truth have in most, perhaps in all, other cases, shown, to monopolize the knowledge of it. I cannot but think that it is a strong argument in favor of the circulation of the Scriptures as a basis of religious belief, deduced from the experience of the world in all periods of history.

There is another consideration of a practical nature, which I should be glad to offer to the meeting, if I have not exceeded my allowance of time. We all have pretty strong, and as I think just, impressions of the superiority of Christendom over the Mahometan, Hindoo, and Pagan countries. Our civilization, I know, is still very imperfect, impaired by many a vice which disgraces our Christian nurture,- by many a woe which

"Appears a spot upon a vestal's robe,
The worse for what it soils."

But when we compare the condition of things in Christendom with that which prevails in the countries just named, we find that all the evils which exist among us prevail there in a greater degree, while they are subject to innumerable others, so dreadful as to make us almost ready to think it were better for the mass of the population, humanly speaking, if they had never been born. Well, now, Mr Chairman, what maketh us to differ? I know of no final and sufficient cause but the different character of Christianity, and the religions which prevail in Turkey, Persia, India, China, and the other semi-civilized or barbarous countries; and this difference, as far as I know, is accurately reflected in their sacred books respectively. I mean, sir, that the Bible stands to the Koran and the Vedas in the same relation as that in which Christianity stands to Mahometanism, or Brahmanism, or Buddhism; or Christendom to Turkey, Hindostan, or China.

We should all, I believe, more fully appreciate the value of the Scriptures, if we compared them with other books assuming the character of sacred. I have not done it so much as I wish I had; but one reason a main one - has been, the extreme repulsiveness of those books which I have tried

to read. I have several times in my life attempted to read the Koran. I have done so lately. I have approached it with a highly excited literary curiosity. I have felt a strong desire to penetrate this great mystery of the Arabian desert. As I have, in some quiet Turkish town, (for in the provincial Turkish towns there is little of the bustle of our western life,) listened at the close of day to the clear, calm voice of the muezzin, from the top of the graceful minaret, calling the faithful to evening prayer,- as I have mused on the vicissitudes of all human things, beneath the venerable dome of St Sophia's, I have, I may say, longed to find some rational ground of sympathy between Christianity and Islam; but any thing more repulsive and uninviting than the Koran I have seldom attempted to peruse, even when taken up with these kindly feelings. And yet, sir, you are well aware that it is not conceived in a spirit of hostility to the Old and New Testament, but recognizes them both as a divine revelation. With such portions of the sacred books of the Hindoos as have fallen in my way, the case is far worse. They contain, it is true, some elevated moral sentiments of an ascetic cast, and some strains inspired by a sense of the beauties of nature. But the mythological system contained in them is a tissue of monstrosities and absurdities, by turns so revolting and nauseous as to defy perusal, except from some strong motive of duty or of literary curiosity, which would prompt the investigation. I really believe that few things would do more to raise the Scriptures in our estimation, than to compare the Bible with the Koran and the Vedas.. It is not a course of reading to be generally recommended. A portion of the books are scarce, and, as I have said, their contents eminently repulsive; but I will venture to say to those whose professional duty it is to maintain the sacred character of the Christian Scriptures, that I know of scarce any line of reading which might be taken up with greater advantage, for the purpose of fair comparison, than that of the sacred books, as they are called, of the Mahometans and Hindoos.

One word more, sir, and I have done. It is sometimes objected to an indiscriminate distribution of the Bible, that

it may be perverted, misunderstood, neglected, and abused. And what means of improvement, what instrument of Christian benevolence, is not subject to the same drawback? The fault is in the mind of man, subject to error, to the blinding effect of passion, to the debasement of vice, in all that he does, and in all that is done for him. There are things in the Bible hard to be understood. And what is there, if we strive to go beyond the mere outside, which does not contain things hard to be understood? Even our exact sciences, constructed upon ideas which are the creation of our own minds, are full of difficulties. When we turn from revealed truth to the teachings of human speculatists on duty and morals, do we not encounter on the threshold those terrible problems of

"Providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate

Fixed fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute,"

problems that have tasked the unaided understanding of man ever since he began to think and to reason? For myself, sir, I am more and more inclined to believe that the truth is presented to us in the Bible in the form best adapted to the infinite variety of the character and talent, intellectual and moral, to which it is addressed. It is not such a Bible as the wit of man would have conceived; but it is such a one as the nature and wants of man called for. The acceptance it has found, alike in ancient and modern times, with the learned and the ignorant, the old and the young, the high and the low, the prosperous and the wretched, shows that it is really adapted in itself, not to one country, age, or class, but to man ; that it speaks to the unchanging wants, and sorrows, and frailties, and aspirations of the human heart.

THE END.