The Mediterranean sea.

Interesting associations.

it was selected. Egypt and the other regions of Africa on the south, are balanced by Syria and the Caucasian countries on the north. There were the Persian and Assyrian empires on the east, and there were the Grecian and Roman empires on the west. India and China, with their immense multitudes, are upon one side, and modern France, and England, and Germany, with their vast political power, upon the other. Then look upon the Mediterranean sea,on the borders of which Canaan lies,bathing as it does the shores of three quarters of the globe, and bearing upon its bosom almost every ship that sailed for the first five thousand years of the earth's history. Palestine is a most remarkable spot for such a purpose. If no such communication had ever been made from heaven, and the earth had remained in darkness and paganism to the present day, its history having remained, in other respects, the same as it has been; and we had looked over it to find the best station for an embassy from above, Judea would have been the very spot. We should have pointed to the Levant, and said, here is the moral centre of the world. If a missionary from heaven is to be sent, let him be stationed here.

It is astonishing how much of the interesting history of the human race has had for its scene the shores of the Mediterranean. Egypt is there. There is Greece. Xerxes, Darius, Solomon, Cæsar, Hannibal, knew no extended sea but the Mediterranean. The mighty armies of Persia, and the smaller, but invincible bands of the Grecians, passed its tributaries. Pompey fled across it-the fleets of Rome and Carthage sustained their deadly struggles upon its waters; and, until the discovery of the passage round the Cape of Good Hope, the commerce of the world passed through the ports of the Mediterranean. If we go back to ancient ages, we find the Phenician sailors the first who ventured upon the unstable element-slowly and fearfully steering their little barks along the

Character of God.

shores of this sea; and if we come down to modern times, we see the men of war of every nation proudly ploughing its waves, or riding at anchor in its harbors. There is not a region upon the face of the earth so associated with the recollection of all that is interesting in the history of our race, as the shores of the Mediterranean sea; nor a place more likely to be chosen by the Creator as the spot where he would establish his communication with men, than the land of Judea.

The time selected is as worthy of notice as the place; I mean now, the time of the advent of the Messiah. The world had been the scene of war and bloodshed for many centuries-empire after empire had arisen upon the ruins of the preceding, none however obtaining a very general sway; at last the Roman power obtained universal ascendancy—and all was at peace. A very considerable degree of civilization and knowledge prevailed over a great part of the then known world; and every thing was favorable to the announcement and rapid spread of a message from heaven, provided that the message itself should come properly authenticated. The message did come, and it was properly authenticated; and the peculiar suitableness of the time and place selected was seen in the very rapid spread of the Gospel over almost half the globe.

There is another topic of internal evidence of the truth of Christianity. The character and administration of God, as exhibited in the Bible, correspond precisely with the same character and administration as exhibited in the light of nature. They both exhibit God as most benevolent in his character, but most decided and efficient in his government. In both, we find him providing most fully for the happiness of his creatures; but in both we see him frowning upon sin with an awful severity of judgment. This is a fundamental point, and it ought to

Language of nature; Of the Bible.

The sufferer in the hospital.

be fully understood. Let us look then at God as he reveals himself in his providence, compared with the views of him which the Bible presents.

See yonder child, beginning life with streams of enjoyment coming in at every sense; he is so formed that every thing he has to do is a source of delight-he has an eye; God has contrived it most ingeniously, to be the means by which pleasure comes in every moment to him he has an ear, so intricately formed that no anatomist or physiologist has yet been able to understand its mysteries. God has so planned it, that he takes in with delight the sounds which float around him. How many times, and in how many ways, does he find enjoyment by its instrumentality! The tones of conversation-the evening song of his mother-the hum of the insect the noise of the storm-the rumbling of distant thunder;-for how many different but delightful emotions has the Creator provided! So with all the other senses; and now, after you have examined in this way the whole structure, body and mind, of this being, follow him out to a summer's walk, and see how a benevolent Creator pours upon him, from all the scenery of nature, an almost overwhelming tide of delight. God smiles upon him in the aspect of the blue heavens, in the verdure of the fields, in the balmy breath of air upon his cheek-and in the very powers and faculties themselves, which he has so formed that every motion is delight, and every pulsation a thrill of pleasure. Such a revelation does nature make to us of the character of God, and of his feelings toward his creatures; and the Bible corresponds" God is love."

But nature speaks to us sometimes in another tone. Let this child grow up, and abandon himself to vice and crime, and after the lapse of a few years let us see him again. How changed will be the scene! To see him, you must follow me to the hospital-room of an alms-house;

The awful misery which vice sometimes brings upon its votaries.

for he has given himself up to vice, and endured suffering as a vagabond in the streets, until society can no longer endure to witness his misery, and they send him to an asylum out of their sight, in mercy both to themselves and to him. He lies upon his bed of straw in uninterrupted agony-his bones are gnawed, and his flesh corroded by disease-every motion is torment, every pulsation is agony; for the God who has so formed the human constitution, that in innocence, and in the health which generally attends it, all is happiness and peace, has yet so formed it, that vice can bring upon it sufferings-awful sufferings, of which no one but the miserable victim can conceive. I once saw in an alms-house, a sufferer whose picture has been in my imagination while writing the above. I have used general terms in my description. I might have given a much more detailed and vivid picture of his condition, but it was too shocking. Were my readers to see the scene, even through the medium of a description of ordinary clearness, the image of it would haunt them day and night. As I stood by the side of this man, and reflected that God had brought him into that condition, and that God was holding him there, and probably would hold him in the same awful suffering while life should remain, I could not help saying to myself, "With how efficient and decided a moral Governor have we to do!" No man would have held this miserable being in his sufferings a moment: the superintendent of the nospital would have released him instantly, if it had been in his power; but God had the power, and he held the guilty breaker of his law under the dreadful weight of its penalty. Man shrinks from witnessing suffering, even where it is necessary to inflict it; but this feeling will not measure, and it has no power to limit God's dreadful energy in the punishment of sin. All nature tells us so, and the language that the Bible uses is the same-" God is a consuming fire." Our feelings can no more contem

Jehovah just, as well as merciful.

Butler's Analogy.

plate with composure, as our hearts are now constituted, the judgments which the Bible denounces against the wicked in another world, than they can the agonies of delirium tremens, or the gnawings of the diseases with which God overwhelms the dissipated and the vile. In both cases there is a severity whose justice we must admit, but whose consequences we cannot calmly follow. If any one thinks that I describe the character of God in too dark and gloomy colors, I have only to say, that all nature and all revelation unite in painting God in the most dark and gloomy colors possible, as he exhibits himself toward those who persist in breaking his law. He is love to his friends, but he is a consuming fire to his foes; and every one ought to go to the judgment, expecting to find a Monarch thus decided and efficient in the execution of his laws, presiding there.

"The Lord reigneth, let the earth rejoice," says the Psalmist; and again he says, "The Lord reigneth, let the people tremble." We have abundant evidence, both in nature and revelation, that we must rejoice with trembling, under the government of God; for that government is most efficient and decided against sin—and we are sinners.

There are many other points of correspondence between the character and administration of God, as described in the Bible, and as exhibited in the constitution of nature; but I must not stop now to describe them. Butler, in an admirable work usually called Butler's Analogy, has explored this ground fully; and I would recommend to all my readers who take an interest in this subject, to obtain and study that work. I say study it, for it is not a work to be merely read, in the ordinary sense of that term; it must be most thoroughly studied, and studied too by minds in no inconsiderable degree mature, in order to be fully appreciated.

I have endeavored, by thus mentioning several points