faith in Him that when its prayers are answered is not surprised? Shall He deliver us, and yet we be found saying, "What manner of man is this?" or can we say under each dispensation, whether of trial or deliverance, "It is the Lord"?

Did we but know His leading, and were we but obedient to it, we should then know of His love and His ability and readiness to save us each moment; for then indeed the Master would not need to say to us, "Oh, ye of little faith!" And when we are out 'toiling in rowing," when the night is dark and we are in danger by reason of the way, He will see us toiling, and even then will manifest Himself to us so clearly that we shall indeed know it is the Lord. And if it should be that He should call us to undertake some seemingly impossible step on the vast waters around, great will be our joy and reward if we have faith then to accept His call, "Come," and in simple and child-like obedience do His bidding. Not as Peter's faith may ours be, but rather as that of the little child who clasps its father's hand and in happy trustfulness follows just where he leads.

Thus shall the winds and waves of life be all subjected to the Divine Commander, and knowing in whom we have believed, and feeling His living power within us to be a perfect power and an all sufficient, we shall find no occasion to say of the Master, “What manner of man is this?" but we shall rather be enabled daily and hourly to exclaim, "This is our God in whom we will trust."

THOMAS W. JOHNSON.

TOLERATION.

THERE was a picture in the Royal Academy last year of the scene of Anne Askew's martyrdom the morning after it took place. In the dreary twilight of a dawn in London, a few smouldering ashes and a half-burnt stake are all that remain. A shivering, wretched-looking woman seems to be trying to warm herself at the dying embers, and another to be seeking with loving care for any mortal relics she might find of the faithful-hearted woman who yesterday was borne upwards in her chariot of fire. Such a scene as this, and the thought of the multitudes who in England have suffered and died for their religion, remind us that we have made considerable progress in what is called Toleration. And yet I am inclined to believe that we pride ourselves more than we need to do on the possession of this very doubtful quality. For, after all, what does the word Toleration mean? We say we "tolerate" a thing when we can just bear it ;-it generally implies that it gives us pain to bear it; or that we do so with some degree of impatience, suppressed or otherwise. Is this our proper attitude with regard to the convictions of others, who, we have every reason to believe, are at least as honest and enlightened as ourselves?

It might be a fitting thing for a ninteenth-century Pope to declare from his seat of infallibility,--that he would of his clemency "tolerate " opinions differing by a shade or two from his own dicta. But for humbleminded people, who have either received their opinions intact from the lips of parents and teachers, or who have attained to them through much earnest search and

some difficulty for themselves, it seems hardly the kind of word to use. Only, unfortunately, we have no other,

-at least I am not aware of any word in the English language--which represents a contented acquiescence in the fact that our neighbours' opinions differ from our own. I believe many excellent persons would say that "culpable indifference" is the right term to describe such a state of feeling; but I am strongly inclined to think that this is in a great degree a mistake, and that there is a sufficient number of justifiable causes for despondency in the world without adding this to the number, that everyone does not think as we do.

In the first place, what are our grounds for supposing that we are absolutely right; that the system of things, as it presents itself to the view of our individual minds, is correct in every particular? It may be that we feel that we have earnestly and sincerely sought for the truth, and have endeavoured to follow it when found; but are there not very many others who we must honestly believe to have done likewise, with what appear to us very imperfect results?

It is right and just that we should be fully persuaded in our own minds that what we believe is in harmony with God's truth; but it does also become us continually to remember how finite our understandings are, how limited our knowledge, how many wise and good people differ from us; and, alas! for most of us, how little we have fulfilled the condition of "knowing of the doctrine, whether it be of God," by faithfully "doing the will of our Father who is in heaven." I am inclined to believe that those are most likely to be displeased with their neighbours for differing from them who have received their beliefs ready made from others; who have, as it were, inherited their opinions and have not toiled for them, and yet who seem to cling to them all the more tenaciously for that very reason, although they can

hardly be in a position rightly to estimate their worth or worthlessness. They who, on the other hand, have won their convictions through the sweat of their brows, who have toiled in many a deep and dreary mine of thought, who have passed through many a hard conflict,-who, like Jacob, on the Eastern hills of Palestine, have wrestled through the long watches of the night, and in the dawn of a glorious morning have had strength to say, "I will not let Thee go except Thou bless me,"-these know how great Truth is; they know something of the value of the inestimable treasure; they know that they have only taken the first step on her threshold, albeit such a step that all their soul is bowed in reverent wonder at the vastness and glory beyond.

It is souls like these who can say, "Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain to it" who, walking beside the ocean of Truth, know that they have but picked up a few of the wonderful things its waves have cast at their feet; who, with one noble intellect of our time in presence of the unread mysteries of our being, can humbly say :

"Behold, we know not anything,

I can but trust that good shall fall
At last, far off, at last to all,

And every winter change to spring.

"So runs my dream, but what am I?
An infant crying in the night-
An infant crying for the light-
And with no language but a cry.”

Clothed in a spirit of humility like this, can we take upon ourselves to judge others, or have we any right to conclude we are wiser than they? Are not the infinite heights before us vast enough to dwarf all our little distinctions here below? Wiser were it for us and nobler, to embrace the whole brotherhood of man in the

arms of our love, and cry to our Father in Heaven for light-knowing that the Bread which cometh down from Heaven and giveth life to the world is also the Light of men, and that in Him is sustenance for body, soul and spirit through all generations.

There is a legend somewhere which says that Truth once fell from Heaven in the form of a diamond, and was dashed to pieces in its fall, and that everybody gets a little bit, but no one the whole. Perhaps the image would be more complete if we were to substitute a ball of quicksilver for the diamond, and see each little fragment rolling itself into a perfect sphere, and so deceiving its possessor into thinking he has been fortunate enough to get the whole; and whilst he is busy contemplating his treasure, or perhaps his own image therein, he does not observe that his neighbour is similarly occupied, and that possibly a larger portion has fallen to his share. So while we, in the exercise of our toleration, are endeavouring to make great allowances for those who differ from us, remembering their education and other circumstances we are apt to forget that our creed has been similarly modified, and that we probably require the same exercise of kindly feeling. We may be certain that as no two persons on the earth's surface can see the heavenly bodies in the same place, because their position cannot be exactly the same; so in the universe of Truth, as far as our intellect is concerned, we can never see things precisely alike, our circumstances never being quite the same. There is such a thing as "mental parallax"; perhaps it is more difficult to calculate than that of the stars.

This truth has been profoundly taught and illustrated by Lord Bacon in his "Novum Organum." He says "Four species of Idols beset the human mind, to which, for distinction's sake, we have assigned names; calling the first the Idols of the Tribe, the