He then advances towards the centre of the oracular temple, and hears a "company of prophets" sing, rejoice, shout, and triumph, as they predicted the one who should come, and proceeds still further till the "quiring cherubim" are heard over Bethlehem. Our author now drops the figure, and gives as illustrations of lyric poetry, the 'Song of Moses, and the song of Deborah and Barak; alludes as specimens of elegy to the inimitable lament of David over the deaths of Saul and Jonathan, and to the lamentations of Jeremiah, and to numerous psalms. "We open the book, or, to recur to the metaphor of a building, we venture to cross the threshhold, and to enter inside. First of all we are struck with the brilliant light that plays on every part of it. It is light from above. But as we attempt to gaze on this house of many mansions, and to form something like an idea of its vast extent and magnificent appearance, we are arrested with the sound of song. There are many voices, many parts, many tones, many instruments, many subjects; and yet the effect of the whole is wondrously harmonious. Chained for a while to the spot, we listen, and the oratorio of creation peals around us, the morning stars sing together, and the sons of God shout for joy. Scarcely The next three lectures are on the has the echo of this died upon our ear when dreams, the biography, and the morwe are excited by the voice of a vast mul-ality of the Bible. In the first, refer titude shouting a song of triumph over a fallen foe, whilst a procession of females, headed by one with a timbrel in her hand, sing responsively what appears to be the grand climax, Sing ye to the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea.' Proceeding towards the interior we hear pastorals, odes, elegies, dirges, lyrics innumerable, wails of heart-rending lamentation, grand choruses, temple music, whilst a melodious voice is ever and anon singing. Praise the Lord with the harp; sing unto him with the psaltery, and an instrument of ten strings. Sing unto him a new song; play skilfully with a loud voice. I will go unto the altar of God, unto God my exceeding joy; yea, upon the harp will I praise thee, O God, my God. My heart is fixed, O God; my heart is fixed; I will sing and give praise. Awake up, my glory; awake psaltery and harp. I myself will awake early." And then in loftier accents he cries, Sing aloud unto God our strength; and make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob. Take a Psalm, and bring hither the timbrel, the pleasant harp with the psaltery. Blow up the trumpet in the new moon, in the time appointed, on our solemn feast day.' But deeming the combined effort of voice and instrument still unworthy of the glorious Being whose attributes he celebrates, he rises to a pitch of enthusiastic grandeur, and loudly summons all creatures, rational and irrational, visible and invisible, material and spiritual, to unite in one prolonged and universal anthem to Him whose name alone is excellent, and whose glory is above earth and heaven. To this concert he invites two distinct companies, one from the heavens and another from the earth; as if he wished their harmonies to meet and mingle in mid-air, and the grand result would be an universal psalm to him whose excellent glory gilds the universe."-pp. 27-9. 6 66 ence is made to the vision of Abram, the dreams of Joseph, of his fellowcaptives, of Pharoah, of Gideon, of Solomon, of Nebuchadnezzar, of Daniel, and of John; and an epitome is given of the dreams of the evangelical narrative. In the second, the riches and faithfulness of the Bible-biographies is dwelt upon, the lecture appropriately closing with the life of the perfect man-the Son of God. In the third, the morality of the Bible is shown to be immutable, the standard for all time, pure as the river that issues from beneath the throne of God, clear as a sunbeam, righteous in its requirements, and holy in its source and nature. The sixth lecture, on "the parables of the Bible" was not delivered orally. This is one of the longest in the volume, to us one of the least satisfactory, the one that we could wish remodelled. Mr. Leask has made the subject of this lecture the terminus ab quo of an exposition of his own views as to the second coming of Christ. Though we are willing to take his own statement that he unfolds these views with modesty, but that necessity was laid upon him to "clear his conscience from the guilt of silence respecting a matter which he feels to be of transcendant importance," yet we cannot think the right place for that development was here. The very consideration which induced him to omit this lecture in the original course ought to have deterred him from its publication in its present form. It is made subservient to one favourite object, the establishment, by a literal interpretation of the parables of our Lord, of the pre-millenarian faith. We are not now about to argue the | but when I think of thy history, I feel an whole question. It would be entirely involuntary shudder. Why? Thou art out of place in a notice like the present. guilty of millions of infanticides, thou art But we cannot refrain from the remark choked with the blood of thy children, that, accepting the principle laid down and thou ploddest in grave-clothes thy thou art laden with corpses uncounted, by Mr. Leask, the order of progress is reversed. Instead of the present being way through the measureless vault of the heavens! Thou art a great hearse, a a spiritual dispensation, and therein graveyard, a network of vaults for the excelling in glory the material one, dead, a huge urn; and whither art thou which has waxed old and vanished travelling with thy terrible load, thou auaway, it is actually about to become, as gust mother? Thousands of nations, and some say, in twelve years, as others say tens of thousands of generations have in fifty, anything but spiritual. The been committed to thy keeping, thou blessedness pronounced by Christ on grim jailor! Many a proud king lies sethose who have not seen, and yet have curely bound in thy cells; thy dungeons believed, would seem to be forgotten. are crowded with despots and slaves, the one harmless, and the other unharmed The men of "peculiarly constructed now; and thou art rich in cities-the minds seem like the disappointed and sorrowful disciples, "trusting for one who shall redeem Israel," and redeem it very much after the fashion that would have relieved the burdened spirits of Cleopas and his fellow, without that glowing exposition that made their hearts burn as Jesus talked to them by the way. We cannot but think that if other expounders have spiritualized too much, the author of this lecture has certainly erred by rushing into the opposite extreme. The "predictions of the Bible" form the subject of the next lecture. "Prophecy," says Mr. Leask, "is history anticipated. History is prophecy fulfilled." The following imaginary soliloquy of a thoughtful and benevolent man, deeply impressed with the strange history of the past, and the doubtful issues of current events, is well described: Im wealth of empires lies fast locked in thy granite safes; and all that nations have toiled for thou claimest as thine own. perious and insatiable! Shall it be always thus? Is there no goal to this wearing race-no intermission, no rest, no final Sabbathism for the children of Adam?"— PP. 165-6. The solution of this is found in the glorious predictions of God's word; and have been working together for good the day shall declare how all things to them that love God. Mr. Leask dwells specially, in the course of this lecture, on one characteristic of prophecy, which so far as his reading has extended, he has not seen noticed by any writer. "The fulfilment of predictions has of course always been considered as an evidence of wish to mention is this: that there are their divinity; but the peculiarity I many prophecies in the Old Testament naturally tended to prevent their fulfil Scriptures, the publication of which which they should receive the Messiah. Our author expatiates at length upon this point, and then glances at the astonishing breadth of vision with which the prophets were favoured, and remarks in conclusion, "that the one topic to which the prophets of Israel summoned the world's attention was the royalty of Jesus." "Alas, alas! what have I seen, what heard, what felt? O earth, earth! shall it be always thus? Pain, sin, sorrow, sorrow, sin, pain, always? One multi-ment," such, for example, as those which form, manifold, ever-changing, everlast-related to the Jews, and the manner in ing cirle of joy, grief, laughter, madness, death! A serio-comic dance of wild liberty and rattling chains, of men of great flesh,' and ghastly skeletons, of bloated vice and broken-hearted virtue, of chariots and war horses, of hearses and coffins for the dead, of marriages and deaths, bells pealing in the morning and tolling at night, and all this accompanied by the horrid harmony of merry laughter, hysteric screams, psalms of gratitude, groans of agony, shouts of despair, and loud songs of drunkards! O earth, earth, prolific mother! sometimes thou puttest on such winning smiles, set in flowers and floating in perfume, that I cannot avoid loving thee; The "miracles of the Bible come next under notice. This is the other lecture which was not delivered in the course; and is the one with which we have been most thoroughly satisfied. There is here food for much thought in every part; and the whole will repay frequent perusal. The eight following characteristics of the miracles of the Bible are dwelt upon in extenso: (1)-That they are of two distinct classes, judicial and merciful; (2)-that they were announced beforehand as about to take place, that is, they were predicted, and their occurrence was the fulfilment of prophecy; (3)-that they were publicly performed in the presence of competent witnesses; (4)-that they were in themselves of an educational and suggestive character; (5.)— that they were recorded as unquestioned facts; (6.)-that the moral character of those who recorded them was above suspicion; (7.)—that the truths in whose favour they were wrought are of the highest and of the most enduring importance-everyway worthy of God and essential to the prosperity of man; and (8.)-that they were referred to by the subsequent inspired writers as demonstrations of the divine interference. We should like to give many passages of great beauty which we have marked in reading this lecture, but must refer our readers to the work itself; simply adding, that to have omitted this lecture because it was not delivered, would have marred the beauty and dimmed the splendour of the whole volume. The two closing lectures are on "the design and destiny of the Bible;" the first being dwelt upon as affording answers, distinct and unequivocal, to the questions, "What is man? whence? and wherefore? It is regarded as "a continual witness in this rebellious world for God; and as teaching men their mutual dependence and relations." "Every man is a link in the chain of humanity. Perfect isolation from the race in which he forms an unit, is as impossible as an absolute vacuum in nature. He may become misanthrope or ascetic; but he must live from the soil which nourishes the race, and breathe the air which they inspire; and the invisible bond which binds him to them cannot be severed whilst life continues. The doctrine of dependencies is little understood. It wants the hand of a master to do it justice. But whilst it is emphatically taught in the Bible, neither philosophy, theology, nor poetry, has yet done anything but glance at it.. Men are acting everywhere and constantly, and by this unbroken action are giving tone and colour to the character of the great family. The history of the human race is being written daily. From the rising to the setting of the sun, this great diary of human feelings, thoughts, passions, and activities, is spread before the eye of the Omniscient, and every man has a word, or a line, or a sentence in it. Every man in every land enters something daily on the pages of this vast journal. There is not an idle man in being. All are scribes. There is wonderful variety in the entries-the signatures of all classes, all characters, all conditions; tyrant and slave, just and unjust, good and bad, rich and poor, help to swell out its huge dimensions. This book is destined to be opened before all its authors, when the last entry shall have been made by the praise awarded and the blame thrown upon last man in the race of humanity, and the each, will have reference at once to himself and to his relative position."-pp. 236-7. Our author closes the lecture by noticing the great design of the Bible, the highest in interest and the first in importance-the revelation to men of the character and attributes of God. In the last lecture, on the destiny of the Bible, there is a graphic sketch of the desolation, misery, and sin, that must certainly come upon the world if this best of books be ever thrown aside by the world, become lost, or be forgotten. 66 There is no code of morals. All gov ernment is a tyranny, and all peoples are under the heel of despotism. The faith of man in his fellow has ceased. There is no distinction between right and wrong. Power is the only standard of conduct. Social organizations have become scenes of chaos. The domestic relation exists only in name. Licentiousness, brutality, intemperance and every loathsome vice, welter over the nations. Trade and commerce languish and decay. Civilization retrogrades. England sinks into barbarism. Europe has become another Africa. Art and science have perished. Education has lost its motive-power. Literature there is none, except the maniac ravings of blasphemy. Darkness covers the earth and gross darkness the people. Men live without hope and die without God." Mr. Leask then gives a sketch of the three great parties into which, as he conceives, the future nations of the earth will be divided, the philosophical, the papistical, and the christian. The hold it has taken upon man, the character of its doctrines, the fact that the perpetuity of the church supposes the perpetuity of the word of trutn, its declarations respecting itself, and the honour of the Lord Jesus Christ requiring its continuance and wide diffusion-these are regarded as reasons for believing and predicting that a splendid destiny awaits the Bible. Such is a brief analysis of these lectures. Mr. Leask has done well to give them greater publicity and a more enduring form. The enthusiasm with which the several subjects are treated is catching; and the perfect freedom of the whole volume from the slightest taint of sectarianism, while it reflects credit on its author, will secure for his book free admission into every body of christians. We feel persuaded that the perusal of these lectures must stimulate those who, with reverence and love, have read the Bible, to make it even more and more the book of their counsel and the guide of their life. Nor can we think that those who have hitherto treated it with indifference can listen to the voice of this charmer, or can gaze on the half-concealed beauties which he reveals, without desiring to hear more of so pleasant a song, to look on the full and unveiled glories of the truth itself; reproaching themselves for their former conduct, and showing that the reproach is fruitful for good by striving to become familiar with the most ancient, the holiest, the most marvellous, the most instructive, the most beautiful, and the best of books. Who shall say that then the enquiry will not arise from their hearts to their lips-Is not this God's book ? for in its deep still waters his image is mirrored. RELIGIOUS LIBERTY IN GERMANY. A Letter to the Assembly of the German Evangelical churches, held at Berlin, in Sep. 1853. By the REV. G. W. LEHMANN, Pastor of the Baptist Church in Berlin. Translated from the German. London: Houlston & Stoneman. such as Baptists and Methodists?" Mr. Hinton and Dr. Steane were deputed by the Baptist Union to attend the Kirchentag; and Mr. Lehmann, not being permitted to speak before the assembly, published the above letter as a vindication and an appeal on behalf of the Baptists in Germany. What the Kirchentag refused to hear, is thus published to all Germany. Mr. Lehmann maintains, in this calm and temperate letter, that the Baptists, equally with other Protestants, revere and honour the Bible as the only authority in matters of faith; that their aim is not to make proselytes; that the Baptists of Germany do not materially differ from their brethren them as followers of John of Leyden and in England and America; that to regard Thomas Münzer is unjust; and concludes by offering "the hand of brotherhood in Christ to all who can and will accept it." We fully agree with the brethren through whose kindness this letter is given to the British churches, in their opinion as to its christian spirit and moderation; and as it may be had for threepence, we strongly advise each one of our readers to order it for himself. THE BAPTIST ALMANAC: or Chronological, Biographical, and Statistical Year-Book for 1854. London: Houlston & Stoneman. THIS little almanac has come to hand It contains, for rather late in the year baptists who may visit London from the a penny, a good deal of information. To country, the metropolitan and suburban directory" will be welcome. It gives, in a condensed form, the situation of the various baptist chapels, the times when services are held, and the pastors' private addresses. Judging from this list, baptist churches are very numerous in the neighbourhood of London. There are some mentioned in it, the existence of which will now be learnt for the first time. THE LEISURE HOUR, for March & April. London: 56, Paternoster Row. THIS is one of the most useful and instructive of our serials. In addition to the continued "Australian Story," we have many articles of special interest for the present time. We hope the "Leisure Hour" will meet with the encouragement it deserves. No family, in which there are young people, should be without it. LIBRARY OF BIBLICAL LITERATURE. No. 1. The Story of Ancient Nineveh; No. 2. Israel and the Pyramids; No. 3. The Dead Sea and its Explorers; No. 4. The Plagues of Egypt. London: W. Freeman, Fleet Street. "THE standing committee of the Kirchentag, or voluntary gathering of the clergy and laity of the German Evangelical churches, which has been celebrated annually for about six years past," proposed for discussion at the last annual meeting the following subject: "How should the church treat separatists and sectarians; BRIEF, accurate, fascinating, and cheap. THE MIDLAND CONFERENCE was held at Hinckley, on Easter Tuesday, April 18th, 1854. Mr. Bott of Barton opened the morning service, and Mr. Goadby of Loughborough delivered a very instructive discourse, on "The respective sacrifices of Cain and Abel," from Heb. xi. 4. The congregation at this service was small. The meeting for business commenced at half-past two in the afternoon. The Secretary prayed, and Mr. Goadby, at the request of the minister of the place, presided. In his opening remarks the Chairman adverted to the thinness of the attendance. He had himself made a sacrifice to be present; and he thought that if many of the ministers and friends in the district had made an effort their presence would have been enjoyed. Rather more than the usual number of churches reported by letter, but many of the churches did not favour the Conference with any report. From the statements received, however, it appeared that 74 had been baptized since the previous Confer ence, and that 66 remained as candidates. The church at Grantham reported that they had commenced negociations for the purchase of land for their chapel, and that they had the unanimous concurrence of the Nottingham committee in the steps which they were taking. The Secretary reported that communications had been sent to the destitute village churches as far as it was thought needful. The Committee appointed to attend to the Swadlingcote case, in reporting stated that the property had been secured, and that the trust-deed was in the course of execution. - Resolved, That the thanks of the Conference be given to the brethren who have attended to this case. It was stated that the Repository Committee had met, as urged by the previous Conference, but no report was presented. A letter from the church at Billesdon was read, stating that the cause there is in a very low state-that the congrega |