like manner was three days in the power of death before his glorious resurrection discharged our debt, and raised us, together with Him. That resurrection was a greater miracle than if the whole race of Adam had been brought out of the grave in a moment. For He had the curse of God and of our sins laid upon Him; and who could roll away this heavy stone from the door of the sepulchre, except He who had power to lay down his life, and power to take it again? Christ hath drunk of the brook in the way; therefore doth He lift up his head, even to the glory of a mediatorial kingdom. Isaac's virtual and parabolic resurrection enables him to become the progenitor of the promised Seed and of the world's Saviour. The actual and most glorious resurrection of our Lord from the grave, where He rested, after having completed the amazing work of Atonement, hath constituted Him the first fruits of a world thus ransomed from the power of the grave, and the miseries of endless death, through faith in his name. "Because I live ye shall live also." "When Thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, He shall see his seed, He shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand." 'His people shall be made willing in the day of his power;" and more than the womb of the morning, "He shall have the dew of his youth. "We are buried with Him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised from the dead, by the glory of the Father, we also should walk in newness of life." Are we in very deed and truth as monuments of his gracious power, members of his body, through living, acting, holy faith, yielding fruit in his name,

according to our baptismal privilege and duty? Then what are the happy, what the animating, what the sanctifying, what the glorious consequences of this everlasting union? "Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather that is risen again; who is even at the right hand of God; who also maketh intercession for us." Are we afflicted? It is not the sword of the vindictive Judge, but the rod of a reconciled and tender Father that is upon us. Are we in fear of death? Christ has extracted its sting, and robbed the grave of its terrors. Do we dread the guilt of sin ? The sword of justice hath smitten our surety and the resurrection hath opened his prison doors, to shew that his suretyship hath satisfied God, and we are safe. He died for our sins, and rose again for our justification. "If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things that are above, where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God."

Is this the day of Christ? Doth faith see it with gladness? Let us rejoice in his Person; for He is the glory of mankind, not less than of the Father. Let us rejoice in his Death; for it is our death to the condemnation of sin. Let us rejoice in his Life; for it is the principle, the support, the substance, of our own, which must be lived by the faith of the Son of God, who loved us and gave Himself for us. Let us rejoice in his Love; if we have sought Him and it by faith; for that Love is the mighty cause of all peace, all joy, all holiness, all hope, all grace, all glory, to the soul of man.

THE Memoirs of eminently wise and holy persons are pregnant with instruction and edification to every serious reader, and especially when as in the case before us, they are written by the individuals themselves. This we think must be strongly felt by every reader of the two small volumes from which the following account is extracted, which are entitled, Life and Remains of the late Rev. William Hamilton, D. D. Minister of Strathblane in North Britain.

On the 4th February 1780 (says Dr. Hamilton) I received my birth at Longridge, in the parish of Stonehouse, county of Lanark.

My father was born January 1, 1738. He married, December 9, 1761, Mary Hamilton, oldest daughter of Andrew Hamilton and Janet Craig of Colenhill, Avondale. My mother used to speak with great interest of the piety of her father and mother, and the passionate tenderness which her mother felt for her children. To preserve his cattle and moveables from the rebels in 1745, my maternal grandfather was obliged to carry them to the bleak and dreary muirs in Avondale. By watching them there in rainy weather, he contracted a cold, followed by asthma, which confined him to the house for the remainder of his life. It is impossible to commence NOVEMBER, 1839.

the training of children too early. My brother Thomas died in Oct. 1782, when I was nearly two years and seven months; but I still distinctly recollect his dress and general appearance, and several adventures with him, and one of these in the spring, when I could not be more than two years and a month or two. Not having seen him die, I could not for some time believe that he was dead. I saw his funeral; but could not comprehend what either death or a funeral meant.

'I have no recollection when I was first taught to pray, nor when first instructed in the being and character of God. James Renwick, the martyr, was observed attempting to pray beside his cradle when two years of age. And either from the example of my father and mother, or from her instructions, I must have early began to pray, for I was in the practice of observing secret prayer, long before my father spoke to me about the nature and necessity of that duty.

If parents possess piety, sound sense, and kindness, they may form their children very much according to their own wishes. Few people have ever possessed a greater avidity for reading, or derived greater enjoyment than myself from the perusal of books. But when my mother, who was my only

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teacher for several years, first tried to instruct me in reading, I used to abscond. Even after she had cut off my retreat, and succeeded so far that I could read a little, I found the lessons such an irksome interruption to play, that I regarded reading as one of the greatest calamities that could be inflicted on the human race. The few books which had then come in my way having been printed by the same individual, I would have rejoiced in his death, from the belief that he was the only printer in existence, and that if he had been despatched the art of printing would have been lost along with him.

After the elements of reading had been mastered, I became fond of the information which it conveyed. The Bible was my classbook; my mother was my tutor : and in reading the Bible beside her, she was always ready to explain any difficulties which occurred, and to make the lessons a subject of conversation. The predictions which foretold the utter destruction of the Chaldeans, and the lasting desolation of Babylon, were the first to impress my mind, and appeared the very perfection of the grand and terrible.

My parents having, on the day of my birth, heard of the death of the Rev. William Gilmour, catechist in Avondale, whom they esteemed and venerated for his piety and benevolence, they resolved that I should bear his Christian name, and be educated for the ministry. After having read over the Bible once or twice with my mother, I was sent to the parish school, then taught by the Rev. James Smellie, St. Andrews, Orkney. My parents expected that I should persevere in learning English till I could read correctly; but on the second day my excellent teacher desired me to bring the Rudiments with me the next morning, and commence Latin, that I might acquire that language along

with a Thomas Gilmour, who had only lately begun it. I soon could run over penna and Eneas in all their cases. In the same manner I was desired to decline Anchises and Penelope. The text told me that the first declension was known by the genitive and dative in œ; but the note informed me that Anchises had in the genitive Anchisis, and Penelope had Penelopes. I was perfectly willing to believe that is and es were the same as ; but the thing was utterly beyond my reach. There was no possibility of believing such a plain and glaring contradiction: and since such an absurdity met me at the threshold, I concluded that the language must abound in such absurdities, and that its attainment was useless. I struck work for the day, and determined to have no more to do with Latin.

'The communication of this decision to my parents was to them a sad mortification. It disappointed their fondly cherished hopes, and perplexed them how to dispose of me for the future. On the fifth day I returned to school with the Bible, and resumed my place in the Bible class. I continued at school for a year or two, and then, as a preparation for becoming, along with my second brother, a Glasgow manufacturer, commenced weaver. But the damp of the shop, during the fog and gloom of autumn, disgusted me at the loom, and led me heartily to wish that I were back at the Latin. I quitted the weaving, but ashamed to avow my desire to return to my studies, lest I should incur the reproach of fickleness, I joined my oldest and third brothers in their labours on the farm.

On this disappointment Dr. H. afterwards remarks

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All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and discloses truths the most important and unchangeable. In seasons of trouble and difficulty, Christians frequently forget that all things work together for good to them that love God. But, if they will only pay close attention to the dispensations of Providence, they will find, that this precious declaration never fails. Events, at the moment painful, humbling, and alarming, have contributed ultimately to my obtaining some of the best and most valuable blessings that I have enjoyed. Of this interesting truth I shall here give a few instances

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Why was my excellent teacher so precipitate, as to set me, on the third day of my attendance at school, to learn Latin, and thus to disgust me at that language? This for a time blasted the hopes, and crossed the wishes of my parents. But God, who is wise iu counsel and wonderful in working, was leading me in a way that I knew not, and qualifying me by a process to which I never would have had recourse, for a degree of usefulness and comfort which I never otherwise would have acquired. The experiments in manufacturing and farming, by compelling me for nearly two years to associate, both with the farmers and hand-loom weavers in their ordinary occupations, gave me an intimate and thorough acquaintance with the habits and manners, the feelings and dispositions of the working classes. From my earliest years, I knew the heart both of the farmers and mechanics. I saw their defects and excellences; I discovered their prejudices and prepossessions, and learned to sympathize with both their sorrows and their joys. My father's house and farm were a seminary for industry, instruction, benevolence, and piety; and the weaver's shop was a school

of virtue. I had three companions -they were pious men, but of very different attainments. Each belonged to a different congregation. One was a churchman, a second was a seceder, and the third a relief man. We sometimes had a little bickering about our party principles, but our conversation was generally of a more useful character, and often peculiarly lively and interesting. The sermons which we had heard on Sabbath furnished the subject of our discourse on Monday; and at other

times we talked of the books which we were reading. The sufferings and achievements of the reformers and covenanters were a never-failing topic of discussion. Our veneration for the sincerity, courage, and fidelity of Knox and his coadjutors was unbounded. Our intercourse was often enlivened by sallies of wit and humour, and seasoned with the most tender and touching appeals upon the ineffable importance of personal religion, and a thorough acquaintance with the doctrines, and a cordial submission to the duties of Christianity.

From what I observed during the short period that I was their companion, I saw enough to convince me of the unsearchable goodness of God. The greater proportion of the human race are obliged to earn their support by the labour of their hands: but he has made the most ample and inexhaustible provision for the temporal and eternal welfare of the whole. There is not one of them inevitably doomed to ignorance, vice, and misery. When the inhabitants of a country degenerate, the working classes are subjected to formidable temptations; but these are no more insurmountable than the barriers which fashion and folly throw around the circles of rank and splendour. The meanest and lowest in all the crowds of toil and care have access to the means of intel