minates, and feeds the kingdoms that surround him. Call him only the Shadow of God, and he does not shine in vain. He is God's missionary, having neither speech nor language, yet making his anthem heard over the city, and over the wilderness, and over the boundless sea. He is God's artist, for ever painting new scenes to decorate His theatre, for the delight of His people. He is God's physician, breathing joy into every living thing, giving colour to the flower and beauty to the cheek. And the moon has her part in the same mission of love and usefulness. If the sun and the moon, therefore, could be proved to be destitute of intellectual life, we should not lament because two gorgeous temples were empty of worshippers; we should feel that they were fulfilling the ends of the Architect, not only by varied usefulness in behalf of His people, but by their perpetual proclamation of His name. And, in a less degree, the remark will apply to the planets with which the eye is most familiar. The dark ship is cheered by them, the astronomer is taught by them, and their Maker is adored in the wonder which they waken. But when the argument is carried into remoter space, and myriads of stars, sun-like in glory and system, are said to scatter light unseen, as field-flowers drop bloom in untrodden paths, our moral sense seems to be outraged and abashed. If they were not created for our sakes, is the remark of Bentley, it is evident they were not made for their own. They must, therefore, have been formed for the sake of intelligent minds. There is a striking passage in Isaiah, which Sir David Brewster quotes, in which God is said not to have created the earth in vain. He formed it to be inhabited. And the conclusion is fairly drawn that, as the Creator cannot be supposed to have made the sidereal universe in vain, it must be inhabited likewise. What, if every planet be now unpeopled? Why should not the seed of another Eden be growing in the slime and the mud? We will not insist upon a population for every planet, or every star, if we are allowed to suppose that they are being prepared for it. We should expect the dwellers in the sky to be of two kinds-prospective and present; the former class would include the whole family of redeemed souls; and for them a home may even now be building; the latter, the whole family of spiritual beings; and for them the home is ready and set apart. Shall we believe the regions beyond the stars to be an infinite series of wildernesses, without one pilgrim to think of God, or ask the way to Him? No. We believe them to rejoice in spiritual inhabitants, glorious in mind and body, and ministering to their Sovereign in every function of intellectual life, the most lofty and the most pure. And here we must acknowledge the pain and the surprise with which we have read the essayist's remarks on angelic existence and service. We give his words :-" And if any one holds the opinion, on whatever evidences, that there are other spheres of the Divine government than this earth-other regions in which God has subjects and servants-other beings who do His will, and who, it may be, are connected with the moral and religious interests of man, we do not breathe a syllable against such a belief; but, on the contrary, regard it with a ready and respectful sympathy. It is a belief which finds an echo in pious and reverend hearts." And then the writer quotes in a notewhom does the reader suppose? The Author of our faith? An apostle? An evangelist? No; Mr. Trench! A doctrine which is written in the Law and the Gospel; which God revealed, and prophets published, and apostles taught; which was designed to enlighten and to comfort the heart; which has cheered the prisoner, and blessed the martyr; which cannot be rejected without rejecting the Saviour; this doctrine is to be regarded with respectful sympathy, and to derive such support as it may from the verses of a poet! Omitting the discussion of such a belief, as not belonging to the present occasion, the essayist observes, "that it would be very rash and unadvised—a proceeding unwarranted by religion, and certainly at variance with all that science teaches-to place those other extra-human spheres of Divine government in the planets and in the stars. With regard to the planets and the stars, if we reason at all, we must reason on physical grounds; we must suppose, as to a great extent we can prove, that the laws and properties of terrestrial matter and motion apply to them also. On such grounds, it is as impossible that visitants from Jupiter or from Sirius can come to the earth, as that men can pass to those stars; as unlikely that inhabitants of those stars know and take an interest in human affairs, as that we can learn what they are doing. A belief in the Divine govern ment of other races of spiritual creatures besides the human race, and in Divine ministrations committed to such beings, cannot be connected with our physical and astronomical views of the nature of the stars and planets, without making a mixture altogether incongruous and incoherent, a mixture of what is material and what is spiritual, adverse alike to sound religion and to sound philosophy.”—(Pp. 391, 392.) We assert unhesitatingly that no sceptic during the last 100 years has written a more daring or mischievous page. It gives the lie to the Gospel, and insults the faith of the Christian. We request the reader's attention for a minute, while we show to him the full significance of the passage. The Jews, in our Lord's time, were accustomed to make a threefold division of the heavens-(1) atmosphere, (2) starry firmament, (3) the dwelling-place of God. To one or other of these regions, Scripture always assigns the homes of angels. The dream of Jacob in the Old Testament, and the vision of the shepherds in the New, will recur to the memory. There is no mention of any Divine form appearing to man which is not described as descending upon earth, or having its abode in heaven. It will not be denied by any Christian that the Lord of angels returned to them. Whither, then, did He go? After He had led His disciples to Olivet and was parted from them, we are told by St. Luke, in words singularly clear and emphatic, that " they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went up." And if we open the letter to the Ephesians, we find St. Paul saying that He ascended "far above all heavens "—went, that is, into the remoter and the more glorious country of the Divine presence. But if He to whom angels ministered ascended among the stars, they who minister to Him must abide there also. Accordingly, the Bible places angels in the sky; the essayist affirms that science refuses a site for their dwelling either in the planets or the stars. The Bible promises to us their sympathy; the essayist declares that we are as likely to know what angels are doing, as they are to feel any care about us. The Bible describes them as ministering spirits; the essayist derides the office as "a mixture altogether incongruous and incoherent." And all this time we have before us the one grand and awful fact, that a Body, which angels attended in its life, its death, and its rising, was seen by steadfast eyes to go up from the earth, ascending higher and higher into the sky-a Body which had walked, which had spoken, which had eaten, which had been handled. We have before us the assurance of inspiration that this Body is now present among, or beyond, the stars; living, breathing, moving; seeing, and sympathizing with human cares and trials, and having the scenery of earth, and the deeds of its inhabitants, mirrored in one bright and unbroken reflection. So different is the teaching of the Bible and of the Essay. For our own part, we shall still consider the heavens to be peopled, while we believe the Bible to be true and the Apostles to be witnesses. The sky will be to us, as it was to them of old times, the highway of angels. We shall still trust in the rejoicing of spiritual love over the tears of the penitent, still gaze skyward in our sorrows, and be cheered by the lighted palaces of our Father. We shall still hope to ascend the illuminated path which the glorious Body has left behind it. And if we accept the view which devout inquirers have taken, that every portion of the starry realms may, in due season, be visited and explored, and become, in succession, the abode of redeemed soulsonce earthly, then heavenly-there is nothing in such a belief which is inconsistent with the goodness of God or the manifested order of His providence. Such a future for the soul seems to embody the rapture of the entranced disciple, when he stood before the wall of jasper and the gate of pearl. Thus the tide of ages, ever rolling onward, will only swell the deep delight of the pilgrim spirit as it journeys from world to world, beholding in each, new wonders of the Maker, new revelations of beauty; climbing steeper heights of glory, only to feed its vision with a brighter Canaan-a Canaan to be reached without a Jordan, and to be possessed as soon as seen. And in those regions, which not even the faintest shine of the earth can reach, and where the blazing sun girts only the feeble glimmer of a star, the unwearied soul may reap ever-ripening harvests of richer joys and more abundant blessings, and draw yet purer pleasures from the wells of life which are with the Eternal.-The Times. OLD URSULA; OR, WHAT CAN I DO? "Small friendship is true friendship while it lasts; Protects the lingering dew-drop from the sun." "BUT, mother dear, what talent have I?" WORDSWORTH. You "Lucy, we have each of us some talent, which God has given us, and which it is our duty to devote to Him. ask me what is yours;-I think it is time.” “Time! O mother, you must forget. You know, I rise early, and help Johnny to dress; then I get the breakfast ready, and clear it away again; then I bring down father's coat and brush it, and tie his neckcloth, and then, if I have time, there is to 66 Stop, Lucy; do not think I mean to accuse you of idleness, my child. I know you do all this and much more. But what I meant was, that you could use your fragments of time to better purpose than you do; those few minutes that you have to yourself occasionally in the course of the day, such as after breakfast and again just before tea. Might they not be better filled up than in warming yourself at the fire or chatting in the kitchen with Mary? You know, we are poor, Lucy, so you cannot give money away; but you can give something far better than money -your prayers and sympathy. Think over what I say to you to-night, when you are alone, and I feel sure you will see I am right.” "Mother, I will." And Lucy kept her word. She thought long and seriously about it; and that night, before retiring to rest, as she gazed out into the still, calm night, and watched the peaceful moon with her attendant stars, and felt how quietly yet how effectually they fulfilled their mission, unnoticed indeed by the multitude, but gratefully hailed by the weary traveller, she kneeled down, and earnestly, yea, tearfully, implored her God to enable her thus to work for the good of others. Lucy was not a rich girl, by any means; she was only the daughter of a small shopkeeper. Her father's resources were but few, and thus her education had been rather defi |