whom reposed for many ages the highest civilization on earth. This history also does what no human history can ever do: it verifies itself by a continual reference to existent facts, and by a continual consistency of each part with every other. The monuments of Egypt, the ruins of Nineveh and Babylon, the concurrent history of all nations, and the traditions of all people, so far as they relate to the same subject, have corroborated, and most wonderfully illustrated, the Biblical record. More wonderful yet is its own consistency, stating briefly, and yet most positively, the facts which must run through and govern the condition of a race or a nation through thousands of years; and while that fact, too, must be multiplied and ramified in thousands of channels, like the minute fibres in the root of some mighty tree; yet we find that all subsequent facts consist with the original statement, all subsequent history but serves as a verification of the original record. As time brings us nearer to the issue of the drama, the characters, principles, and plan of the divine history become more apparent and conspicuous. order, beauty, and harmony.

All is

THE BIBLE IS A DELINEATOR OF HUMAN NATURE.

All discussions upon moral philosophy, intellectual philosophy, and metaphysical laws generally, at last depend upon, and centre in, two ideas, viz., the nature of the soul, and the nature of its obligations.

Now, the origin and nature of the soul and its obligations are fully stated in the Bible. Where is he who has added any thing to that knowledge? Where is the philosopher, the writer, the genius, the reasoner, who has been able to discover a faculty of the mind, or a source of moral obligation, which was not known to the prophets of Judea? If a man cannot add one cubit to his stature, still less can he add a new quality to his soul. Humbling as the thought may be, and ought to be, it is yet a truth, that while man has been endued with faculties capable of conquering matter and civilizing society, and out of all bringing glorious triumphs, he has been utterly unable to add any thing to the soul itself, or discover any thing of its nature beyond what is revealed in the Scriptures. That is a path in which faith, not reason, must be his guide and friend :

"Dim as the borrow'd beams of moon and stars

To lonely, weary, wandering travellers,

Is reason to the soul; and as on high,

Those rolling fires discover but the sky,
Not light as here; so reason's glimmering ray
Was lent, not to assure our doubtful way,
But guide us upward to a better day."

It is true, that many philosophers have busied themselves with systematizing what is called intellectual philosophy, and codifying the laws of moral philosophy; but what iota of real knowledge has been added to the original stock? Much dangerous speculation has been engrafted on revealed truth,

but no real discoveries made. These treatises may in some sense be valuable, by classifying the facts and phenomena of mind; but when we want simply to realize the actual powers and duties of the soul, they cannot give us any real addition to the knowledge revealed in the Bible.

The portrait of man, in his generic character, as given in the Scriptures, is a daguerreotype of his moral nature, drawn by the pencil of divine light. It is accurate in all respects. No human being has been able to read that description of man, and say— This is not my nature. No one has been so great, and none so low, that their likeness was not inscribed on the pages of Holy Writ: none have been so base, and none so noble, none so deformed, and none so perfect, that all his features, his peculiarities, his baseness, or his glory, have not been drawn so clearly, so strikingly, that through all the ages of time that character will stand forth, and those features be recognized!

The Bible is the only book which contains this portrait of human nature. It is the only one in which this branch of knowledge can be learned. If it be useful, then, for man to know himself (and ancient philosophers have said this was the most valuable of knowledge), certainly it is useful to study the Bible, which alone contains an accurate account of human nature.

THE BIBLE CONTAINS THE DIVINE LAW.

That there are certain impulses of feelings, and suggestions of uninstructed reason, which may be called the law of nature, and sometimes lead to right actions, St. Paul admits when writing to the Romans. But that this is an insufficient moral law, and totally inadequate to perfect any part of character, much less lead to the righteousness of faith, the same inspired writer, in the same epistle, proves, by drawing the darkest picture of human depravity, when restrained by no other law, which was ever exhibited to human eyes. It is a true picture of the Roman, in his highest estate of glory; and a true picture of man, unguided and unrestrained by a divine law, in every age and in every nation.

There follows, then, from this fact, that there is a need of a divine law. Because there was a need of it to perfect his announced plan of mercy, God revealed such a law. It was revealed, at first, in a dark age of the world, when the visible and tangible only could be understood by, and impressed upon the human mind. It was revealed, therefore, in the midst of all the sublime phenomena which could strike and astonish the wondering soul. It was attended by the visible presence of divine glory. It was given to men invested with supernatural power. It was revealed to a peculiar people. It was preserved by a succession of extraordinary acts. The spirits of

heaven, and all the elements of earth, were made to conspire in preserving, extending, and glorifying this holy law.

Such was the first dispensation of the law, revealed in an age of darkness, but accompanied by types and shadows of a more glorious dispensation yet to come. For two thousand years, this divine law continued to be the only spiritual light visible amidst the darkness of antiquity. On Judah's hills and Syrian plains it continued to shine, invested with supernatural glory, guarded by supernatural power, and gradually extending its illumination over other nations and other lands.

This illumination was not confined to the peculiar people to whom the divine law was originally revealed. It was a light shining in a dark place, but a light which could not be hid. Through the midst of ancient empires some knowledge of this law extended. Daniel proclaimed it in the court of Babylon, and Jonah preached it amidst the palaces of Nineveh. Although unacknowledged and unobeyed, the traditions, history, laws, and even arts of the ancient nations, exhibit ample proof that they were not unacquainted with the sacred history and holy laws of the Hebrews. And thus the light of the first dispensation became diffused, in however faint a degree, through the civilization of antiquity.

This was the preparation of antiquity. At length the day of the second dispensation dawned from on high. It was in the midst of the most gigantic and