strate its living connection with a nation's highest good. Turkey has accepted from Christian hands a favour which strengthens her territorial integrity, but weakens her bigotry; opens her heart towards freedom, truth, and right, and awakens in her dying system a new sensibility to the rising life of the world; while Sardinia comes up as the morning star of Italy. Are we not warranted to call this movement an advance?

It had its harbinger. The memorable spirit and genius of the first Napoleon groped for the way towards this state of things; so far as the present is what we have called it, an advance, a step in reform, he was a reformer before the reformation. He understood the political disease of France and of Europe, but went too fast with his remedy. He anticipated the growth of republican sentiments in Europe, for those sentiments had deep root in himself. When he stated the coming alternative for Europe, that she would be either Republican or Cossack, and forty years ago, in his misery on St. Helena, expressed his presentiment of the late alliance, and his persuasion that England and France would be the real antagonists of Russia in her aggression, he signified what has proved to be fact, that the war would be a struggle between liberty and despotism. When he proposed to re-establish the kingdom of Poland as a barrier against Russia, England herself would not consent. And after shedding a river of her best blood at Waterloo, to blot out the name of Napoleon, and re-instate his enemy over France, behold her led, by the spirit and power of that detested and dishonoured name, to victorious battle against actual Cossack aggression, and ready herself to ask of the Powers, if she could with any hope, the resurrection of Poland. The first Napoleon was too fast. There was yet no place for his political ideas, and he raised all Europe against him; he became distracted and desperate in his straits; his personal ambition met a terrible retribution; and he fell like a seed into the ground, to die, and to produce the harvest now partially reaped.

The recent strugle in Europe was an effort to preserve the balance of power. It was, indeed, as nearly a war for religious principles as any war in this age of the world can well be; inasmuch as Russia made the Moslem persecution of Greek Christians in Turkey the pretext for his aggression. But the real cause of the contest was, on the one part, the desire of commercial advantages, involving the increase of political power, and on the other, the fear of an overgrown dominion. The interests and sentiments of the European nations are yet too heterogeneous for a state of political rest. There is not yet an agreemeut as to the real conditions of their highest prosperity as one great commonwealth. Some of the sovereigns are afraid of the people, and cannot bear agitations of the popular spirit, or demonstrations in behalf of popular rights, in their neighbourhood. And this fear is the greater and more reasonable, from the unavoidable progress of the people in ac

quiring a knowledge of their rights and their being moved to assert their rights while yet unprepared to maintain them. It is not the least among the good fruits of the war, that the treaty of Paris increases the restraint on popular volatility, weakens the hopes from premature insurrections, and will help to hold the masses quiet till they have more fully acquired, as in this state of the world they inevitably will acquire, the intellectual and moral conditions of the true political freedom. Meanwhile, the sovereigns, having less to fear from the blind haste of the people, can afford them more facilities and opportunities for tentative motions towards liberty, and even, as we hope will prove true in France, can build up, without any sacrifice of peace and blood, enduring structures of constitutional government.

Whatever of evil may have corrupted the motives of the actors in this drama, and augmented the dreadful suffering attending it, will, as we all believe, be overruled for good. The suffering has doubtless been wisely substituted by Providence for greater suffering which would otherwise have been wrought by that evil in a different course. The actors are responsible to their Judge; in his hands we leave them. We would adore the infinite wisdom which has overruled the proceedings, and which must be as yet the basis of our faith as to many of the good results; and we proceed, with gratitude and hope, to the work of the Lord in the fields now opened anew to the hand of Christian culture. SPECTATOR.

THE FALLACY OF PROVERBS.

"BEGGARS MUST NOT BE CHOOSERS."

MR. EDITOR:-This is the title of an article in one of Sears' instructive publications, see "Facts for the People," p. 81, in which the writer undertakes to set himself on a pretty high seat, and dispute the world; for, if "the wisdom of a nation is found in its proverbs," the same must be true of the world: and he that will dispute these proverbs, must be judged as disputing the wisdom of the world. Surely, Mr. Editor, a man may be not only justifiable, but also commendable, in so chivalrous an undertaking; but surely also, it behooves him to study and master the subject before he plants his foot on such a high and precarious pinnacle. The old proverb, that "beggars must not be choosers," has received the suffrage of the world, as it well has deserved, except the writer of the article above referred to.

The writer perverts the meaning of the proverb, and thus creates occasion for criticism and contradiction. It surely never entered into the calculation of the author, or quoter of the proverb, that beggars should not know their own necessities, nor choose and petition for such articles as would supply those necessities; it was

only intended that beggars should not be difficult and captious about the quality of the articles generously bestowed upon them to remove their necessities, as a hungry beggar refusing bread, because he preferred sweet cake; or a man shivering with cold, refusing a homespun coat, because it was not broadcloth or silk velvet: the pride and ingratitude which such behaviour would betray has occasioned the sound proverb before us, the soundness of which no man can gainsay.

In proverbs, brevity is deemed an essential quality: they would be distasteful, cumbersome, and almost pointless, if they embodied the reason and the philosophy on which their moral is founded; therefore, a generous mind should exercise charity enough to endeavour to construe them with fairness. Examples could be furnished in abundance to show the ease with which the wisest maxims may be misapplied, and rendered ridiculous: but as the exhibition would be painful to both the writer and the reader, although having no object besides illustration, it must be omitted.

II. "A ROLLING STONE GATHERS NO MOSS."

The same article contains a misconstruction of another proverb of established reputation, viz., "A rolling stone gathers no moss." This proverb, like the other, has a limited and special application, the truth of which the writer of the article in question evidently saw and acknowledged; but by proceeding to extend its application beyond due limits, found occasion for criticism. The proverb has been familiar to the present writer from his childhood, and he never supposed anything more was intended by it, than the sound principle, that a farmer changing his location every year, or frequently, would so disarrange his business, occasion expense and loss of time, as to prevent the accumulation of property, and as a tree transplanted every year could never be productive. Moss then is the property of the rolling farmer, and the fruit of the rolling tree. If the writer of the article in question supposes that swine by wallowing will collect adhering matter, or a snowball will, by rolling, increase in material, no one will contradict him, but it is irrelevant. SAYRS GAZLAY.

PRESIDENT DICKINSON ON PREDESTINATION.

No. II.

[Continued from p. 10 of this volume.]

It is ordinarily objected, if this doctrine be true, that God's decree is infallible, and that there is an infallible necessity of its accomplishment. Who can resist his will? Who can overthrow his counsel? To what purpose is it to do anything toward our salvation, since the event will be according to the Divine determina

tions? What need of ministers? or, to what purpose are the promises of the Gospel? To this I answer

The decree of God neither brings salvation nor damnation upon any man. The decree of election compels no man to comply with the terms of salvation; no man is constrained by the decree of reprobation to bring damnation upon himself. The decree of God no ways infringes upon or robs us of our utmost freedom and liberty; no ways disables us from accepting the tenders of salvation; no ways constrains us to go on in the way of death and ruin. There is no such decree that will save the elect, though they go on in their trespasses; that will damn the reprobate, though they accept of a tendered Christ. It is a compliance with the terms of the Gospel, and embracing an observed Saviour, that will procure salvation. Mark 16:16. It is sin that will purchase damnation. Hos. 13:9. In a word, our eternal weal or woe depends, not upon the decree of God, but upon our improving or neglecting the means of salvation. I have frequently seen this illustrated by familiar instances.

the

The term of our natural life is ordained of God; we can't outlive our appointed time. Job 7: 1. But would it not be an unreasonable madness to neglect all the means of our lives' preservation, as food, apparel, sleep, and everything that would yield refection and nourishment to nature, and depend upon the decree of God to keep us alive? Again, the eternal God has known from everlasting whether we the next season shall have any harvest, and thence the foreknown event is necessary. Shall we, therefore, neglect cultivating and sowing our ground, and depend upon Divine decree for a crop? No! he that does not sow, neither shall he reap. Once more, if you were fallen into the water and ready to drown, would you refuse offered relief, and say if it was appointed you should escape, there is no danger; if not, there is no help? No, no! In matters of this nature, none are such prodigies of stupidity as to make such improvement of the Divine predeterminations. And yet in affairs of infinitely greater consequence, such corrupt reasonings are heard among us. Strange, indeed!

The 17th Article of the Church of England most truly says, "That for curious and carnal persons, lacking the spirit of Christ, to have continually before their eyes the sentence of God's predestination, is a most dangerous downfall, whereby the Devil doth thrust them either into desperation, or into wretchedness of most unclean living, no less perilous than desperation."

I may add that he that will accept of the tenders of salvation, may make sure his election; he that rejects the tenders of salvation will make sure his reprobation and damnation. It is not an unreasonable exhortation, wherefore make your calling and election sure. No; make sure your vocation, and your election is sure; make sure your love to Christ, and it is sure he has first loved

you. 1 John 4:19. Make sure your faith in him, and it is sure that you are ordained to eternal life. Acts 13:48.

But by your neglecting the means of salvation, by going on in a continued course of impenitence, you seal damnation to yourself. Thus the Church of England, in the last paragraph of the 17th Article "Furthermore, we must receive God's promises in such wise as they be generally set forth to us in the Scriptures, and in our doings that will of God is to be followed, as we have expressly declared unto us in the word of God." Thus I come to

Prop. 2. That the predestinating counsel of God was free, arbitrary, and sovereign.

This proposition is very clearly illustrated by that: Rom. 9:21, 22, 23. Has not the potter power over his clay, to make one vessel to honour, and another to dishonour? What if God, willing to show his wrath and make his power known, endured with much long-suffering vessels of wrath, fitted to destruction; and that he might make known the riches of his glory, on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory. For the setting this proposition in a true light, take these following particulars.

1. The eternal counsel of God was free, arbitrary, and sovereign from any necessitation. He was under no necessity to give being unto any creature. If it had consisted with the sovereign pleasure of the Almighty to have left the whole created world forever in the dark grave of their first nothingness; or to have made the souls of the rational world like the brutes, as fading and mortal as their bodies, who could have gainsayed? Who could have resisted his will? For who hath been his counsellor? Rom. 11:34.

2. His eternal counsel was free and arbitrary from all moral obligation. If the sovereign God had eternally determined to leave all the posterity of Adam in that abyss of misery that he foresaw us casting ourselves into, by the fall of our first parents, without any possibility of escape, none could have found fault: it would have been the display of unspotted sovereignty; for how can the Most High be a debtor unto his creatures? Who hath first given unto him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? Rom,

11:35.

3. His eternal counsel was arbitrary and sovereign in that it was free from any motive out of himself. The only original and fountain, the only motive and inducement unto the predestinating counsel of God is his cudozta, the mere good pleasure of his will particularly.

1. It was not any merit, faith, or good works foreseen in one creature more than another, that was, or could be, any motive unto the distinguishing decree of God. It was not that God foresaw one better than another, that moved him to make choice of one rather than another. We are all hewed out of the same rock; all descended from the same corrupted stock; all of the same vigorous brood; all