Student. Certainly I do, or I should not be a Presbyterian.

Preacher. Why, sir, the confession of faith says, "God has, for his own glory, foreordained whatsoever comes to pass."

Student. It does.

Preacher.

And do you believe that?

Student. Certainly I do. Do not you believe the Bible?

Preacher. Yes; but that language is not in the

Bible.

Student. The Bible tells you that God "worketh all things after the counsel of his own will," which is precisely the same doctrine.

Preacher. But the doctrine of predestination is unreasonable. My reason revolts, whenever it is presented.

Student. I will examine that point with you, if you will answer each question I ask you, and then stick to the answer you have given.

Preacher. I can easily do that; but you could not make me acknowledge that doctrine in a lifetime.

Student. I should not want a lifetime, unless it were a very short one. Remember, now, this is our agreement: you are to answer each question I ask, and then stick to the answer you have given.

Preacher. Yes, that is the agreement. Now, come on with your questions.

Student. You acknowledge that God foreknows all things from eternity?

Preacher. O, yes; but then foreknowledge is a very different thing from predestination.

Student. Well, we will not dispute about that

now.

You admit that God foreknew all events from

eternity?

Preacher. Yes, certainly. I am not going to deny God's foreknowledge.

Preacher. I maintain the doctrine of God's foreknowledge as firmly as you.

Student. If God from eternity foreknew all future events, it must have been in one of these three ways: First, he saw that future events would spring into existence by chance, without any cause; or, second, he depended on some other being to bring them about; or, third, he had determined to bring them about himself. Can you think of other method? or was it not in one of these three ways ?

any

Preacher. I suppose it was in one of these methods. I can think of no other.

Student. Well, was it the first? Did God from all eternity behold all future events springing into existence by mere chance, without any cause?

Preacher. No, I think not.

Student. To maintain that, would be atheism. Preacher. Yes, to say that God from eternity saw that all future events would spring into existence without any cause, merely by accident, would be atheism. Student. Well, there was a period when no being existed but God, I mean the period before he had created either man or angels. Could he then have depended on any other being to bring into existence the future events which he foresaw, when there was no other being in existence? Preacher. Certainly not. Student. What do you say?

But what next?

But one other method

remains that is, he himself had determined to bring

them to pass. Preacher. Stop! I was too fast. I should not have admitted your statement. There was another method, in which God foresaw the future existence of some things. Student.

This is violating your agreement; for you were to stick to the answer you had given. But let us hear what you were going to say.

Preacher. I say God knew, from "the reason and nature of things," how some events would come to pass. Student. Pray, sir, what sort of a reason and nature had things, before God created all things, and gave them a reason and a nature? Thus you see your whole foundation is swept away; and you can find no resting-place, until you come back to the good old Bible doctrine, that "all things are of God."

Preacher. Well, rather than admit that doctrine, I will deny that God foreknows all things. I would rather deny the foreknowledge of God, than admit the doctrine of predestination.

Student. If you deny the foreknowledge of God, you may as well deny his present knowledge; for the Bible teaches the one as plainly as the other; and, indeed, there is scarcely a step from the position you have assumed, to the doctrine of him who "says in his heart, There is no God." Now, sir, you see the wretched result to which you come in this discussion with me; and all this family see it. I am no minister. I am but a youthful member of the Presbyterian church. I have no pretensions to distinction among them; and yet you see how you have come out in this discussion with me. In the course of your sermon

to-night, you said many things against those "great, high-learned men," who are preaching in the neighboring counties. You arraigned their motives, and denounced their principles. I must caution you to be more modest and moderate, and not hazard too much in this warfare; for if you have come out thus wretchedly in a little discussion with me a mere stripling - a mere boy in the Presbyterian church- what on earth do you think would become of you, should you fall into the hands of one of those "great, high-learned men," whom you have been so violently and publicly denouncing.

Whether any permanent

Here the discussion closed. and profitable impression was left on the mind of the anti-Calvinistic preacher, is not certainly known. Of the divinity student, however, it should be recorded, that, in due time, he entered the gospel ministry. He became distinguished as an able expounder of the holy oracles. Many, very many, of our Lord's disciples in the west have sat under his ministry with great delight, while he has "fed them with knowledge and understanding." Laboring, like the great apostle of the Gentiles, with his own hands, to supply his temporal wants, he has, without cost to the church, preached salvation to destitute thousands. And the author of the "Western Sketch-Book," with emotions of gratitude to the Giver of all good, would record on this page, that he has had the privilege of profiting much by the clear, sublime, scriptural views of the mighty work of redemption, presented in the familiar conversations, the sermons, and the published writings of Rev. Abel Pearson.

JO; OR, THE VOICE OF CONSCIENCE.

ABOUT the year 1820, I became particularly acquainted with a venerable elder of the Presbyterian church in East Tennessee, whom I will introduce to the reader as Mr. M'Clellan. He was a man in humble circumstances, advanced in life, and possessed of a very fine and highly-cultivated intellect. He belonged to that class of reading Christians, who were the glory of the primitive Presbyterian church in the west. The Bible, Henry's "Commentary," Doddridge's "Family Expositor," Boston's "Fourfold State," the "Bible Dictionary" of John Brown of Haddington, Edwards "On the Will," Edwards "On the Affections," Newton's "Letters," Bellamy's "Wisdom of God in the Permission of Sin," &c., &c.: such is a sample of the works studied by the church at that period. Ah, "there were giants in the earth in those days," alongside of whom could some of our modern peacock-tail theologians be placed, they would soon learn to sympathize most fraternally with the spies sent out by Moses, when they said, “We were in our own sight as grasshoppers"! The venerable Elder M'Clellan, mentioned above, was remarkable for the fervor, comprehensiveness, and power of his prayers. Although more than a quarter of a century has rolled into eternity since I last heard his voice, yet the very words employed in some of his earnest and thrilling