alone. The religion of some begins and ends with the study of their own spirit. Their own spiritual consciousness, as they call it, is their Alpha and Omega. For the settlement of the greatest religious questions they look to their own reason. They fancy all truth lies hidden in their own soul. They think of it as a well, with the stars of a glorious sky reflected there. No external teaching is needed by them-their own spirit is their priest. To it alone they put their deep questions; the leaves of its book alone they turn over. They fancy that the mind only asserts its true independence when it casts off the tuition of the past and present, when it scouts all external monitors, when it listens only to its own music, and is absorbed in the murmurings of its own voice. Such notions are very popular in the present day in some quarters. Some departments of literature are pervaded with this spirit. David meant something far different, when he said, "commune with your own heart." Enlightened reason means something far different. Honest heart communion alone will teach us much, but its teaching is all of a certain. kind. It reaches not beyond a certain point. It makes us see what we are, but the feeling inspired is not of the proud self-complacent stamp. An unpartial, complete, thorough self-consciousness awakens a sense of sin. It excites a sense of want. There is a perception of the beauty of human nature as created by God, but there is also a conviction of the depravity of human nature, through the self-indulgence, selfishness, and obstinacy of man. There may be glimpses of a glorious past in the early history of humanity, but there are also apprehensions of a degraded present, and forebodings of a dark future. A fall, an apostacy, a descent from innocence, a sinking down from God, is felt. The contradiction and confusion of human nature is realized. Conscience holds up the law's broken tables. Conviction is quickened, fear of punishment ensues. Communing with the heart does this-under the mysterious influence of a Power presently to be noticed-but it cannot do more. It shows the disease, not the remedy. It exposes to the storm, it does not point out the port. David communed with something besides his own heart: "Thy law is my meditation day and night." Thy testimonies are very sure, making wise the simple." "Thy word is a light unto my feet, and a lamp unto my path." God has given a revelation signed and sealed by himself. The evidence of the Divine origin of the Bible is incontestible, prophecies now fulfilling attest it. It is full of miraculous knowledge, as well as the record of superhuman wonders. Any theory giving it a merely human origin must abound in diffi

culties, contradictions, absurdities. We know that it is God's, from evidence, external and internal.

Communing with our own hearts we must commune with the Divine Word too,-" When thou goest, it shall lead thee; when thou sleepest, it shall keep thee; and when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee,"- "Talk with thee!" Yes, it will, and that most honestly too-first about thyself-thine own sinfulness, thy guilt, thy danger. It will open chambers of imagery. It will lay bare dark secrets-it will go down very deep. "For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." But if the heavenly word talks in a tone of terror, it talks in a tone of mercy too. "After the fire a still small voice." When man hears from his own heart that he is a sinner, that word confirms it, and deepens the conviction; but it goes on to inform him of a divine and omnipotent Saviour, who took on himself our nature, and died for us on the cross. It tells him how Christ came into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved-how, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so was the Son of man lifted upthat whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. It declares the wonderful fact of the atonement, and that through the blood of Christ we may be cleansed from all sin, and that faith in his name is the simple and only method of obtaining pardon and peace. When man finds he is full of confusion and self-contradiction, and that word makes the hopeless state of things within still more apparent, it goes on to reveal a divine and gracious Spirit who renews men's hearts, and turns disorder into beauty, and darkness into light, and death into life. It discloses the possibility of a new birth, the regeneration of the soul by the grace of God, and offers the Spirit to all who will ask for it. When man's own soul vainly struggles with evil, and that word persuades him more than ever of his own weakness, it proceeds to inform us of a certain method of victory, even through faith in Him who has overcome for us. And when man looks in despair to himself for consolation, amidst hours of bereavement and loneliness, spiritual anguish, and the fear of death, that word at once. strengthens such despair, and kindles a true, bright, glorious hope, that rises over the agitated soul, "like to music serenely beautiful after a night of tempest and of horror."

Remember, then, self-communion alone will not suffice. Yet is self-communion essential to salutary communion with the

THE ENGLISH MONTHLY TRACT SOCIETY 27, RED LION SQUARE, LONDON.

divine Teacher. While apart from the messenger who descends from above, you will never get an answer to the questions suggested from within,- -so also apart from the monitor within you will never feel your need of that salvation which is revealed from above. Some converse with the divine oracle, and their understandings become enlightened on many points; but they are only enlightened. Truth goes no further than the understanding. They have right conceptions of the gospel in theory. They can see its truths, can harmonize them, can group them together into systematic form, but they have no appreciation of their value, like that which a lost wanderer has of the value of a guide, who has found him in an agony of despair on the edge of a precipice, and snatched him from death, and brought him safely home.

To know our own hearts is essential to our knowing Christ. He stands at the door and knocks. The door has never been opened. It is bolted. The bar is rusty. The portal is overgrown with tall matted weeds. It must be opened from within. Will " any man hear his voice and open the door" till he has seen the wretchedness of the abode-till he feels the utter ruin of his own soul-till he is convinced that there is no hope for him but in Christ? Never. Never is Christ let in, and welcomed, till the soul is conscious of its need, and that consciousness comes of listening to an awakened conscience, speaking truthfully as long as ever it will. And what rouses conscience, and enlightens it, and teaches it the truth concerning sin and perdition, but the holy Spirit of God, who is the creator of conscience, and the author of the Bible? He convinces the world of sin, and righteousness, and judgment to come, and then he testifies of Christ. First, he teaches us what sinners we are, and then he shows what a Redeemer Jesus is, and so he becomes "a Comforter." The gospel is but a theory to us, till self-knowledge, through the Spirit's agency, makes the salvation which it brings a blessed fact, and, at the same time, Christ once received, we know ourselves better than we did before.

Study, then, yourselves, that you may know your want of Christ, and pray for the Spirit to aid you in your study; and be assured, that when Christ is in you the hope of glory, the Holy Spirit will prove to you a most blessed and precious Comforter. He will speak to you by day and by night, when you are afraid and when you are hopeful, when you are faint and weary, and when you are strong and courageous-when life beats high, and when death comes near. His voice will mingle with other voices, and sanctify them all. His thoughts will mingle with other thoughts, and purify them all.

They

"If any

Once more I would say, "Commune with your own heart" on the great subjects of interest contained in the Bible. are all of immense moment. They are all practical in some way. They all relate to you. Let us select one. man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." That is just the thing to talk to your own heart about now at the present time. "In Christ." In Him as the ark of safety-the city of refuge. Believing in Him the Redeemer. Accepted in Him the beloved. Talk to your own heart about that—and ask, Are you in Him? "If any man be in Christ" (and every man is invited to be in Him, for "God so loved the world as to give his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life")-"If any man be in Christ"(the truth is of universal application-true for you and every soul), "he is a new creature. The Spirit of God works in him a wonderful change, through the very faith which he has in Jesus Christ. Talk to your own heart, and inquire whether this change has been begun in you. And this is what we are to understand by "the new creature,"-first, "Old things pass away." It is new in the sense of putting an end to what is old. However early the change, there is an ending. There is the crushing of seeds, the trampling out of sparks. When the change is later the ending is more manifest, because there has been time for the outgrowth of evil. Though there has been little, if anything, in the way of vice, nothing in the way of crime, yet evil under a spiritual form has been existing and working. There has been alienation from God-indifference to devotion -intellectual pride-self-dependence. Whatever the previous life of sin, there is an ending of it when any man becomes a new creature. We can conceive of the condition of a being who only needs something to be added to what he has, who only requires that which shall cover and crown what is already possessed; the old things being the ground and foundation of the new. Not so is it in reference to this change. The old comes to an end. It cannot be carried into the new world of regenerate life. There is a casting away as well as a receiving -a stripping off as well as a putting on-a renouncing as well as an accepting a dying to the past as well as a resurrection to the future. There is a crucifixion of the flesh which is corrupt there is a putting to death of the old man with his deeds. And, secondly, "All things become new." There is new light-new love-new hope-new joy-in a word, new life. It is transmuted, if not transfigured. If there be nothing outwardly startling to others, there is a change full of blessed

wonder felt by the subject of it himself. There is all the difference between a life " according to the course of this world," and "a life hid with Christ in God." Now talk over all this with your own heart, and inquire what you know of this ending, and of this beginning. It is no light thing, because it is your life.

Yet again, hear the inspired exhortation, "Commune with your own heart." Remember, that self-ignorance and inattention to such matters as are now pressed upon you must be followed by an awful acquaintance with yourself and with them hereafter. The objects which now divert attention will ere long disappear. Fancy a traveller passing through a crowded city-going out of the gates, and coming down at length into a lonesome, dreary valley, where all is silence and death. What a contrast. What solitude of spirit comes. The mind is forced on itself-on its memories-on nature-on God. Have you never been in such a lonely place that, in spite of all efforts to the contrary, you have been compelled to realize your own individuality, and to think of Him in whom you live and move and have your being? But there is no loneliness and silence like that of death-like that of eternity. Oh! the solitude and stillness around a human spirit just quitting the body-just leaving the noise and bustle of this world-just dismissed from amidst the carnage and shout of the battle field or from amidst the din and murmur of the market and the mart. Think of the solitude and stillness of it as it stands before God, and becomes conscious of Him, and of his relation to itself. All objects that could amuse and divert gone for ever gone. All possibility of delusion at an end. The truth known -its own condition known-its own destiny known. This knowledge succeeding the deepest ignorance before. Think of all this and tremble, lest knowledge of yourself should come then-too late!

Devote now some space of time to this exercise. Say one hour. Is that much for self-communion? Let it be devoted wholly and honestly to the employment. Take into conference the divine teacher-the Word of God. What is it to thee? What are thou to it? It is a guide. Art thou a follower? It is a law. Art thou obedient? It is a refuge. Art thou a fugitive? If not before, "commune with your own heart on your bed, and be still." To-night do this. In the darkness and stillness of the night season, while others are slumbering, do this. There will be nothing then to intrude and disturb. The communion at first may not be pacifying. To "be still may be an impossibility. The revelation of yourself to your