day. God hides them in his sacred pavilion from the provoking of all men, and from the strife of tongues.

Meekness is the rest and serenity of the soul; and it may be affirmed, however we account for it, that whenever the mind is free from disturbances and excitements from without, when it subsides into itself, and into the stillness of calm thought, it is happy. The wicked cannot think; they cannot descend from the surface into the deep waters of the soul; because it is there that conscience dwells.

In the silence of the inward man, the still small voice of God's Vicegerent can be distinctly heard, and therefore the guilty fly from their own interior, and seek a refuge from themselves in that animal nature which the union with the body throws around them. But where the intentions are sincere, where the conscience speaks an approving sentence, where the soul reposes in the blood of Jesus, and, justified by faith, is at peace with God; there the stillness of the mind, and the pure and unimpeded exercise of thought, is a pleasure so satisfying and so refined that it seems at times like some balmy breeze from heaven, or like the breath of God himself. These are the days in God's Courts, one of which, the Psalmist says, is better than a thousand. These are the hours when the heirs of immortality remember God upon their beds. These are the seasons when the pure in heart see God, and when the man of prayer holds converse with his Father who seeth in secret, and soars upon the wings of confidence and love into the regions of light, and into the realms of glory.

But it is not merely from the natural operation of meekness that these blessings are derived. The meek are, in a peculiar manner, the care of heaven, as abundant Scriptures testify. They are led into the paths of wisdom and of truth, by the hand of God himself. "Them that are meek," says the Psalmist, "shall he guide in judgment, and such as are gentle, them shall he learn his way.' "For God resists the proud," saith St. James, "and giveth grace unto the humble." The meek are invited to cast all their temporal cares upon God, "For in the times of dearth they shall have enough: the meek shall eat and be satisfied." "The Lord lifteth up the meek, while he casteth the wicked down to the ground." "The Lord taketh pleasure in his people: he will beautify the meek with salvation." "The meek, also, shall encrease their joy in the Lord, and the poor among men shall rejoice in the Holy One of Israel." "The meek spirited shall possess the earth, and shall be refreshed in the multitude of peace." "For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy, I dwell in the high and holy place; with him, also, that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones." These passages need no comment they all concentrate in one point of clear and lumi

nous proof, that humility is that favoured soil on which the richest dews of heaven descend; that "blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth."

But this promise has, doubtless, a further bearing. That meekness which flows from faith in Christ claims an inheritance in the new heavens and the new earth. All that the meek can taste of here is but an earnest of their future joys. Their pleasures here are mingled and disturbed; many are the troubles of the righteous: the feeling heart and gentle spirit often mourn for that peace which no efforts can conciliate, and breathe their sighs to heaven in solitary places. But the mind which seeks for peace on earth shall find it without alloy in heaven. The soul which catches every partial gleam and passing gale of spiritual happiness here below, shall rise to pure felicity in freer air and under cloudless skies. Its heaven is begun on earth, and it contains within it that imperishable principle, which, by its own native tendency shall ascend to the light and glory of the presence of God. That

Land of pure delight

Where saints immortal reign;

Where infinite day excludes the night,

And pleasures banish pain.

Into those regions the meek shall, through the blood of that spotless Lamb who was meek and lowly in heart, infallibly find a passage. When the reign of discord and turbulence is over, the gates of heaven will open; its everlasting doors will be lifted up, and those who have been conformed in life to the humility of the Son of God, shall enter in. There they shall rest from all their troubles by fountains of still water, and repose upon green pastures, beneath those trees which lift their branches in the paradise of God. Or sometimes, (tasting of these varieties in which Scripture paints the happiness above,) they will leave these pastoral scenes of bliss, and enter into the glories of the New Jerusalem. There it will delight them to tell its towers, and mark well its bulwarks, and to gaze upon its glittering pinnacles and spires, gilded by the uncreated light of God: to visit there the abodes of angels, and the habitations of just men made perfect: to enter into those tribunals of solemn justice, whose sanctions are resistless power, and whose decrees are everlasting righteousness; or to worship in that temple not made with bands; for in the heavenly Jerusalem the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it. These are the mansions in which those that humble themselves shall be exalted: these are the celestial habitations in the new heavens and the new earth, which God has prepared for the meek.

But will it by some be thought presumptuous that any should feel an assured and joyful hope that this high inheritance is theirs? It would, indeed, be presumptuous, daring, insolent and vain, if the child of corruption and of dust claimed it as the

reward of his own merits, or in his own strength assayed to scale the steep ascent to heaven. But meekness has no deservings of its own to plead. It is its nature and property, to know that man is, of himself, utterly reprobate and vile; that to him belongs only shame and confusion of face; that were he to meet the awful purity of God's justice, his only hope, though vain it were, would be, that the mountains should fall on him, and that the hills should cover him. But is it presumptuous to trust, not in ourselves, but in the living God? Is it arrogant to give obedient and implicit credence to what the mouth of the Lord hath spoken? If the Almighty has sent down his mes sage of glad tidings, is it pride or vanity in his servants to hear? Is it, in a word, the high-minded who feel convinced of sinwho bring themselves in guilty before God-who fly for refuge to the atonement offered upon the cross-whose only ground of hope is in Him who came to seek and to save that which was lost, and to die, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God? No, my brethren; the foundation of the sinner's hope is laid, not in his pride, but in his humility and meekness. But beside all this, on what principle can even the man of the world feel jealous of those who meekly and patiently look for happiness in heaven? Surely, according to the general estimate of the world, if in this life only the meek had hope, they were of all men most miserable. The meek are not their competitors for the high things of life; they rival no man's claims for them; they covet no man's possessions; they desire to give to all their dues, and to owe no man any thing, but to love one another. And shall these be thought aspiring if they seek invisible treasures, of which they would wish all to be partakers? Whom do they interfere with, or defraud, if they expect a share in blessings, free to others as the light of heaven, and boundless as eternity? What selfish or exclusive interests do they pursue when their prayer is, that all should repent themselves and turn to God, and that heaven may spread wide her tents, and enlarge her curtains to the utmost boundaries of space, and throw open all her gates to receive multitudes countless as the stars, and as the sand upon the sea shore innumerable?

H. W.

THEOLOGICAL EDUCATION IN GERMANY.

In presenting to the readers of the CHRISTIAN Examiner a contraction of a series of Papers on Theological Education in Germany, which appeared three years ago in a very ably conducted and orthodox American periodical entitled the "Biblical Repository," edited by Professor Robinson of Andover College; we hope we may not be considered as departing too much from our character for originality. We are not aware that American religious publications have, as yet, an extended circulation in Ireland, and therefore consider it as highly probable that these papers have not been seen by many of our subscribers. They are written by Professor Robinson himself, after a personal inspection of the state of Germany; and we are glad to catch at an opportunity of giving additional circulation to information conveyed through such able and trustworthy hands :

"The history of Germany for several centuries is an object of intense interest to the theologian, as well as to the politician. That assemblage of nations comprised under the general name of Germany, has long been what it still is, a people of comparatively little practical energy, but of vast intellectual exertion. Broken up into a multitude of larger or of petty states, without a capital to serve as a centre of laws or of religious effort, and living under governments essentially despotic, their moral and mental energies have had no outlet in the ordinary channels of civil life and practical utility which exist under free governments, and have therefore been able to display themselves only in the walks of literature and theoretical science. But in all that regards intellectual labour and intellectual excitement, and in all that serves as sustenance to these, the Germans fall at least behind no other people; in many things they have been far in advance of all other nations. The art of printing, with all its mighty results, owes its birth to Germany. Here, too, was engendered that spark, which kindled and spread with the rapidity of lightning over Northern Europe, and produced at length the clear and steady light of the Reformation-the great principle of liberty of thought, suggested to the mind of the Monk of Wittemberg, and by him spread out before the world-and in England coupled with the great kindred principle of liberty of action-that has lain at the foundation of all the mighty movements of succeeding centuries. If it were right to refer to a single individual that which was but the expression of the spirit of an age, we might thus ascribe to Luther not only the Reformation in Germany and England, but also regard his exertions as the germ from which have sprung all the great political events that have since astonished and convulsed the world; the revolutions of England and of France; and with happier results, the foundation of a new empire in a new hemisphere; with the revolution by which this last threw off the

pressure of a foreign yoke, and founded, on a basis unknown in history, institutions of freedom which will bear the test of experience, so long as virtue and intelligence shall be the characteristics of the people; but which, it requires not the power of prophetic vision to foresee, will be surely swept away, whenever ignorance and irreligion shall become predominant in the land.

"The light of the Reformation has not yet departed from Germany; although its glory has been obscured in these latter days, by urging to an extreme the fundamental principles on which it proceeded. The Reformers, with all their zeal for liberty of thinking and freedom of investigation, never had a thought of subjecting the form and matter of revelation to the decisions of human reason. With them the Bible was THE ONLY AND SUFFICIENT RULE OF FAITH AND PRACTICE. Their reason acknowledged its authority as paramount to all other, and yielded with reverent submission to the guidance of its holy precepts, In modern times, men whose hearts have been opposed to the truths of revelation, have carried their freedom of investigation to the extreme of calling in question and denying, not only the fact of an actual revelation, but also the possibility of one at any time and in any circumstances. The reason of man has been proclaimed the source and the interpreter of all religion; the Scriptures declared to be the production of merely human wisdom; and all systems of faith and practice deduced from their pages denounced as the imposition of a crafty priesthood upon the ignorant and credulous. All this, however, is nothing more than had already taken place, and with still greater virulence, in other nations; especially in England and France. The difference is, that in the latter countries these enemies of revelation were not enrolled under the banners of the church; they attacked her as open adversaries; while in Germany the poison has spread through the body of the church. itself; and those who have solemnly bound themselves to make the Bible their only rule of faith and practice, have been among the first to discard its authority and contest its doctrines. The rationalism of Germany is the deism of England. The latter was professed by a few; the former has spread among the many; and its advocates, by pressing their consistency to its ultimate results, have already produced a reaction, which promises, by the blessing of God, in time to bring back the German churches to the faith and practice of the Gospel, as exhibited in the principles of the Reformation.

"In Germany a love of antiquity predominates in external things, although discarded in regard to intellectual matters; and centuries seem there to be less remote from one another than we have here been accustomed to conceive them. The period of the Reformation seems hardly separated from the present time. The names of Luther and Melancthon are as familiar in the mouths of the people, as with us those of Washington and