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SACRED POETRY.

PRAISE.

HARPS of eternity! begin the song ;
Redeem'd, and angel harps! begin to God,
Begin the anthem ever sweet and new,
While I extol him holy, just, and good.
Life, beauty, light, intelligence, and love!
Eternal, uncreated, infinite!

Unsearchable Jehovah! God of truth!
Maker, upholder, governor of all:
Thyself unmade, ungovern'd, unupheld.
Mysterious more, the more display'd, where still
Upon thy glorious throne thou sitt'st alone;
Hast sat alone, and shall for ever sit
Alone; invisible, immortal One!
Behind essential brightness unbeheld.
Incomprehensible! what weight shall weigh-
What measure, measure Thee? what know we more
Of thee, what need to know, than thou hast taught,
And bidd'st us still repeat, at morn and even,
God! everlasting Father! holy One!

Our God, our Father, our eternal all!

Source whence we came, and whither we return;
Who made the heaven, who made the flowery land.
Thy works all praise thee; all thy angels praise:
Thy saints adore, and on thy altars burn
The fragrant incense of perpetual love.
They praise thee now: their hearts, their voices praise,
And swell the rapture of the glorious song.
Harp lift thy voice on high,-shout, angels, shout!
And loudest, ye redeem'd! Glory to God,
And to the Lamb, who bought us with his blood,
From every kindred, nation, people, tongue;
And washed, and sanctified, and saved our souls;
And gave us robes of linen pure, and crowns
Of life, and made us kings and priests to God.
Shout back to ancient Time! sing loud, and wave
Your palms of triumph! sing, Where is thy sting,
O death? where is thy victory, O grave?
Thanks be to God, eternal thanks, who gave
Us victory through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Harp, lift thy voice on high! shout, angels, shout!
And loudest, ye redeem'd! glory to God,
And to the Lamb, all glory, and all praise:
All glory, and all praise, at morn and even,
That come and go eternally; and find
Us happy still, and thee for ever blest.
Glory to God, and to the Lamb.
For ever, and for evermore. Amen.

Amen.

HOPE IN THE RESURRECTION.

POLLOK.

THROUGH Sorrow's night, and danger's path
Amid the deepening gloom,
We soldiers of an injured king
Are marching to the tomb.

There, when the turmoil is no more,
And all our pow'rs decay,
Our cold remains in solitude
Shall sleep the years away.
Our labours done, securely laid
In this our last retreat,
Unheeded o'er our silent dust

The storms of life shall beat.

Yet not thus lifeless, thus inane,

The vital spark shall lie,

For o'er life's wreck that spark shall rise, To seek its kindred sky.

These ashes too, this little dust,

Our Father's care shall keep, Till the last angel rise and break The long and dreary sleep. Then love's soft dew o'er every eye

Shall shed its mildest rays, And the long silent dust shall burst With shouts of endless praise.

H. K. WHITE.

MISCELLANEOUS.

The weakness of Infidelity.-Although, when surrounded by company and excited by applause, Hobbes was accustomed profusely to pour out his blasphemies and to indulge in impious bravado against his Maker, yet solitude was intolerable, the dismal reflections of his desolate mind he was unable to endure; if by any accident he was left to himself in the night, without his candle, he was absorbed in the most childish terror; and his memorable exclamation on the borders of the grave, in spite of all his pretensions to philosophy and learning, "I am going to take a leap in the dark," is a sufficient exhibition of the miserable uncertainty as to the future, and the wretched despondency as to the present, which the rejection of the revelation of God entails upon the victims of its delusion.

bishop of Rochester, who was cruelly and iniquitously Support in the hour of trial.-When Dr Fisher, condemned to be beheaded by Henry VIII., came out from his dungeon in the Tower of London, and saw the scaffold where he was to die, he took out of his pocket a Greek Testament; and looking up to heaven, he exclaimed, "Now, O Lord, direct me to some passage which may support me through this awful scene. He opened the book, and his eye glanced on the passage, "This is life eternal, to know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." The bishop instantly closed the book, and said, "Praised be the Lord! this is sufficient both for time and for eternity." Thus did Providence direct him to consolations, which rendered him insensible to the agonies of death, and afforded him a foretaste of the immortal blessedness of heaven.

The Experience of a Traveller.-In Willis's "Pencillings by the Way," the following remarks are made in reference to the mode in which the Sabbath was spent on board a steam-boat between London and Leith: "I was pleased to see an observance of the Sabbath, which had not crossed my path in three years' travel Half the passengers, at least, took their Bibles after breakfast, and devoted an hour or two evidently to grave religious reading and reflection. With this exception, I have not seen a person with the Bible in his hand, in travelling over half the world.

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PROVIDENCE PROVED BY EXPERIENCE. BY THE REV. JAMES BUCHANAN,

North Leith.

WHEN the Psalmist, after reviewing the various dispensations of Providence, affirms, that "whoso is wise and will observe these things, even they shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord," he plainly proceeds on the supposition, that the events of human life in general, and the facts of every man's own experience in particular, are of such a nature that no one can seriously consider them, without acknowledging that there is a Providence at work in the world, and that this Providence is a gracious and a merciful one.

That there is a Providence directing, controlling, and overruling all the events which take place on earth, whether these be of a public or more private nature, is a truth which, however much it may be doubted by the careless, and however boldly it may be denied by the profane, will, nevertheless, evidence itself to the conviction of every considerate mind, which contemplates habitually and dispassionately the events of human life, in connection with the causes out of which they spring, and the results in which they terminate, or which they have a tendency to promote. To a careless observer, the course of events may seern to be determined by no fixed principles, and to be regulated by no steady laws; all may seem to be a strange medley of uncertainty, vaccillation, and change; but on more attentive observation, the course of events will be found to afford as strong evidence of a constant Providence, as the structure of nature affords of a wise and intelligent Creator. It will hardly be denied that a concurrence of events to one great end, especially if these events be numerous and complicated, while, at the same time, they seem to be mutually independent of one another, and to have no other connection except what arises from the supposition of a Supreme Will overruling them all for the accomplishment of its own designs, may afford as striking a proof of God's interposition as is furnished by the construction of a piece of mechanism, or by the collocations and adjustments of material elements in any organized body. When we examine the structure of a plant, or of an VOL. II.

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animal, or when we consider the formation of any one organ, such as the human eye, we see at once that its parts are so adjusted to one another, as to answer an important end; and hence we infer, from the traces of design and wisdom that are exhibited in its structure, that it could only be the product of a designing cause, or, in other words, the result of God's creative wisdom and power. Now, what we affirm is, that a series of events may be so arranged, as to afford precisely the same evidence of an overruling Providence,-events which naturally have no apparent connection with one another, but which, nevertheless, may be strung together so as to have a common bearing on some one result, and so as to demonstrate, by their concurrence to that one end, just as an organized body demonstrates, by the fit combination. of its parts, the interposition of divine wisdom and almighty power. The argument, in both cases, proceeds on precisely the same principles; in the one case these principles are applied to the combinations of matter, in the other to the combinations of events; but in each instance there is an end, and a concurrence of means towards that end, which affords ample evidence of design; and the advantage of considering the subject in this light, consists in the proof which it affords, that the doctrine of a constant and presiding Providence rests precisely on the same ground, and should be received with the same unwavering certainty, as the doctrine of God's being itself, in so far as that doctrine is embraced on the strength of those proofs which nature furnishes of the design and wisdom of the Creator of the world.

It is true that there are many events of so trivial and insignificant a nature, that we would not think of founding upon them any argument for divine Providence; but it is equally true, that there are many material objects in nature, which, were they considered by themselves, might not afford a sufficient, or at least a striking, evidence of divine creation. When the theist wishes to establish the latter doctrine, he selects, not a stone or a solitary piece of clay, but some organized body, as a specimen of God's works; and, in like manner, in establishing the doctrine of a Providence, we are at liberty to consider events in their combination and succession, and to select

have been the objects of a watchfulness which has never slumbered, and of a kindness which has never been weary in doing us good. Were we to attempt an enumeration of all the blessings which we have received at God's hands; of all the deliverances which he hath wrought out for us; of all the snares from which he has preserved us; and of all the manifestations of his longsuffering patience and tender mercy, which have occurred in our own experience; were we to begin with the years of infancy and feebleness, and to trace our progress through the slippery paths of youth, till we reached our present state, we should soon find how impossible it is to reckon up the sum of our obligations to "the loving

such combinations as most signally display the to- | kens of God's design. These are prerogative instances, in both cases. Not that God's creation, or God's providence, is less real in the plainer forms of matter, or the more trivial events of life, but that they are less strikingly exemplified; and hence the origin of those views which have often been presented to the world, and as often excepted against, respecting particular and special providences, which, if they be meant to convey the idea of anything miraculous, are unquestionably liable to just exception; but, if they be honestly meant, merely as striking examples of a Providence which is at once,universal and minute, are no more to be objected to than is the common practice of selecting a striking specimen of de-kindness of the Lord." sign in illustrating the proof of a creation, or of But it is not by a view of our mercies and primaking a striking experiment in illustrating any vileges, considered separately by themselves, but of the laws of nature; and, for this reason, the by a view of the whole course of our lives, conPsalmist selects, in the present case, several illus-sidered with reference to God's declared end and trative specimens, and founds on these the doctrine of God's overruling providence.

design in it, that we shall be most thoroughly convinced of the wisdom and kindness of his providence towards us. The declared end of God in all his dispensations, is the manifestation of his own glory, and the gradual improvement and ultimate perfection of our moral nature. Keeping this end in view, and considering all his dispensations as having a bearing on its fulfilment, we shall see, in our afflictions, not less than in our mercies, ample evidence of his wisdom, and shall be enabled to know experimentally, that

love him." His is a holy love, acting wisely with a view to moral ends, and seeking to bless its objects in a way suitable to their dignity, as moral and responsible beings. To this end, affliction itself is made subservient, and the temporary

becomes, in his hands, the means of a far purer and loftier happiness, the happiness of a renewed mind, of a good conscience, and of well regulated affections. Hence, on the Christian scheme, there is no contradiction in that seeming paradox,

The general doctrine of a Providence may be established on these and similar grounds; nor can I conceive it possible to hold that an act of divine power was necessary for the creation of the world, while it is denied that the continual exercise of divine power is needful for its maintenance and support; or to believe that we could not have acquired our existence but from God, while we arrogantly imagine that we may exist without, or independently of, his will. But I ap-"all things work together for good to them that prehend that, in order to realize and appreciate God's providence, we must have recourse to the means suggested by the Psalmist, and, instead of looking only to abstract reasonings, apply ourselves to a close and considerate observance of all the methods of God's dealings with our-deprivation of mere sentient and animal enjoyment, selves; we must review all the way by which God has been leading us; and connecting his dispensations with the declared end and objects of his moral government, and with our felt necessities, we shall be able to see, each in his own case, innumerable proofs both of the wisdom and care of Him, "in whom we live, and move, and have our being." The events of every man's life, when they are thus considered, will afford abundant evidence of a Providence, and will impress that great doctrine on the heart with a power which no abstract reasonings can be expected to exercise over the generality of mankind. The man who, on reviewing the course of his life, can see no trace of God's providential hand, may as well, on considering the frame of his body, refuse to acknowledge the marks of God's creating hand; and he, on the other hand, who is most minutely attentive to the facts of his own personal experience, will be the most thoroughly penetrated with the conviction, that there is a Providence that upholds all, and overrules all.

It is in the details of each man's private history, that we find the most touching manifestations of God's providential care: and, on considering these, none of us can refuse to acknowledge, that we

"blessed are they that mourn," for, "by the sadness of their countenances," God seeks to make their "hearts better," and then they are blessed indeed. It is on this principle of enlarged and comprehensive benevolence, that God, the Father of his people, acts, and the very restraints which he imposes on them, and the chastisements with which he visits them, when these are viewed in connection with his design and end in them all, are pledges and tokens of that loving-kindness which, in him, is not an isolated principle, but an attribute which, however supreme and infinite, is co-ordinate and co-active with perfect holiness, justice, and truth

Fully to realize these views, however, we must look back on all the way by which he has been leading us; for the events of each man's life, like the more public events of history, can seldom be impartially considered at the time of their occur rence; they occasion such an agitation of mind, and call into play so many feelings and passions,

that we are too apt to take a partial view of them, especially while as yet the ends for which these dispensations were sent, are unknown. or, at least, have not been realized in our experience. It is after the stunning shock has passed away,-after the tempest of natural feeling has subsided, and after we have begun to taste the fruits of a mature experience, that we are able, on a calm, though, it may be, a pensive review, to see all the parts of this chequered drama in combination, and to mark the wisdom and kindness which adjusted them all, in relation to some great and important end. Such a review of all the way by which the Lord hath led us, will be best taken from heaven.

SKETCH OF THE

and that we have the strongest testimony of the respect and attachment which the Irish clergy, as well as laity, entertained for him at a later period, we are inleft his native land, about the thirtieth year of his age, clined to coincide with those who state, that, when he his object was to increase his stores of knowledge, and to gather from continental society that improvement which would fit him for the service to which he had devoted all his energies.

How long Columba remained abroad is also matter of uncertainty; but the scanty evidence which we meses, proves the ample opportunities of improvement which, during his absence, were afforded him, and his own after career offers indubitable testimony how much he had profited by these opportunities. His piety and general accomplishments procured him, in every quarter, a cordial welcome, gaining him the respect and esteem of the pious and the erudite, and opening up to his scrutiny the treasures which lay concealed in the seclusion of monastic establishments. And

HISTORY AND CHARACTER OF COLUMBA, while he stored his ardent mind with the learning of

THE APOSTLE OF THE HIGHLANDS.

BY THE REV. DONALD FERGUSSON.

WHILE much of fable may be blended with fact in the relation transmitted to us of the early Christians, and, more particularly, of such as had encountered difficulties and braved dangers in their zeal for the diffusion of the Gospel; yet is there always abundance of real incident interspersed, to render the narrative at once interesting and instructive.

The history of the life of Columba retires so far into the gloom of a distant and savage age, and his character has been made the subject of such conflicting testimony, that it is often difficult to distinguish truth, through the veil of prejudice on the one hand, or of partiality on the other; fortunately, however, the proofs of his devotion to the cause of Christ are so numerous and substantial, as to resist alike the encroachments of time and of envy, and he has left behind him a sweet odour of sanctity, which requires enhancement from none of the ornaments of fancy, or the glow of romance, by which too many of his biographers have. rather obscured than dignified his memory; and in giving a brief detail of his character and labours, it seems necessary to strip them of all that is improbable, and of much that is marvellous, in order that the narrative may be read with patience and with profit.

Columba was a native of Ireland, descended, as his biographers inform us, from the royal family of that kingdom, and connected also with the princes of the Dalriad Scots: He was born A. D. 521; and his parents, induced, as some say, by certain mysterious incidents connected with his birth, or as others, with greater probability, imagine, by his early disposition to plety, and the indication of uncommon talents, devoted him, from his very childhood, to the sacred profession.

His education was intrusted successively to several of the most learned and devout of the Irish ecclesiastics. under whom he discovered, when yet a youth, the embryo symptoms of his future godliness and greatness, so that he was regarded, by his instructors, less as an inferior and pupil, than as a companion and a friend, and was accustomed to receive from them the appellation of the Saint.

Of his early labours in the ministry little is known; some authors conjecture that he had engaged too deeply as a partizan in the political dissensions which at that time agitated Ireland; that he thereby incurred the deep-rooted resentment of the ecclesiastics; and was compelled, on that account, to leave his native country: but when we consider how utterly this supposition is at variance with the whole tenor of his future life,

the eastern and western Churches, his active eye caught whatever appeared to him useful in the ecclesiastical institute and discipline of the different monasteries which he visited; for upon the rules of some of the eastern Churches he is supposed to have formed the model of his own system, the efficiency of which he seems to have tested, by founding a religious establishment in Italy.

Nor was his ardour in the pursuit of knowledge more distinguished than the singleness of his heart and the warmth of his zeal. Clad in the proof armour of humble and holy devotedness to his God and Saviour, he was equally unmoved by the fascinations of luxury, as by the promptings of ambition. It is told of him, when sojourning in France, that Sigibert, the reigning monarch of that country, charmed with his wisdom and accomplishments, urged him, by all the solicitations of friendship and promises of high distinction, to settle in his kingdom, and fix his residence at his court. Columba, however, sought the friendship of a higher and mightier Potentate than he, and desired for himself no fair and fertile heritage, his object being to sojourn in that land which offered the fairest prospect of his being useful in gaining a rich harvest of ransomed souls to the glory of the Saviour's name; and, therefore, prompted by the Spirit of his Divine Master, he replied, that, so far from coveting the wealth of others, he had, for Christ's sake, renounced his own.

Having thus traversed Europe and Asia, in the pursuit of knowledge, he returned to his own land,-his mind well stored with learning, and his heart glowing with deeper devotion to his God, and a holier zeal for his cause, rich in experience, and ripe in wisdom: and having thus gained all that he could gather from the world's converse, he resolved that the treasures which he had amassed should not "be hid under a bushel,” but should be made to diffuse verdure and fertility over a sterile wilderness, so that being enriched out of the fulness that is in Christ Jesus, even the waste and solitary desert should be made "to rejoice and blossom as the rose."

The man who devotes himself to the extension of Messiah's kingdom on the earth, occupies a position not more honourable than delicate and dangerous. The Christian missionary, indeed, seems to inhabit an element of his own, he stands midway, as it were, betwixt heaven and earth, the channel of communication betwixt the Creator and the creature, receiving, with the one hand, the blessings which descend from the upper sanctuary, and, with the other, dispensing those blessings to men,-pleading, at one time, at the bar of heaven for the sinner's pardon; pleading, at another, at the bar of the sinner's conscience, for the admission of the Saviour into his heart; therefore it is peculiarly

necessary for him to make provision for his arduous enterprise, with all the caution and the forethought which a skilful and sagacious mariner employs, when about to trust his bark to a boisterous ocean; as he prepares his vessel for braving the ocean's buffetings, examines all her parts, and stores her with every necessary to meet the contingencies of the voyage,-so must the Christian champion arm himself against the buffetings of sin, store his mind with knowledge, and his heart with faith, devoting himself, body, and mind, and spirit, to the sacred work.

And thus had Columba prepared for his labours; his mind and body were both in their prime; his naturally superior mental endowments had been expanded by unwearied application; skilled in all the learning of the age, he had neglected no branch of study which he considered as likely to facilitate the progress of the great object which he had so deeply at heart; polished and conciliatory in his manners; pleasing, yet venerable, in external appearance, nature and art seemed to have combined in forming in him a fit instrument to win the admiration and sway the hearts of a rude people.

To these, however, were superadded qualifications still more requisite for an ambassador of Christ. He was characterized by a zeal in his Master's cause not more devoted than pure; by no one could it be said, with greater effect, or evidence of truth, than by Columba, "I seek not yours but you."

In early life he had resigned to his relatives the royal inheritance to which he had been born the heir, desiring no share in their wealth, except what they voluntarily contributed to the advancement of Christ's cause: But though thus humble, yet was he firm in his resolves, nether crushed by difficulties, nor dismayed by dangers; having "once put his hand to the plough," he never thought of looking baca, but committed his all into the hands of him "who is a faithful Creator," and having him as a friend, he feared no foe. He was the inflexible enemy of oppression; the stern denouncer of violence and outrage; ignorant alike of arrogance and of servility, he "gloried in nothing save in the cross of his Lord Jesus Christ;" and thus regulating his own conduct by the rules of Christian justice and integrity, he desired to induce all others to adopt the same standard.

Earth seemed to have no charm for him besides the delight of conferring benefits, for "his treasure was in heaven," and thereof was his conversation; his heart was his God's, and with him was it his delight to hold communion; he gave his hatred to nought but sin, his fear to nought but temptation,-his trust to none but his Saviour. Although the earlier part of his history is little else than a blank, yet can all this, and much more, be gathered from the events of the later period of his life, all of which justify us in regarding him as exhibiting on earth many of the graces of heaven,--much of the purity and zeal of the early apostolic fathers and panoplied thus in celestial armour, he went forth to fight the battles of the Cross in a foreign and barbarous land.

:

His own country had, at an early period, been blessed with the light of Christianity; but from afar, the black and barren shores of Scotland, shrouded in the clouds of superstition and heathenism, seemed to scowl defiance across the sea; and thither had Columba determined to proceed on his philanthropic mission.

tricts of Scotland were throughout almost equally bleak in their spiritual as in their natural scenery, when Columba landed upon its shores. Although, then, it be possible that prior to his arrival, one or two efforts had been made to remove the universal barrenness, and one or two scattered hamlets of that vast wilderness had been refreshed with the soft dew of the Gospel, yet the efforts must have been few and feeble, and the effects limited, so that to Columba remained the task of giving life, and form, and union, to previous operations. There might previously have existed a few shoots from a Christian root, but they were stricken and stunted, rudely shaken by the tempests or nipped by the chilly atmosphere of heathenism. He not only trained and fostered the produce of the past, but persisted in planting more extensively, until in place of one or two solitary shrubs, there sprung up over the wide extent of the nation a mighty forest of " plants of renown."

In the year 563, in the 42d year of his age, Columba is supposed to have set out upon that missionary enterprise, whose successful termination has obtained for him the title of the "Apostle of the Highlands." ·

He sailed from Ireland in a small currach, or wicker boat, covered with hides, accompanied by twelve chosen associates, and landed in the Island of Hi or Iona, lying on the west of Mull, about midway between the territories of the Picts and the Caledonians, and which has, since that period, been more commonly known by the title of Icolmkill, or the island of Columkille, the celtic designation of Columba.

It is not ascertained in what manner, or from whom, Columba obtained possession of this island as a settlement some consider the grant to have been made by the princes of Pictland, others by the princes of the Dalriad Scots; the latter supposition appears the more probable from the fact, that the Dalriad Scots were supposed to be, at that time, better inclined to the Christian faith than their Pictish neighbours, conjoined with the certainty that the pious stranger was himself allied to the Scottish monarchs. Others again suppose that Iona had, as well as Arran, been a seat of the Druids, who had been compelled to forsake this haunt upon the intrusion of some Christians, prior to the arrival of Columba, who was afterwards induced to make choice of that Island for his residence, no less from the hereditary sanctity attached to the locality, than for the facilities which its situation afforded of communicating with his native country. The cause of its selection, and the means whereby the grant was obtained, are, however, matters of comparatively trivial importance; suffice it to know, that here Columba was permitted to fix his habitation, and that from this sequestered islet, issued forth the light of Christian knowledge upon the north of Scotland.

Thus settled in Iona, Columba, having arranged the internal economy of his religious establishment, more upon the principle of a seminary than of a monastic institution, prepared for engaging in his great design, with an energy and activity worthy of the sacred cause.

No attempt could, at first sight, appear more hopeless than the enterprise in which this holy man had embarked. His doctrines were distasteful alike to king, and priests, and people; the mass of the community were scarcely a step removed from barbarism; the rcigning prince of the Pictish territories ordered his It is a matter of doubt, among the learned, to what ex- gates to be shut against the Christian's approach, and tent Columba may be regarded as the instrument of con- the Druids used their almost unlimited influence over verting the tribes of the north and west of Scotland to the vulgar mind, not merely to counteract his efforts, the faith of the Gospel; Ninian had preached the doc but often even to the imminent peril of his life, which trines of the cross to the southern Picts; and Ciaran, the was frequently attempted, shortly after his arrival in preceptor of Columba, had also, before this time, visited Scotland. The natural character of the country too, and preached in Cantire; it is possible, that their disciples was unfavourable; wild, woody, mountainous, and inmay have endeavoured to disseminate the truth of Chris-fested by beasts of prey, it presented most imposing tianity; and the traditions regarding Palladius also may difficulties to a man who did not possess the advantages be no fable. Still, it is pretty clear, that the northern dis- of native manners or the native dialect.

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