It has been observed that "James' bishops," as "Here lyes beneath thir laid-stanes Lo, here ye have his epitaph."† * Guthry's Memoirs. Scott's MSS. in Adv. Lib. f Wodrow's Biographical Collections, (Maitland.-ED.,) vol. i., part i. Gladstanes was succeeded in the primacy by John Spotswood, a shrewd and crafty politician, and the author of a History of the Church of Scotland, which, as has been well observed, might more properly be called "Calumnies against the Church of Scotland." The man who, as appears from his private correspondence, was engaged in all the shuffling and jesuitical plots of the government for overturning Presbytery, which he had sworn to support, could hardly be expected to give a fair account of transactions in which his own credit was so deeply implicated, and for his share in which he was afterwards excommunicated by the Church which he had betrayed. His falsehoods and misrepresentations have been so satisfactorily exposed, that to appeal to him now as an authority, on any disputed point of history, is set down at once as a mark of blindfold prejudice. It could hardly be expected that men who had been thus intruded into the government of the Church under the wing of royal prerogative, and contrary to the will of the nation, would find it easy to gain either respect to their persons, or submission to their authority. In fact, the people despised them, and the ministers continued to preach against their intrusion, and to administer ordinances as if no such persons as bishops existed in the country. The king found it necessary, therefore, in the absence of all respect for their episcopal powers, to arm them with civil authority. For this purpose he erected the Court of High Commission, a sort of English Inquisition, composed of prelates, noblemen, knights, and ministers, and possessing the combined powers of a civil and ecclesiastical tribunal. This nondescript court, whose proceedings were regulated by no fixed laws, was empowered to receive appeals from any Church court, to summon before them all preachers charged with speeches contrary to the established order of the Church, and on finding them guilty, to depose and excommunicate, or to fine and imprison them. Thus invested with powers which enabled them to set at defiance both the Church courts and the civil jurisdiction, the bishops proceeded to depose, fine, and confine at their pleasure all who were obnoxious to them. A THOUGHT ON THE STATE OF THE JEWS. SEE ye that people, whom the world's rude scorn Alas, afflicted nation! now no more Shout thy glad tribes at Zion's temple gate; True, Israel, thou art stricken; yet beware, Ye Gentile nations, rich through Israel's fall, Lest, in your pride, with impious hearts ye dare Despise, whom God has deign'd His own to call. Despise them not; for see His words declare, That they are still His own-that still His love Is set upon them; while his constant care Preserves them separate, wheresoe'er they rove. And not, perhaps, far distant is the time When He, in mercy, shall make bare His arm, In Israel's cause, and call, from every clime, Their scatter'd tribes and all their foes disarm. His seed from east and west the Lord shall bring; The north and south no longer shall retain His sons and daughters-while Heaven's mighty King His chosen people shall restore again. And then, once more, shall Zion's glory shine, While to her rising brightness kings shall flee; And the proud Gentile, taught by power divine, Before her light shall bow the suppliant knee. Then shall approach the day when He who trod Our world in meekness, shall descend with power, And earth affrighted shall confess its God. Oh! who shall stand in that most awful hour! Great day of wonders! happy they who've fled For refuge to the Cross-they need not fear Though mov'd the stedfast earth,-dispell'd their dread, As with Him in his glory they appear. NOMOTHESIA, OR THE GIVING OF THE LAW, PART I. A. M. BY THE REV. JAMES ESDAIle, D.D., Minister of the East Church, Perth. THE founders of laws, and of civil and religious institutions, have always wished it to be believed that they had the authority of heaven for the regulations which they introduced. Numa pretended to conferences with the nymph Egeria, and made the rude fathers of Rome believe that his political regulations were the dictations of heaven. The legislators of Greece had recourse to the same expedients; and Solon and Lycurgus so contrived matters, as to be able to plead the sanction of the gods for the laws and political regulations which they instituted, respectively, at Athens and at Sparta. Indeed, it is impossible that any laws can be binding on the consciences of men, unless they can plead such authority. Even the Heathen saw that men must be subject "not only for wrath, but for conscience' sake;" for the public laws cannot repress the thousandth part of the mischief that would be done, were there no restraints but the ordinances of the State. If there are any who imagine that these observations have a tendency to weaken the authority of Moses, and to place him on a footing with those who have judged it necessary to practise pious frauds, and deceive the people for their good, a little reflection will soon dispel this idea, and demonstrate that the pretended revelations of the Heathen legislators have their origin, either in a conviction of the necessity of divine authority to give efficacy to the laws, or in some well authenticated instances in which the will of heaven was clearly made known; and the world, from the carliest ages, must have been familiar with such instances. However great the cor ruptions in religion might be in early times, Atheism, at least, was not amongst the number; the mythology of the Heathen is one continued record of the manifestations and exploits of their deities; and this, there can be no doubt, arose from the authentic evidence which the earliest nations of the world had of the actual interpositions and revelations of Jehovah. The three sons of Noah, by whom the post-diluvian world was peopled, were familiar with such interpositions; the catastrophe of the flood would give it a lasting impression on their minds, and on that of their posterity; and both tradi tion and superstition would serve to produce deep impressions of the divine interference to regulate the affairs of men. This is the origin of that universal belief current both among the Heathen and among truc believers, that God has often interfered to instruct, or to punish the world. No wonder that Israel should be so deeply impressed with the extraordinary circumstances under which the law was given at Mount Sinai. To see their propbet, legislator, and guide, returning unscathed from the midst of the lightning, and smoke, and earthquake, and thunder, which enveloped and shook the mount, must have made a deep impression on those who witnessed these extraordinary manifestations of divine power; and their posterity was not permitted to forget them; for they are woven into the inspired poetry of Israel, and that devoted, but most interesting people, still willingly continue to sing the songs of Zion in the lands of their captivity, where they are held by something stronger than any human bonds, till the time shall come when "the Lord shall arise, and have mercy on Zion." Such were the extraordinary circumstances under which the law was given to Moses; how different from those under which "grace and truth" were announced to the world by Jesus Christ! Observe how strikingly the contrast is drawn by the apostle, Ye are not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, nor unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest; but ye are come unto mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and Church of the first-born, which are writ ten in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus the me diator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, which speaketh better things than that of Abel." Heb. xii. 18-24. But not only is the contrast between the circumstances under which the law and the Gospel were given, great and striking; it is still more remarkable, when we consider the object, the substance, and the essence, of the two dispensations. This cannot be more pointedly stated than in the words of the evangelists, "The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ." John i. 17. There was no room for grace under the law; its sentence is "cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them." Gal, iii. 10. Shall we suppose this sentence to be rigorous and severe? it is quite the reverse; it is most reasonable, most equitable; it is absolutely indispensable: was God to give his law to Israel, sanctioned by all the demonstrations of divine majesty and of terrific power, and yet was he to allow this law to be violated with impunity? | they undergo many changes and modifications according This would have been to have allowed himself to be to the altered circumstances of the people to whom they insulted to his face, and to have his power and sove- are given; but a great part of the Jewish law was given reignty denied and ridiculed. If any one should be dis- by anticipation before the circumstances to which it posed to plead the slightness of the offence, or the in- was applicable had any existence. The laws respecting different nature of the action, in regard to the moral agriculture, which are minute and particular, were altolaw, the very apology would demonstrate the aggrava- gether impracticable in the wilderness; the laws and tion of the offence; the casuistry of the transgressor regulations respecting the cities of refuge, and the cities would suggest to him the plea that the trespass was so to be allotted to the priests, were prescribed when the triding, or the evil done so insignificant, that it could people dwelt in tents with nothing to sustain their hopes not justly subject him to rigorous punishment. So, he but the distant promise of a settled habitation; the thinks that he may insult the Almighty for a trifle, and worship of God, too, was distinctly defined, and though that the simpler and easier his commandments are, he it assumed a very different aspect after the Jews were may feel the less fear and compunction in violating them! settled in the promised land, from what it had during We admit that there are degrees of guilt, and that some the sojourning in the wilderness-the magnificent temsins are more heinous in the sight of God than others; ple coming in the place of the moveable tabernacle—yet and it would be easy to state certain aggravations which the service was essentially the same, and Solomon's increase the enormity of sin, but it is not necessary, temple derived its glory from the same sacred emblems and, except in very particular circumstances, would be that consecrated the tabernacle in the wilderness, viz., improper to do so, as every one, who is not conscious the ark of the covenant, with its sacred contents, "the of such aggravations, would think himself comparatively golden pot that had manna, and Aaron's rod that budded, innocent. It is much more profitable to look to the and the tables of the covenant." Heb. ix. 4. And much stern severity of the Jewish law, and to remember that as we have reason to regret the obstinacy of that inthere are no degrees of guilt in the sin of disobedience fatuated people, it is, nevertheless, interesting to obto a positive commandment, or, if there be any, the serve the indelible impression stamped on their character violation of the slightest is the most heinous, because by the Mosaic institutions, down to the present day. it is the most easily observed; it then assumes the character of a sin of presumption, and of defiance against the ordinances of the supreme Law-giver; such was the offence of the man who gathered sticks on the Sabbathday, it was a public disowning of the God and King of Israel, it was treason against the constitution of the Hebrew commonwealth, and the offender was punished with death. Num. xv. 32-36. Thus, then, we see that there was no room for grace under the law of Moses; mercy to presumptuous offenders could not be manifested without a complete subversion of the whole frame-work of the Mosaic institutions; nevertheless God made a covenant with his people by sacrifice, as a symbol and pledge of the grace that was to be revealed by Jesus Christ. And as grace was not manifested under the law, neither was the truth fully revealed; both grace and truth came, in the fulness of their manifestation, only through Jesus Christ. The law was "the shadow of good things to come," "a schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ;" it bore testimony to the placability of the Almighty, and demonstrated that he had no pleasure in the death of the sinner; but it pointed out no sufficient remedy, for it was impossible for man to conceive that the blood of bulls and of goats could take away sin, or that a rational and accountable being could transfer his guilt to an irrational victim which cannot sin, and, therefore, cannot be a proper object either of punishment or reward. All this was known by the righteous under the Old Testament dispensation; and down to the time when the Saviour appeared, there were many righteous persons "waiting for the Consolation of Israel," and Anna the prophetess "spoke of Him to all that looked for redemption in Jerusalem." Luke ii. 25, 38. The law was given to Moses in the face of all Israel; it was acted on from the moment it was given, and it imparted an entirely new aspect to the whole civil and religious economy of that peculiar people. In most cases, laws are gradually introduced; and, in all cases, A LETTER WRITTEN BY SIR JOHN CLERK OF PENICUICK, BART., TO HIS ELDEST SON, JOHN CLERK, AFTERWARDS SIR JOHN CLERK. To my dearly beloved wife, Christian Kilpatrick, my Fearing I might be surprised with death, and hurried into eternity, (as many are) and so lose the opportunity of putting my house in order, and acquainting you with some things which concern your comfortable living together, in the fear of the Lord, I have in weakness, and as the Lord gave me strength, laid hold on his covenant, and resigning all my earthly concerns and worldly substance to you most cheerfully, I have reserved for myself the hope of salvation, and that inheritance which is incorruptible, undefiled, and fadeth not away. I have, by my testament and bonds of provision in favour of my younger children, made my will known as to the most just and equal division of that estate which the Lord was pleased to bestow upon me, and directed and assisted me in distributing the same; and I have chosen this occasion of giving my last counsel and advice to all of you, that when I come to die, I may have nothing to do but die. And O that I may be helped, through grace, to live and die in the Lord! Be thankful and content with what the Lord hath provided for you, and study godliness, which, with contentment, is great gain; bear one another's burdens in the Lord. Your mother-in-law, as she has been most dutiful and affectionate to me, so she has, according to her power, promoted your interest, and studied your comfort, and that of all my other children; I entreat you therefore, my dear John, to be a kind, obliging son to her, and a loving brother and affectionate father to our children. I am very confident you will do this according to your power, and their deservings, and therefore (have) suppressed all arguments that might excite you to the performance of that duty towards them all; which, I am persuaded, you will do most cheerfully of your own accord in the strength of the Lord. By concord, small things come to good account; therefore I advise you to live together, if possible, for this will contribute to your honour and interest; and because some differences do arise, even amongst those who have the root of the matter in them, and are sincere believers, therefore I require, and command you in the Lord, that in case any such difference should arise among you, to end the same by a friendly reference to a mutual person, and not to go to law. (1 Cor. vi. 1.) The day ere long will break, and the shadows fly away, and the morning of the resurrection will appear. O! that you may study, then, and make it your chief business to get an interest in the first resurrection, that when Christ who is our life shall appear, you may also appear with him in glory. And in order to this, I know nothing more suitable and necessary for you, than to be making sure a saving interest in God and the everlasting covenant through Jesus Christ, before the time come when ye shall walk through the valley and shadow of death, that you may fear no ill, and may have ane undoubted right to all the great and precious promises through Christ, and be enabled to auswer all challenges arising from temptations, afflictions, and desertions, and may plead confidently with the Lord for the performance of all his promises. I earnestly request you all, in the strength of the Lord, to make a personal covenant with the Lord speedily, and yet deliberately, sincerely, and expressly in writ, and sign it with your heart and hand; for therein consists the very direct formal act of justifying faith. For your direction in this duty, you may consult with these learned and godly men,-Messrs Guthrie, Wedderburn, Allan, Dickson, and Clark, what they have written on that subject. And for your encouragement, I must tell you that since the day I was directed by the Lord to set about that solemn duty, which was in the year 1683, I have, as I think, thriven and prospered more both as to my body and soul than ever I did before that time. I found no small advantage by my keeping a spiritual journal, wherein I wrote down daily my experiences and practice, with the divine providences that occurred. I advise you to try and set about this duty more diligently than ever I did, for this will give you a nice and critical view of all the various steps and degrees of God's method of grace to your souls, and will acquaint you with the wickedness of your own hearts, and Satan's devices, and his manner of managing his temptations: this will discover to you what progress you have made in sanctification, and whether your stock of grace be on the decaying hand or on the growing; and this, through the blessing of God, will be your remembrance many ways for the good of yourself and others. Neglect not, I pray you, to set up the worship of God in your families, that he may have a visible throne erected in every one of your houses; but above all, prepare an habitation for him in your heart, for he is your God, and your father's God. Keep up communion with him by secret prayer, and meditaion, and by the observance of all his ordinances; and practise all commanded duties, walking as always in his presence, and aspiring ever to perfection through the blessing of the Lord. Be kindly affectionate one to another. Beware of entering rashly and familiarly into an intimate friendship with any person : let these be your companions who you have good ground to think will be your company in heaven. Look not on any person as worthy or intimate of your respect and love, with whom you may not carry on a heavenly correspondence and fellowship in timely prayer and divine conference. Acquaint yourselves much with the Scriptures, and take the help of the best commentaries thereon which you can purchase, for these are the glasses wherein you can best see the mercy and goodness of God in Christ, your own vileness, and the absolute need you have of a Redeemer. Look upon religion as the highest improvement of the human life, and as the best guide to human nature. I earnestly recommend to your love and respect all the faithful ministers of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and would have you study all opportunities of serving them, especially of receiving the Gospel of your salvation kindly from them. O! that the Lord may let you know the infinite advantage of being the objects of his love, and the subjects of the prayers of his saints and people. I earnestly beg it of you, and if I have any power with you, I command that my burial and interment, when the Lord shall determine it, may be according to a particular memorial herein inclosed and signed by me, so far, at least, as is possible in every point. I have heard many wise persons cry out against the vanity and extravagance of burials; and yet good people many times, being led by the stream of the fashion, and to prevent reproaches, have been forced to run into these extravagances at the interment of their deceased friends, and all because they left no particular order in write anent their interment, which seeing, I have studied to obviate, and I hope you will please me in this. As for my spiritual journal carried on by me from the year 1688 to this day, and my written personal covenant with my Lord and my God in Christ, with some excerpts out of the Scriptures, I leave them with you to your perusal, so then to be burned when you think fit. Finally, I exhort you all that ye sorrow not as those that have no hope of a glorious resurrection; for though I change my place, I change not my hope, but go to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God, the author of my life, and love of my soul. Within a little space I hope we will meet in glory, and joy for ever with the angels above, and the spirits of just men made perfect, in showing the praises of our God, the Prince of the kings of the earth. Farewell; be perfect; be of good comfort; for our glorious Redeemer is gone up with a shout into heaven, and shall come again with the sound of a trumpet. Sing praises to him, be of one mind; live in peace, and the God of love and peace be ever with you. Now unto Him that is able to keep you from falling, and present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, to the only wise God our Saviour, be glory, and majesty, dominion, and power, for evermore. Amen. My dearly beloved, yours in the Lord, THE FAITH OF MOSES: A DISCOURSE. Extract from a manuscript written by Hugh Clerk, | of the children of Israel from Egypt to Canaan second youngest son of the said Sir John Clerk:was very plainly typical of spiritual blessings. "Sir John Clerk, first baronet, of Penicuick, my father, Egypt was the land of bondage; but however aged seventy-two years, eleven months, and one day, died cruel that bondage was, there was there much suddenly on Saturday the 10th March 1722, about ten which a mind, dead to the glorious spiritualities o'clock at night, being three days only after my sister of the promises of God, could have willingly enMary was married to Mr Moncrief of Culfargie. He joyed; and hence, even after the children of Israel had been a little out of order for some days before his had departed, and in the wilderness had all that death; however, that very night on which he died, they could wish, besides being free from bondabout nine o'clock, I remember perfectly well, he called age, we find them still in their hearts returnin Alexander Thomson, the groom, and ordered him to ing to Egypt, saying, "We remember the flesh have his horse ready in the morning, for he intended to which we did eat in Egypt freely, and the cucumgo to church with the young folks; so he went to bed bers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the soon after, smoked his pipe as usual, and about eleven onions, and the garlick." They were rescued o'clock my mother went to bed, and finding him colder from Egypt by a great act of atonement, called than ordinary, she arose and lighted the candle, and the feast of the passover,- -a striking emblem of found him dead. We could not observe that he had Christ, a lamb slain without blemish and without suffered the pains and agonies of death, in regard his spot,-in which they were all required to express looks were altogether sweet and composed, and the bed their faith by sprinkling their door-posts with its clothes lying in order on him, so that he seems not to blood; and hence it is said, "By faith Moses kept have died like other men, but to have fallen asleep." the passover, and the sprinkling of blood." They were all rescued by a mighty act of God from under their grinding bondage, an emblem of that power by which we are still delivered from a present evil world, and the dominion of sin and Satan. And as they "all passed through the cloud and through the sea, and were baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea," at the very commencement of their journey towards the land of Canaan, so none of the members of our race can take one step towards heaven until they experience the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost. As they did all eat the same spiritual meat, and drink the same spiritual drink, for they drank of that spiritual Rock which followed them, and that Rock was Christ," so it is by the true bread from heaven, and that water of life which Christ still gives to all who believe, that every Christian is sustained in the wilderness of this world. As they were all journeying towards that good land of which the Lord their God had said he would give it to them, so the Church on earth, of however many members composed, seeks a better country, even an heavenly, a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Until at last, having all finished their course, its members pass in triumph through the dark swellings of the Jordan of death, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads. BY THE REV. JAMES BEGG, A.M., Minister of Liberton, County of Mid-Lothian. "By faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter; choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season; esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt: for he had respect unto the recompence of the reward."-HEB. xi. 24-26. THE name of Moses stands prominently forth in Old Testament history as the deliverer and lawgiver of the people of Israel,-the prophet whom Christ himself was to be like. He was born of the despised race of Hebrews, at the time when Pharaoh had brought them into cruel bondage, and at the time, too, when he had commanded all their male infants to be slain. But as Moses, when a child, was "exceeding fair," or as it may be rendered, divinely beautiful, he was hid three months of his parents. When he could be concealed no longer, he was exposed to the danger of destruction, but was rescued by the daughter of Pharaoh, who adopted him as her own son, and had him trained in all the learning of Egypt. But Moses despised all the sinful pleasures of the court, and reckoned it his highest honour to have been descended from Abraham, to whom the promises belonged. He knew that Abraham's children were still the chosen people of God, that from them the promised Messiah would descend; and that, although they were now oppressed in Egypt, God would bring them forth with a mighty hand from the land of their captivity, and put them in possession of that land flowing with milk and honey, which he had promised to their fathers. You are aware that the whole of these promises had a spiritual meaning, and that the abandonment of Egypt by Moses and the whole progress That all this was intended to be thus figurative, no one we think who reads the Scriptures with attention can doubt. The great truths of Christianity were known by Moses and the patriarchs as they are now, and by the same simple reliance on the atoning blood of Christ, did all these men reach heaven. Abraham saw afar off the day of the Messiah's triumph over principalities, and powers, and spiritual wickednesses, and rejoiced. Job, who lived at the same period, looked forward with rapture to the day on which his Redeemer would stand upon the earth. Jacob died waiting for the salvation of God. And the Apostle Paul assures us that, to those who travelled through the wil |