may, indeed, pass to our final home ere the task be finished. But other hands will take it up, and conduct it forward to its completion. Be it ours to strive, that they may have nothing to do but to perfect what we have almost consummated, and to raise the shout of victory over the total destruction of a foe which we left routed and flying. We are urged, by every impressive and cogent motive, to arouse to action. Heaven, with its authoritative commands; earth, with its guilt and sorrows; and hell, with its quenchless fires, all invoke us to do what we can for the deliverance of our species. The predictions of Scripture, the developments of Providence, the aspects of the age, the success already granted to our incipient efforts, proclaim, with trumpet-tongue, that "the harvest of the earth is ripe ;" and, from every surrounded point, there comes to us the thrilling mandate, "Thrust ye in the sickle, and reap," strengthened by the glorious incentive," He that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life eternal."

Brethren, the drama of the world is hastening on to its crisis. Soon will the curtain be lifted, and disclose that new order of its moral creation, in which righteousness shall abundantly flourish, and perfect love, and purity, and joy, spread their balmy wings over our redeemed humanity. Then, and not till then, will the hour of rest arrive to the church. Then, and not till then, having accomplished her mission, she may repose from her toils; and, like some universal mother, gathering from the four winds her sinless and happy offspring, fold them in her arms, and nurse them at her bosom. Then will the ruins of the apostacy be repaired, and angel-lyres, and all human voices, unite to sound the anthem of a world recovered. And then will be realized, O how brightly! the entrancing vision of the poet, who, dwelling "fast by the oracle of God," drew from its sacred well his sweet and seraphic inspiration:

"One song employs all nations, and all cry,
Worthy the Lamb, for he was slain for us.
The dwellers in the vales and on the rocks,
Shout to each other, and the mountain tops
From distant mountains catch the flying joy ;
Till, nation after nation taught the strain,
Earth rolls the rapturous hosanna round."

THE BEARINGS OF MODERN COMMERCE ON THE PROGRESS OF MODERN MISSIONS.

BY

REV. JOHN S. STONE, D. D.

Surely the isles shall wait for me, and the ships of Tarshish first, to bring thy sons from far, their silver and their gold with them, unto the name of the Lord thy God, and to the Holy One of Israel, because he hath glorified thee. -ISAIAH 69: 9.

THIS passage is from a most glowing prophetic description of the ultimately universal spread of the Gospel through our world. It is from a prophecy, which foreshows, not only that every land shall be subjected to Christ, but also that "the abundance of the sea shall be converted unto him." In this great work of winning the world, commerce, it seems, is to take a conspicuous part. While "the isles" wait for Christ, "the ships of Tarshish are to be "first in bringing the sons of Zion from far, with their silver and their gold as an offering unto "the name of the Lord their God," and as consecrated means in the hands of Him, who hath steadfastly purposed to "glorify the house of his glory."

دو

Among all the means used in converting the human race to Christ, commerce, no doubt, is to be one of the most important. Three-fifths of the earth's surface are covered with waters; while the remaining fifths lie in the shape of two vast continents, and of innumerable isles, the abodes of men, and the depositories of those treasures which God has given for the use of men. Between these, the great deep is a broad highway; and commerce, with her ships, the only system of intercommunication. Without commerce, neither science nor art, neither civilization nor religion, could spread beyond the boundaries of the land of their birth. All other agencies, not purely spiritual, are, when left to themselves, local. Commerce has the only created arm that can reach round the globe.

This, then, is the grand agent which God has prepared for himself, and which he purposes to use in the work of gathering in the nations to Christ, and in collecting the gold and silver, the redundant means, which that work demands. The connection of commerce with the spread of the Gospel, is, therefore, a thought full of interest. To its development, so far as the nature of the occasion, and the special object in view will admit, I now invite your attention. I restrict myself to the bearings of modern commerce on the progress of modern missions; and, even in this view, shall find more than can be adequately surveyed in the short time allotted to our examination.

I. By modern commerce, I mean that which has overspread the earth since the invention of the mariner's compass, and the consequent discovery, in 1492, of a new world, as distinguished from that ancient commerce, which, having no trusty guide, crept only along the shores, and explored only the inlets and interior waters of the old continent. This modern commerce is now the mightiest body of human power, that can be found in action on our world. From an unskilled infant, with little or nothing of experience, it has grown to a colossal giant, as dextrous in its skill as it is resistless in its power. In the discovery and application of steam, it has impressed into its service nearly all the agencies of nature; and it wields them with all the certainty of science, and with all the efficiency of experience. With this subtle power, it outstrips the wind upon the ocean, and almost copes in speed with the eagle on the land. With this viewless and resistless agent, it has opened the bowels of the earth, and penetrated the solitudes of the wilderness; and, in the results of agriculture, manufactures, and mining, has made ancient lands pay new tribute to the main, and new regions unlock their before hidden treasures to its grasp.

I spread the definition of modern commerce over these operations on land, not because the text has special reference to so broad a system, but because from the beginning the system has been actuated by one spirit; because the whole body of the great business world has but one soul; and because commerce in her ships is but the grand carrier for commerce on her wheels.

This, then, is the commerce of which I speak; that which has been growing up in the world for the last three hundred and fifty years. It is this, the bearings of which on modern

missions, we are now to examine; on modern missions, as distinguished from ancient; as springing up at the same time, and operating through the same period, with that commerce by which they have been affected.

This commerce, the word of God justifies us in believing, is at least a part of that which is to be instrumental in the divine work of evangelizing mankind, in bringing all her sons into the church of Christ, and in furnishing for the Lord the silver and the gold, the mere human means, which his enterprise of mercy requires. Has this commerce thus far done the work for which it has been raised up? Has it yet been God's handmaid in gathering the nations to Christ, or in carrying to them that Gospel of salvation, which teaches man to love the Lord his God with all his heart, and his neighbor as himself; to recompense to no man evil for evil, but rather to overcome evil with good; that Gospel, which is truth, and justice, and temperance-which is purity, and love, and peace, and which is intended to make earth like heaven, and man like God? Has commerce yet taken her destined part in doing this her destined work? For an answer, let us take as brief a survey as possible of her doings.

II. I begin by premising one thing. It is undoubtedly true, that modern commerce has been the occasion of a great extension of the arts of civilization, and of the blessings of true religion. Within the last half century especially, her ships have wafted the true missionary of the cross, with the true Gospel of Christ, and with the elements of true Christian civilization, to almost every part of the earth. And in almost numberless ways, through the channels which she has opened, almost numberless blessings have been spread over the world. Walls of separation have been broken down; nations have been brought closer together; and the bonds of one universal brotherhood have begun to be woven around the one great family of man. But, then, all this has been but an incident to the system, not its main object, nor yet its main result. It has not grown out of the spirit and tendency of commerce, but has come to pass in spite of that spirit and tendency. Commerce has spread these blessings, just as war has spread them. The object of war is not to civilize and Christianize, but to conquer and subdue. But, then, in its shock, refined nations sometimes mix with barbarous; and thus, even though in letters of blood, teach them lessons of a thousand things, which before they never knew. So it has

been with commerce. The blessings which she has carried, were not in her heart. They only followed unbidden in her train. They went, not by her, but with her, and often in spite of her. While, therefore, we must not be unmindful of the good of which she has been the occasion, this good must not be suffered to blind us to her real character, and to her own proper works. To proceed, then, in our proposed exam

ination.

Unfortunately, modern commerce awoke at a time when Christianity had been sleeping for a thousand years in the growing, thickening darkness of a spiritual night; a night, which, as usual, grew darker and darker till the very break of day. Amongst the monstrous things engendered in that night of darkness, was the grand usurpation of the Papacy, which arrogated to itself the prerogative of Almighty God. "The Pope," to use the language of the historian Robertson, "as the vicar and representative of Jesus Christ, was supposed to have a right of dominion over all the kingdoms of the earth." Nor was this an unexercised right. For, immediately after the discovery of the new world, a mere “Italian priest boldly presumed to give away God's earth, as if he sat God's acknowledged vicegerent. Splitting this mighty planet into two imaginary halves, he handed one to the Spanish, and the other to the Portuguese monarch; "* thus pretending to convey to each a right to all the countries within their assigned limits which they might discover, not already occupied by any Christian nation. And who were the people to whom this monstrous grant was made? A part of the millions of that old world which for thousands of years had been growing more and more dense in population, more and more dense in superstition, more and more dense in the vices and diseases of old and corrupt institutions. Lust of power, and lust of gold, having fed to fatness on the men and the wealth of Europe and of Asia, stood eager for new victims and new gratification, when this great western world was thrown open by the hand of discovery to the knowledge of mankind. And what was the character of this freshly discovered world? It was a paradise, swarming with untold millions of simple inhabitants, beautiful, confiding and noble in their simplicity. It was a vast storehouse, full of the natural wealth of silver and gold, and of the natural beauties and luxuries of a most bountiful soil.

* Howitt's Colonization and Christianity, p. 21.