send him; to the Acts of the Apostles he should go, and see how inspired men answer the great question of the ages, "What must I do to be

saved?"

But if a man is already a Christian, and would know how on that foundation to build a noble structure-if he would do the best with himself, and make the utmost out of life—we would point him to the Book of Proverbs.

He will find that no idea of the merely

So, too, if there be any young man who has supposed that the ordinary social virtues are all the religion a man needs, and if he has an impression that the Book of Proverbs favours this idea, let him come and study these pages. book is so at war with the ornamental virtues when not attached to a holy heart. God is in this Book of Proverbs. It insists in its opening chapters that sooner or later, in time or eternity, utter ruin will overtake the character that is not built upon "the fear and the love of God." Wisdom, moral wisdom, that which takes God's claims into account-is the basis of the morality it enjoins. This, the foundation stone, once laid, the book shows how every stone is to be hewn and every course to be placed as we build the edifice. And so all private life and public life, all

social, domestic, and political relations, all moralities and courtesies and charities, are here separated and then combined and illustrated, their shape and colour all given, and the whole commended and commanded to the young men of all ages and climes. Or, it may be, that one has imbibed notions which he thinks more especially broad and free. He cares less for the right ordering of outward life, thinking it more a matter of custom, convenience, or education. He has become interested in the speculations of the hour as to the origin of all these things about us, and as to the laws of this wondrous nature that is engaging the attention and awakening the keen interest of the thoughtful and intelligent young men of the day. He is becoming less stout in his assertion of what man can do, and more aware of the mighty forces of the world. He is smitten. by the majesty of law. He comes to think of this force, compared with which man's power is so feeble, as impersonal. Solomon became at one period absorbed in the thought of the objects of the natural world, as a modern young man is in danger of becoming absorbed in the thought of its laws. As the one found himself drawn to be an idolater, so the other is drawn towards fatalism in the presence of the vast powers of the universe. But there comes

a time when a man sees the tendency of things. He has to own an impersonal nature, or else a personal Creator and Sovereign. Fatalism says It, exactly as religion says God.

Each of these excludes the other. If there be a God who rules His universe, there is no room for the fatalistic it. If there be, in the smallest event, anything outside the divine control, then there is no more an infinite God. Fatalism, a century ago, loved to talk of all things as coming by chance, as if everything were too loose for a God. To-day it would insist that everything is so fixed, so bound by law, that there is no place nor need for God in the working of events. They work themselves out in definite ways. Buckle, with scholarly phrase, will have it that even moral actions are as fixed as physical events. And in social life a frivolous fatalism is constantly heard, saying, "It is all fixed, all fated. It happens so. It can't be helped. It is a thing of destiny. What is to be will be."

Now, how is this fatalism to be met? By asserting the truth of man's free will? But that is simply meeting the vastly lengthened line of fatalism at one point. It is opposing an avalanche by the brandishing of a pin. Within certain limits man is free. But his circle is as that of a peck-measure to the

powers and events There is, then, no

orbit of the most distant planet. A thousand things touch every man over which he has no control. His birth, in its time, place, manner, circumstances, and, usually, his death also, are not matters of his own will. First and last, and midst and always through his life, he encounters that are beyond his control. sufficient answer to fatalism in the undoubted truth of man's free will. There is one and only one answer broad enough to meet all the facts. It is the answer of religion. Religion insists upon a God, all-wise, all-just, who, through fixed law, and, if need be, over fixed law-who, through man's freedom, and if need be, over that freedom—can and does control all things according to the counsel and purpose of his own eternal intelligence and will. Strangely enough, some men always confound these two things-fatalism and the divine election. But they are as far apart as the poles. each other. Both cannot be true.

They exclude

One of them

fatalistic it, is

must be. And the only reply to the that furnished by the being and rule of a personal God.

Fatalism may be compared to a vast revolving iron wheel. It goes round remorselessly, pitilessly, crushing all before it. It can have neither intelli

gence nor purpose, neither justice nor compassion. It shrieks with every revolution, "It can't be helped. It must be endured. It is all fixed and fated. There is no purpose, no reason, no result. It is the only God." Before these awful revolutions of this terrible and monstrous lawless law-for law without a God is really lawless-all the light and love and joy of the divine Paternity are crushed out, and man seems to be the mere mote imprisoned in the mountain. Oh, how widely different in all its power on human life is that great solar fact that "the Lord God omnipotent reigneth!"

There is an ante-war incident that shows the power for despair of the one and for hope of the other view. A dark cloud hung over the interests of the African race in our land. There seemed no way of deliverance. Frederick Douglass, at a crowded meeting, depicted the terrible condition. Everything was against his people. One political party had gone down on its knees to slavery. The other proposed not to abolish it anywhere, but only to restrict it. The Supreme Court had given judgment against black men as such. He drew a picture of his race writhing under the lash of the overseer and trampled upon by brutal and lascivious men. As he went on with his despairing words, a