between the Hebrew and Pagan chronicles as to the time of the miracle; for under the head" Assyria," as late as A. M. 2829, Syncellus, another chronologist, has inserted four kings, not found in Eusebius, whose united reigns make 162 years.

Moreover, it should be remembered, that I am not proving the history of the birth of Hercules. Amphytrion had readily adopted him; and it is probable that the fiction was invented, after the great deeds which may have furnished the fables of his twelve labors, in order to magnify into a deity the founder of the Olympic Games, rather than for the purpose of veiling the shame of Alcmena, or dignifying the bondsman of Eurystheus: in such case the ancients would not have been very scrupulous about Chronological accuracy.

I expected to find further collateral testimony to the occurrence of the glorious miracle, which we have been considering, even in the wild fancies of Indian mythology; and I have not been disappointed. As in the fables of the Western empire, we have a record of the longest night, so in the Pagan chronicle of the Eastern world is to be found evidence of a day of extraordinary length. The fact is incontestibly proved by the Skanda Purána, in which it is related, that at the end of the Suttya Yug, or "Golden Age," a mountain arose, and for a time impeded the progress of the sun; till, by miraculous agency, at the prayer of Agastya, the obstacle was removed, the mountain sank into its place, and the sun was permitted to pursue its wonted course.

As these observations are extending much beyond my original intention, I shall not attempt to compare chronologies in this instance. Neither is it needful to my present purpose, with such a manifest absurdity on the face of the record, to search after reasons for the cause assigned to the miracle by the inhabitants of the Eastern hemisphere: it suffices merely to advert to the fact that Hindooism, like the religion of Greece and Rome, brings its theories to minister to our need in investigations like the present; whilst the whole fabric vanishes, as dust before the whirlwind, when opposed to the consistency of the revelation granted to us in the Word of Truth.

I would now address myself to those who profess to "search the Scriptures" and the ways of Providence, and nevertheless dare to deny the occurrence of the miracle;-even to those master-spirits of human philosophy, who declare hostility to their Maker, their Redeemer, and the all-sufficient Comforter of his people.

Wondrous as is the event, Paley has justly observed, that we have far greater evidence of the supreme power of the Almighty in that the sun has risen and set for six thousand years;-therein, in a strict sense, is the miracle; rather than that the unerring arm, which upholds and regulates all things, should have altered the established order for one day!

Stupendous as is the miracle,-the revolution of the globe suspended, no consequences result beyond this world itself; and, according to the received opinions of modern astronomy, it is a change in the face of nature, the least important which could occur to its inhabitants. Beneficial as is the alternate succession of day and night, we may easily comprehend, that the repetition of the one or the other, out of the regular course, might be attended with less practical inconvenience to nations or individuals, than a tempest, or even a shower!

No alteration of season ensued; no change in the solar system is required to be believed; much less any deviation from the uniformity of the grand system of the universe! This world, sustained in its orbit by the great Creator who has ordained to every one its position, pursued, with the other planets, its wonted course round the sun;-the whole solar system kept its appointed place ;-as also "ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands” of other suns and systems composing the incomprehensible scheme of creation ;-which the mind may endeavor to compass, but must fail in an immensity of space as boundless as eternity! When you "look through nature up to nature's God," the mind must be lost in the vast contemplation* !

One eternal God orders and harmonizes the whole! Reflect, that although He, in His infinite wisdom, hath determined that the knowledge of Himself, in His divine essence, shall be unattainable by us in our present imperfect state;-although the utmost possible stretch of the most exalted powers of human reason can but lead to the conviction, that He is equally incomprehensible in His mighty works of creation; he hath nevertheless revealed Himself in His infinitely more glorious and amazing work of redemption and grace, through Jesus Christ! Whilst you would exhaust the utmost power of your intellect to prove that there is no God, or detract from his majesty by "taking from His word" and denying His miracles, the meek and unlettered child of simplicity, blessed by wisdom unto salvation,that wisdom which all who seek shall find,—is pitying and praying

* Chalmers, after expatiating on the heights and depths explored, and the wonders unfolded by the telescope and miscroscope, observes, that the splendor and variety of the universe would suffer as little by the annihilation of a world like ours "and all that it inherit," as the verdure and sublime magnitude of the forest by the destruction of a single leaf, and the myriads which inhabit its surface, as it falls into the stream that runs beneath the branch from which a breath of wind has torn it. And he continues, "Now, on the grand scale of the universe, we the occupiers of this ball, which performs its little round among the suns and systems which astronomy has unfolded-we may feel the same littleness and the same insecurity" as the meanest of those insects. "We differ from the leaf only in this circumstance; that we require the operation of greater elements to destroy us. But these elements exist."

for you; and is practically experiencing-in peace here and a joyous hope for hereafter-that the belief in a triune GOD as a merciful FATHER, reconciled to the sinner by the sufferings of his Son JESUS CHRIST, and cherishing the penitent by the influence of the HOLY SPIRIT, is fraught with comfort inexpressible.

Seriously reflect on the end at which you cannot but arrive. Plunge into the mysteries of creation to falsify the "written word of God." The deeper you dive, the farther will you find yourself from any satisfactory conclusion. Your philosophical research can bring you to no result, but the conviction of your own very nothingness; as sure as the circle originates in a point, although it becomes larger and larger in immense and interminable proportion the wider the compass is extended.

Reason bewildered and baffled, but convinced, pride, not reason, may be the next idol which will rule you; if it hath not been from the beginning the main-spring of your deceiving spirit, whose impulse has blinded and governed the reason of which you have boasted; whilst your nothingness has been clouded by your neglect of the precept of the wisest of the wise of ancient Greece. "Know thyself," then, 'ere it be too late, and looking "through nature up to NATURE'S GOD," submit and pray. Let it be the first effort of an emancipated reason to implore the direction of your Maker. Pity that you who have deceived yourselves, and misled others, had not drawn a moral from the comparison of your own proud opinion of yourselves, and the state of those demented beings, idiots from their birth, who for God's wise purposes exist. They seem to address a warning voice to the most exalted philosopher in terms like these, “Such I am, and such, at an instant, may you be, if it be the will of God who formed us both." Humble yourselves then before Him. He is faithful, as well as omnipotent; merciful, though just; and will assuredly hear, if sought through the means which he hath appointed; even Jesus! Disbelieve in an overruling Providence you cannot; believe also in the Redeemer; and from amidst the mazes and darkness of infidelity, let the supplication—though it be even the yet trembling supplication-arise, "Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief!”

But are there none amongst professing Christians, who look lightly on these miracles: nay, who are ashamed in common converse to admit that the sun stood still on Gibeon, that the prophet Jonah was swallowed by a whale, or that the walls of Jericho fell at the shout of Israel, before the Ark of the Covenant? who talk of the difficulty of believing the first, the impossibility of the second, and the agency of battering-rams, not ram's horns in the last instance who are ever ready to seek for, and attribute to, natural causes, events impenetrably wonderful, awful, and sublime? Alas! there are too many whom the "evil heart of unbelief," pride, and

the fear of the world preclude from entering into the spirit of the religion they profess: many whose worldly interests it may suit to acknowledge themselves of the Church, and in the "faith of their fathers," who know not even the meaning of that profession:much less are they acquainted with the distinction of sectarians, all of which, and especially "Methodists," they will decry with the animosity which an Islamite would bear to the profaner of the shrine of Mecca, and therein think they "do God service," forgetting that all alike are of the one church visible, preaching Jesus Christ, the eternal and co-equal Son of God, and Him crucified for the sins of men. They have read portions of the Holy Scriptures, and learned their creed, under the same circumstances as the schoolboy acquires by rote a problem of geometry :-but in the end know no more of Christianity than the school-boy of the object proposed and demonstrated, or of its practical application. It is not my purpose to digress into the ample field of inquiry presented by the many stumbling-blocks of professing Christians: it suffices for my present purpose to remark, that disbelief in the miracles of the Old Testament is one on which many risk their salvation, overlooking or forgetting that our Saviour himself has declared the authenticity of the Books wherein they are related. I have adduced three, out many, instances, in which it has fallen to my individual observation to notice, generally, amongst avowed believers, a shameless anxiety, shameless alike, because it neither impresses the utterer, nor excites the reprobation of the hearer,-to cling to every support which may protect their pride (whilst they hope to save their consciences) from the imputation of implicit belief in the word of God, as handed down to us from the beginning. Such will eagerly catch at an asserted mis-translation, an assumed difficulty, any thing which they imagine is calculated to impress their hearers with the notion that, whilst they embrace Christianity, their enthusiasm is not so gross as to receive as truth every thing which has been recorded to have occurred out of the course of nature. These look upon the Books of Moses as being little better than the traditions

of

* I have observed, that few go beyond this: they profess no more intimate knowledge of what they affect to believe. I will record an instance. I once heard a Magistrate and Justice of the Peace asked what was his faith? His reply was, that his father was a Christian, and he was bound to maintain the same principles. He followed up this determination (after strong invectives against apostacy of all characters), in reply to some acute questions of his interrogator, with sentiments so diametrically opposed to a belief in the Holy Trinity, as to induce a rejoinder, that he had expressed opinions which totally disqualified him for the exercise of his judicial functions; for that any individual who heard him might demur to his judgment, as his oath must be held of no avail with reference to the principles he had asserted. I will venture to say, that most of the company present considered the judge sufficiently orthodox, and his interrogator censorious.

of the ancient Greeks and Romans. May the Spirit of God, which happily for fallen human nature seeketh the souls of men to reconcile them to Himself, and doth not always leave the rebellious to the vanity of their own imaginations, confer upon those of this wavering character, who may read these observations, the blessing of inducing them to study, and to commence their inquiries into the plenary inspiration of the Holy Volume, in the same spirit in which I have implored the professed infidel to commit his mental energies to the guidance of his God,-a spirit of humility and prayer, lest they fall under the condemnation which awaits both of "taking away from the words" of the Book of Truth and Life. For their encouragement, I will quote the testimony of Sir William Jones, to the harmony and beauty of the inspired writings ;-his erudition, and spirit of research and investigation, the boldest amongst them will not venture to dispute. He thus expresses his opinion, "I have carefully and regularly perused these Holy Scriptures, and am of opinion, that the volume, independantly of its divine origin, contains more sublimity, purer morality, more important history, and finer strains of eloquence than can be collected from all other books, in whatever language they may have been written*."

It cannot be out of place to address a few words to those Hindoos, who, emancipated from the thraldom of the creed of Brumha and his multitude of miraculous incarnations, profess to be seeking a religion, on which to establish the principles of their actions for time, and the foundation of their hopes for eternity:-for such must be the aim and end of their inquiry and reformation, if they are really desirous to inquire and reform at all. To these the belief in miracles is a stumbling-block of no common kind. They have risen above the tyranny of the gross superstitions which enslave the minds of their countrymen; but, when they reflect that whole nations bow to the creatures of their own imaginations, and can be deluded by the most fanciful forms of deceit, they may suppose that Christians are tinctured with the same spirit of self-delusion. Unhappily too, it is feared, that many of these inquirers have become imbued with the doctrines of those whose writings encourage this waywardness, but whose only desire has been to magnify themselves amongst their fellow-worms of earth.

One exhortation is alike applicable to all. "Search the Scriptures :"-in them are "the words of eternal life." The occurrence of a glorious miracle is attested by the records of the three systems of religion which have overspread the whole earth: the Holy Scriptures and the fantastic day-dreams of eastern and western Paganism and there cannot be the slightest possible imputation of collusion on the part of either with another. The fact of this alteration of the course of nature is indisputably confirmed, and * An autograph note in his Bible.

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