forth towards necessitous persons. The persecutors of the two witnesses shew themselves cognisant of the law and piously observe it. They They are as happy over the dead martyrs as if the earth had poured forth the treasures of a plentiful harvest into their lap. Now will they show themselves capable of gratitude and benevolence. With religious scrupulosity they send relief to their needy neighbours. Shall not Christians learn to be bountiful? With our sins pardoned, our dispositions sanctified, our relationships to God altered, and a lively hope of heaven, should we not find in our hearts to be charitable? "As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith." Gal. vi. 10. It is said of the two prophets that they "tormented them that dwelt on the earth." How did they torment them? It might be by inflicting judgments on them. They were dowered with miraculous power to speak killing words to consume those who offered to silence them or interrupt them in the discharge of their public testimony. The elements were subject to them, so that they could command drought or plague at their will. This punitive power would be a torment to their enemies. There is, however, another way by which they would torment them, namely, by reproving their sins, by shewing them a holy example, and by preaching the truth. In a corrupt state of society faithful reprovers and exemplary characters are always objects of dislike. The world and the church living in close neighbourhood cannot fail to torment each other from diverse causes. The church vexes the world by its pure conduct, and by speaking out the truth, which is offensive to vicious minds. Then by way of reprisals the world vexes the church by persecution and petty annoyances. As long as the church and the world occupy the same stage of action together this cannot be avoided, unless the church were to prove false to its convictions and obligations, in which case it ceases to be a church. These two witnesses are witnesses no longer than they torment the world. And a church is a church no longer than its conduct proves a reflection on a vile world, whose manners it condemns by purity of conduct. The two martyrs are representatives of a witnessing community. All Christians in office or otherwise are witnesses for God, and in proportion to their conformity to Christ, torment the world. And it is for good that they do so. The physician or the surgeon torments the patient by manipulating his wounds and probing his sores; but it is done out of love, that he may bottom the evil and cure it. If the evil is not searched it will reign on. Truthful dealing is the best, and the kindest, and the most effective. Witnessing is painful work. It is sure to trouble both the witness and the parties on whom it operates. To be faithful he has to give up the pleasure of saying smooth things that will win him smiles and favour, and utter painful truth that

B

will bring on him frowns and displeasure. Public men who do not vex and torment somebody with the truth which they preach never do much good. It it quite to the credit of these two public mouthpieces of the church that they tormented them that dwelt in the land. May the churches of Christ never lack intelligible and fearless expositors of the truth, whose word will be understood and felt.

The next thing to notice is,

III. THE RESURRECTION OF THE WITNESSES. Ver. 11, "And after three days and an half the Spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet; and great fear fell upon them which saw them." The triumphing of the wicked is short; so is the apparent defeat of truth and rectitude. The one is commensurate with the other. The friends of truth should never despair. The sun may be eclipsed; but it shines forth again with its wonted brightness. Wickedness may be strong, and victorious for a time, but it cannot have a lasting triumph. "This is your hour and the power of darkness." The hour passes away, and right and truth come forth victorious, and appear more illustrious for the temporary defeat. Or suppose it be three days and an half instead of an hour, the import is still the same-a brief space. This borders hard on what befel Christ our Lord, who rose from the dead on the third day. The additional half day grows out of the peculiar use of numerals in this book of Revelation, the three and a half being a division of the perfect number seven. Or it may be considered that three days and an half was the extreme period that could be allowed to dead bodies above ground in an eastern climate. On the fourth day at noon their enemies were stricken with fear to see them spring to life again, just as the sun crossed the meridian point. At the time when John wrote this book, the idea of resurrection had been realised in facts, in several facts, both in the Old Testament and in the New. The idea was not an invention, or a theory, or a hope: it was a realised notion, realised in several instances, but most gloriously in the resurrection of Christ, which is here alluded to as the model. Fear fell on them which saw them, just as fear fell on many when the resurrection of Christ became known in Jerusalem and Judea. Saints may die, and preachers be killed; but Christ lives, and his cause survives all opposition. If we take this as an ideal scene, with an occult meaning in it, its import is that infidelity may boast a short victory and truth be in the shades for a space, but that the good cause will ultimately prevail and have a long reign. Christianity does not depend on the lives of its ministers. The preachers die, but the truth lives and flourishes. Rather than Christ shall want witnesses, the very stones shall find a tongue and become vocal. The church goes into mourning over her dead preachers, and is sad

at having to part with them; but they are scarcely interred till they rise again. On the third or fourth day they are back again. The veritable identical men do not reappear, but their pulpits are filled by others of like character. For all practical purposes they live again in their successors. And when men are raised up in their places of the same talents, and energy, and industry, and zeal, we are bold to say that the witnesses are risen from the dead. Elijah is perpetuated in Elisha, who falls heir to his prophetic mantle. Moses is renewed in Joshua, who becomes Israel's leader. John Wesley expires, but he revives again in hundreds of itinerant truth-bearers, who tread in his steps and carry the banners of the cross through the land. They are smaller men perhaps than he, but there are more of them. And when the times require them, giants shall arise in the land. Suppose Hugh Bourne and William Clowes have succumbed to the stroke of death, and sleep their long sleep! What then? Cannot the Head of the Church repair the loss to us? Do we not see the ministerial staff every year on the increase among us? And suppose it be conceded that the gifts of the new supply are inferior to those of the retired veterans, which we are not in haste to acknowledge, the greater number comes in as a compensation. Let the Church be grateful, and trust in God, who raises the dead. And if the said individuals should be indispensable to the progress of the connexion, they will be amongst us again when such necessity shall be. A good succession is every way as valuable as an actual resurrection. It reconciles many a dying minister to his unharnessing, when he sees young vigorous men coming forward and waiting to be set apart to the work. This, too, is the Church's comfort when her efficient servants expire, whether by martyrdom or ordinary death, or when they are enfeebled and disabled by age and long labours.

It is an ingenious conceit which some have, that the witnesses experience a resurrection in the honours done to their memory by posterity. The worship of heroes is after sundown. There is a resurrection of names as well as of bodies. It has been the lot of some never to be well understood or duly appreciated in their lifetime. They were seen to disadvantage by those quite near to them; seen through the medium of false construction, or of evil passions working in their compeers, emulation and envy, detracting from their real merits. The world knew them not; even a half-blind church misapprehended and undervalued them. The next generation knows them better. After three days and a half it comes to be understood that they were true men, and their names bear a bloom on them which they retain for generations. We complete our remarks by considering,

IV. THE ASCENSION OF THE WITNESSES. Ver. 12, "And they heard a great voice from heaven, saying unto them, Come up

hither. And they ascended up to heaven in a cloud: and their enemies beheld them." Their ascension is another point of conformity to Christ. Like him they bore testimony three years and a half; like him they suffered a vile death at Jerusalem, where also their Lord was crucified; like him they rose from the dead after a short time; and like him they ascended up to heaven, and in a cloud too, for such was the manner of his ascent. Acts i. 9, which is the only place where the cloud is named as his chariot, says distinctly," a cloud received him out of their sight." The only ascension we have any account of in the Old Testament was in all probability in the same style; only the cloud is there described in more animated language in the bold license of Hebrew poetry. "And it came to pass, as they still went on, and talked, that behold there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven." 2 Kings ii. 11. Strip this of its imagery and flourish, and you have a cloud which in the language of poetry is easily turned into a chariot. "Who maketh the clouds his chariot, who walketh upon the wings of the wind." Ps. civ. 3. The historical application of this part we leave to those who believe in that theory of interpretation. We seize on the ideal meaning as more reliable. So far from the violence done to the public advocates of the gospel in those early times being fatal to it and crushing it, it survived and took a more exalted position. It was exalted to heaven, and was taken under Divine protection. The same idea is repeated in the opening of the twelfth chapter, where Christianity is represented as a new-born babe, imperilled by a dragon seeking to devour it, whose malignity was defeated by Divine interference. "And she brought forth a man-child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron; and her child was caught up to God, and to his throne." It will be seen that we do not take our text in literal earnest. Two men suffered death for prophesying or preaching; their dead bodies were left without burial on the street of Jerusalem; on the fourth day they rose from the dead, and rode up to heaven on a cloud. This is the picture or the enigma. The moral and the meaning have to be sought out. Our solution is, that during the invasion of the Holy Land, the advocates of the Christian cause were persecuted, many of them even unto death, their enemies rejoicing as if the cause they defended had died with them; when lo! a host of apologists and propagandists rose out of their ashes, and the truth displayed itself in new vigour, and gained a foothold from which its foes could no more remove it than they could follow the ascended witnesses to heaven. The truth is safe, as safe as what is in heaven, and out of the reach of human malice. And what is more, all its lovers and adherents shall share its triumphs. Why were these two men raised from the dead? Because Christ rose from the dead before

them and for them. And why did they ascend to heaven? Because Christ had forerun them thither by a glorious ascension. And where the Master is there must the servant be also. His ascension and theirs are one; they are identified with him. So are all that love him and espouse his cause. His ascension is ours, the type, security, and pledge of ours. Let us but be witnesses for him, and the martyr's reward awaits us. Even now already we are ascended, and have sympathy with, and relation to, the exalted Saviour. We are in companionship with the glorified martyrs. "Our conversation (citizenship) is in heaven." In privilege and by representation we are in heaven already. Let us do our witnessing work till the twelve hundred and sixty days shall have run their circle, then the same celestial voice that invited them to ascend, will fall upon our ears with the welcome summons, "Come up hither."

T. G.

ART. III.-COMMON SENSE VERSUS THE ASSUMPTIONS OF GEOLOGISTS.

Advanced Text Book of Geology. By David Page, F. G. S. Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh and London.

The Geological Evidences of the Antiquity of Man, &c., &c. By Sir C. Lyell, F.R.S., &c., &c. Second Edition, John Murray, Albemarle street, London, 1863.

MPERTINENCE is a stain upon human character, amongst whatever class of society it may be found; but surely impertinence must have reached its highest point of development when a writer in the "Christian Ambassador" dare assume that a philosopher may assume anything; for the principle of induction, by which all philosophers, geologists included, profess to be guided, allows of no assumptions whatever, therefore for us to assume that a disciple of Bacon may assume, or take anything for granted, is certainly bold if not impertinent; but though this position is bold, yet the responsibilities incurred, we trust, we duly feel, and can bear without serious risk.

We acknowledge our obligations to science, and if our homage is of any value we give it in the loyal spirit of "hero worship" to all true philosophers. But science may err, yea, has erred, and has frequently had to be rectified by the unsophisticated power of mind, and the experience of the non-scientific portion of human society and it is because of the past errors of philosophers, and the possibility of their present errors, that we make free to give our opinions on their present teachings.