PAST AND PRESENT.

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EFORE man's fall, he enjoyed continual seasons of intimate communion with God. And although that communion may well be supposed to have been characterised by all due and becoming reverence towards the Great Creator, it doubtless partook of an element of familiarity and natural alacrity of approach which has never been experienced since the birth of sin. There would be a want of constraint in the approaches of our first parents, while pure and untainted by the evil element, which would render their intercourse with their Maker, who had stamped His likeness upon them, unaffected and congenial. The only difference or discrepancy, between themselves and God, was in the degree and not in the perfection of their attributes, so that there would be, so to speak, a loving reciprocity of soul between them and the Creator. Love would be the one motive principle of all they did; and they would feed this principle by constant intercourse with the source and spring of all true, vital love. God never had to seek them out amidst the mazes and the bowers of Eden, but the first distant footfall was enough, and man and God stood side by side, before the Almighty voice was raised to cry, "where art thou?" But how sadly changed the aspect of the scene, after the serpent's guileful hiss has whispered thoughts of sin and rebellion! Where is the glad and bounding eagerness with which the creatures, so lately from the hand of God, go forth to meet Him as He walks at eventide amidst the hoary olives and the fragrant myrtle bowers. The setting sun of yesterday beheld the sinless Adam walking with God amidst the flowers and shrubs, and Eve, the youngest and the fairest of the Great Creator's works, skipping with extasy to meet Him as He comes. But how strangely altered is the scene to-day! The sun is painting with its mellowing light the western sky,

and kissing with a liquid glory the foreheads of the distant hills. The dews are gently falling upon the closing blossoms, and a sparkling drop clings like a tear of joy and of content within the bell of many a modest flower. The shadows of the cedars and the palms are lengthening, bright birds with gleaming plumage sit roosting on the boughs, and nothing can be heard but the Eolian sighing of the zephyr, as it softly breathes among the leaves and branches. No, not even the murmured whispers of the first lovers, as they talk of happiness and God, can greet the ear or violate the silence; for they do not take their wonted walk along Euphrates' banks to-night; they do not stoop to pluck the budding orange blossom, or the red arbutus berry; they hide themselves behind some dark and clustering groves, where not even this evening sunlight can anoint them with its smile; their hands are tightly locked together, but neither turns to speak; the man averts his pale and saddened face, and the woman bends her fringing lashes towards the ground. Motionless and mute they stand, and listen anxiously for some expected sound. At length a footstep of some one walking in the garden in the cool of the day is heard, and soon the question echoes forth, "Adam, where art thou?" The guilty pair cling to each other in affright. No bounding forth to meet the approaching visitor no glad response to the inquiring voice--but blushing and abashed they creep from their lurking place, and naked and ashamed they cower beneath the scrutiny of God. The interchanging tide of union between man and God is chilled; the image of Himself, which He imprinted, is marred and desecrated with a serpent's oily trail; fear, the abject fear of slaves, the fear which hath torment, has taken up the place of willing and obedient love, and sin has separated between man and God. Seeing, then, that between Himself and His creatures there was a great gulph fixed; seeing that there was nothing left in man to induce a natural approach towards Himself—that the inherent bonds of affinity had been warped and broken; seeing from the nature of the case that there could no longer be any spontaneous leaning towards Himself on the part of man, the Almighty set Himself to bridge over the abyss which sin had made—to rebind the bonds which had been snapped asunder, and by a stoop of

condescension on His own part, to address overtures of love and mercy to mankind, and effect, by this divine condescension, the union which was formerly maintained and cemented by the holy ambition and aspiration of man.

And, in furtherance of His great and loving scheme of reconciling a fallen and rebellious world unto Himself, Jehovah made His communications to mankind through various media. It would have been only natural to suppose that after so flagrant a violation of God's mild commands after so foul a revolt against His righteous and beneficent sway-man should at once have been cut off from all further fellowship with his Maker, and precluded thenceforth from participation in His favour. But, so far from this, the introduction of sin was the means of evoking a climax of mercy and compassion from the Great Jehovah-for, instead of dethroning the rebel from his place in the Divine regard, it reverses the relationship between the creature and Creator; and we see God now making overtures of grace to man, instead of man making the approaches of zealous love to God. The relative positions are actually changed-guilt and pride has checked the fond upliftings of the human heart to heaven-but tenderness and pity have constrained the compassionate stoop of the Divine Heart to earth. Now that man has ceased to make the overture to God, God begins to make that overture to man. He sees the danger that there is, of the noblest vessel of His hand being wrested from Him by the Prince of the power of the air, and dashed to pieces before the Great Contriver's face; and, for His own honour's sake, as well as for the sake of the creature of His power, He interposes for his rescue.

As men increase in number, so does sin extend. The second man was a murderer, and with him the great Jehovah held, as it were, a personal interview, and prescribed with His own lips his punishment. Still the great family of man increases, and wherever he sets his foot, he blasts the fair and lovely earth with sin. God's interpositions only serve to terrify him, and to increase the mortal fear and hate in which mankind regard Him. God had implanted in His creature a free and an unbridled will, determined that if He had his service, it should be the voluntary offering of his heart. But now He looks upon

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the world which He has made and which, while Eden's fragrance floated up before Him, He pronounced "very good"-and sees each generation turning its united will against His own, and sinning against Him with an outstretched arm. The entire world is redolent of guilt, and amidst all the tens of thousands of His creatures there is not one that serves God; no, not one. Yes, just one family is faithful to His service. From just one household does the voice of prayer come wreathing up before Him. He has made millions of human beings, and of these just one remembers Him, and turns to Him! What wonder, then, that He should repent Him that He made the world, and that He should resolve to drown it in the flood? Wearied and insulted by the continuous and foul rebellion, the Great Supreme conceives and forms His mighty resolution. He determines to destroy and renovate creation. But He does not forget the family of His one solitary servant; the prayers of the house of Noah still vibrate gratefully within His ears, and gently wake the tender fibres of His heart. The mind that plans the dire destruction of the earth, devises, too, the rescue and protection of His servant; and, while the myriad rebels against Almighty rule are washed by the surging billows from the highest mountaintops-while from the throats of hoary sinners, and of youthful traitors, the dying wail is heard-while the gurgling cry of sinplagued fathers, mothers, sisters, wives, and daughters, rings throughout the air-while the boundless waste of waters is bestrewed with countless myriads of dead, and its restless ripples toy with rigid carcases of young men and maidens, old men and children, like light corks just cast upon their breast, the faithful family, who remembered from whose hand their mercies came, and whose were all their ways, sail through the waves within the harbouring ark, unhurt amidst the war of elements, and guided by the power of Almighty love. The flood subsides, and men again begin to multiply. Again the choking element of sin extends, but God has put His sovereign grace into the hearts of not a few, and amidst all the diffusive wickedness, He has His faithful servants. He sets apart one tribe on which to exercise His special love, and in whose history to illustrate His sovereign purposes; and, when from the Egyptian thraldom

Israel's wail for freedom reaches to His ear, He interposes with His power for His people's emancipation, and with a strong hand He breaks the oppressor's chain, and sets the prisoners free. But still there is this element of fear, which makes them dread to hear the direct accents of His voice. "Let not God speak with us, lest we die." This seems to be their constant cry, and the implication of their daily conduct. Still merciful and gracious, still anxious for His people's happiness, the loving mind and heart of Infinite Wisdom are engaged in devising a scheme whereby Jehovah can commune with His creatures, and they, in their turn, can familiarly make known their requests unto Himself. Seeing that it is the vast disparity between Himself and man-between His purity and man's defilement His omnipotence and man's weakness-His majesty and man's nothingness; seeing that it is this vast disparity which keeps the Creator and His creature so far asunder, the Great Jehovah appoints a medium of communication between Himself and man, which shall familiarise their intercourse together, and dispel the trembling fears which conscious sin had engendered. He knew that man would not fear to come with their complaints and petitions to a human creature like themselves, and so He appointed and inspired holy prophets to be the media of communication between Himself and His creatures. To this end He breathed His Spirit upon Moses, and spake with him as a man speaketh with his friend; for this He tuned the harp of Israel's sweet singer, to pour forth his psalms of heavenly minstrelsy; for this He strung the lyre of Isaiah to seraphic strains, and bade the voice of Jeremiah join in the refrain; for this Ezekiel spoke at His command, and Daniel's visions brightened on his page; for this the minor prophets seized the pen, and wrote down burning words upon the scroll; for this, in times past, He spoke unto our fathers by the prophets, that there might be a gracious bond of union between God and man.

But, though these prophets all saw different visions, and many of them pointed towards different events, each spoke with more or less distinctness of a glorious event that was to come. Some spoke of this so plainly that mothers prayed for their unborn children, and almost wept, to find upon their birth, that they