believeth, and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be condemned." "He that believeth on the Son of God," says John, "hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God, hath made him a liar, because he hath not believed the record that God gave of his Son." And when the Saviour promises that the Spirit of truth will come "to convince the world of sin," he pronounces this to be the great iniquity of which they shall be convicted-" because they believe not on me." If such then are the decisive statements of God's word, what shall we say of the system which presumes to strip faith of its moral character, affirms that man is not accountable for his belief even to his Maker, and that the grossest infidelity, Deism, Atheism itself partakes not of moral blame-is not sin, or at least regards all such offences as very trifling indeed! Is not this to pronounce the declaration of the Saviour, the testimony of the apostle, and the conviction wrought by the Spirit—A LIE? On no subject does the Bible speak with more solemn emphasis than on this"He that believeth on the Son of God hath everlasting life: he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him." To this our modern liberalism offers a bold, unqualified contradiction. Here, then, we leave it at issue with the God of the Bible, who will assuredly vindicate his own cause. The second grand error which we formerly noticed on the subject of faith, is that which represents it as nowise essentia either to the Christian character or to acceptable obedience. This, doubtless, originates in that false conception of the nature of faith which we have now endeavoured to correct. Faith is regarded as a merely intellectual and not a moral principle, and on this ground men are led to deny its importance. But the error is greatly promoted by the mistaken apprehensions that prevail respecting the Christian character itself, and what constitutes acceptable obedience. By the term Christian, men generally understand something very different from that peculiar character that marks the children of God, and distinguishes them from the world. In the conventional language of the world, a Christian is a person born of Christian parents in a Christian country, and professing, or rather not rejecting the religion of Christ. The mere circumstances of birth, country, profession, complete the idea of the world's Christianity. In New Testament language, the Christian is one who is justified, adopted, and sanctified "Ye are washed, ye are sanctified, ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God." "Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God!" Now faith is indispensable to the formation of this character. It is necessary to our justification, for it is written- "The just shall live by faith.' Christ, by his Spirit, reveals himself to us as "Jehovah our righteousness;" and in the act of faith we receive him as "of God made unto us righteousness"-"for the righteousness of God is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe." Again, faith is the principle of our adoption-" For ye are the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus." 66 As many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name." By faith we become related to Christ; he is not ashamed to call us brethren; and it is this relation alone that entitles us to the character of " the sons of God," for he himself distinctly connects the latter privilege with the former, in his address to Mary-"Go to my brethren and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God." Once more, faith is necessary to our sanctification. Are we endowed with exceeding great and precious promises? It is, says Peter, that "we might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world, through lust." Now it is faith that realizes these promises. Paul illustrates the divinely transforming influence of faith's discoveries, by a fine allusion to an incident in the life of Moses-*"We all with unveiled face beholding, as by a glass, the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, as from the Lord the Spirit." And John assures us, that the perfection of faith in the vision of God, will be the perfection of holiness in the likeness of God- "We know that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is." Faith, then, begins and perfects the Christian character. By faith we are justified and made righteous before God, by faith we are adopted in [Beholding-the glory of the Lord.] "Here is one of the most beautiful contrasts that can be imagined. Moses saw the Shechinah, and it rendered his face resplendent, so that he covered it with a veil, the Jews not being able to bear the reflected light: we behold Christ as in the glass of his word, and (as the reflection of a very luminous object from a mirror gilds the face on which the reverberated rays fall) our faces shine too; and we veil them not, but diffuse the lustre which, as we discover more and more of his glories in the Gospel, is continually increasing.". "-DODDRIDGE, to the divine family and become the sons of God, by faith we are sanctified and transformed from glory to glory into the likeness of God. Yet this is the principle which many presume to deride, and which all our modern liberals treat as of small account. But the error lies in their false or inadequate estimates of the Christian character itself, and till these are corrected, in vain shall we look for any just conception of the importance of faith. Now if faith is so important to the Christian character, can we doubt whether it is necessary to acceptable obedience? Yet it is the current doctrine of liberalism, that evangelical faith is by no means essential, and that all the duties of piety and benevolence may be fully discharged by the man who is an utter stranger to the principle. This sentiment, we allow, may not always be so plainly or strongly expressed; but its meaning, its spirit, is avowed in the sneer, the sarcasm, the virulent invective, or the indulgent pity bestowed on all who are zealous in leading the world to Christ. Now to this sentiment, however expressed, we oppose these two explicit declarations of the apostle" Without faith it is impossible to please God," and "whatsoever is not of faith is sin." No language can be more decisive. It pronounces faith to be the principle of all acceptable obedience, and strikes at the root of that unprincipled system which professes the Christian name, but repudiates all that is peculiarly Christian. Farther, it will be allowed, we presume, that the heart must be the source of acceptable obedience: now Peter expressly assures us that it is faith which purifies the heart. And the same apostle exhorts the brethren in these terms-"Wherefore having purified your souls by obeying the truth, (that is, by faith,) through the Spirit, to unfeigned brotherly love, ye will love one another from a pure heart continually."* Nay, faith is the sustaining principle of our spiritual life, for thús Paul gives his own experience-"I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God." But if it sustain the life itself, will it not operate in all its motions, feelings, and exercises. Indeed whoever reads the eleventh chapter of the epistle to the Hebrews must be satisfied that faith is the all-informing principle of new obedience. It was faith that animated, as with one soul, that noble army of patriarchs, prophets, martyrs, and confessors. * Macnight. It was faith that inspired their zeal in labours, their patience in sufferings, their courage in conflict, their hope in death. And "faith that worketh by love is ever the vital, all-pervading energy of new obedience. It enters into the most secret intimacies of the divine life, animates all the duties of practical religion, invigorates every enterprise of spiritual benevolence, and, in the day of trial, will enable us still to endure hardness as good soldiers of Jesus Christ." But destitute of this saving grace, what principle of the heart, what act of the life, what attribute of the character can be accepted in the sight of God? The Bible declares-Not one. "Without faith it is impossible to please him.' The character may be embellished with many specious accomplishments, the heart may be framed to the nicest sensibility, and the life may be refined from the grosser pollutions of the world, yet one thing is lacking, and this the Lord requires. "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ" is the grand requirement of the Gospel; it is "a kind of universal command that runs through all this dispensation of heaven to the children of men, and therefore to reject it is to be guilty of a kind of universal disobedience," and discovers, even through the guise of many plausibilities, a determined alienation of the heart from God. Nay, these very plausibilities, these conventional virtues, however useful or amiable in the sight of men, may be the very elements of rebellion against God; for he who seeth not as man seeth, has inscribed upon them all, "Whatsoever is not of faith is sin." We feel we shall be pitied and despised for the weakness and uncharitableness of this sentiment, but we have learned to believe God rather than men, and we know that the judgment of charity must be the judgment of truth. (TO BE CONCLUDED IN OUR NEXT.) THE PRECENTOR. TO THE EDITOR OF THE ORTHODOX PRESBYTERIAN. SIR, BEING lately on a visit to a friend in the ministry in the North-West of the province, I was particularly struck with the appearance of the singing clerk of his congregation, and was led to wonder that an individual so advanced in life (for he is above eighty years of age) should enter with so much heart and earnestness upon the duties of his official calling. Upon a more intimate acquaintance, however, I L soon discovered the secret of the old man's enthusiasm. I found that he had been from early life the teacher and precentor of the congregation-that he still retained an ardent love of psalmody-and was impressed with the importance and solemnity of sacred song. Indeed I was never more surprised and gratified than when the old man sung with much feeling, in my hearing, the subjoined verses of his own unaided composition. He had made them long ago, and taught them to his pupils, by whom they were usually sung as a concluding exercise before the dismission of the school. It occurred to me that they deserved more general circulation, and that you, perhaps, might lend a page or two of your periodical for that purpose. There is a great charm in their simplicity, and they have a quaint and harmonious flow about them that it is impossible not to admire. I am sure they will be acceptable to many, especially to your country readers, and I am not without the hope that some of our other teachers of sacred music will adopt and use them as a happy commendation of their art. How desirable when young people come together to improve themselves in psalmody, the "science of heaven," that they should be impressed with the importance, the devotional tendency, and scriptural authority of the exercise and how much more seemly would it be to close their meetings for practice by the singing of the verses here subjoined, than to mingle, as is sometimes done on such occasions, the sacred with the profane, in hurried and abrupt succession. : I shall only further add, that these stanzas may be sung to the tune of "The King's Anthem," so generally and favourably known. I am, &c. &c., Children who do incline Singing psalms is the mode, Whilst the rude and profane Sporting with death; I'H to my Bible go, G. My duty there to know, |