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money and without price. Now, whenever you feel ill-humored, or disposed to murmur at any of their requirements, just look a moment, and see how the account stands. Inquire what would be the consequence, if they should refuse to take care of you.

For the Religious Magazine.

DISPUTES ABOUT REGENERATION.

A FABLE.

Two philosophers fell into a discussion about motion. One laid down Aristotle's famous definition,-The act of being in power, so far forth as in power. The other preferred his own definition, equally learned and unintelligible. The difference rose into an angry dispute. It grew wider and wider, till all hope of agreement seemed lost, and the parties were in danger of becoming personal enemies. Pausing to take breath, one waved his cane in the air, and said, "That is motion: do you assent?" "Yes." So they shook hands, and the breach was healed.

THE PARALLEL.

Two Christians fell into a difference about regeneration—its nature, means, and the office of the several agents concerned. They had several encounters on the subject: each widened the difference, and cooled the mutual charity between them, more than the last. After an interval, they both met in a religious meeting, to which many had been drawn by the inquiry, "What shall I do to be saved?" M. addressed them on the importance of now bringing this inquiry to a successful determination; warned them against supposing, like Naaman, that the thing to be done, was any thing mysterious or unintelligible; insisted that repentance was the simplest and plainest thing in the world, and urged them, by all the arguments naturally suggested to a man in earnest, to submit their case to God, with a full, unreserved confession of their guilt. He concluded with a prayer for God's blessing on his efforts, and seemed ready to sink under a sense of the inefficiency of his own exhortations, without the Spirit's aid. After the meeting, N. addressed him as follows:-"Pray when did you come to your present views

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respecting regeneration?" "Long ago: ever since I had any definite conceptions on the subject." "But did you really mean so in our last discussion ?" Exactly." "Exactly-so did I.” So they shook hands, and the difference was forgotten.

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REMARKS.

The more simple and plain is any thing, the more interminable is the dispute, which may arise about it. Hence the difficulty which some have affected to find about defining or understanding unity, personal identity, &c. &c.; and hence, long and endless disputes about such subjects. Among those who have experienced what it is to be regenerated, to believe, to be converted, disputes about what the thing is, are like disputing what it is to wash and be clean. Men often miss truth, by diving for it fathoms deep, when it is floating on the surface; and they are so possessed with the contrary belief, that you cannot persuade them to look on the surface and see. The awakened sinner will not be beaten off from the persuasion, that his great difficulty is in his inability to understand correctly what is meant by faith in Christ, change of heart, and other expressions signifying the same thing, under different aspects whereas his only difficulty is, to HUMBLE HIMSELF RIGHT DOWN BEFORE GOD AND MAN.

For the Religious Magazine.

ACTIVE BENEVOLENCE AND CHRISTIAN ENJOYMENT.

We cannot agree with Dr. Young, that "it is impious in at good man to be sad," though we are satisfied that much of his sadness might often be easily banished.

"Assur

One mode of doing this, is Active Benevolence. ance," says President Edwards, "is not to be obtained so much by self-examination, as by action;" and the assertion is equally true of Christian enjoyment, which flows from this assurance.

This was the course adopted by Howard, the philanthropist. His rule for shaking off trouble was, "Set about doing good. Put on your hat, and go and visit the sick and the poor in your neighborhood;-inquire into their wants, and minister to them; -seek out the desolate and the oppressed, and tell them of the consolations of religion. I have often tried this method," he

adds, "and have always found it the best medicine for a heavy heart."

The prescription is a good one; and others, as well as Howard, may find a remedy for trouble in active benevolence,-in going about doing good. This will dissipate that sickly and morbid sensibility, which broods in secret sadness over real or imaginary sorrows,-which so often obscures the brightness of the good man's days, and shuts out from his soul the cheering light of heaven. This, if in vigorous exercise, will leave us no time for the indulgence of gloomy reveries, or desponding forebodings. This will call forth those sympathies of our nature, which are most conducive to our enjoyment as social beings. This will show us the reality and extent of our own blessings, by their contrast with the woes of others. This will multiply our positive pleasures, and will sweeten them all with that joy, which flows from the thought that we have rendered others happy. This too, by its very exercise, will afford more and more of that evidence of piety which is found in the zealous and faithful discharge of duty, and thus also will increase our enjoyments. This, in short, if performed in a right spirit, is active holiness, with which, in the economy of Providence, happiness is ever connected.

So it has ever been found, in every age of the world. Howard, to whom allusion has been made, in the early part of his manhood, was very much disposed to gloom, and despondency; and he did not gain habitual cheerfulness, but by doing good. Paul did not win the full assurance of his title to a bright inheritance in the skies, by musing in sadness upon his secret sorrows. It was when occupied with active usefulness, that he attained to a clear and cloudless hope of his acceptance with Christ. And many a desponding, mourning child of God, by imitating the apostle's active benevolence, might realize, in his own experience, much of the apostle's exalted Christian enjoy

ments.

"Wouldst thou from sorrow find a sweet relief?
Or is thy heart oppressed by woes untold?
Balm wouldst thou gather for corroding grief?
Pour blessings round thee, like a shower of gold.
'Tis when the rose is wrapt in many a fold,

Close to its heart, the worm is wasting there

Its life and beauty; not, when all unrolled,

Leaf after leaf, its bosom rich and fair

Breathes freely its perfumes, throughout the ambient air.

Rouse to some work of high and holy love;

And thou an angel's happiness shalt know,

Shalt bless the earth-while, in the world above,

The good begun by thee shall onward flow,
In many a branching stream, and wider grow.
The seed, that in these few and fleeting hours
Thy hands unsparing and unwearied sow,

Shall deck thy grave with amaranthine flowers,

And yield thee fruits divine, in heaven's immortal bowers."

T. E.

For the Religious Magazine.

THE LAW A SHADOW.

The law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things." Heb. 10:1. "Which are a shadow of things to come, but the body is of Christ." Col. 2:17.

Shadow here means imperfect delineation, a rough sketch * An illustration will explain exactly the apostle's meaning.

When Chantry undertook to make the statue of Washington, which stands in the Massachusetts State House, the first thing was, to make a model in clay, or other easily wrought material, to foreshow imperfectly, what the finished image was to be, and serve to guide the chisel in its formation. In that model image, a judicious eye would have detected the hand of a master; and at the same time, imperfections enough, if it were to be judged as a finished work of art.

But suppose it had fallen under the observation of som smatterer in criticism, who understood not its proper design. What objections! what ridicule! what triumph! How plainly does he see it to be the work of a bungler! Even the perishable nature of the material betrays the maker's consciousness of incompetency to carve for immortality. He catches at the supposed faults so eagerly, that he misses all the touches of the master's hand. Now he has abundant proof, that Chantry is no sculptor. Or, perhaps, professing to know Chantry's works well, he has here plain demonstration, that the present work was never from his hand.

Again. Let the finished marble meet the eye of another self-sufficient critic. He cannot deny that this is the finished work of a master's hand. But then the appearance is not just that which best becomes Washington. Washington was all goodness, philanthropy, bent on seeking the people's happiness. His countenance might better express his ruling trait. A more elevated, inviting position of the arms would be more appropriate. But as it would be too presumptuous to elevate his own

* Stewart's Commentary,

judgment above Chantry's, he hits upon a method of reconciling his own decision with fact. Chantry really meant to represent Washington's features and position, in this latter manner,and, to be honest, we must say, the marble image so does it does in sense, though literally it is quite different. But the literal form was given in accommodation to the previous model, by which it was wrought. The necessity of following that, led the sculptor to express himself in a way to be perfectly understood, only by a very refined criticism.

Few minds could be so ignorant, or so inclined to be deceived, as to be deceived by criticisms like these. Yet if, some how or other, the admission of them afforded the only escape from some painful duty, some unwelcome truth, some humbling acknowledgment, would not men be found so to impose on themselves? Then why are the above so exact representations of criticisms passed so confidently on the Holy Scriptures?

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But to the humble, though unlearned Christian, the assaults of such criticism are powerless, as would be the supposed criticism on the statues, to one, who had repeatedly seen, at respectful distance, the living features of Washington, and contemplated the statues, till he saw, in each, such resemblances to the life, as none but the hand of a master would give. Such a Christian may not have so definitely, as above, stated to himself the apostle's meaning, in calling the law a shadow, or sketch, of what the gospel is the full image. But from all his investigation of the Scriptures, he feels substantially this truth. And though the objections may perplex, they can no more persuade him, than if he could lucidly refute them. He feels substantially that neither the law nor the gospel pretends to give a full and perfect representation of the divine character, "of the good things to come," any more than either of the statues pretends to be the living, moving Washington. And to complain, that any acknowledged trait of the divine character does not fully appear in either Testament, till tortured by criticism, seems to him as unreasonable, as to complain, that the statue does not exhibit every posture, or every feature, which Washington as general, statesman, or philanthropist, might assume. It is in vain to tell him that Christ is spoken of as a sacrifice for sin, only in accommodation to Jewish rites and manners-the sense being, that he died a martyr to the glorious truths he had taught. This seems to him to be taking away the only rational account to be given for the appointment of sacrifices, namely, to prefigure the sacrifice of Christ-to prepare the minds of the people to receive the doctrine of a Saviour sacrificed for the sin of the world. The criticism seems to him

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