Sectarian teachers of every kind and name, trampling under foot their own principles, start forth in convention as full-fledged politicians, discuss in full synod our national measures, and propound their crude fancies to Parlia ment in the thrice holy name of the God of love. To crown the mischief, an estimable clergyman of our own Church, duped by the liberal follies of the age, throws the shield of his name over the motley group, and lends his voice to swell the cry of agitation. Not content with stringing together the borrowed fallacies of the economists, he begs the question at issue in his title page, and can find no fitter motto for his assault on the corn laws than the words of Solomon, "The righteous considereth the cause of the poor, but the wicked regardeth not to know it." Now on this very point we join issue with Mr. Noel. We believe that sound policy, true benevolence, and Christian duty, are alike opposed to that course of legislation which he com