King. Thus rejecting the True Light, darkness encompassed them.

When Jesus expired, the vail of the Temple was rent, and the Life and Power thereof departed. And as they despised the only name in heaven, or given among men, by which Salvation cometh, why offer the oblation, -pleading the Lord to avert the impending judgment, since Jesus, finally cast off by them, uttered, "Behold, your house is left unto you desolate!" There was no hope! Jerusalem fell!"

To the Christian of the Nineteenth Century we solemnly appeal, and of him enquire, if, according to the Scriptures, he is looking for the consummation of the Gospel of Jesus. Does he not expect the Judgment; and must it not begin at the house of God?

When the Refiner appeareth, the gold must be purified; and when He maketh up His jewels, they that fear God and work righteousness will be spared, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him. Israel of old departed from God, and in her trial failed, and the storm swept her away like a house built upon the sand. Yet a remnant was saved, who bore the Spiritual Ark and Covenant to the Gentiles. And when the fullness of time is come, they too shall be judged, and in that judgment the faithful and obedient shall be spared, and encompassed as with a shield

of fire; but the faithless and unbelieving, the hypocrite and profane, shall be swept away as with the besom of destruction.

From the foregoing we conclude

1. That the strange phenomena moving mind and matter, the conflict of Nations, the peculiar manifestations of man's religious nature; modern prophets, and the strange excitement known as spiritualism, indicate some important crisis at hand.

2. From the determinate and unprecedented opposition to the Christian religion, we conclude, according to the Scriptures, that Antichrist has arisen.

3. We judge that nominal Christians, omitting the weightier matters of the law, Justice, Mercy and Faith, and seeking fellowship with Mammon and her worshipers, are fulfilling, in themselves, the prophets, and affording evidence of the approaching Consummation.

4. Having reference to the history of the Jews their ignorance of the presence of the Messiah, although in their midst, his final rejection by them, together with their fall; by analogy, we infer that nominal christians of this day, who manifest so little of the true spirit of Christ, are imitating the example of ancient Israel, and thus provoking upon themselves like consequences

-the consequences that await the apostate church in the last day. Thus in the events of

this age, the Word of God is maintained and fulfilled, and signs are afforded of the second coming of the Son of Man.

That these conclusions are legitimate, we appeal to the history of the past, the scenes of the present, the hope of the child of God, and finally, to the WORD, in, which God has covenanted in Jesus, by whom he is reconciling the world to himself, to restore all things.

Then wo to the rebellious, the hypocrite and unbeliever, to the lords and potentates of the earth for a day of terror awaits the ungodly. But joy, peace and salvation unto those who love the Lord Jesus, and like the wise virgins, are patiently waiting the coming of the Bridegroom, for they shall enter through the gates into the holy City.

And, to the slumbering watchman, it may be said, "Sleep on: the Day of the Lord has come. Ye taught it and believed it not'"

BEING ITS STATE.

IT IS of the utmost importance that we understand the intrinsic qualities of our primary being, together with the extrinsic influences to which it is liable. This knowledge is especially essential when considered in the light of our immortality. To obtain it should engage our first thoughts.

Man, in his constitution unites those principles and forces which qualify him a receptacle of the laws and attributes of the physical and spiritual realm, both of which blend in his composition. A truer statement of man, originally, cannot be made a more perfect philosophy of his being, and of its creation, cannot be adduced, than is recorded in Gen., chap. 2. "The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and he became a living soul."

Volumes have been written as exponents of man, of his origin and constitution, but all do not say more. The profoundest thought cannot fathom its depths, the widest range does not approach its boundary, nor the most lofty flight ascend its exalted dome.

The quality and proportion uniting in man's existence, from the natural and spiritual realms of which he partakes, determine the character of his essential being; that which matures him, determines the condition of his futurity.

If the immediate sphere from which he is propagated, and the realm through which he arises into maturity, shall have been, from any cause, rendered discordant and unhealthy, it follows, as a natural sequence, that he will be but a type of their imperfections. Again, as growth is the reproduction, and in a special form, of the inherent, incorporated, modified, and unfolded properties surrounding and involving life, man, natively, can only obtain a changed or higher mode of the principles engaging his being; and that mode must tend to the natural ultum of the preponderating qualities, inherent or obtained. If, therefore, his being incline to, and absorb, predominantly, the material or outer sphere of his existence, it follows that the baser propension will obtain to a disproportion, the inclinations will be debased, and the spirit robbed of those diviner attainments intended in his creation.

And if his sphere be deranged and misdirected, how indispensable to man, for his present and future good, is a knowledge of himself and the nature of the laws and principles affecting him, together with the means of his restoration.