Lamb that dwells in the midst of the throne shall feed his people, and lead them to fountains of living waters: and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." Rev. vii. 17.

XII. Concluding observations, which may come from a review of the whole of these subjects. With such a series, it is proposed to fill up one corner of The Orthodox Presbyterian, from month to month, during the present year; and the subjects, it is hoped, will be neither unentertaining nor unedifying. They will afford suitable reading for a sabbath evening. And that we may be enabled to write so as to be faithful, and their readers to peruse our pages so as to promote their edification, is our earnest prayer to God, who alone can command the blessing.

PRESBYTERIAN LAITY.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE ORTHODOX PRESBYTERIAN. SIR,

FOR several years I had looked with deep and painful interest on the discussions that distracted the Synod of Ulster. No one, I believe, acquainted with its past history, and a friend to genuine religion, can avoid feeling, that for many years previous to these discussions, the ardent spirit of devotion had greatly declined within its bounds. Many of the aged I have known to look back with pleasure mingled with regret on the better days of their earlier remembrances, and mourn that the spirit of religion had given place to formality and the spirit of the world. They felt, by comparing the Presbyterianism of their own times with Presbyterianism as it originally rose and flourished, under the ministry of the worthy men who propagated it in our province, that it had begun to degenerate; and that the spirit of lukewarmness was making gradual advances, and threatening to lull into the slumber of death every feeling of religious ardour that still lingered in the land. Their feelings, in such times, must have been similar to those of the captive Israelites, when they sat by Babel's streams, and wept over the ruins of their country and their church. How then must those who yet survive, after having mourned over the decay of piety, be cheered to witness the revival of religion in our times? They rejoice to look round upon their country and see the le

thargy of more than a century shaken off, and the Ministers of our church roused to exertion for the restoration of its purity. In this they recognize the work of God; and while they send up their most fervent aspirations of gratitude for what He has done, they earnestly pray that He will not forsake his own work,—that He will bless it in its commencement, and conduct it to a happy issue.

Still that much is yet to be done among us, must be evident to every one in any tolerable degree acquainted with the religious state of the laity of our church. Even *when a boy, I had observation sufficient to convince me that we were defective in the performance of our religious duties. I knew from my Bible that a Christian must be a man of prayer, and that what was enjoined as the exercise of private devotion, was also enjoined as the exercise of families and of all Christian societies.-I knew that parents were bound to bring up their children in the way of truth and godliness, both by the direct inculcation of Scripture precepts, and by their own unvarying example; but I found in the circle of my acquaintance few indeed whose walk and conversation bore testimony to their fulfilment of these duties. Seldom did I find the family circle made a scene of social devotion. The records of brighter eras in the history of our religion, informed me that it was not always so. I saw that we had degenerated from the fervid feelings and unostentatious practical piety of our fathers; and in the enthusiasm of my early zeal, I have been almost tempted to look on the persecuted Presbyterians of Scotland, as a favoured and happy people, compared with the lukewarm and worldly-minded Presbyterians of our own times. I knew that they had bequeathed to us the fair form of our religion, organized by wholesome scriptural discipline, and animated by holy zeal; but I saw that while the skeleton of the system remained, the soul-the heaven-born principle that gave life and beauty was not there.

Presbyterianism, as it was planted, and as it long continued to spread in Ulster, was the external bond of union among those whose hearts were more strongly united by love to the Lord Jesus. Persecuted by the men of power, they shrunk not from their frown, nor deviated from the path of duty. Persecution having failed in accomplishing its object, died away; and the church enjoying the blessings of religious liberty, rapidly extended her boun

daries. A church's welfare is not always, however, to be estimated by outward prosperity, nor by the number of her professors. Did we make these the data of our judgment, we would often be led to pronounce her state prosperous, and to exult in her health and vigour; while a better knowledge of her interior state would show us that these flattering appearances too frequently resemble the deceitful smile of health, that flushes the countenance of the victim of decay. It was thus with Christianity in the days of Constantine; and thus too it fared with the Presbyterian Church in Ulster. She grew in numbers and 'popular favour; while a spirit of lukewarmness prepared the way for a relaxation of discipline, and for the admission of corruption in doctrine. The progress of these evils was indeed slow, and much opposed by the friends of pure religion; but it accelerated with their duration, until it threatened to prove like the leaven, which when once introduced, leavens the whole lump. Laxity of discipline made way for the preaching of erroneous doctrines; and the preachers of such doctrines were naturally opposed to that strict discipline, an adherence to which would have excluded them from the church.

Such were the origin and progress of error among the spiritual guides of the people; and that indifference to religion, which had already diffused itself among the people, prepared them to swallow it with greediness. There were still indeed many-perhaps a great majoritywho held the truth in its purity-who were not unacquainted with vital godliness-and who consequently would not have suffered any open attack to be made on the fundamental articles of their faith, without meeting it with the most determined opposition. Accordingly, preachers, whose religious opinions differed from those of their church, were cautious in introducing their peculiar tenets. They avoided preaching on doctrinal points, and dwelt almost exclusively on the mere morality of the Gospel. They spoke of holiness, without describing its nature, or pointing their hearers to the only source whence genuine holiness can spring. In congregations where this kind of preaching formed almost the only spiritual instruction of the people, it could not fail to introduce a deplorable ignorance of the Scriptures; and this is inseparable from an indifference to the blessed truths which they reveal. Hence when heterodox clergymen had suf

fered their people to become ignorant of truth, they could proceed with more boldness to the direct inculcation of error. Thus by the unfaithfulness of those who were placed over the people to instruct and establish them in the truth, were Arianism and Socinianism introduced,the prevalence of which we have still reason to deplore.

When such was the state of religion in our churchwhen many of our Ministers were opposed to the fundamental doctrines of Christianity-when the people had become lamentably deficient in the practice of religious duties-when our church had thus a name to live-while all that could ennoble a church was by many of her members forsaken or despised-and while growing infidelity triumphed over the drooping state of our religion, were no faithful servants of the Redeemer found to stem the torrent of error and immorality, that was undermining the goodly fabric of our religious system? Yes: the evils of which I complain, though widely prevalent, were not universal. The greater number of the Ministers still acknowledged the truth, and proclaimed it to the people. Their defect lay not in forsaking the truth; but in their neglecting to defend it from the encroachments of its enemies. It seems that they suspected not the growth of error until its advocates began to boast of their numbers and their power. Then indeed the Ministers who knew and valued and inculcated the truth, became alarmed for the honour of our Zion. Some of the most eloquent and fearless among them stood forward in defence of their great Master's cause, and opposed the march of the giant error, with a firmness and a zeal which drew upon them the odium, and the calumny, and the undying hatred of their opponents; but which will for ever endear their names to the friends of truth and godliness.

Thus commenced that revival of religion which is now spreading in the Synod of Ulster. Its Orthodox Ministers determined no longer to permit the spiritual rights of themselves and their people to be violated by men who openly denied all that they had learned to recognize as truth, or who, not daring openly to declare themselves opposers of her doctrines, retained their congregations by a continued concealment of their sentiments. Hence arose the violent and protracted discussions which disturbed several meetings of the Synod-which produced much angry feeling, and destroyed the harmony that should

pervade Christian assemblies; but which terminated in the late separation of the Arians and Socinians from the Orthodox members of the body.

Having thus briefly sketched the progress of the decline and revival of religion in the Synod, I shall endeavour to point out and illustrate some of the duties of the laity at all times; but chiefly at times like the present. The Ministers, we have already seen, are in the field, and actively employed in rebuilding the dilapidated walls of our church. To them I deem it necessary only to say, "Proceed as you have begun. You are indeed inadequate to the work, but it is the Lord's, and he will give it abun dant success in the hands of his servants." My chief design in these remarks is to offer some hints that may be useful to the people in rousing their latent zeal, and in leading them to attach a due importance to their privileges, and to co-operate with their pastors more vigorously than they have yet done in the work of reformation.

The people have indeed shown that they feel a deep interest in the contest between truth and error. They have not looked on with cool unconcern while their most active Ministers have been struggling for the restoration of their church's purity. Those congregations in particular that long pined under a heterodox ministry, have proved, by their withdrawing from such ministry, that though they felt respect for the persons of their Ministers, their attachment to truth was still greater. It gives me sincere pleasure to be able thus publicly to praise them for unshaken adherence to their religious principles. I rejoice that the blighting influence of a system of preaching, in which the doctrines of the Redeemer's deity and atonement, and of justification by faith in Him, were either overlooked or vilified, has not been able to seduce them from the faith; but that the great majority of those placed in such circumstances have still retained a respect for the doctrines and discipline which we received from our Scottish forefathers,-persuaded that they prize these doctrines, not merely because our persecuted ancestors held them, but because they are derived from the source of immutable truth. Above all, I adore the goodness of Almighty God who has acknowledged the cause that is his own, by preserving it in situations in which human depravity and the pride of erring reason combined to eradicate it from the minds of men. In the firm adherence