REMARKS AND STRICTURES. To hear marriage spoken of by those who have assumed the Christian profession, (for in this matter, we renounce all intercourse with infidels, profligates, and socialists,) as a LOTTERY is an awful outrage upon our natural instincts, a deliberate violence committed upon our reason, and an impious impeachment of the wisdom and benevolence of God, who has circumvallated and garrisoned the domestic constitution by the most efficient provisions of our physical organization and the exquisite mental and moral sensibilities of our nature;-whilst all the discord, and concomitant infelicities which occur in this sacred enclosure have, unquestionably, arisen from those who have gained admission therein, by the imbecility or stratagems of an odious treachery. In the apostolic injunction, Be not unequally yoked, where can be discovered the necessity of the chance or fatalism of a pretended or affirmed sortilege? If through the fatal influence of family pride, the unhallowed lust of passion, the sordid love of money, an immoral compliance with the artificial requisitions of fashionable life, or an unauthorized submission to the urgency of parental pertinacity, (for of all oppressions the most insidious and contemptible is domestic tyranny,) an ill-starred marriage works of God's hands; and it is a reason for our subjection to God, our chief Lord, and his dominion over us.” The text, also, has a particular reference to Jesus Christ, as expounded and illustrated by St. Paul, in Hebrews ii. 6-8, where, to prove the sovereign dominion of Christ, both in heaven and in earth, the apostle shows that he is that Man, here spoken of, whom God has crowned with glory and honor, and made to have dominion over the works of his hand. The greatest favor ever manifested to the human race, and the greatest honor ever put upon human nature, were exemplified in the incarnation and exaltation of the Lord Jesus; these far exceed the favors and honors done us by creation and Providence, though they also are great, and far more than we deserve. In this, every other instance of Divine condescension is eclipsed,—all our thoughts are swallowed up, and our contemplations must issue in wonder, love, and praise." is effected, all the unhappiness and vicious consequences accruing therefrom,-like the unalterable law of cause and effect,-is exclusively attributable to the gross prostitution of that divine ordinance instituted by Jehovah himself, in the garden of Eden, when unpolluted by the stain and crime of man's disobedience, involving all the disastrous results which have flowed therefrom. "Sacred wedlock! law of heaven, By wisdom framed, in mercy given; Curs'd be the lusts that violate The spirit of the apostolic injunction, likewise, clearly denounces the unnatural and indecorous affinity of blooming womanhood with decrepid senility, originating either in the promptings of mercenary motives, or the unseemly indulgence of amorous propensities. Equally abominable in the sight of a holy God, must be the intentions and conduct of those who think to assume the momentous responsibilities of the ministerial office, with the ostensible or avowed design of converting the pulpit into a stepping-stone for personal aggrandizement and social elevation, through the medium of an advantageous, though insincere, matrimonial alliance; while some have even gone so far as to desecrate the solemn sacrament of the Eucharist for the accomplishment of a similar purpose; neither are those clergymen free from reprehension, who, apparently unimpaired in physical strength and mental faculties, retire to the fashionable residences of watering places and summer resort, from the stated performance of ministerial labors; as soon as they have secured the otium cum dignitate of a petticoat pension. What an offensive spectacle in the sight of God, Angels, and Christians, is the frequent exhibition of ecclesiastical coxcombs, whether in the adolescence, maturity, or decline, of their ministerial functions, that when they should be wooing a soul, they are evidently more anxious to court the admiration of their persons, manifested in the bestarched cravat, the becurled periwig, preparatory attitudinizing, the studied display of the perfumed cambric, dangling from the trimmed digits of the bejewelled fingers of a bepoulticed hand. The subtilty and malignity of Satan, the magnitude and grievous effects of sin, the priceless boon of Inspiration, the blood-bought gift of Redemption, and the sacred influences of the Holy Ghost cannot tolerate such solemn mockeries! If, in the foregoing remarks, the writer is considered to have indulged in observations too severe and outre, he would recommend his censurers to consult the sentiments and strictures of that extraordinary theologian, the late Robert Hall, who invari ably placed in juxtaposition-side by side-with vulgarity, affectation, buffoonery, pride, vanity, and pharisaism in the sacred desk-Satan, his angels and allies. The extravagant expense for the ostentation of personal pride and social importance displayed in the fitting up, and auctioneering, for the most fashionable pews, in professing Christian churches, are also very serious abominations, converting the House of God-the house of prayer, into a house of merchandise,-a den of thieves.-Matt. xxi. 12, 13. DESCRIPTION OF THE PLATE. The plate represents the escort of a departed believer to the gate of heaven. The conducting angel, being preceded by the announcing angel, on the banner of whose trumpet are given those passages which constitute the credentials or passport of Faith, and which, upon being presented to the receiving angel, the portals of the city of the heavenly Jerusalem are instantly thrown open for the ad mission of their charge. Lower down, is a guardian angel, surrounded by happy cherubs, conveying the son of the departed to the Paradise above; upon the drapery of whose ethereal vestment is inscribed that passage upon which is founded the doctrine of infant salvation, for the reception of such juvenile inhabitants amongst the angels of God. RESIDENCE AND SOCIETY. In the unwearied and exhilarating progress of our advancing and animating inquiries respecting the spiritual nature, exalted rank, amazing attributes, and beautiful characteristics of celestial intelligences, we have now arrived at an important point of our elevating and delightful theme, requiring the sober and serious consideration of the local or constituted residence of angels, usually denominated Heaven; and which is variously represented in Scripture-as the city of the living God,-the resplendent habitation of the innumerable company of angels,—the magnificent palace of the celestial Jerusalem,-the bright mansions of the incorruptible, unfading, and eternal inheritance of the saints in light, the holy and glorified throne of Redemption and the Godhead, the sacred Mount Zion and upper sanctuary of the Christian church, resounding with the triumphant hallelujahs of the ransomed inhabitants, victorious over Satan, sin, and mortality,—THe august and effulgent SHECHINAH OF ETERNITY. Various and momentous as are all the revealed communications of the Bible, it is a striking circumstance, eliciting admonitory reflections, that scarcely anything is taught us in Holy Writ concerning any of the worlds included under the general name of Heavens, except the Supreme Heaven. The reason for which, it is not difficult to ascertain, being found in the truthful conviction that whatever information might have been given or knowledge attained respecting |