natural desire for the beatitude of the beloved one among the sanctified.

There is nothing further in this century of doctrinal import, nor is there anything that can in the least degree favour the assumptions of Roman controversialists till the latter part of the

fourth century; but much that is directly opposed

to Romish doctrine.

In the epitaph of a youth twenty-two years of age, of date A.D. 310, we find the beautiful euphemism for death, ACCERSITUS AB ANGELIS— "called away" (literally, sent for)" by angels." There is no doctrine of purgatory here. The Christian soul, like Lazarus, is borne of angels to Abraham's bosom, and not, like Dives, to tormenting flames, albeit called of purgatorial efficacy to cleanse the pollutions of the flesh. In an epitaph of date A.D. 329 occurs the still nobler expression,

NATVS EST LAVRENTIVS IN ETERNVM

ANN. XX. DORMIT IN PACE.

Laurentius was born eternally in the twentieth year of his age. He sleeps in peace.

The primitive Christians had no doubt of the immediate happiness of those who died in the faith. They were incapable of the blasphemous thought that the atoning blood of Christ was insufficient to wash away their guilt, and that, therefore, they were doomed to penal fires

'Till the foul crimes done in their days of nature
Were burned and purged away."

All the expressions applied to the death of the
righteous indicate the assurance of their spirits'
peace and rest and happiness. Thus, in addition
to the examples already given, we have, A.D. 338,
BENE QUIESCENTI IN PACE, "resting well in peace;"
A.D. 348, REQUIEVIT, "entered into rest;" A.D. 353,
PAUSABIT,
" will
repose;" A.D. 355, QUIESCIT, "he
rests"-not REQUIESCAT, "may he rest," as the
Romanists write, but the joyous assurance of
present repose in the peace of God; A.D. 359,
IVIT AD DEUM, "he went to God;" A.D. 363,
SEMPER QUIESCIS SECURA, "thou dost repose
ever free from care;" A.D. 369, VOCITUS (sic) IIT
IN PACE, "when called (away) he went in peace."
Sometimes these pious sentiments are expressed
more fully, as in the following example, in which
the body is represented as

"A worn-out fetter that the soul Had broken and thrown away."

for

PRESBYTER HIC SITVS EST CELERINVS NOMINE DICTVS CORPOREOS RVMPENS NEXVS QVI GAVDET IN ASTRIS. Here has been laid a presbyter, called by the name Celerinus, who, breaking the bonds of the body, rejoices in the stars-i.e., in heaven.

The Christian mourners sorrowed not as those without hope. Their loved ones were "not lost,

but gone before." In the following, faith exultingly beheld the dear departed with the white

robed multitude before the throne :—

PRIMA VIVIS IN GLORIA DEI ET

IN PACE DOMINI. NOSTR. XP.

Prima, thou livest in the glory of God, and in the peace of our Lord Christ.

LVCIVS DORMIT ET VIVIT

IN PACE XO.

Lucius sleeps and lives in the peace of Christ.

In the following the deceased is represented as comforting the mourners by the thought of the felicity of the blessed :

LEVITE CONIVX PETRONIA FORMA PVDORIS
HIS MEA DEPONENS SEDIBVS OSSA LOCO.
PARCITE VOS LACRIMIS DVLCES CVM CONIVGE NATÆ
VIVENTEMQVE DEO CREDITE FLERE NEFAS.

I, Petronia, the wife of a deacon, the type of modesty, lay down my bones in this resting-place. Refrain from tears, my sweet daughters and husband, and believe that it is forbidden to weep for one who lives in God.

The first inscription at all favourable to Romish doctrine is the following barbarous example, of date A.D. 380:

HIC QVIESCIT ANCILLA DEI OVEDE

SVA OMNIA PEPENDIT DOMVM ISTA

QUEM AMICE DEFLENS SOLACIVMQ. REQVIRVNT PRO HVNC VNVM ORA SVBOLEM QVEM SVPERIS TITEM REQVESTI ETERNA REQVIEM FELICITAS CAVSA MANEBIS. Here rests a handmaid of God, who out of all her riches possesses but this one house; whom her friends bewail and seek for consolation. O pray for this thine only child whom thou hast left behind. Thou wilt remain in the eternal repose of happiness.

This yearning cry of an orphaned heart for the prayers of a departed mother is, however, but a slight support for the stupendous system of the invocation of the saints; and this example is near the close of the fourth century, when the primitive purity of the faith had already begun to be corrupted. But even in the fifth and sixth centuries the vast proportion of the inscriptions were of a highly evangelical character, and were entirely antagonistic to the most cherished doctrines of the Church of Rome.

The Christian view of death is always, in striking contrast to the sullen resignation or blank despair of paganism, full of cheerfulness and hope. Its rugged front is veiled under softest synonyms. The grave was considered merely the temporary resting-place of the body; while the freed spirit was regarded as already rejoicing in the presence of God, in a broader day and brighter light and fairer fields than those of earth. The following examples will illustrate the pious orthodoxy of those early Christian epitaphs. In the year A.D. 383 we find the following senti

ment:

ABIIT ETHERIAM CVPIENS CELI CONSCENDERE LVCEM.

She departed, desiring to ascend to the ethereal light of heaven.

In A.D. 393 we read:

LIMINIA MORTIS ADIET

EVIVCHIVS, SAPIENS, PIVS, BENIGNVS

IN CHRISTUM CREDENS PREMIA LVCIS ABET (sic). Eutuchius, wise, pious, and kind, believing in Christ entered the portals of death, and has the rewards of the light (of heaven).

Of the same year is the following:

DVLCIS ET INNOCES (sic) HIC DORMIT SEVERIANVS IN
SOMNO PACIS

CVIVS SPIRITVS IN LVCE DOMINI SVSCEPTVS EST.
Here sleeps in the sleep of peace the sweet and innocent
Severianus, whose spirit is received into the light of God.

In an epitaph of date A.D. 399 occurs the senti

ment

NEC REOR HVNC LACRIMIS FAS SIT DEFLERE
CORPORIS EXVTVS VINCLIS QVI GAVDET IN ASTRIS
NEC MALA TERRENI SENSIT CONTAGIA SENSVS.

Nor do I think it right to lament with tears him who,

freed from the fetters of the body, rejoices among the stars, nor feels the evil contagion of earthly sense.

Of somewhat similar import is the following:

HIC REQVIESCIT......QVE A DEO INTER EXORDIA VIVENDI DE HAC LVCE SVBLATA EST VT IN MELIORE LVMINE VIVERE MERERETUR.

Here rests......who was snatched away by God in the very beginning of life from the light (of earth), that she might be worthy to live in the more glorious light (of heaven).

We find also such expressions as the following: A.D. 500, SEMPER FIDES MAISIBET (mansebit) APUD DEUM, ever faithful he shall remain with God;" LOTICUS HIC AD DORMIENDUM, "Loticus laid here to sleep;" QUIESCIT IN DOMINO JESU, "he reposes in the Lord Jesus;" IVIT AD DEUM, "he went to God;" CORPUS HABET TELLUS ANIMAM CÆLESTIA REGNA, "the earth possesses the body, but celestial realms the soul;" MENS NESCIA MORTIS VIVIT ET ASPECTU FRUITUR BENE CONSCIA CHRISTI, "the soul lives unknowing of death, and consciously rejoices in the vision of Christ;" SALONICE ISPIRITUS TUIS IN BONIS, "Salonica, thy spirit is in bliss." A martyr's triumph over death is expressed in the lines: "Paulus was put to death in tortures in order that he might live in eternal peace." In the following we read the language of a mother's affection struggling with her tears:—

MACVS PVER INNOCENS

ESSE IAM INTER INNOCENTIS COEPISTI
QVAM STAVILIS EST TVI HÆC VITA EST...
COMPREMATVR PECTORVM GEMITVS
STRVATVR FLETVS OCVLORVM.

Macus, innocent boy, thou hast already begun to be among the innocent. Unto thee how sure is thy present life......Hushed be this bosom's groaning! Dried be theseweeping eyes!

OTHING serves to reveal a man's character more clearly than his admiration does. Whenever we discover what it is that a man admires, and what are his reasons for admiring it, we have got most of the information needed to complete a diagnosis of his moral and mental characteristics.

Every one of us admires; and in doing so we yield to a natural and powerful impulse. This impulse has, doubtless, been implanted in us for the wisest purpose;

but, like everything else which goes to make up the complex unity called man, this universal tendency to admire may be abused as well as wisely yielded to; and, according to our use or abuse of it, will it help to elevate or to degrade our characters.

Admiration must not be regarded as being merely the gratification of a taste. The most important moral principles are involved in every exercise of it. Whenever we admire a quality in another, our admiration goes to intensify, in its possessor, the quality admired.

Besides this, our admiration of any quality helps, in some degree, to form a sort of public feeling in its favour; and in this way each of us exercises his own influence in educating, happily or unhappily, the popular judgment. But however much, or little, our admiration may influence others, it never fails to affect our own characters most seriously. Our moral natures appropriate and assimilate the quality which we admire in others; and, though we may be unconscious of it, the admiration serves to make us like the person whom we admire. In this way, there are few means of moral education which are so potent as admiration; and the judicious Christian parent will take care to keep the minds of his youthful charge well supplied with proper objects.

We need never be in want of objects to admire. God is the One Great Object of our highest worship; and his works are to be sought out that we may delightedly admire them, and worship him through our devout admiration of them. And God's Word is quite as full of marvels as God's world is. If the geologist has not yet exhausted the wonders of the earth, nor the astronomer the wonders of the sky, as little has Christian research discovered all the priceless secrets of the Bible. And God is also to be traced and admired in his adorable providence. The life of each of us is full of its wonders; and, next to the blessed Bible, the book which may be most profitably conned by the thoughtful Christian is the record of the Lord's dealings with his individual self, as he will find it written on the tablets of his own memory. And, besides all these, there are the wonders of grace, the workings of the divine Spirit in the lives of Christian men. Every holy thought, every loving act, every consecrated life is the fruit of his gracious operation. To the anointed eye, the world everywhere and Christian life in all its phases are full of God; and if he be a God that seems to hide himself, it is to excite our search that we may discover and admire his works; and if our search be honest, however imperfect, it cannot fail to be rewarded.

There are a few who formally, and in so many words, refuse to admire anyone. They profess to think that such admiration is a sort of idolatry of the creature. But for all their grand professions, these apparent exceptions to the rule turn out, when looked at, to be no exceptions at all. They do quite as much in the way of admiration as their neighbours; only, in their case, admiration, like charity in the proverb, always begins at home; while, unlike genuine charity, it always ends at home as well. It is from mere pride and envy that they are so morbidly afraid of the sin of a moderate admiration. Humble love is never afflicted by any of these green-eyed fancies. Of course, it is quite possible that a man, admiring the human instrument, may, like the Jews in the days of our Lord, make an idol of it, while He to whom all the glory is due may be overlooked, This is bad; but is it any better when self-conceit, craving for an idol, cannot travel so far from home to find

one, as to go even to John the Baptist? However, these scrupulous tithers of the mint and anise generally relax their favourite rule, when it threatens to hinder any one from offering to themselves a few grains of the idolatrous incense.

Pride cannot stoop to admire others; it prefers to criticise. How can it admire, when to do so implies generally some inferiority in the admirer? In its right place, the admiration of a good thing is the dutiful homage which a good man pays to a goodness confessedly superior to his own. But how can pride prefer this lowly place? Not a few, though they lack the candour, seem to be of the opinion of old Kiskanah, a North American Indian, who said, "It is very strange that I never meet with any man so sensible as myself." This remark is paralleled by a similar one from the opposite pole of social life. The late Margaret Fuller Ossoli once said: "I know all the people worth knowing in America, and I find no intellect comparable to my own." Whatever might be the profundity of Kiskanah's judgment, or the grandeur of Signora Ossoli's intellect, many would decline the possession of them if it entailed the compensating drawback of the accompanying selfconceit.

Admiration, to be truly useful, needs to be both controlled and educated. To receive the full benefit of it, and to exercise all its influence judiciously, we need to be taught both what to admire, and how to do it. Our admiration, at first, is always immature and injudicious. Those of us who have advanced any length through life, can, on looking back over past progress, see that we have passed through stages of admiration, corresponding to our own stages of mental and moral development. When we were children we could do no other than admire as children; but happy are they who, in regard to the highest objects, have reached a stage where as men they have put away childish things.

Pascal, in his "Thoughts," speaks of three different kinds of glory, each of which has its own circle of devout admirers. There is, first, the outward and visible splendour of this world's glory, the pomp of courts, "the buckram and prunello" which play so prominent a part on the stage of life. There are many who admire glitter of this sort; but their admiration shows them to be in moral and intellectual childhood. Infinitely above this, as Pascal states it, lies the realm of intellectual grandeur, the glories of which are utterly invisible to the thoughtless crowd who admire the tinsel of the other. Infinitely above this second region, again, lies a third world, the realm of divine love; which is as completely hidden from the keen eye of intellect as it is from the. idle gaze of sense. Only the pure in heart can behold its glories, for they alone can see God. This is the kingdoin of holiness, in which Christ is King; the splendours of which are as much superior to the highest triumphs of intellect, as these are superior to the glitter and parade which are the delight of the foolish. Let the Christian seek to educate himself into an increasing

capacity for enjoying the beauties of this loftiest region; | and when he is able to find his sweetest pleasures here, he shall have little admiration to waste on things that cannot be admired, without lowering in some degree the character of the admirer.

An incident in the life of Telford sets before us an illustration of two kinds of admiration, the childish and the more judicious; though neither of the two has respect to the highest objects. When Telford undertook to hang his suspension bridge across the Menai Strait, he made one of the most daring attempts which the bloodless heroism of peace had ever proposed. So soon as the first chain had been extended from land to land, a foolhardy cobbler in the neighbourhood crawled along the links to the centre. Perching himself uncomfortably there, at a considerable height over the ocean, he sat on his dangerous seat until he had sewed a pair of shoes; which done, he crawled back along the chain to terra firma. Here was courage too, though of the crudest kind—courage rather in the unsmelted ore than in the metal; and, of course, many of those who witnessed the rash and useless feat applauded it immensely, for they could appreciate heroism like this, infinitely better than they could appreciate that of Telford. The judicious, however, preferred to admire the engineer, and to condemn the cobbler.

In the exercise of admiration, we must not allow ourselves to be carried away by the multitude. There is a danger of this. A somewhat severe censor of human weaknesses says: "Such a goose is man, and cackles over plush-velvet grand monarques, and woollen galleyslaves; over everything and over nothing;--and will cackle with his whole soul merely if others cackle." Neither should we be carried away by our own feelings, for they will equally mislead us. As little may we allow ourselves to be made the dupes of our own imagination-a very common case, indeed, in the choice of objects to admire. It is because they follow imagination that not a few think so enthusiastically of the distant, while they despise the near. They see the blemishes of the object at hand, but fancy has room for free play when it decorates the distant unknown with every conceivable excellence. Omne ignotum pro magnifico sumitur. All that would be needed to disenchant the idolater, in this case, would be an introduction to his idol. "Tis distance lends enchantment to the view" might serve for a motto to a good many things.

It is because of this undue activity of imagination in the ignorant, and because this activity of imagination is necessarily left without control, from their lack of a well-cultivated judgment, that, in this class, the faculty of wonder invariably exaggerates the wonderful quality possessed by any object of their admiration. Forming, in this way, an increased estimate of the object admired, they go on to offer it a still more admiring homageto wonder more, to exaggerate more, and to admire more, till the furthest limits in this direction are reached, and the poor heart becomes bankrupt. There is a cave

in India which for long enjoyed the reputation of being interminable. Tradition told of an adventurous Rajah, who had set out to explore its unknown depths, and who took with him one hundred thousand torch-bearers and one hundred thousand measures of oil; but he and his company were lost for ever in the immense chasm. Now the cavern has been lately explored, and has been found to be smaller than one of our ordinary city churches! Perhaps it is to the working of this principle in rude and ignorant ages that we owe in part the origin of polytheism. The popular hero, first immensely admired, and then as a consequence, having his admirable qualities greatly exaggerated, passed through succeeding stages of admiration and exaggeration, till he who at first was the people's hero ended by being made the people's god. By all means let us admire; but let our judgments be enlightened, and in strictest accordance with truth.

We read in the earlier chapters of Genesis that the strong rude men before the Flood admired the gigantic. The men of renown in that age were all mighty men, men of violence, giants. And neither the giants nor their admirers have yet become quite extinct. The world has still a weakness for giants; and if a man will only be gigantic, though it should be in folly or in wickedness, the world, or at least a large section of it, will put him in her calendar of saints. She despises the small, or the common-place; but she will permit a man to be as bad as he pleases, or even to be as good as he pleases, if he will only be either on a scale which is vast enough to overpower her imagination. The life of the blessed Saviour, the meekest and lowliest of men, is a constant rebuke to the world for its idolatry of the striking; and so too should the lives of his disciples be.

In according approbation, the judgment of God and that of fallen sinful man never happen to coincide. How could such harmony be expected, when the one dwelleth in the light, and the other loves the darkness rather than the light? That which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God. On the same brow on which man sets the seal of his highest approval, God never sets his; nay, he not unfrequently places on it the brandmark of his extreme displeasure. In his inmost heart, man always prefers some Barabbas to Jesus; for, to the fleshly eye, the latter has no beauty of any kind wherefore he should be desired. Set before him a Jacob and an Esau, and he will be almost sure to think the latter the lovelier character of the two. It is remarkable that the Phoenician of Greek literature, so greatly admired, and, in several respects, apparently so admirable, is the very same people of whom the Bible speaks under the name of Canaanites,-that loathed and loathsome race whose enormities were such that their polluted land spued out her filthy inhabitants.

From this extreme divergency of judgment between the holy God and sinful men, as to what is worthy of approval, there continually arises a source of much difficulty, and an occasion of much temptation, to the ear

nest Christian; while, at the same time, it is of the utmost importance that, in this as well as in other spheres of duty, the servant of Christ be faithful to his Lord. Since admiration tends to intensify those characteristics which are admired, in the person who possesses them, making him either the better or the worse for the admiration bestowed on him; since it always influences the popular judgment and feeling in favour of the qualities admired; since it invariably affects the moral and spiritual character of the person who admires-it is of unspeakable importance that, in according this admiration, the Christian never cease to feel that he is Christ's witness, Christ's servant, and in some respects Christ's representative. If he be placed in the circumstances of an ordinary Christian, it is probable that in no sphere of life which lies open to him, is his influence for good or evil likely to be so powerful, as in this of giving or withholding his admiration. If silence sanctions, much more does express approval. To most of us, this may be the chief talent with which we have been intrusted, in order that we might trade with it; but which we may also bury in the earth, or, worse still, may so grievously misuse as actually, by means of it, to comfort the sinner and help the wicked. Admiration, properly looked at, is a lower exercise of precisely the same faculty which, in its highest exercise, becomes worship; and just as a consistent Protestant, in a Romanist country, would not uncover his head before the Host in the streets, even though all around him be kneeling in worship, so neither may the devout Christian admire, though the world around him be worshipping its idol, and be clamouring angrily on him to join it in the homage; unless, indeed, he can offer his admiration in his capacity of a hearty Christian.

Of course there are many things even in this evil world which, as Christians, we may approvingly recognise; nay, which we may not refuse to honour. Not to speak of moral virtues of every kind-the "whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report"-all of which the Christian will instinctively approve of, there are also those social distinctions which God has been pleased to institute. All these we ought cheerfully to recognise and honour; but those distinctions which are merely worldly and conventional, we may recognise only in so far as we can serve our Lord by our recognition of them. The relationship between parent and child, between the master and his servant, the ruler and his subject, the wise and the ignorant, the aged and the young-these are all divinely appointed; and the inferior honours God when, in a proper spirit, he honours the superior whom God has set over his head. But where, for instance, are we ever charged to give any honour, of any kind or degree, to mere wealth, whether of gold or lands, and this quite independently of the use to which the riches may be put? Where has it been appointed to us to reverence the man who, trusted with gifts of intellect, profanes them to the most mournful uses? If the rich man be a father, by all means let his children honour him; if he be a master, let his servants honour him; if he be a magistrate, let his office be honoured in the honour paid to its occupant; if he be learned, let him be honoured for his learning; if good, for his goodness; but on no account let him receive admiration or reverence because of his mere possession of wealth. The rule is, "Honour all men ;" and the rich man is always entitled to his share of the respect which is to be given to every human being; but let no additional reverence be shown to him simply because he happens to be the unfaithful steward over so many bags of money. John Baptist did not so accord his admiration, nor did Paul, nor did Christ. It is not meant to insinuate by these remarks that a lively Christian will be in any danger whatever of giving honour to mere wealth by itself, say, in the hands of a wealthy scoundrel; but it is more than insinuated that many worthy Christians are in danger of unconsciously accord

If the early saints, in the fervour of their first love, were a little too vehement in the eagerness with which they turned aside from an evil world-a world between which and themselves they felt that God's own hand had planted the impassable barrier of that primeval enmity which for centuries had lain between the two seeds of Genesis iii.—we, on our part, are little tempted to make the same mistake. Our peculiar danger lies in the opposite direction. We fail to declare with sufficient clearness that our sympathies, our expectations, our interests, our admirations, are all necessarily different from those of a world lying hitherto in wickedness.

they measure out the various degrees of respect which fall to be bestowed on honoured brethren. The same good man will not always receive the same regard because of his moral and spiritual worth alone, which he would have received, if, in addition to the moral and spiritual worth, he had also possessed half a million of money.

In so speaking, we do not mean to affirm that the consideration of a man's earthly riches can have no place whatever in helping us to form a proper estimate of the honour which we ought to accord to him. For several reasons it certainly ought to be considered; and perhaps chiefly for this, that the employment to which a man puts his wealth will affect most materially our view