hope, but as those who, believing that Jesus died and rose again, are no less assured, that even so, them also that sleep in Jesus, will God bring with Him.

It is no common-place exaggeration to speak of this melancholy event as a heavy calamity to the University. It will, certainly, not be felt to be exaggeration here. There appears, indeed, here something of a just feeling of the severity of the stroke. We never remember a visitation of the kind which seems to have touched so many; and we certainly never knew one in which so many had such cause for mourning. There was no man more decided in his preferences, or who more unequivocally manifested them. But those who were farthest from him here, were made to feel that his particular attachments, however strong, left untouched in his heart a fund of genuine benevolence, which was more than sufficient for every demand on it. His zeal for his friends did not make him indifferent to others. He did justice to all, and sought to procure justice for all; took a generous interest in their struggles, in their disappointments, in their success. An assertor of the claims of the timid or the indolent, a guardian of the reputation of the absent; of the interests of the weak; a counsellor, a reconciler; he was left to be a kindly link between the most discordant elements; while to the affection which such endearing qualities won for him, was added all the respect which is given to energy, determination, and boldness; to stainless honour, uncompromising principle, the highest public spirit, and the most approved disinterestedness. His talents were too faithfully dedicated to the public, in the important station which he filled here, to be much known beyond the sphere of his labours. They were, in fact, exerted up to the hour of his death, in a way which necessarily confined the full knowledge of them to his nearest friends. He first laboured diligently, and successfully, in the pursuit of attainments, in which the public take no interest, and upon which it can exercise no judgment; and then most perseveringly and faithfully devoted himself to the discharge of the duties of the situation in which the success of his exertions placed him. In the due discharge of these duties, the public are, indeed, most deeply interested; but they so withdraw a man from general observation, that those to whom the country owes most in such stations, are those of whom it knows the least. His fidelity and ability in the discharge of these unostentatious duties, were well known, and fully appreciated here. His nearer friends knew that he would never step aside from them to seek distinction; and they did not desire that he should; but they confidently anticipated, that when the course of duty led to exertions more fitted to develope and display the powers of his mind, he would have assumed a higher place in public estimation. This period never arrived; and it is of very little consequence. He went on, labouring faithfully (that is, if he did not regard too little the trust of life and health,) in the discharge of the quiet duties of his station, and ever welcoming every addition to them, which promised to make the place that he loved a more efficient steward of the great interests confided to its care. He was a cordial promoter of all the various measures of academic improvement which have extended to every department of our Institution since the accession of its present head, and, above all, a most hearty and able instrument in carrying into effect the great changes which have been made in the most important branch of all the education of our divinity Students. He entered upon the duties of this department with a deep sense of the responsibility which lies upon those who have to train the

as

religious instructors of the land a feeling which never left him, but which seemed continually gathering strength as be went on. Under it he laboured most honestly to increase his own qualifications for the task, and so seriously and earnestly exerted himself in it, that all who fell under his instruction must have seen that he was labouring for them, ever in his great Taskmaster's eye." His labours were, we hope, useful to many; we are sure that they were profitable to himself; that he grew in grace under the faithful performance of this most important work, and experienced the truth of the happy promise, that "he that watereth shall be watered also himself."

Here he has left a void which cannot be expressed; but which is deeply felt, and likely to be increasingly felt, by all who were joined with him in this work, with any measure of his own interest in it. He had given himself unreservedly to it; and would have not only been zealous and active in forwarding further plans of improvement, but invaluable in facilitating the adoption of them, by the influence of his example, and by the weight which a fuller acquaintance with his character was hourly procuring for him among us.

We may stop here, for we have come to the great purpose for which we have been writing. We trust it has been sufficiently apparent that we have not been writing for the public. Our departed friend was one whose varied worth, those who knew him best, and loved him best, must be content to know that the public can never be made to appreciate. We have not written for his sorrowing friends; and still less for his afflicted family. Both are still too much stunned by this heavy blow to feel its entire severity. It is not enough to have lived long with him, they must live for some time without him, to know all that they have lost in him. But both have feelings which it would be mockery to attempt to assuage by such a tribute to his memory. What would sound as wild exaggeration to those who only knew him at a distance, would fall coldly upon the hearts of his family and his friends. Least of all have we written to indulge our own feelings. One, from whom God has been pleased to take away the best friend that he was ever pleased to bestow upon him-the truest-heartedthe most single-minded, the most devoted, and the tenderest-is not likely to find speaking or writing about him, in measured terms, a soothing task. We write neither for the public, nor for the friends, nor for his family, nor for ourselves, of him, whom God has taken to himself. We write on behalf of the place to which he was so strongly bound; and especially of those endearing interests to which he devoted himself so heartily-for which he was content to spend, and to be spent--and to promote which, either in his life or in his death, would have been happiness to him. We write for those through the land to whom those interests are dear; who have been looking with satisfaction and with hope upon what has been doing here to advance them; that they may know what a loss it has pleased God to inflict upon us, and what need we have of their prayers, that it may be supplied; that He who is the Lord of the harvest may send labourers into His harvest, to fill the place that He has made void ; and that, meanwhile, He may Himself stir up us, who for a while remain behind, to add watchfulness and diligence to deeper self-humiliation, and more earnest prayer..

AN ABSTRACT OF A SERMON ON REDEMP. TION. BY THE REV. CHRISTMAS EVANS.

"WHEN Our world fell from its first estate, it became one vast prison. Its walls were adamant, and unscaleable; its gate was brass, and impregnable. Within, the people sat in darkness and the shadow of death: without, inflexible JUSTICE guarded the brazen gate, brandishing the flaming sword of eternal law. MERCY, as she winged her flight of love through the worlds of the universe, paused to mark the prison aspect of our once paradisaic world. Her eye affected her heart. Her heart melted and bled, as the shriek of misery and yell of despair rose upon the four winds of heaven; she could not pass by, nor pass on ; she descended before the gate, and requested admittance. JUSTICE, waving the flaming sword in awful majesty, exclaimed-no one can enter here and live!—and the thunder of his voice outspoke the wailings within.

"MERCY expanded her wings to renew her flight amongst the unfallen worlds. She re-ascended into the mid air, but could not proceed, because she could not forget the piercing cries from the prison. She, therefore, returned to her native throne in the heaven of heavens. It was a glorious high throne, from everlasting,' and both unshaken and untarnished by the 'fallen fate of men and angels. But, even there, she could not forget the scene that she had witnessed and wept over. She sat, and weighed the claims of all the judicial perfections of Jehovah, and all the principles of eternal law; but although they arose upon her view in all their vastness, she could not forget the prison. She re-descended with a more rapid and radiant flight, and approached the gate with an aspect of equal solicitude and determination; but, again, she was denied admission. She stood still-her emotion was visible. JUSTICE ceased to brandish the sword-there was silence in heaven.

"Is there admission on no terms whatever ?' she asked. 'Yes,' said JUSTICE; but only on terms which no finite being can fulfil. I demand an atoning death for their eternal life-blood Divine, for their ransom.' 'And I,' said MERCY, 'at once, accept the terms.' It was asked, on what security, and when they would be fulfilled?' Here,' said MERCY, is the Bond-my word! my oath! and, four thousand years from this time, demand its payment on Calvary for, I will appear in the incarnate form of the Son

of God, and be the Lamb slain for the sin of this world!' "The Bond was accepted without hesitation, and the gate opened at once. MERCY entered, leaning on the arm of JUSTICE. She spoke kindly to the prisoners, and gave them some hints of her high undertaking on their behalf. All were amazed, and many melted, by this timely and tender interference; and to confirm their hopes, MERCY, from time to time, led the 'captivity' of some 'captive,' that their salvation might be the pledge and prelude of eventual tri umphs.

"Thus the gathering of the first fruits,' in the field of redemption, went on for ages; and, at last, the clock of prophecy struck the fulness of the time.' Then MERCY became incarnate in the person of the Son of God, who appeared in the form of a servant, publishing his intention and determination to pay the mighty Bond. And soon the awful day of payment arrived; then the whole array of the judicial attributes of Jehovah took their stand on Calvary, with JUSTICE at their head, bearing the Bond of Redemption. Angels and archangels, cherubim and seraphim, principalities and powers, left their thrones and mansions of glory, and bent over the battlements of heaven, gazing, in mute amazement, and breathless suspense, upon the SOlemn scene-for now the Mediator appeared without the gates of Jerusalem,' crowned with thorns, and followed by the weeping church. As he passed along the awful array of the judicial perfections of the Divine character, none of them uttered a word of encouragement-none of them glanced a look of sympathy to him-'it was the hour and power of darkness." Above him were all the vials of Divine wrath, and the thunders of the eternal law, ready to burst on his devoted head-around him were all the powers of darkness,' on the tiptoe of infernal expectation, waiting for nis failure. But none of these things moved him from the purpose or spirit of Redemption. He took the Bond from the hand of JUSTICE, and moved on to the cross,' as a lamb to the slaughter.' He resigned himself to that altar of ignominy.

"Then JUSTICE unsheathed the flaming sword, and, marshalling all his terrors, went up to the altar to enforce his claims. The rocks rent under his tread-the sun shrunk from the glance of his eye. He lifted his right hand to the eternal throne, and exclaimed, in thunder- Fires of heaven! descend and consume this sacrifice!' The fires

of heaven, animated with living spirit by the call, answered We come !-we come!-and, when we have consumed that victim, we will burn the universe! They burstblazed-devoured, until the humanity of EMANUEL' gave up the ghost; but the moment they touched his divinity, they expired. That moment, JUSTICE dropped his flaming sword at the foot of the cross; and the law joined the prophets, in witnessing to 'the righteousness which is by faith;' for all had heard the dying Redeemer exclaim, in triumph It is finished!'

"The weeping church heard it; and, lifting up her head, cried-It is finished.' The attending angels caught the shout of victory, and winged their flight to the eternal throne, singing-It is finished.' The powers of darkness heard the acclamations of the universe, and hurried away from the scene in all the agony of disappointment and despair-for the Bond was paid, and eternal Redemption obtained."

THE BIBLE versus THE BOARD, THE PRIEST, AND THE COURT OF CHANCERY; or, the Working of the New System of National Education, as Exemplified in the History of the Ballyholey School, in the Parish of Raphoe, County of Donegall. By the Rev. W. D. KILLEN, Minister of the Presbyterian Church, Raphoe. W. M'COMB, Belfast P.p. 51. 1835.

FOR a long time we have abstained from indulging in any remarks on the New System of Education. We did so, not because our views of its unscriptural constitution and evil tendency were changed, but because we were unwilling to wound the feelings of some of our own brethren, who regarded it differently from what we have ever done, and because we felt assured, that its own doings would soon expose it to the public eye in such a light, as would bring down upon it the condemnation of every friend of truth. The publication of the pamphlet, whose title we have transcribed, forbids us to be longer silent. The case of injustice and oppression, so clearly made out in it, forces us again to entreat the public attention to this desolating system, for, while we read it, all our forebodings were more than realised, and as the friends of liberty and justice, we must again warn the churches. The case is briefly this. Mr. Killen connected a school with the Board, stipulating to conduct it on certain principles specified in his answers to the queries of the Board. A lease of the schoolhouse was made out, consistently with these answers, and altered by the Board from its usual form, in order to meet the special case. On these principles the school was scrupulously conducted. But these were contrary to the real principles of the Board. The Priest of the parish soon took offence at the school. He complained to the Board. And the issue