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VOICES FROM THE THRONE; 
 
 "H, 
 
 GOD'S CAIiLS TO FAITH AND OBEDIENCE. 
 
 DV 
 
 A 
 
 REV. JAMES COOKK SEYMOUR, 
 
 Author of " Thf Kicer o/ Lift." 
 
 ^fa®^ 
 
 TORONTO: 
 
 METHODIST BOOK AN[) ITIUJSHIXG HOUSE, 
 
 78 * 8i KIN(; STRKKT |.;\.ST, 
 
 1881. 
 
% 
 
 I 
 
A WORD OF EXPLANATION. 
 
 -25- 
 
 ^^HE iiiiii of tliis little lidok is to iticscnt, in as rloar, 
 "^ coiMincliciisivc, and fonihlc iimnntT as I could, and 
 in a connected and very luief form, the ^Mcat salvational 
 truths of the (iospel, and some of tli(! stronj,'est motives to 
 a lile of faith antl earnest, active piety. Some of the chiof 
 forms of error now prevalent, and some of the principal 
 dangers and duties of the Clniri'li at the pr.'sent time, are 
 kept in view all alon<,^ In a word, I have written this 
 book to helj) to save souls, to arouse the peo[tle of God to 
 greater holiness imd usefulness (myself among the rest), and 
 to glorify ( Jod. , 
 
 I dedicate it to the I.oiU), and fervently pray that Ho may 
 bless it to every one who may read it. 
 
 JAMES ('. SEYMOUR. 
 
 Markham, February, 1881. 
 
C()NTi;.\TS. 
 
 I. TlIK CHKAT KIN(i 7 
 
 H. WOIILDS OX WORLDS i«j 
 
 III. Tin; OVKHSIIADOWINC I'KKSKNcK '2^ 
 
 IV.— THK KiNCS SOX -.ii 
 
 V. TH K « i i! KAT It KVOLL'TION ..... , h 
 
 VI. lifk;s thtk aim tjo 
 
 Vn.~ THE SALVATION AH.MV 74 
 
 VIIL TlIK IICSII (>K TLMK 87 
 
 IX. TIIK DAV OF |)(K».M pr. 
 
 X.-~-I)EKrs OF WOK 10.-, 
 
 XI. TlIK LAND OF I'.LISS 117 
 
 X 1 1 -STHAN( ; i: i; kfi( ; ks 125 
 
 XIII.-WELCOME FOK ALL 139 
 
s^ 
 
 VOICES FROM Tin; THRONE. 
 
 CHAPTKK 1. 
 
 THE OKEAT KlSd. 
 
 VKRV unlA'licver in <'nn\ ami tin- Hil»K', 
 lias a cretMl of liis own : and it" a cit't'il 
 is wanted tliat is terril»iy ilo^niiatic. 
 and tt>iTil)lv liai'd to Indii'V*-, anyol' tlir 
 intid(!l cieeds — and tli«'ir name is legion 
 — will serve tlie purpose. 
 It may l>e hard to Ixdicve that tlirre is a (Jod, 
 but it is a million times harder to helieve that 
 there is none. It is ahout as difKcult to accept 
 the doctrines of our modern A^'nostic material- 
 ists. These Agnostics — know-notlnng people — 
 who, when it conies to believing in a Personal 
 God, pretend they know nothing, and can know 
 
IJt' •*'■ 
 
 V(»|( i;s FkoM TIIF. rHI{(>NK. 
 
 !ii 
 
 notlnnj^- ; y»'t, in i«'s|)L'ct to tliuir own niutciial- 
 istic ideas, ihv.y aw no longer Ajjiiostics, l»ut 
 Ovodics, who picti'ii 1 to know nearly cvcrv- 
 tliinj,^ an<l insist on tlio acc.e|ttanc(' of tlioir set 
 of (loetrinrs to tlieexelusion of all otlieis. Look 
 at sonie of tlir articles in tlir Kvohitionist creed. 
 Our Ai;-nostic (lo^iiiatists insist tliat physical 
 facts are the only facts in all the universe; tliat 
 are woi'thy of tlu' least consideration, if theie 
 ai'e any facts in mental phenomena, oi- in the 
 spiritual and r(.'ligious history and experience of 
 mankind, they are not worth noticin;^'. Tliey 
 are quite certain that tliere is no sucli ihiny as 
 free-will or choice of action on the part of man 
 — all his actions, whether of mind or hody, are 
 undei' tlie same physical law of necessity tliat 
 makes a stone fall to the earth, or two ^ases 
 cliemically unite. Tliev re«iuire us to believe 
 that there is no such thing in nature as intelli- 
 gent design ; as, for instance, the eye was never 
 madi' to see nor the ear to hear. The or«lei", nv- 
 rangement and adaptation that we see, iniply no 
 such thing as design, pui-pose or plan. All has 
 come by matter working itself out in "fortuitous 
 variation." Furthermore, as the main plank in 
 their d<jctrinal platfoini, that there is nothing in 
 the structure, arrangement, and government of 
 
I'»n; (iUKAT KlNf;. 
 
 th»' pliysical universr, or in the ro^^non of mental, 
 moral un<l spiritual phenomena, tliat re<juiivs or 
 even indieates tlie existence of a supreme intel- 
 lii'ence. If Me exists, He has «riven no sij^n of 
 it — H«' is Unknown : an<l it is impossihle for 
 man to appreciate His existence — foi* He is Un- 
 knowahle. 
 
 These wise philosopliers assure us, tliat proto- 
 plasmic slime, or some original elements of mat- 
 ter, have evolved or made all the forms of heing 
 we know anvthin*^ of — material, mental, morr,.', 
 
 »' ~ lit 
 
 or spiritual : and this is accomplished hy the 
 very simple and easily understood () process of 
 nuitter chaiii-in'^ itself from " incoherent liomo- 
 geniety, to coherent heterogenity, through con- 
 tinuous diti'erentiations." 
 
 And finally, the Agnostic is (piite positive that 
 this wonderful slime, which has worked such 
 marvels, has in it such " potency and promise " 
 of unheard-of things yet, that the world need 
 not trouble itself much about the evidence of 
 any connected chain of indisputable facts, run- 
 ning up to the beginning of things, but can rest 
 assured of the truth of all these doctrines, 
 chieHy on the authority of the emphatic asser- 
 tions of the Agnostics themselves. 
 
 Talk about doL'uiatism after this I Wliere 
 
10 
 
 VOICES FROM THK THl{(hNK, 
 
 could tliere be found doctrines more thoroughly 
 irrational and ai)siird than tliese — so scjuarcly 
 contradictoi'y of unii\iesti()iia])le facts — so infi- 
 nitely difficult to believe, and which confiont 
 the human intellect with such tyrannical and 
 outrageous demands ? 
 
 Likewise, every infidel system that rejects the 
 Bible, necessarily and imperiously insists on our 
 faith in some such domnas as the followiniij : — 
 That God has left mankind from the first with- 
 out any revelation of truth and duty — any dis- 
 covery of man's true nature and destiny, or of 
 God's will, such as the Bible and the Bible alone 
 contains — that the Bible-writers were conscious 
 deceivers and impostors, or dreamy enthusiasts 
 — that the so-called facts of Scripture, are no 
 facts at all, but forgeries or fancies — that the 
 precepts of the Bible, though the purest and 
 most sublime ever delivered to mankind, are only 
 an impious frau<l — that although the Scripture- 
 writers knew, or ought to have known, the 
 fraudulent nature of their teachings, yet they 
 strangely acted in harmony with them all their 
 after lives, and that often amitlst the most 
 terrible sufferincjs — that althouo^h over fifteen 
 hundred years were occupied in writing the 
 Bible, and every imaginable facility existed for 
 
THE GREAT KING. 
 
 11 
 
 the exposure of its fraudulent character, yet the 
 fraud was never found out all that time ; and 
 although for eighteen centuries more, every kind 
 of investigation has been going on by friends 
 and foes alike, the sham has not been exposed 
 yet, but still continues to deceive the vast ma- 
 jority of the most enlightened nations of man- 
 kind. That although the influence of the Bible, 
 more than all other influences combined, has 
 purified human character and human society, 
 yet it is nothing after all but a piece of decep- 
 tion, and the most gigantic imposture, too, that 
 ever was in the world, as it comes in the name 
 of God, and deals decisively with every conceiv- 
 able human interest for this life and the next. 
 And all this, it is insisted, shall be believed, 
 without any adei^uate proof whatever ; but 
 chiefly because these wise philosophers themselves 
 authorize us to believe; their own boM and 
 vehement assertions beintr the chief, if not the 
 only foundation, they are al)le to give us for our 
 faith. 
 
 To ])e capable of accepting as true any such 
 preposterous dogmas, betrays a capacity for 
 credulity not easily measured. Any one infidel 
 doctrine of the sort puts a strain on the believ- 
 ing powers of the mind immeasurably more 
 
12 
 
 VOICES FROxM THE THRONE. 
 
 severe than can ever be required in accepting 
 the whole tliat is ever asked for the inspired 
 truth and authority of the Scriptures. 
 
 It is not pretended that the believer in God 
 and in the Bible may never encounter difficulties 
 — nor is it anything to l»e wondere<l at if he 
 does — but all his difficulties are but arit-hills 
 that can be reasonably and honourably sur- 
 mounted ; but those of the Atheist and Intide! 
 are Alpine mountains that can only be scaled by 
 the abnegation of reason itself, and the adoption 
 of endless inconsistencies and the most gigantic 
 absurdities. 
 
 There is, indeed, one living and true (iod ; but 
 it is a remarkal)le fact, that there is no attempt 
 made in the Holy Scriptures to furnish an ex- 
 haustive account of the Divine Being. 
 
 God is presented to us as a Being, of whom 
 we may know something; but whom, with our 
 present faculties, w^e cannot fully compiehend. 
 This is reasonable, for it is clear that finite minds, 
 like ours, could not possibly fathom an infinite 
 mind like His. This, at once, lifts our conception 
 of the Divine nature and glory \'astly above all 
 the ideas of God as reflected in the heathen 
 mythologies, ancient or modern. The notion of 
 God in all these is essentially human. He is 
 
 rii I 
 
THE GREAT KTNCJ. 
 
 1 •"» 
 lo 
 
 for the most part, the impersonation of luinian 
 nature, and often in its greatest weaknesses and 
 hlackest vices. 
 
 The Scriptural idea of God is something grand 
 and sul)lime in the highest degree. His very 
 names are a revelation of infinite greatness and 
 glory. God is the great 1 AM, self-existing, ab- 
 solutely independent, all-sufficient in Himself, 
 unchangeable and eternal. He is Jehovah — the 
 Being alone in whom the essential idea of the 
 highest existence concentrates. The Almighty, 
 whose power knows no limit. The (h-eator, who 
 alone is the originating cause of the universe, 
 and all it contains. The Lord, the adorable 
 Being by whom all things consist, the foundatiim 
 that sustains all matter and all mind. The Most 
 High, the only Potentate, supreme above all 
 beings and all things. 
 
 God is an infinite Spirit, whose presence is 
 everywhere, who never had a beginning, whose 
 duration can never end, and whose nature is al)- 
 solutely and eternally unchangeable. His in- 
 finite mind comprehends all things, and His 
 wisdom can never err. His purity is absolutely 
 perfect, His majesty unspeakably glorious, and 
 His bliss without measure oi- limit. But this 
 wonderful Being, concerning whom such over- 
 
14 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 powering thoughts are revealed, is further pre- 
 sented to us in the sweet light of a Father, a 
 Redeemer, a Saviour, a Comforter, a Friend. All 
 these inconceivably great and tremendous attri- 
 butes are exercised, in respect to us, with a 
 justice which can show no partiality, a faithful- 
 ness and truth which can never swerve, a long- 
 suffering and forbearance which endures to the 
 last extremity, a generous bountifulness which 
 ever deals with lavish hand, a goodness that 
 embraces every need and every needy thing, a 
 mercy that ever melts into boundless streams of 
 compassion, and a Love that ever rules with 
 Imperial tenderness and aL-conquering sway, in 
 all the amplitude of that eternal Heart. The 
 very ability to conceive such thoughts as these 
 is the highest glory of mind itself. It lifts men, 
 even the meanest savages, immeasurably above 
 the most intelligent of the brute creation who 
 are incapable of such thoughts, and above the 
 most cultured sages of heathenism in any age, 
 who never knew such a God as this. 
 
 The thought of such a glorious God acts like 
 the sun shining on the dark corners of the earth. 
 It sheds most precious light on a thousand dark 
 problems, which otherwise must lie hidden in 
 inextricable and confounding mystery. It har- 
 
THE (J HEAT KING. 
 
 15 
 
 monizes with, and overtops, the most expanded 
 notions we have, or ever can have, of the mag- 
 nificence of the physical universe, it is just the 
 field where mind can find the most satisfying 
 exercise of its loftiest soarings, and profoundest 
 searchings, and it is above all things, just what 
 man's heart needs in its unutterable and irrepres- 
 sible yearnings. All our wealth — intellectual, 
 moral, spiritual — concentrates in that infinitely, 
 precious word — God. That word wakes the glad 
 symphonies of the heavenly throng. It is a melo- 
 dious joy that resounds, as nothing else can, in 
 millions of human souls, and it will yet call forth 
 the responsive outbursts of praise, foreseen in the 
 Apocalyptic vision — " And every creature which 
 is in the heaven, and on the earth, and under the 
 earth, and such as are in the sea, heard I saying, 
 ' blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be 
 unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto 
 the Lamb for ever and ever.' " 
 
i 
 
 CHAPTKR ][. 
 
 WORLDS OX WORr.DS, 
 
 REATION is a revfilation of God. It 
 reveals God in His works, as the Bible 
 reveals Him in His Word. The one 
 shows us His hand, the othei* His 
 heart. These are two sister-revela- 
 tions — or rather they are husband and 
 wife, whom God Himself hath joined together 
 in one. They must not be — they cannot be sun- 
 dered or set against each other. There can be 
 no real contiict of testimony concernini' God, be- 
 tween the true facts of iiature, and the true 
 teaching of Scripture. Conflicting testimony, 
 in appearance, has often l)een paraded, but it is 
 always the offspring of ignorance an<l j^'rversity 
 — and ever will be. 
 
 Were it possible for men to search out fully the 
 
 I 
 
WOKLDS ON' WORLDS. 
 
 17 
 
 real facts of natural science, and to understand 
 fully what the Word of God really does teach, 
 there would be the blending of the most magnifi- 
 cent and harmonious light, not a ray of w^hich 
 would fail to illuniinate to us the glories of the 
 Godhead. Neither should we be discouraged in 
 prosecuting so difficult, but so noble a search as 
 this. What marvellous progress has been made, 
 ev^en within a century or two, in the knowledge 
 and elucidation of the Scriptures ! These deep 
 mines of eternal truth have yielded stores of 
 treasure to the enterprising and courageous 
 toilers of these later times, quite unknown to 
 the generations of the past. So also in natural 
 science. Men of science, who after all, are but 
 the prophets of God, working in the sphere 
 assigned them by the Great Master, have pene- 
 trated deep into the mysteries of nature, and 
 with a boldness, persistency, and success, wor- 
 thy of the highest admiration, have enormously 
 enlarged our knowledge of the physical universe. 
 And with what result has this twofold investi- 
 gation been going on ? There is not a thoroughly 
 established fact in natural science but is in 
 agreement with the thoroughly understood 
 teachings of the Bible. And as these two lines 
 of independent, and, on the whole, honest en- 
 
18 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 fU 
 
 quiry will be pursued — and they will be, with 
 ever intensifying keenness — may we not predict 
 for future generations that these labours of 
 friends and foes alike, will, in the end but greatly 
 enlarge, and render far more just and right 
 men's views of the ever-blessed God ? We be- 
 lieve it will be so. 
 
 We must not measure God by what we see 
 of Him in nature, any more than by what we 
 read of Him in Scripture. They are both but 
 imperfect and partial revelations of God. In the 
 Bible, God has told us only something of Him- 
 self — in creation He has show^n us only something 
 of Himself. We may well believe that God's 
 power certainly could make far greater worlds 
 than either the eye or telescope of man can dis- 
 cover. His skill could devise far more lovely and 
 complex forms of being than any that exist. His 
 all-seeing eye reaches behind all worlds and all 
 space itself. His goodness could develop far 
 brighter illustrations than any the physical uni- 
 verse now contains. Not only could all this be 
 but it is not unlikely that it may be. And yet 
 the views of God, as seen in His creative works, 
 are glorious indeed. The grandeur of God's 
 thoughts impresses us in the extent of these 
 wonderful works. What countless worlds are 
 
 n 
 
WORLDS ON WORLDS. 
 
 19 
 
 scattered through space ! Who can imagine 
 their splendour, their magnitude, the extent of 
 space they fill ! Every year, we approach some 
 of these worlds nearly 200 millions of miles, and 
 they are no larger in appearance ; we recede 
 that distance from theui, and they appear no 
 less. What suns and systems s])read themselves 
 before our naked eye ; but what vaster ones 
 there doubtless are, whose light travelling on 
 from the beginning, has never reached us yet ! 
 Our earth itself, but an atom — a speck in this 
 mighty congregation of spheres — yet is the 
 grandeur of God everywhere written on its 
 l)row. In the streaming light, the swelling 
 mountains, the sweeping winds, the resounding 
 ocean, the flowing rivers, the waving forests, 
 the wide-spread plains. W^hat a notion of the 
 power of God is in the thought that, at His 
 word, this earth and all those starry worlds 
 sprang into existence ? He spake, and it was 
 done. He commands, and they still stand fast ; 
 each held firm in its existence, and in its pro- 
 per path of duty, by His simple will. The 
 beauty of God is reflected in the loveliness of 
 the light, the charm of the lan<lscape, the flash 
 of the gem ; in the diversified forms of animal 
 and vegetable life, where are some, like the 
 
20 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 .11 ' 
 
 bounding antelope, whose movements are grace 
 itself ; or the blushing rose, or gorgeous lily, 
 whose adorning surpassed that of King Solo 
 mon in all his glory. The .skill of God is seen 
 not oidy in the vast framework of nature — in 
 the construction, disposition, arrangement and 
 harmonious working of the mightiest worlds — 
 but in th(; very same things, as seen in the 
 humblest insect or lowliest vegetable. And what 
 wisdom is everywhere manifest ! God has made 
 nothing in vain. There is not a world in the 
 universe but has its special place to occupy, 
 and specific purpose to fulfil ; neither is there 
 a blade of grass nor a grain of sand. Every- 
 where, too, there are evidences of the opera- 
 tion of One, and of only one Supreme mind. 
 These are seen, not in a dull and monotonous 
 uniformity — but in an essential unity — pre- 
 .served amidst an ever-varying and boundless 
 variety. And through all, there shine forth the 
 unmistakable signs of an intentional goodness — 
 the benevolent purposes of God. It might have 
 been a pain for the eye to see, the ear to hear, 
 or the limb to move ; but God has made them 
 pleasures. The light does not rush from 
 the heavens bringing the glare of noonday 
 in an instant, but steals upon us, soft and 
 
WORLDS ON WORLDS. 
 
 21 
 
 tender as a mother's kiss, Th«' air carries 
 into the lim^^s, not streamlets of noxious 
 gases, but of vivifying oxygen. Tlie I'ivers pur- 
 sue the ocean, tracing their pathway in verrhire 
 and fertility. The wi<lespread ocean is kept 
 bright and pure iiy striving winrls and sporting 
 waves. The beasts for th«* most part an* liarm- 
 lessand useful — it is only tlie few tliat resemble 
 the venemous reptile or tn-acherous tiger. The 
 trees and herbs that are poisonous are scarce ; 
 while the earth is clothed with vegetation, grate- 
 ful to the eye, giving delightful shade, and 
 affording nutritious and pleasant food. The 
 mountains are not generally belching volcanoes, 
 but the peaceful and nurturing homes of the 
 w^orld's rivers of life. The earth itself is firm 
 beneath our feet, and not, as it might have been, 
 forever trembling in the convulsions of earth- 
 quakes. It is the goodness of God that has 
 made such benevolent arrangeinents in nature — 
 the goodness of Him " whose mercy is over all 
 His works." But it is in man himself wx dis- 
 cover the brightest revelation of God as seen in 
 His creative works. Man is a .sort of universe 
 in himself, and in some respects a greater uni- 
 verse than the world of nature. Even his bodily 
 frame is the most wonderful mechanism of the 
 
22 
 
 VOICES FROM THE TTfRONK. 
 
 rf 
 
 ffii ! 
 
 Divine hand. There is no form of majesty and 
 beauty in this world that will bear the least 
 comparison with the foiin and face of man. 
 Even oiw most exalted conceptions and imagin- 
 ings of heavenly forms, are all based on the model 
 of the human body ; but his body is nothing to 
 his mind. This is the image and likeness of 
 God. By this he is linked with the higher and 
 the highest intelligences. By this God has en- 
 throned him as the lord of nature, and by this 
 his conquests over the forces of matter are 
 achieved and maintained. That mighty donunion 
 of mind we have seen vastly extended, even in 
 our own time, in the subjugation of the power of 
 steam, which man has hitched to the car of the 
 world's commerce ; in the capture of the light- 
 ning flash, which obediently wafts man's v/ishes 
 to the furthest ends of the earth ; in the perfecting 
 of that greatest marvel of all — the printing-press 
 — by which the thoughts of one man's soul, in a 
 few hours, may be imprinted on the souls of 
 millions with more than sun-painted accuracy. 
 Neither may we doubt that future generations 
 will witness far greater discoveries and improve- 
 ments than we have ever known ; since the 
 march of mind, like the course of a great river, 
 flows ever increasingly onward. Neither must we 
 
WORLDS OX WORLDS. 
 
 2.S 
 
 forget that man is not now what he once was. 
 His normal condition of power and glory, when 
 lie came from his Maker's hand, has largely faded 
 away. Sin has impoverished and ruined him, 
 yet he is great .still, even in his ruins — 
 as many remains of the mighty cities and em- 
 pires of old are great still, though their original 
 .splendour has long passed away. The glory of the 
 Great Architect of the universe is further seen in 
 what mu.st be after all the chief object of crea- 
 tion. It cannot be t^ at to .show forth the Divine 
 character for God's own sake, He made the 
 worlds — for that was unneces.sary ; but for the 
 sake of His intelligent creatures, for whom it 
 was necessary. God has graciously condescended 
 to share the joys of being with His creatures, 
 but He desires to complete their happiness by 
 teaching them His own glorious nature and 
 character. The Bible teaches us that this world 
 was made for man — and it is evident it was so. 
 Everytliing goes to show that this world is the 
 cradle of man's existence — the school where he 
 is to receive his elementary instruction and ex- 
 perience in regard to his great Father in heaven, 
 and a preparation for a future and higher life. 
 This view of the subject casts a still richer and 
 more glorious light on God's creative works. 
 
24 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 U :'i 
 
 Mark what a history reveals itself ! A true evo- 
 lution by far more majestic than any our modern 
 philosophei'.-; have spoken of. Here we see why 
 God did not l)rin<:f man into heincj soonei' — the 
 home of the infaiicy of his existence was not 
 ready for liim. It needed those processes of pre- 
 paration so hriefly yet so comprehensively 
 sketched in the first chapter of Genesis. Ele- 
 mentary matter, under the forming Hand of its 
 Great Creator, needed to be brought into con- 
 sistence and shape, and the great outlines of our 
 mundane system established. The first and 
 lowest forms of life — the foundation and support, 
 as it were, of all the rest, e(hiced ; the lights set 
 up as regulators of times and seasons. The higher 
 forms of animal life in the ocean and on the 
 land called into being ; and not until the early 
 and terrific revolutions by which the earth's 
 crust was formed, had subsided ; not until the 
 earth was fully stocked with all necessary living 
 things and the whole furniture, so to speak, 
 placed in the home, was man called to occupy 
 it. 
 
 His occupancy of earth during the whole 
 period of time will be but a brief stage in the 
 progress that will still lead to higher development 
 of excellence, not only in man himself, but in the 
 
WORLDS OX WOIU.DS. 
 
 25 
 
 material universe ; and thus God works out for 
 the world, from elementary beginnings, a career 
 of constant and glorious progression, keeping 
 ever in view, the wisest and noblest of ends, and 
 leading upwards to an altitude of splendour and 
 glory, which imagination pictures in wain. 
 
 Oh, as we tread the hallowed courts of God's 
 great Temple, ]ot it be with a reverent step ; let 
 everything speak to us, as it surely is meant to 
 do, of the High and Holy One, in the presence 
 of wdiose works we stand ; and as our hearts 
 throb with adoring love, let us with the hea^'enly 
 worshippers break forth in joyous ascriptions 
 of praise — " Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive 
 glory and honour and power. For Thou hast 
 created all things, and for Thy pleasure they 
 are, and were created." 
 
 -^.' 
 
-^— 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE OVERSHADOWING PRESENCE. 
 
 HE Word of God declares that " God 
 hatli prepared His throne in the 
 heavens, and His Kingdom ruleth over 
 (dl ;" and to suppose anything else 
 would be incredible. To suppose that 
 God created all things and afterwards 
 left everything to itself, would imply that matter 
 possesses inherent powers of self-control and 
 adaptation, and the very highest moral qualities 
 that distinguish the Eternal Mind itself ; it would 
 imply the gravest rejection on the character 
 of God Himself as less reasonable and careful 
 than the creatures He has made ; it would imply 
 that the universe, where everything strikingly 
 exhibits the presence of order, arrangement, and 
 unity of purpose, was conducted without the 
 
THE OVERSHADOWIXG PRESENCE. 
 
 27 
 
 slightest reference to these things, or by a blind 
 chance, which either means that there is some 
 sort of irregular superintending Power, or it 
 means nothing at all. 
 
 How God conducts the affairs of the uni- 
 verse may be an interesting enquiry ; but it 
 is not so essential as that He does do it. That 
 there are laws which He himself has established, 
 and by which He works, is in harmony with the 
 intelligence and wisdom of His own nature ; 
 but that He is inexorably bound by those laws 
 and can never set them aside for any purpose, 
 however great or beneficent, would be to make 
 His own laws a greater power in the universe 
 than He is Himself. 
 
 This providential oversight of God is all- 
 embracing. It extends equally to the passage of a 
 planet through space, and the flight of a bird 
 through the air — to the regulation of an angel's 
 mission, and the life-work of a bee. It weighs 
 the mountains in scales, and the hills in a 
 balance, and every mote in the sunbeam as well. 
 It watches ceaselessly over the interests of the 
 highest archangels, and etjually so over the low- 
 liest reptiles. It shapes the history and destiny 
 of nations, and holds in control the least, as well 
 as the greatest, affairs of individual men. That 
 
28 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 loving oversight of our Father above feeds the 
 sparrows and watches their fall, and it counts 
 the very hairs in the l)eliGver's head, the sighs 
 that escape his heart, the tears of sorrow that 
 fall from his eyes ; it takes cognizance of all 
 his wants, and makes ample provision for their 
 supply. 
 
 That there are "niystevies in God .5 providen- 
 tial management is undeniable, and it would be 
 more marvellous still if there were none. The 
 unsearchableness of God, whether in His nature 
 or His conduct, accounts sufficiently for the 
 greatest mysteries that may occur in any and in 
 every field of obsi.Tvation, If we could find out 
 God to perfection, we could solve all the mys- 
 teries in the universe ; but until we can do that, 
 we must be content to dwell in the presence of 
 a great many mysteries. If we bear in mind 
 that the great thing in this life is our moral 
 renovation and discipline and education, in view 
 of an eternal life beyond, and that this is to be 
 completed within the very short time we are 
 permitted to stay here, it will help to explain a 
 great many otherwise mysterious providences. 
 We must remember that God has endowed us 
 with faculties developed just so far as suits a 
 state of trial or probation. Our outward cir- 
 
THE OVERSHADOWING PRESENCE. 
 
 29 
 
 cumstances are likewise specially adapted to 
 such a condition The Bible itself is but a 
 revelation expressly adapted to beings whose in- 
 tellectual and moral nature is imperfect, and in 
 course of training for a far nobler and more 
 perfected state of existence. Our position in 
 relation to the material universe is the same. 
 We have no faculties for investigating more than 
 a limited area of God's great works and ways, 
 and if we had these faculties we could not use 
 them. We dwell in a corner of the universe, 
 and like a man in a valley, the view from our 
 point of observation is necessarily circumscribed 
 and partial. At best, we can only know in part. 
 We see a portion of God's administrative schemes 
 which date back thousands of years before we 
 were born, and which will yet require probably 
 thousands of years more before they are fully 
 ripened. It is not possible — it is not necessary 
 — we should now comprehend all the great and 
 wonderful purposes of (Jod, which are designed 
 to run throughout the whole course of His ad- 
 ministration, and which are included in the life 
 and experience of every individual ; but it is of 
 prime importance to us to learn and practise 
 that trust in God's wisdom and love, so befitting 
 
30 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 .1 % 
 
 I- lili 
 
 'm ^^ 
 
 i ! 
 
 our present state of trial, and so indispensable 
 to our eternal happiness. 
 
 There are doubtless many things charged to 
 the inscrutable ways of God which more truly 
 ought to be set to the account of the wilful 
 ignorance and wicked perversity of man. There 
 are many so-called mysterious dispensations that 
 are no mysteries at all, but can be easily ac- 
 counted for on rational and moral grounds. 
 There are things mysterious to us in youth, whose 
 explanation God makes clear enough to v.s when 
 we get older ; and by-and-by in heaven God will 
 pour celestial light on our darkest and most 
 pci'plexing problem ;. 
 
 Even our limited knowledge and observation 
 on earth teaches us how wisely and righteously 
 (iod does truly govern all things. It is impos- 
 sible not to see all around us, ten thousand signs 
 of the operation of a wise and benevolent 
 Superintending Providence. On no other prin- 
 ciple whatever can we account for the regularity 
 of the seasons, the j^eriodical supply of food, the 
 inter-dependence of creatures on each other, the 
 continuance and preservation of the weakest 
 forms of life, and multitudes of phenomena 
 obsorvable everywhere, all bearing the same 
 i i>- . ny, . ,. 
 
THE overshadowtnt; presence. 
 
 31 
 
 What, too, is the history of nations, but chiefly 
 the expansion of God's ideas and plans in the 
 government of the world. I'hey have been 
 raised up, or permitted to be, for purposes of 
 instruction, or warning, or liojje, to other genera- 
 tions and ages ; and when their specific purpose 
 has been fulfilled, they have been succeeded by 
 others, whose existence and work may have been 
 for widely difierent ends, but equally useful in 
 the general designs of the Great Administrator 
 of all. 
 
 And thus standing, as we do to-day, on the 
 favored mount of observation, we can prolong 
 our vision backward through those thousands of 
 years that are past, and see through all those 
 vast changes a steady current of good things 
 towards us, and enriching us, on whom the ends 
 of the earth have come, with far greater trea- 
 sures of knowledge, and Avisdom, and incentives 
 to duty, than any generations ever before [)os- 
 sessed. So, also, within the still narrower circle 
 of our own brief lives, how much can we discov- 
 er to vindicate God's dealings with us ^ Who of 
 us can recount the daily mercies of the long past 
 — the years of health — the full supplies of bread 
 — the comforts and luxuries of our lives ^ When 
 we think of the blessings of Christian parentage ; 
 
32 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 I ■ : 
 
 of civilized life, with its sweet amenities ; of 
 Christian society, with its still sweeter converse ; 
 when we think of the perils from which we 
 have been shielded, and the pleasures we have 
 shared, and the merciful pilotage through life's 
 rough voyage, that somehow has never failed 
 us — where are we to look for the explanation of 
 it all, hut to the loving hand of God, which has 
 ever been upon us for good ? 
 
 And even those darker scenes of pain and 
 grief and suffering through which we have 
 passed, were not what they seemed — the rushing 
 upon us of ruthless foes — but the disguised visits 
 of our real friends. The providence of God has 
 transmuted the base metal of our afflictions into 
 the pure gold which we willingly place among 
 our most treasured spiritual riches. Those very 
 trials that w^ere to us so painful and so inex- 
 plicable, through the grace that sanctities, have 
 smoothed and polished us, refined and softened 
 our hearts; have made us gentler and more tender; 
 and, above all, have loosened the unlawful ties 
 that bound our hearts all too closely to this 
 world, and have drawn our souls in trustfu^ love 
 far nearer to God and heaven. 
 
 We can understand quite enough of God's 
 providential administration to justify our joyful 
 
THE OVERSHADOWlNYi PRESENCE. 33 
 
 and most undisturbed confidence in Him in 
 those things we do not understand, and which 
 He has, for the wisest reasons, left for the pre- 
 sent unexplained. 
 
 Let us delight to trust God, not in the spirit 
 of an indolent fatalism, or of a rash presump- 
 tion, but in the spirit of reverent, obedient love 
 
II 
 
 iir 
 
 
 ^^^nS6 
 
 
 U'i' 
 
 A. 
 
 ^:.ti 
 
 ^^ 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE KINGS SON. 
 
 EDEMPTION is especially a revela- 
 tion of the infinite love and mercy of 
 God. " God so loved the world, that 
 He gave His only begotten Son." 
 That there was such triumphant love 
 and tenderness in God's great heart, 
 neither creation nor Providence could at all ade- 
 quately declare ; but the story of Redemption 
 overwhelmingly does. That story carries us 
 back to the beginning, grows upon us unceas- 
 ingly through all time, and swells into an ocean 
 of eternal mercy for evermore. 
 
 The first human being came from God's crea- 
 tive hands, the perfection of beauty; the last and 
 most exquisite embodiment of God's skill, power 
 and goodness. His body w^as a form of heavenly 
 
THE KIXO's SON. 
 
 :\n 
 
 grace and majesty, his inind was the peer of 
 angels, his lieart beat with a seraphic purity and 
 love. But in one fatal hour all was changed. 
 He failed to stand the te^^t of fidelity and loyalty 
 to God wliieh had heen appointed him, as an ac- 
 countable, moral agent, and a> still within the 
 limits of his prol)ation. That violation of God's 
 command on the part of our first parents, simple 
 as it may seem, yet contained every element of 
 rebellious iincjuity. It was the deadly seed, cap- 
 able of producing all the wickedness which has 
 ever since spread through tlie world. The sun 
 of man's glory had set. Sin's fatal grasp now 
 encircled him. . Its cruel power had already 
 sealed the doom of his l>ody as the victim of the 
 loathsome dissolution of the ;n^ve. His glorious 
 intellect, it shrivelled into meanness, enveloped 
 in darkness, and perverted deeply. It kindled 
 in his heart a very hell of corruption and misery. 
 Sin, at a stroke, smote him down from his 
 throne of intellectual and moral glory and hap- 
 piness — cut him off from the favour and presence 
 of God — stamped him as the enemy of his 
 Maker — alienated from liim the friendship of all 
 the holy intelligencies of heaven — and allied him 
 to the hateful demons of tlie pit — blasted all his 
 prospects for the present or future, and left him 
 
36 
 
 VOICES FROM TFIE THRONE. 
 
 Jill 
 
 to perish, helplessly and hopelessly, in the ever 
 deepening darkness of a misery that knew 
 neither abatement nor end. 
 
 What was to be done ? And here arises the 
 mystery of mysteries. Difficulties on difficul- 
 ties here crowd upon each other, as we face 
 that terrific question, — How could God be just, 
 and yet the justifier of ungodly man ? 
 Whether the mind of men or angels will ever 
 fully sound the depths of that wisdom and love 
 wrapped up in the answer God has actually given 
 to this (question, we know not ; but there are 
 some things that seem tolerably clear to our 
 feeble powers of compreliension. To have per- 
 mitted man to suffer all the necessary results of 
 his own evil ways, might have been in accord- 
 ance with the stern demands of infinite justice, 
 but certainly not in accordance with the mercy 
 of a God, whose very nature is Love. To have 
 pardoned and passed l)y man's sin in the arbi- 
 trary exercise of the Divine prerogative of mercy, 
 would have been an exhibition of weakness, as 
 degrading to the character of God, as tlie holy 
 and righteous Monarch of the universe, as it 
 would have been disastrous in its moral effects on 
 all the intellectual beings He had made. The su- 
 preme authority of law must be preserved un- 
 
THE KINGS SON. 
 
 37 
 
 ,s 
 
 impaired, the supreme dominion of mercy must 
 have its full sway unhindered. Who will under- 
 take to fulfil these conditions of salvation ( " J," 
 said the Son of God; " J, who am rich with the 
 eternal «^dories of the Godhead, will hecome poor, 
 that fallen man may he made rich. I will stoop 
 down to wretchedness and dust, that these guilty 
 worms may rise. I will make myself of no re- 
 putation, and tak(; upoji me the form of a servant, 
 and being found in fashion as ji man, will humble 
 myself and Vu'come obedient unto death, even 
 the death of tlie cro.ss. T will die, as an atone- 
 ment for the sins of mankind- -as an expiation of 
 the I'ighteous wrath of Divine Justice. 1 will 
 sati.sfy all that infinite justice can claim. I will 
 open the Hood-gat(?s of mercy wide enough for 
 the most boundless streams of salvation to flow 
 upon the human race." That glorious ofler was 
 acccepted. And now dawned the first ray of the 
 light of life on the flrst guilty pair. " The seed 
 of the w^oman — the comini:: incarnated Redeemer 
 of mankind — shall indeed bruise the serpent's 
 head." Down throufjh the intervening acfes, 
 that blessed hope of fallen man brightened con- 
 stantly. It fired the songs of the Hebrew 
 bards — it gu.shed in the living streams of pro- 
 phetic description — it was fore-shadowed in 
 
•r^mm 
 
 38 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 
 every historic scene — its symbols re-appeared in 
 each successive age — it was anticipated in every 
 bleeding sacrifice. 
 
 In the fulness of time, the world's Deliverer 
 came — and such a Deliverer 1 Such a character 
 and life, as every succeeding generation of men 
 have been studying, with ever-growing wonder 
 and delight and love, and will to the end of 
 time. The unmistakable signs of the Divine 
 glory of Christ were not wanting all through His 
 earthly career. At his birth, a starry guide led 
 the Magi to the spot where his infant form was 
 cradled, and angel bands burst from the mid- 
 night sky in rapturous songs of praise. At the 
 opening of His mission, the heavens parted 
 above His head, and a voice from the Heavenly 
 Throne, acknowledged Him as God's well-beloved 
 Son, while the plenitude of the Holy Ghost filled 
 His being. At His bidding, the boisterous winds 
 and raging waves of Galilee at one time lay 
 still, at another made for His feet a pathway of 
 adamant. 
 
 His touch was the instant cure of the foul 
 leprosy, the palsied limb, the chronic plague. As 
 the few loaves and fishes received his benedic- 
 tion, they grew into a full repast for hungry 
 thousands. His all-penetrating glance surveyed 
 
THE KINGS SON. 
 
 39 
 
 the dej^ths of the most secret thoughts of men. 
 At His word, the cowering legions of devils re- 
 leased their deadly grasp of human souls, and 
 slunk away ; while that same voice a"Woke the 
 sleeping dead, and restored to the widow her 
 only son, and to Mary and Martha their only 
 brother. On the mount, the veil of His flesh 
 could no longer restrain the divine Majesty 
 within, and it streamed forth in overpow^ering 
 splendour. On His cross, the sun refused to 
 shine, and mourned for hours in darkness ; 
 while the earth shook in horror, the rocks clave 
 apart, and the dead sprang to life from their 
 dusty sepulchres. The grave could not detain 
 Him. His divine energy overthrew its barriers, 
 and He rose again ; while all heaven's hosts 
 broke forth into loud halle'ujahs as He ascended ; 
 the King of Glory entered once more those 
 pearly gates, and sat down again on that throne 
 where it was His right to reign. He was God 
 indeed — the Great I AM, manifest in the flesh — 
 God blessed for evermore. 
 
 But Christ was man as truly as He was God. 
 He WPS man, with all the instincts, sensibilities, 
 sympathies, and sinless infirnnties of human 
 nature ; and, as a man. He presented to the 
 world the only instance it has ever seen of a 
 
ii 
 
 40 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 iii, I 
 
 if; 
 
 
 IHII 
 
 II 
 
 spotless and perfect human character. In him 
 there was no deficiency and no excess. From the 
 lirst breath he drew in Bethlehem to the last on 
 Calvary, there was no moral imperfection in 
 Him. Never was there a life more human, more 
 public, more severely scrutinized yet could no 
 man convince Him of sin ; neither was there in 
 Him the least fault in the eye of God. And 
 what words of wisdom fell from those lips ! He 
 was truth itself. In Himself was verified and 
 fulfilled the prophecy, and prom.ise, and type, 
 and shadow of the long past ; and gathering up 
 these scattered materials of truth of all by -gone 
 times, He builds them into a glorious temple of 
 doctrine which surpassed and superseded all 
 other, and which can never be surpassed and su- 
 perseded itself — doctrines, whose power of intel- 
 lectual and moral elevation are absolutely illimit- 
 able, and against which the gates of hell can never 
 prevail. But we are chiefly drawn toward that 
 deep Divine tenderness of heart, that overflowing 
 love of Christ, which, in Him, far exceeds all 
 other qualities. We see it in Him when, as a 
 gentle boy, His love for His mother constrained 
 Him to com ult her wishes as a sacred duty ; and 
 again, amidst his dying agonies on the cross, to 
 find for that now forlorn mother a home and a 
 
THE KINGS SON. 
 
 41 
 
 
 friend for her remaining days. We see it in 
 Him, as He takes np the little children in His 
 arms, puts His hands upon them, and blesses 
 them. Tender compassi(m starts the tears from 
 His eyes as He beholds tlie heart-broken sisters 
 of Bethany, and the desolation of their once 
 happy home ; and it sends them streaming down 
 His clieeks as He sits on Olivet, and surveys 
 the lovely Jerusalem, whose awfal doom His 
 prophetic eye sees fast hastening on. That 
 lovinf'" s-^'j^ippfhy broke forth afresh day by day, 
 as those diseased, deformed, distressed, down- 
 trodden nniltitudes eagerly thronfjed around 
 Him, and sought from Him that blessed relief, 
 which they had sought everywhere else in vain. 
 But above all, it is through the humiliation and 
 sorrows of Christ that we can look into the 
 depth of that marvellous love, He cherished for 
 our race. 
 
 We labour in viiin to imagine the extent of 
 humiliation and saffering involved in the Hon of 
 God, becoming iDc^inate at all in human form, 
 even under the ii^st favoured circmiistances. 
 What a change for an angel of God, accustomed 
 to the glory, the beauty, the purity, the peace, 
 the ineffable joy, the unfettered freedom, the 
 glad exercise of vast powers, the sweet intluence 
 
42 
 
 VOICES FROM THE TVIRONE. 
 
 
 
 I 
 
 II! 
 
 
 I, 
 
 of innumerable kindred spirits ; and, more than 
 all, the undimmed presence of the great Jehovah, 
 to descend to the prison-house of our weak clay, 
 even though as an earthly monarch and sur- 
 rounded with all the pleasures and greatness this 
 world could afford ! An angel doing such a thing 
 were as nothing to Christ doing it. The Lord 
 Jesus has done that indeed, but O ! how much 
 more ! • 
 
 When He came, had all t • ''-"y-beils of 
 earth pealed forth His pra'so, had .; emperors 
 of earth contended who should do Him honour, 
 had the riches and glory of the world been laid 
 at His feet, had the Jews and Gentiles vied with 
 each other in their eagerness to believe in Him, 
 to accept His teaching, and obey His holy laws ; 
 had his life been one short joyful triumphal 
 march, even then no human lanfj^uacje could de- 
 pict the condescending love or the honour thus 
 done our race. ' 
 
 But how different from all this was Christ's 
 experience ! When He first saw the light it was 
 in a stable, and in a manger where oxen fed. 
 The food He ate was won at Joseph's workbench, 
 where, too, there is little doubt that Jesus the 
 carpenter worked for many a year. As a foot- 
 sore and weary pedestrian, He traversed for 
 
THE KINGS SOX. 
 
 48 
 
 years the mountains and vales of Palestine ; and 
 His one triiim]ihal procession saw Him seated on 
 a borrowed ass. The foxes had their holes, and 
 the birds of tlie air their nests, but the Son of 
 man oftentimes had not where to lay His head. 
 Thirsty, He begged a drink of water from a 
 foreigner ; hungry, He sought food on the fig- 
 tree and found none. His disciples had left their 
 fishinof-tackle on Galilee to follow Him, and one 
 of them valued His life's-blood at thirty piece^. 
 of silver. All the property He left for the soldiers 
 to divide were His soiled, blood-stained clothes ; 
 while a sepulchre — the gift of benevolence — re- 
 ceived His lifeless remains. What must have 
 been the grief of His sensitive soul at the heart- 
 less indifference, the stolid unbelief, the super- 
 cilious contempt, which greeted Him all through 
 His career ! The very race whom God had 
 honoured and blessed far above all other human 
 beings, for two thousand years, and who, at this 
 moment, were being exalted by His presence 
 among them to a pinnacle of deathless glory, 
 found it hard to discover means of showin$jf how 
 emphatically they despised, rejected, and scorned 
 Him. 
 
 But the closing scenes of that career reveal an 
 accumulated force of malignity on the part of 
 
44 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 His enemies, and an aggregated sum of agonies, 
 which rolled their tumultuous waves through 
 His soul, See Him in Gethsemane's bloody 
 sweat, as He prays and ponders on that execrable 
 indignity of Judas, and the ripening plots of earth 
 and hell. Conscious of an innocence as spotless as 
 the throne of God, yet is He seized as a felon, 
 and that at the instigation of His own professed 
 apostle. Dragged before the tribunal of 
 Oaiaphas, He then met the gaze of men who 
 looked upon Him as the ferocious tiger looks 
 upon its prey. Hurried thence to the bar of Pilot, 
 He found that vacillating wretch, who there dis- 
 pensed the laws of heath* 1.1 P ^me, a more 
 righteous judge than the men who sat in the 
 seats of Moses and Aaron. Sentenced to death, 
 through the sheer force of the shouts and threats 
 of a frenzied rabble, with whom the murderer 
 Barabbas was a saint compared with Jesus, He 
 is delivered over to every species of indignity 
 anu torture. 
 
 Those savage soldiers, drilled in merciless 
 cruelty on a hundred bloody fields, show to- 
 wards Him the same brutality of nature as the 
 treacherous beast that paws with its victim be- 
 fore it devours it. 
 
 It was not enough for His tender flesh to be 
 
THE KING S SON. 
 
 45 
 
 torn with the hideous lash ; they clothe Him 
 in mockery in a robe of royal scarlet, with a 
 reed for a sceptre and a thorny crown, striking its 
 horny points deep into His brow ; with jeers and 
 laughter they bend the knee, and sp4,y, " Hail, 
 King of the Jews 1" while they strike Him on the 
 head and spit in His face. Led forth to the 
 place of skulls, and in the company of ■ felons, 
 they crucified Him — that is, they put Him to 
 death, which combined more of shame, exposure, 
 contempt, ignominy, and lingering torture than 
 any other — a kind of death which every Roman 
 citizen and Jew regarded as an eternal disgrace, 
 and which was reserved for slaves, and those 
 only whose crimes were of the meanest and mc^t 
 abominable description. 
 
 Hanging in mortal agony on that accursed tree, 
 He was poured out like water, and all His bones 
 were out of joint. His strength was dried up like 
 a potsherd, and His tongue clave to His jaws. He 
 inight tell all His bones. They looked and stared 
 upon Him. But the sufferings of His body were 
 as nothing to the agony of His soul. With what 
 anguish did He see and hear that raging multi- 
 tude ; those human dogs, that compassed Him 
 about ; those strong bulls of Bashan, that beset 
 Him on every side, gaping upon Him with their 
 
i 
 
 46 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 )■ ■ 
 ■■. 1 
 
 i: I 
 1. i 
 
 ll 
 
 
 Pi 
 
 i ; 'r s I 
 
 i 'i 
 
 mouths, as ravening and roaring lions ! With 
 what exquisite torture did He hear those 
 mockers, with an ingenuity all infernal, turn 
 His very confidence in Clod against Himself I 
 as He saw them shooting out their lips, and 
 shaking their heads, as they said, " He trusted in 
 the Lord, that He would deliver Him ; let Him 
 deliver Him, if He delight in Him." With 
 what sad sensations of heart n\ust Christ have 
 contemplated all this diabolical malignity, as 
 the return men made for all His condescension, 
 benevolence, and love ! 
 
 Can we doubt, either, that, in these terrible 
 hours, all the power;^ of darkness, all the hatred 
 of the pit, was let loose on that wonderful 
 sufFel'er, whom Satan well knew was the 
 mightiest foe of sin and hell in the universe ? 
 More fearful still, and more than all other 
 agonies, was the withdrawal, for a time, of His 
 Father's face. That mysterious darkening now^ 
 interposed between His soul and that sweet 
 beaming love that had ever shone upon Him 
 from the heavenly Throne, and extorted from 
 Him, His most heart-rending cry of all — " My 
 God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me ?" 
 As if it was necessary that the Sin-Bearer must 
 feel in the deeps of His soul, the righteous and 
 
 Mi:' 
 
THE KINGS SOX. 
 
 47 
 
 holy wrath of Gofl against sin. Christ's suffer- 
 ings, as far as man can discern, constitute a com- 
 plete circle, which includes every conceivable 
 form of sorrow which an innocent being could 
 endure ; but as it was expiatory suffering — a 
 sacritice which atoned for the sins of the human 
 race — it doubtless had elements of intensity in 
 it which we cannot gauge, and of which we can 
 know nothing. 
 
 And in what manner did Jesus undergo all 
 this for us ? With a fortitude that never quailed, 
 with a meekness that never murmured, wdth a 
 patience and forbearance that no provocation 
 could irritate ; and with a perseverance that 
 never paused until He could cry out — " It is 
 finished ;" and through it all, and above it all, 
 with a love that nothing could sour or alienate 
 or diminish ; a love for man that glowed all the 
 more intensely as the fiery furnace of His 
 sufferings grew hotter ; and, just as His accumu- 
 lated agonies were tearing asunder His nature, 
 that love sent forth its last and grandest outgush 
 from His heart — a prayer for His murderers — 
 " Father, forgive them ! " 
 
 Love — infinite, measureless, all-embracing, 
 eternal — is the secret of this wonderful story. 
 Love for us perishing sinners, was the mighty 
 
1 
 
 ! 
 
 i' 
 
 ■ 
 
 w 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 f 
 
 
 
 P f h 
 
 ■j 'J 
 
 li 
 
 48 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 magnet that drew the Saviour to earth. Love 
 S' t Him to the poor to make them rich, to the 
 helpless and weak that He might be their 
 strength, to the outcast and forlorn that they 
 might have at least one all-powerful Friend. 
 Love led Him wherever there was human grief, 
 that He might assuage and heal it. Love nerved 
 His soul as He struck, with resistless might, at 
 the deadly foes that had wrought all the ruin of 
 our race — sin and hell. And by love He con- 
 quered ; and what a victory — or rather what a 
 congregation of victories ! Christ's enemies 
 seemed indeed to have effected His complete and 
 irrecoverable overthrow, but it was their own. 
 
 Poor Judas rejoiced for a moment in the shining 
 silver — the wages of his perfidy — but it burnt his 
 soul like molten lead ; the thought of that inno- 
 cent blood gnawed him, as with the jaws of 
 hell, and hurried him to his own place. 
 Pilate, whose craven heart was terror-stricken 
 at the mention of an accusation to Caesar, and 
 to avert that dreaded alternative, delivered up 
 the Innocent, but in vain, for soon he was on 
 his way to face the Emperor's wrath, a speedy 
 banishment and a disgraceful death. That 
 very Roman power, under whose authority 
 Christ was murdered and by whose soldiers he 
 
THE KING S SON. 
 
 49 
 
 was mocked, from that day was doomed to a 
 decline and fall which was not to end until 
 all its mighty legions were swept away, and 
 the irreat iron fabric — the wonder and terror of 
 the world for so manv centuries — w^as reduced 
 to endless desolation. The 4fews had slain Christ 
 in bitter mortification at the colhipse of their 
 selfish lust of national power and wealth and 
 grandeur, under their <'Xp','Cted Messiah; and that 
 they might still maintain tJieir temple and wor- 
 ship, their place an<l nation ; but ah'eady the 
 avenging Nemesis had .stretcl»ed over their city 
 and nation the destroying .sword ; and in a few 
 years, that glorious temple was left with not one 
 stone upon another, and tliat city visited with a 
 scourge which, in all the lii.st/)ry of sieges, wars, 
 and bloodshed, is utterly without a parallel ; 
 while for eighteen centuries since, the Jew^s 
 have wandered over th«^ earth without either 
 place or nation. 
 
 Christ's tragic end seemed the death-knell of 
 truth and virtue and goodness ; but it was then, 
 indeed, that pride and .selfi.shness w^ere most 
 emphatically humbled, and humility and self- 
 sacrifice most emphatically exalted — that meek- 
 ness and forbearance were made more chivalrous 
 than the boldest earthly courage — that patient 
 4 
 
u 
 
 \i ifi 
 
 50 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 suffering for righteousness' sake became a patent 
 of nobility more illustrious than the loftiest title 
 ever worn by man. There, indeed, all the tinsel 
 greatness of this world dwindled to nothing ; 
 while the true and lastino- liches and orlories of 
 purity and fidelity, and truth and love, shone 
 forth with the most captivating beauty and the 
 most unfading splendour. It seemed the deci- 
 sive climax of sin's dominion ; it was its real and 
 eternal overthrow. In the death of Christ there 
 was discovered a new world of mercy and salva- 
 tion. Wrath was appeased, justice satisfied, 
 God reconciled, the most heinous sins made par- 
 donable, the most utter vileness removable, 
 perfect deliverance held out to the greatest slave 
 of sin, blessed hopes to tlie most despairing soul, 
 mighty strength to the weakest, and sweetest 
 joys to the most wretched, and everlasting bless- 
 edness, instead of woes that could never end. 
 
 Christ's death, too, seemed the grandest vic- 
 tory of death itself ; but it was then and there 
 alone that death indeed was abolished. The 
 reign of that king of terrors ceased as Jesus died 
 and rose again. It was then that life and im- 
 mortality were brought to light ; and as the 
 Redeemer lay in the grave, it was made there- 
 after but a resting-place, where the bodies of 
 
 I, 
 
THE kino's son. 
 
 51 
 
 fatent 
 t title 
 tinsel 
 ,hing ; 
 fies of 
 shone 
 id the 
 > deci- 
 al and 
 t there 
 salva- 
 itisfied, 
 de par- 
 ovable, 
 st slave 
 [ig soul, 
 weetest 
 bless- 
 end. 
 3st vie- 
 there 
 The 
 us died 
 md im- 
 as the 
 t there- 
 :)dies of 
 
 1. 
 
 His saints sliall softly sleep awhil«' ; and as He 
 rose afjain, it was their sure <'iiaraiitoe that they, 
 too, shall yet awake to glory everlasting. 
 
 Satan, too, through whom the poison of sin 
 had lirst bc'ii instilled into our worM, hy whom 
 the tianies of evil had been fanm'(l, and whose 
 areh-plot had now been a})paiently crowned with 
 such complete success — Satan, jubilant over 
 that agonized Sufferer withtiie grim Joy of hell 
 — yet it was his hour of doom in which Christ 
 planted His conquering heel on that serpent's 
 head, and whose crushing powder will never cease 
 until he is cast into the lake of fire to rise no 
 more forever. 
 
 Blessed Jesus ! With what faltering words 
 can we descril'e such a character as was His, such 
 .1 work as He did, such love as He showed forth. 
 And shall we ask what place the Lord Jesus 
 should hold in the confidence and love of man- 
 kind \ From the heights of His mediatorial 
 throne, whither He has gone to plead inces- 
 santly our cause, He looks into our hearts, and 
 asks : " What think ye of Christ ?" How can 
 we turn away from that loving gaze ? How can 
 w^e resist such love as His ? Surely we cannot 
 chime in with those who would deny His name, 
 exclude Him from their thoughts, and, if pos- 
 
.. 
 
 I 
 
 52 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 sible, from the very world He suftered to re-'' 
 deem. Oh, we cannot thus crucify our precious 
 Saviour afresh, and put Him to an open shame. 
 Nay, rather let our right hand forget its cun- 
 ning, and let our tongue cleave to the roof of 
 our mouth, if we forget Thee, dearest Saviour — 
 if we prefer not Thee above our chief joy. 
 
 I 
 
 
to re-' 
 •ecious 
 shame. 
 s cun- 
 foof of 
 aour — 
 
 y- - - 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE GREAT REVOLUTIOX. 
 
 HE salvation bouglit by the redeeming 
 blood of Christ opens heaven in the 
 human soul. Cod makes man His 
 living temple, where He manitests 
 His presence, power, and love. And 
 how that arising of the Son of Right- 
 eousness within man's heart discovers the disas- 
 trous, deep, and widespread efi'ects of sin ! If 
 we would form a just estimate of human de- 
 pravity, we must look within the human heart 
 — we must know something of the condition of 
 that xast internal kingdom where our moral 
 capabilities are at work. It is there the springs 
 of action are found — ^the head(|uarters of our 
 being — whence issue the mandates of the soul, 
 which crystallize into words and deeds. Nor 
 
54 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 *: ;h 
 
 can we tell all that may be in the heart by what 
 is visible in the life, no more than we can 
 measure the extent of a volcano's internal fires 
 by the occasional overflow of lava on its sides — 
 no more than we can estimate the warlike capa- 
 bilities of a fort by the occasional discharge of 
 some of its guns. There may be latent evils slum- 
 bering in the soul, which only await a sufficient 
 occasion, and a sufficient provocation, to draw 
 them forth ; and nxich there are. The Divine 
 Word has said the heart of man is enmity 
 against God — is deceitful above all things, and 
 desperately wicked ; and although the soul, 
 in the darkness of its sin, mav be unable 
 to see or believe this dreadful truth, yet when 
 the light of salvation enters, it Ijecomes start- 
 lingly and distressingly visible. 
 
 It is no wonder that this insight into our 
 desperate and totally depraved condition 
 awakens within us the most poignant anguish. 
 The terrifying contrast appears between the 
 foulness we have been cherishing and the purity 
 we have been rejecting — between our treatment 
 of God and His of us. A painful consciousness 
 seizes us that we have had a Father to whom 
 we owe our existence, with all its joys, its facul- 
 ties, its possibilities, wh'^iii we have not acknow- 
 
THE GREAT REVOLUTION. 
 
 55 
 
 what 
 re can 
 1 fires 
 ides — 
 3 capa- 
 Lrge oi 
 s slum- 
 ifficicnt 
 ) draw 
 Divine 
 enmity 
 o-s, and 
 
 \Q soul, 
 
 unable 
 t when 
 
 ;s start- 
 
 nto our 
 ;ondition 
 anguish, 
 the 
 lie purity 
 
 eatment 
 oiousness 
 bo whom 
 its facul- 
 
 acknow- 
 
 l^een 
 
 ledged and reverenced, but rejected and dis- 
 obeyed — one w^Jiose loving care for us has far 
 exceeded that of a mother ; but whom we have 
 spurned away from us in malicious rebellion — a 
 Saviour whose unspeakable love and sacrifice has 
 awakened no grateful response within us, no 
 enthusiastic affection, no willing obedience ; but 
 on the contrary we have repaid all His tears, 
 and blood, and sorrow, by cruel unbelief, and by 
 swelling the ranks of His enemies. Ah, it is 
 this that cuts us to the heart ; it is this that 
 overwhelms us with a sense of our moral mean- 
 ness, our base ingratitude, our wickedness so 
 transparently hideous, that our conscience cries 
 out, and well it may, " Behold, I am vile," — 
 " God be merciful to me a sinner." 
 
 But the Spirit of God, thus mercifully con- 
 vinces us of sin, for the same reason that the 
 good and skilful physician makes first his 
 searching diagnosis, that his patient may be the 
 more thoroughly, and the more speedily healed. 
 Blessed, indeed, are those whom God thus makes 
 to mouiTi, for He means that they shall be com- 
 forted. But how is this comfort to be attained ? 
 How shall the troubled heart find that peace 
 with God, for which it sighs ? And here again 
 do we see the condescension of Divine grace, 
 

 i 
 
 Hi! 
 
 ?1 
 
 « 
 
 56 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 In 
 
 I : 
 
 adapting itself to the possibilities of our nature. 
 God has not suspended our acceptance with Him- 
 self, on the condition that we discharge ex- 
 tremely difficult 01* impossible duties. Man-made 
 systems of salvation always impose conditions 
 of that kind. They insist on the performance 
 of duties, for which the natural man has no 
 moral powers, as is the case in all self-righteous 
 systems ; or the expiation of sin, through fearful 
 and prolonged sufferings of body, which, even 
 were they effectual, millions could never under- 
 go, or the making of distant pilgrimages and the 
 offerings of costly oblations for which the vast 
 majority of mankind have neither the oppor- 
 tunity nor the means. But God's plan is simple, 
 available and practicable to those of all ages, 
 sexes, conditions in life, to every variety of 
 human beings, and in every variety of circum- 
 stances, and in every age and period of time, to 
 the end of the world. Paul's memorable reply 
 to the convicted Philippian jailor, is God's all- 
 comprehending answer to every anxious en- 
 quirer after salvation — " Believe on the Lord 
 Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." It is 
 faith, and faith alone, that is the connecting 
 link between our distracted, guilty souls, and a 
 reconciled God. 
 
iture. 
 Him- 
 
 'i 
 
 e ex- 
 
 
 -made 
 
 '1 
 
 itions 
 
 ■ % 
 
 mance 
 
 ,J 
 
 las no 
 
 1 
 
 bteous 
 
 1 
 
 [earful 
 
 > 
 
 , even 
 
 
 under- 
 
 i^ 
 
 ,nd the 
 
 
 le vast 
 
 
 oppor- 
 
 ^^^^H 
 
 simple, 
 
 
 11 ages, 
 
 
 ety of 
 
 
 circum- 
 
 
 iime, to 
 
 ^^^He''-' 
 
 e reply 
 
 
 d's all- 
 
 
 )us en- 
 
 
 e Lord 
 
 ^^H 
 
 " It is 
 
 
 meeting 
 
 
 =i, and a 
 
 
 THE GREAT REVOLUTION. 57 
 
 But the question comes back from many an 
 eager enquirer, " What is it to believe in Christ 
 unto salvation ? " There are what we may call 
 different kinds or degrees of beUef. There is an 
 historic belief in (Hirist, which is slmph^ a bare 
 intellectual opinion or assent to the truth of the 
 New Testament record, a good deal as we believe 
 in an^" other authentic history, and with a some- 
 what similiar effect upon our character, affections, 
 or lives ; that is, not necessarily any at all, or an 
 effect imperceptibly small. Such a faith . is ut- 
 terly too weak to fulfil the mighty claims of 
 Christ upon our souls, or to sustain and satisfy 
 the soul itself in its wrestlings after God and 
 heaven. 
 
 There may be a stronger persuasion of this 
 kind that more fully realizes the great saving 
 ends that Christ had in view, and more vividly 
 perceives the plan of salvation as wrought out 
 by the Redeemer of men ; but neither can this 
 be saving faith, for it is only at best but an in- 
 tellectual recognition of the truth, and does not 
 necessarily touch the real citadel of the soul, the 
 conscience, the affections and the will. It is 
 with the heart man belie veth unto righteousness. 
 Neither is every persuasion that does move the 
 heart, true saving faith. Felix, under the 
 
58 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 «ii 
 
 I f].. 
 
 ■51 If 
 
 powerful preaching of Paul, as he reasoned of 
 righteousness, temperance and a judgment to 
 come, was so far convinced of the truth, and his 
 heart so far affected by it, that he " trembled," 
 but he was no true believer. And Satan him- 
 self is as perfect an example of an intellectual 
 believer as the universe contains ; and, moreover, 
 feels the tremendous power of truth so deeply 
 that he too " trembles." Neither is it faith that 
 saves, even when the most powerful l)e]ief in the 
 truth is combined with the most pungent con- 
 viction of sin, as was the case with the Philip- 
 pian jailor, who still cried out — " What must I 
 do to be saved ^. " and to whom the Apostle re- 
 plied — " Believe." He had not believed savingly. 
 The fullest intellectual acceptance of the truth, 
 and the most heartfelt consciousness of sin, still 
 lack an essential element of true faith — and 
 what is that element ? It is trust — it is the 
 decisive act of the soul, by which it rests for sal- 
 vation on the atoning sacrifice of Christ. There 
 is a wide and vital distinction here. It is one 
 thing to cherish even the most sincere and hearty 
 regard for your guest, it is another thing to open 
 wide your door, and bid him welcome to all the 
 hospitality of your home. It is one thing for 
 a besieged city, surrounded by the king and his 
 
THE GREAT REVOLUTION. 
 
 59 
 
 led of 
 nt to 
 id his 
 bled," 
 
 him- 
 ectual 
 •cover, 
 leeply 
 \\ that 
 in the 
 it con- 
 Philip- 
 must I 
 ,tle re- 
 vingly. 
 
 truth, 
 in, still 
 h — and 
 
 is the 
 for sal- 
 
 There 
 
 is one 
 I hearty 
 to open 
 
 all the 
 ling for 
 
 and his 
 
 armies, to profess, however honestly, all possible 
 regard for that monarch, it is quite another 
 thing to open to him the gates, to lay down the 
 weapons of war, and submit to his authority. 
 It is one thing for a traveller in the desert, dying 
 of thirst, to see the cool, sparkling water, to be- 
 lieve in its powers to quench his thirst and save 
 his life, and to long for it as only a thirsty man 
 can — it is (|uite another thing for him to lift it 
 to his lipH and drink, until he thirsts no more. 
 Even so, the faith that brings salvation into 
 the soul receives Christ, bv the deliberate act of 
 the will, opens wide the door of the heart, and 
 accepts Him joyfully, as our Prophet, whose 
 teaching we fully receive, and to whose laws we 
 willingly yield obedience; as our Great High 
 Priest, on whose all-atoning blood we actually 
 rest for present pardon and peace; ast)ur King, in 
 whose power, love, and faithfulness, we repose a 
 firm confidence, and under whose authority we 
 completely subject ourselves. It is the mighty 
 grasp of the whole soul on the unfailing promises, 
 the immutable faithfulness of the eternal God. 
 Such an act of decisive and resolute dependence 
 on God, Abraham, and Moses, and David, and 
 those other illustrious Old Testament believers, 
 not only professed themselves ivilling to do, but 
 
' yi 
 
 
 '111 
 
 h 
 
 60 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 actually did do. So also did the Syro-Phcenician 
 woman, the centurion of Capernaum, blind 
 Bartimeus, the penitent thief, the eunuch of 
 Ethopia, Saul of Tarsus, the three thousand on 
 the day of Pentecost, and the long roll of the 
 saved in the apostolic time, and all that hav^e 
 been saved since. Such a faith, and such only, 
 is anything like worthy of God, whose single 
 word is a surer foundation than all the heavens 
 and all the earth. And such a faith can, and 
 ought to be exercised in God by multitudes, who 
 find little dithculty in exercising a faith a good 
 deal like it, in the common relations and business 
 of life. Are not these elements of faith, belie ving- 
 assurance, and acting-trust, plainly visil)le in the 
 child in its mother's arms, the wife in her hus- 
 band's home, in the merchant at the bank, who 
 takes imhesitatingly thousands of mere promises 
 for solid gold — yes, and in multitudes of self- 
 righteous men and procrastinators, who are fixed 
 in the persuasion, that there is somehow a good 
 hope for them, and rest contentedly in the house 
 they have built for themselves upon the sand ?■ 
 God has made this act of firm reliance on the 
 atoning merits of Christ's blood, as the grand 
 condition of our acceptance into IJis favour, and 
 there is the highest wisdom and propriety in His 
 
 * 
 
THE GREAT REVOLUTION. 
 
 61 
 
 Lician 
 blind 
 ;h of 
 id on 
 f the 
 have 
 only, 
 single 
 avens 
 [1, and 
 ^, who 
 I o-ood 
 isincss 
 eving- 
 in the 
 r hus- 
 V, who 
 omises 
 f self- 
 [3 lixed 
 a good 
 house 
 sand ? 
 on the 
 errand 
 ar, and 
 in His 
 
 ■"^s 
 
 doing so, even as it appears to our imperfect 
 apprehension. Surely, we might well suppose 
 that God would provide some way, in which our 
 souls could most powerfully deny that there is 
 saving virtue in anything else but Jesus cruci- 
 fied ; and bv which we niioht set our most em- 
 phatic seal of recognition on the all-suticient 
 merits of Christ's sacrificial death. Such an 
 act of trust in Christ's blood gives us this oppor- 
 tunitv. 
 
 It is reasonable that, in return for such mar- 
 vellous love as that of Jesus Christ, there be 
 some possible act by which man may most ade- 
 (juately express his overpowering sense of grati- 
 tude. God has shown us precisely how that can 
 best l)e done, by this simple act of soul-reliance 
 on that astonishing love of Christ. Such a faith 
 as this, [it the same time, is a death-blow to 
 pri(k' and selfishness, wliich are the reigning cor- 
 ruptions in the human soul. It is also some- 
 thing witliin reach of the simplest child, the 
 meanest intellect, and the poorest man in the 
 world, while it is equally well adapted to the 
 greatest and noblest of the human race. 
 
 Such an act of faith brings us, at once, into sav- 
 ing contact with Christ ; as when the afflicted 
 woman touched the hem of Christ's garment, the 
 
t 
 
 62 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 i;l 
 
 ' ( 
 
 I'll i 
 
 healing virtue of Christ's saving energy flows 
 into our souls. That free and full pardon of sin, 
 which God was before quite willing to give, he- 
 eause of the atonement made by Christ, He now 
 does give and writes it consciously on our hearts. 
 At the same time the Holy Spirit works a change 
 within us of the most delightful and glorious sort. 
 Deep as sin has struck its deadly fangs into our 
 nature, the saving grace of God follows after, 
 and everywhere that sin has abounded in our 
 souls, grace there begins much more to abound. 
 New faculties are not created, but there is the 
 creation of a new and blessed use of those we 
 have. The understanding sees, in an altogether 
 new light, the detestable character of sin, the real 
 loveliness of holiness, of God and heaven. The 
 judgment is delivered from the warping bias (jf 
 evil, and enthroned injustice and righteousness. 
 The conscience becomes a sens' '^ive monitor, a 
 vigilant sentry on the outlook of the soul. The 
 will turns round and steers for heaven. The 
 ati'ections enkindle with holy fires. Old things 
 have truly passed away, and all things truly be- 
 come new. That good Spirit expels the old 
 enmity, and sheds the sweet love of God abroad 
 in our hearts. The old nest of corruptions is 
 swept out, and the heart is washed and made 
 
THE GREAT REVOLUTION. 
 
 63 
 
 flows 
 
 
 f sin, 
 
 
 3, be- 
 
 
 now 
 
 
 earts. 
 
 
 lange 
 
 
 s sort. 
 
 
 io our 
 
 
 after, 
 
 
 in our 
 
 
 >ound. 
 
 
 is the i^ 
 
 
 se we '^ 
 
 V 
 
 getber , 
 le real 
 
 
 Tbe 
 
 "A 
 
 jias of 
 
 Lisness. 
 
 '':Vk 
 
 itor, a 
 
 
 . The 
 
 
 The 
 
 
 things 
 
 
 ily be- 
 bhe old 
 
 
 abroad 
 
 
 tions is 
 
 
 1 made 
 
 
 clean in the blood of the Lamb. The old 
 tyranny of sin is smitten down, and the reign of 
 King Jesus and holiness is .set up. The old war 
 of the passions with (}(A, and truth, and puiity, 
 comes to an end, and we have peace with (Jod 
 through our Lord Jesus Christ. The old misery 
 gives place to a new joy that is unspeakable and 
 full of glory. Where the old despair brooded, 
 hope springs up, blooming with immortal pros- 
 pects. The old downward tendency, leading 
 constantly onward to eternal ruin, is reversed, 
 and we begin to climb the majestic heights of 
 holine.ss and heaven. We are born again, 
 ac([uire a new nature, rejoice in new moral and 
 spiritual powers, «iraw hreath in a new atmos- 
 phere of holiness, break forth with new voices 
 of prayer and prai.se, taste truly the blessed 
 waters of Life and nourishing milk of the Word, 
 and begin a new life, with new and blessed rela- 
 tionships on every liand. We are no longer slaves 
 of sin and Satan, but the free-born citizens of 
 Christ's commonwealth ; no longer the children 
 of wrath, but the beloved .sons and daughters 
 of the Lord Almighty ; no longer enemies of 
 God, but reconciled to Him throuf^h the blood 
 of His dear Son ; no longer outcasts and pro- 
 digals, but in our Heavenlv Father's arms, and 
 
iin 
 
 *■ 
 
 'I'l 
 
 64 
 
 VOICES fr(jm the thkoxe. 
 
 heart and home ; no longer excluded fioiii a 
 share in the vast possessions of onr Father in 
 heaven, but made heirs of (lod and joint heirs 
 with Jesus Christ. Oiu* fellow-man is no longer 
 our natural enemy, hut every man is henceforth 
 a brother ; the world is no longer the chief good 
 of our existence and ambition, but a momentary 
 si^^^e; whence we may successfully step into a 
 far higher and nobler life. This is a revolution, 
 grander by far than any other ; than all the 
 romantic and mighty revolutions of history. It 
 astonishini^ (iliects as have often been seen in the 
 after-lives of converted men and women. It is 
 is such a change as this, that has produced such 
 this that is the invariable starting-point in the 
 history of that \'ast army of distinguished saints 
 of Ood, whose lives and actions have left such 
 widespread and permanent blessings to man- 
 kind ; a legacy more valuable than all else that 
 human efibrt of the past lias l)equeathed to pos- 
 terity. 
 
 And this glorious renewal of the soul in 
 righteousness and true holiness, Christ's precious 
 blood has made free to all men ; free as the 
 sunshine that bathes the world ; free as the 
 gushing streams or the encircling air ; so com- 
 plete and full in its operations, as not to ceas 
 
THE GREAT RKVOLUTIOX. 
 
 65 
 
 roin a 
 ther in 
 t heirs 
 
 longer 
 cet'orth 
 A fTOod 
 lentary 
 ) into a 
 olution, 
 all the 
 )ry. It 
 II in the 
 . It is 
 ted such 
 it in the 
 
 d saints 
 
 ft such 
 to nian- 
 
 •Ise that 
 1 to pos- 
 
 soul in 
 precious 
 e as the 
 t as the 
 so com- 
 to ceaif ' 
 
 until sin is destroyed, and the soul shines forth 
 in the full-orhed beauty of a perfected holiness ; 
 and which canbe realized 7ioiv ; for this instant 
 wherever there is a penitent, believing soul in 
 the act of trusting Christ f«n* all His mercy, there 
 Christ will be found in the act of liestowinc: all 
 His great salvation, and bestowing it consciously, 
 for the Spirit of God, and our own delighted 
 consciousness, will unite their testimony that we 
 are the children of God. 
 
 Thou adorable Father of mercy, accept of 
 our feeble thanksgiving for the wondrous gift of 
 Thy dear Son. We beseech Thee to help us 
 now, even this moment, to embrace, wdth all our 
 hearts, that blessed Saviour, and to trust in His 
 merits for pardon and peace w^ith Thee. O be 
 pleased to pour upon us Thy Holy Spirit, that 
 we may be born from above, and sanctified to 
 Thy holy service, and made meet for the inherit- 
 ance of Thy saints in light. Grant us speedily 
 these infinite mercies, for Thy great Name's 
 sake. Amen. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 LIFES TRLrE AIM. 
 
 REGENERATED soul is not imme- 
 disiely transplanted to the paradise 
 above. That might appear to us a 
 most desirable and safe change ; but 
 God has arranged it otherwise, and 
 with the same wisdom and love that 
 marks all His steps, He detains us here for a 
 longer or shorter time. As, with the infant just 
 born, there is much to be undergone before the 
 maturity, the instruction, the usefulness of a 
 really successful life can be achieved, so with 
 the infant Christian ; he has, generally, many a 
 battle to fight, many a lesson to learn, much im- 
 portant work to do, before he is ready for the 
 everlasting mansions above. Our life on earth 
 has not much in it to make a complete paradise 
 
 ; I 
 
LIFES TRUE AIM. 
 
 67 
 
 lot imme- 
 e paradise 
 ar to us a 
 lange ; but 
 ;rwise, and 
 d love that 
 here for a 
 infant just 
 V,efore the 
 ihiess of a 
 d, so with 
 ly, many a 
 1, much im- 
 idy for the 
 fe on earth 
 ete paradise 
 
 — such a perfect and permanent state of happi- 
 ness as the human heart so strongly craves ; but 
 it has plenty in it to make it a grand school of 
 discipline and t^lucation — a most fitting place, 
 wher<i character is formed, and n>atui'ed, and 
 tested, and shown to the world before it disap- 
 pears to sunnier climes. If, therefore, the 
 Christian's pathway does not always lead througli 
 flowery meads and under the brightest skies, 
 and amidst the sweetest symphonies and the 
 most delicious ease — if, instead, he has often to 
 fight like a soldier, toil like a labourer, and 
 sometimes suffer in the spirit of a martyr, there 
 need lie no surprise, as it is all in harmony with 
 God's merciful designs in his present life, and 
 His Itenevolent purposes in regard to the future. 
 The Christian life is unquestionably, and of 
 riecesfitv, a constant contention with difficulties 
 and advt'rsaries all along. Our spiritual Inrth 
 itself takes place amidst the throes of an agoniz- 
 ing struggle with all manner of opposing evils. 
 We have a relentless foe from beneath, whose 
 fiendish eyes are ever watching us, and whose 
 malignant and tireless cunning seeks every ad- 
 vantage to seduce us to ruin. We live in a 
 world the chief current of whose thoughts, 
 desires, and dispositions rushes wildly away from 
 
m 
 
 ■enrta^^ancaaif 
 
 
 ill 
 
 !.■ 
 
 68 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 God and goodness and purity ; and worse than 
 either of these is our own nature — the body — 
 with its imperious demands, its distressing weak- 
 nesses and sufierings, its powert'nl appetites and 
 passions ; and the soul, even tliough renewed by 
 the grace of God, yet, in the earlier stages of its 
 Christian career especially, is still so prone to 
 turn aside from righteousness, so weak and sus- 
 ceptible of evil. Add to this, the calamities, the 
 disappointments, the heart-i'cnding sorrows of 
 separation and death, to which Christians are 
 exposed ecpuilly with all other human Vjeings, 
 and we have certaiidy enough to try the stout- 
 est heart. To an entjuircr after salvation, or a 
 young Christian, all this may seem rather dis- 
 couraging ; and yet, in looking at this somewhat 
 formida])le aspect of a Cristian life, Ave must not 
 forget that this is the darkest side ot it, and, 
 moreover, the only dark side there is at all in 
 the whole history of a Christian, in either time 
 or eternity. A great deal, too, of all these pain- 
 ful experiences people are certain to have to 
 undergo, whether they are C'liristians or not ; 
 and a host of tribulations are the sure 
 heritage of ungodly siiniers, which the Christian 
 entirely escapes, and which are fr.r v/orse than 
 anything he ever has to experience. It is true 
 
LIFES TRUE ATM. 
 
 69 
 
 that in the world the Christian will have tribu- 
 lation ; but it is also true, in a far nnore terrible 
 sense, that the way of transg-rcysors is hard. 
 There is a powerful inspiration in the true 
 nobility and real heroism of this struo-gle with 
 evil. The Christian fights on the side of truth 
 a^^ainst falsehood, purity against moral corrup- 
 tion, mercy against cruelty, love against hatred 
 freedom against oppression, Christ and lieaven 
 airainst Satan and hell. It is true, he is amonfj 
 the numerical minority, for it is still but the 
 few who follow Christ's standard in this world ; 
 and the many are, as yet, marshalle'l under the 
 black banners of sin and Satan: but his work 
 is all the more chivalrous for that. In present- 
 ing a bold and manly froiit to all these myrmi- 
 don forces of e\'il, he becomes a hero of far 
 noblei' type than those who fought on the 
 plains of Marathon, or in the Pass of Therjno- 
 pyhe. 
 
 The Christian fights not foi' the paltry in- 
 terests of some shadowy throne of earth, but for 
 the imperial interests of Christ, the King of 
 kings ; not to gain the trifling and transient 
 honours and possessions of this world, but to 
 secure an unfading crown of righteousness and 
 an enduring patrimony in the skies. And it is 
 
m 
 
 iiiil 
 
 ifii 
 
 '^'l! I 
 
 70 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 on these battlefields, in tlie midst of all these 
 struggles, toils, and sufferings, that every noble 
 quality of Christian manhood is developed. Here 
 we learn to deny ourselves willingly, to take up 
 our cross cheerfully and follow Christ loyally 
 wherever He leads us on. Here we learn to 
 stand firm under the severest assaults of the 
 enemy, to obey promptly the most difficult com- 
 mands, to endure without murmuring the 
 severest trials, and undertake unhesitatingly the 
 heaviest toils. It is, indeed, a most precious 
 trial this, more so than of gold, though tried in 
 the tire ; for God here shows us the inherent 
 weakness of ourselves — the omnipotent strength 
 we have in Him — the malignant power of sin, 
 the far mightier power of grace — the dross of 
 evil that would still so tenaciously adhere to 
 our souls — the triumphant virtue of Christ's 
 blood, that can cleanse us from all unrighteous- 
 ness — the utter vanity and deception of all 
 things temporal — the sterling worth of eternal 
 realities. And as years roll by, we accumu- 
 late a ripening experience, full of hallowed 
 and inspiriting memories of battles won, and 
 work done for Christ ; and even our mistakes 
 and failures become to us precious monitors of 
 wisdom and hope for future use. Whatever may 
 
LIFES TRUE AIM. 
 
 71 
 
 these 
 noble 
 Here 
 ke up 
 )yally 
 irn to 
 of the 
 b coin- 
 o- the 
 .■ly the 
 reeious 
 ried in 
 iherent 
 length 
 of sin, 
 ross of 
 lere to 
 Christ's 
 hteoiis- 
 of all 
 eternal 
 Lccuinii- 
 allowed 
 on, and 
 iiistakes 
 litors of 
 ver may 
 
 happen, the faithful Christian can lose nothing ; 
 while his whole Christian nature daily grows 
 more confirmed, established, strengthened, and 
 settled, and his victories become more fully as- 
 sured and more easily won. 
 
 The struggles and trials and sorrows specially 
 incident to a Christian's life, it may undoubt- 
 edly be hard to undergo ; but it will be far 
 harder for us to do without them, and ever see 
 the kingdom of heaven. There is no other road 
 that leads to a softened, chastened, well-rounded, 
 polished, completed and strong Christian cha- 
 racter — a character that truly reflects Christ's 
 lovely image as in a glass, and a character which 
 furnishes to the world one of its choicest and 
 most indispensable benedictions. 
 
 And what helps God has graciously provided 
 us in this work ! We have His own Holy Spirit, 
 whose mighty energies are our strength, whose 
 loving hands hold us up, whose infallible wis- 
 dom is our directory, whose sleepless vigilance 
 is our watcli-guard, whose sanctifying grace 
 makes all things work together for our good, 
 and whose sweet consolations allay our pain, and 
 lift up in joy our drooping hearts. 
 
 We have the Word of God, a sword so quick 
 and powerful that, if well used, it will cut through 
 
ir 
 
 IMtii 
 
 78 
 
 VOICKS FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 IHI 
 
 ■M. .( 
 
 ! I 
 
 the thickest armour of the foe, and put to flight 
 the very stoutest armies of the alien. We have 
 the throne of grace, where the door of access is 
 always open, and God's great ear always atten- 
 tive — all His resources available in response to 
 our simple prayer of fpjth ; where, quicker than 
 the lightning's flash along the telegraphic line, 
 we may send our message to the skies, and God's 
 heart is moved and His mighty arm stretched 
 out to save. 
 
 We have the Church of God, like a blessed 
 oasis in the desert, where we may sit in the cool- 
 ing shade, drink of the living waters, and refresh 
 our jaded spirits in the precious ordinances of 
 the sanctuary, and in the soul-reviving com- 
 munion of His saints. We have the grateful 
 sympathies and inspiring examples of the noble 
 army of Christ's living soldiers, whose com- 
 panionship in arms we now share, and with 
 whom we are daily marching to victory and to 
 heaven, as well as of those, whose warfare is 
 passed and final victory gained, and who, from 
 the skies, are beckoning us onward. 
 
 We have the Sabbath, a weekly refuge from 
 the strife and weariness and grovelling of earth, 
 and a bright promise and delicious foretaste of, 
 and most hopeful preparation for, the rest that 
 
LIFES TRUE AIM. 
 
 73 
 
 ehave 
 cess is 
 atten- 
 )nse to 
 sr than 
 ic line, 
 1 God's 
 [•etched 
 
 blessed 
 le cool- 
 refresh 
 nces of 
 
 com- 
 rrateful 
 noble 
 
 e 
 
 ;e 
 d 
 
 com- 
 
 with 
 
 and to 
 
 rfare is 
 
 10, from 
 
 ge from 
 )f earth, 
 taste of, 
 est that 
 
 reniainetli for the people of God. And we have 
 the present enjoyment of the sweetest happiness 
 that the human heart can taste this side of 
 heaven — tlie hapi)in('S8 of doino' irood. 
 
 O f? 
 
 And oil, witli what intense earnestness and de- 
 votion should we give ourselves to this, our great 
 life-woi'k ! With what tenacity should we cling 
 to the bleeding side of Jesus; with what un- 
 conqueraltle wrestlings should we labour to ob- 
 tain from God the richest and highest experience 
 of the Christian life — the very strongest faith, 
 the very brightest hope, the most perfect love ! 
 With what unwavering fortitude should we stand 
 forth as witnesses of Christ in the very midst of 
 the 'most crooked and perverse generation.? of 
 sinners, among whom God has set us as his 
 beacon-lights ! With what self-forgetfulness, and 
 wakeful remembrance of the necessities of a dying- 
 world, should we trea<l in the footsteps of our 
 Divine Master ! With what con.suining zeal and 
 holy ambition should we strive to enter ourselves 
 through the strait gate of life, and what stren- 
 uous efforts should we put forth to lead others 
 there too ! 
 
i 
 
 'f I 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE SALVATION ARMY. 
 
 HERE can he no <loul)t tliat tlie re- 
 ligion of Christ is God's many-sided 
 remedy for all the sins and sorrows 
 that afflict the human race. Then 
 why has not the world been more 
 fjenerallv converted to Christ before 
 this ? There are many reasons. The very 
 genius of Chiistianity forbids its progress, ex- 
 cept on conditions that are of difficult realization. 
 It is of all systems the most intolei'ant of evil, — 
 the most radical in its enmity to all the darling 
 sins of the human heart. It flourishes only on 
 the wreck and ruin of every species of evd. 
 
 Other systems of religion, such as pagan sys- 
 tems of all sorts, Mohammedanism, and degene- 
 rate forms of Christianity — like Romanism — 
 
THE SALVATION ARMY. 
 
 75 
 
 are all compromises, more or less, with the selfish- 
 ness, and pride, and lusts, to which man's fallen 
 nature clings so fondly. This will very largely 
 accovmt for the widespread and l(jng-con- 
 tinued hold that these false ystenis have had 
 on maid<ind. But Christianity allows no com- 
 promises of this kind. It aims at nothing short 
 of the highest ideal of purity, and insists on the 
 most thorougli subjugation of our inner-being 
 to the dominion of Christ. 
 
 T'lis very lofty purity of its aims lias ever 
 made it a shining mark foi' Satan's most tiery 
 darts, and has often provoked the desperate and 
 malignant opposition of fallen humanity. 
 
 We must not forti'et that, in its earliest his- 
 tory, everything that violence and persecution 
 could possibly do for its total extermination was 
 done, and that almost uninterruptedly for several 
 centuries. The strength of the world's mightiest 
 forces was employed to the utmost for this pur- 
 pose ; and the bloody harvests of martyrdom, 
 reape<l times almost without number, seemed 
 again and again to have nearly swept it from the 
 face of the earth. For man}- ages, the Chris- 
 tianity of the most of the world was so adul- 
 terated with heathenish elements and so over- 
 loaded with merely hvnnan accretions, as seen in 
 
il M 
 
 it 1. 
 
 I 
 
 I 
 
 wjOTAata: i»i¥«JKHU 
 
 •I 
 
 7() 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 -ill 
 
 both the Gicck and Latin Churche.s, that its true 
 character was wretchedly oV).scured and its vital 
 power most sadly diminished. Look in,*: at our 
 own times, there are many grave and soirowful 
 causes for the slow extension of the New Testa- 
 ment religion in the world. The old enmity, 
 which produced the opposition just adverted to, 
 is still rampant in the world. Satan has not 
 changed, though his methods may be diflerent. 
 The depravity of the human heart is still the 
 same, thouo'h its hostility to ti-uth and i'Oo<lness 
 may run in new-found channels. There aie still 
 hideous fabrics of heathenish superstition — like 
 the Buddhism of China and the Pantheism of 
 India, beside the more enlightened imposture of 
 Mohammed — which powerfully fascinate the car- 
 nal instincts of mighty millions of the human 
 race. A large part of the so-called Christianity 
 of the world, such as Romanism, is still only a 
 gross caricature of real Christianity, and con- 
 veys to mankind an utterly false impression 
 of the true character of Christ and His religion. 
 Infidelity, which is only the unrestrained and 
 vigorous expression of the rebellious in.stincts 
 of the corrupt heart — a braggart defiance of 
 the authority of God and His laws, of which 
 it is a real agnostic ; it knows nothing as it 
 
THE SALVATION ARMY. 
 
 77 
 
 should, and ;;reatly wants to know even less ; 
 it, too, with the ener;/y that spite supplies, puts 
 forth its widespread and pf.Tsistent opposition, 
 while it seai'ches with di.shonest eye, through- 
 out all the realiiis of natun? for materials by 
 which to explode the whole (Christian system, 
 and banish God from His own woild. intem- 
 perance, as a huge ma^dstrom, attracts with ter- 
 rilic power the baser app^.-tites of human na- 
 ture, and draws down U> destruction its count- 
 less myriads. Immoral literature — nuich of 
 which resembles the old Jewish sepulchi'es, 
 with fair outside but full of horril)le rottenness 
 within — sends its dea/lly poison into the hearts 
 of millions of the young and of the old. In 
 the absorbing lace for nches and the pleasures 
 of the world, the claims of (iod and of religion 
 and eternity are quit<,' forgotten by multitudes, 
 or treateMl as if they were the mythic relics of 
 some dark an<l bygone age ; while the facilities 
 and improvements of ourmoflem civilization are 
 seized by the enemies of Christianity, and ener- 
 getically employed to assist in its destruction. 
 
 Through all these legions of powerful external 
 foes, a pure Christianity has to cut its way ; but 
 there is another sort of oljstruction far more de- 
 trimental than any of these, and it is found within 
 
!'T 
 
 1 41 
 
 i 
 
 
 i. 
 
 , i 
 
 1 
 
 : 
 
 •i:|| 
 
 i 
 
 78 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE, 
 
 the ranks of Christians themselves. It is no 
 cynical iincharitableness, but the sad truth, to 
 say, that iiinnense numbers of professing (Chris- 
 tians, arc Christians in very little more than 
 name ; they neither enjoy the vitalizing- power 
 of true religion in their hearts, nor manifest it in 
 their lives. These lifeless formalists who are, 
 alas ! far too numerous in all the Churches — 
 either as members or close arlherents — are judged 
 of as representative Christians, by an ignorant 
 and undiscriminating world, only too glad to 
 confound saints and sinners together, and deny 
 that Christians are any better than other men. 
 
 Among those to whom we dare not deny more 
 or less of the spirit and character of true Chris- 
 tians, what weakncisses, short-comings, and even 
 decidedly objectionable features are constantly 
 subtracting from the influence of religion on 
 themselves, and seriously impeding its progress 
 all around ! 
 
 It would be a w^onder, indeed, if such profes- 
 sors either made rapid spiritual progress them- 
 selves, or gave much help in conquering the 
 world for Christ, while they can so largely con- 
 form to the ways of an ungodly world, in its 
 .fashions and maxims and idolatries — while they 
 set such a high value on W' ealth and make such 
 
m\ 
 
 THE SALVATION ARMY. 
 
 70 
 
 \ 
 
 
 tremendous efforts and sacrifices for its acquisi- 
 tion — while they can lavisli so much money on 
 the hixuri«'s and ph'asurt's and pursuits of tins 
 world, and d<»l(' out, with such a parsimonious 
 and unwillin;^^ hand, to the cause of Cod — while 
 they can cheerfully spend so much time and 
 enerc^y in prosecuting schemes of selfish andii- 
 tion, and engage so reluctantly, and with such 
 feeble purpose, and do so little, to extend the 
 kinijfdom of Christ in the world. 
 
 Alas ! it is only too true that in Christ's little 
 army there is many a i^ickly soldier hardly able 
 to drag himself along, many a cowardly deserter, 
 who runs away in the day of battle, many a one 
 who, under the uniform of a Christian soldier, 
 has a heart that beats in far too strong sympathy 
 with the enemy. All these painful facts help 
 to account for the slow spread of Christ's re- 
 ligion ; but they serve, at the same time, to 
 illustrate all the more strikingly, the great work 
 it has already done, and the vast and glorious 
 mission Cod designs it yet to accomplish in this 
 world. 
 
 Progress, after all, marks the career of Christ's 
 cause and of His Church, all along the line of 
 its history from the beginning. In spite of all 
 the powers of earth and hell, all the incessant 
 
:" ■ 
 
 j' lmamii i iijwyR ii iiriB i i i Bia i i 
 
 ! 
 
 80 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 and deadly hostility without, and all the 
 treachery and langour and unfaithfulness within 
 its own bosom, Christ's cause has steadily in- 
 creased in numbers and strenuth, until it has 
 now reached a degree of inHuence it never had 
 before, and is to-day the grandest power in the 
 world. 
 
 No one can consider the present aspect of the 
 world in its relation to Christ and His kingdom, 
 without feelings of the most profound thankful- 
 ness and hope. It is true, that wickedness of 
 every sort is dreadfully prevalent throughout 
 the world, but it has never been so conspicuously 
 abominable as now, nor the true Christian cha- 
 racter and life so conspicuously beautiful as 
 under the bivighter shining forth of the Gospel 
 light of these days. Taken as a whole, there is 
 little doubt the world is much less desperately 
 and universallv wicked than in former times, 
 and far more under the power of truth and good- 
 ness than in any previous age. Christ's loyal 
 servants have been far from spending their 
 strength for nought. To say nothing of the 
 enormous amelioration of human society, in 
 many nations, and in almost every condition and 
 relation of life, directly or indirectly traceable 
 to the influence of Christian efforts — whole 
 
THE SALVATION ARMY. 
 
 81 
 
 the 
 ithin 
 
 f in- 
 
 ; ha.s 
 
 had 
 
 11 the 
 
 .f the 
 dom, 
 
 nations oi" the most degraded })agans have been 
 reclaimed to civilization and to Chriwt. Many 
 others have been so inter-penetrated with Chris- 
 tian truth, that their heathen gods and systems 
 are already paralyzed, and the doom of their 
 enervated superstitions sealed for a certain down- 
 fall at an earlv date. The most venerable 
 systems of error and tyranny, like Romanisn) 
 and Mohannnedanism, un<ler the increasino' lioht 
 of the Gospel, have l)een discovering their essen- 
 tial falsehood and weakness, to the inquisitive 
 eyes of this generation ; and their foundations 
 becoming so honeycombed and rotten, that their 
 fall cannot be postponed to any very distant 
 period. 
 
 The assaults of scepticism have, in the past, 
 in\'ariably resulted in the building up more sub- 
 stantially, of the fortifications of Christian evi- 
 dence, and in the manninix of her bulwarks with 
 more powerful and skilful defenders. There 
 can be little doubt that the present efforts of 
 Atheistic materialism will end similarly well. 
 
 The blessed Book of God — the bread of eter- 
 nal life — throuo-h the blessino- of its Great Au- 
 thor, on human efforts, has, like the loaves in tlie 
 Saviour's hand, been multiplied and distributed 
 
 6 
 
1 1 
 
 k 
 
 ;,ii! 
 
 82 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 
 to tlie rauii>sliing nations, in almost every 
 laiii-uaiio and dialect on the face of the earth. 
 
 Christian missions have planted the seed-corn 
 of Cliristian Churches, in almost every country 
 in the wcn-ld, which has, in many instances, 
 grown ahcady into rich and hopeful spiritual 
 harvests. The work of the Sunday-school and 
 faithful parental teachin«^-, has forestalled 
 amongst tlie young, an incalculable amount of 
 evil, and ensured the capture for Christ, of whole 
 millions of children, who are making a lartjer, 
 more loyal, and more powerful army of Christian 
 soldiers than the world ever saw before; and 
 that great work goes bravely on with an enthu- 
 siastic interest, and a compacted organization of 
 labour, never dieamed -of in anv former time. 
 The great moral reforms of the world, like 
 temperance, are daily gathering force, for the 
 full and final prostration of the Goliath vices of 
 the earth. The Titanic power of tlie press 
 never before was so fully and universally en- 
 listed <m the side of Christian truth, or so etiect- 
 ively employed in the direct advocacy of Christ's 
 cause, as it is now. Hosts of fresh labourers, from 
 every rank of society, and from the most unex- 
 pected (puirters, have been springing up, whose 
 earnest eti'orts ha\ e won many thousands to re- 
 
 \i '. 
 
THE SALVATION ARMY 
 
 83 
 
 ery 
 I. 
 
 jorn 
 itry 
 ices, 
 itual 
 and 
 ailed 
 it of 
 vliole 
 
 u'ger, 
 
 pentance and salvation; while the whole body 
 of believers of every name have received such a 
 spiritual (jiiickeninj^-, within the last century 
 and half, as has raised, by many degrees, the tone 
 of their entire Christian character and life, and 
 has more rapidly multiplied the nundjcr of tho- 
 roughly devoted and truly Christdike men and 
 women, than in any previous period since the 
 apostolic times. The march of Christ's cause, 
 though slow, has been sure, and it daily hastens 
 with accelerated speed to fulfil a destiny so 
 commanding and so all-subduing, that in com- 
 parison all the past is as nothing. It is God's 
 purpose thrt all the earth shall yield allegiance 
 to Christ. The leaven of Christian truth will 
 yet leaven the whole human race. The Church 
 — the spiritual family of God — will yet subju- 
 gate and include the world. 
 
 Great as will be those future triumphs of 
 Christ's cause, when the earth shall ]>e filled 
 with the knowledge of the glory of God, as the 
 waters cover the sea, thev are effects which 
 might be predicted as resulting from the death- 
 less vitality of the Christian system, and the full 
 exercise of the undeveloped powers of the 
 Church of God. If the labours of such a com- 
 paratively small number of faithful Christiana 
 
if ^' r 
 
 p 
 
 
 If 
 
 ill! 
 
 lii 
 
 84 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 as have actually occupied the field, have, with 
 the Divine blessing, accomplished such great and 
 permanent results, what might we now expect, 
 should faithful labourers vastly increase, both in 
 numbers and in all the elements of enlarged 
 spiritual power { There is no calculating what 
 an amazing extension of the blessed religion of 
 Jesus Christ might be immediately witnessed, if 
 professing Christians would only wake up to 
 their privileges and duty ; and can Ave calculate 
 what losses to the world will be inliicted, ijthey 
 do not i Oh ! why should those who say they 
 have accepted Jesus as their Saviour, live so 
 long in the weakness of spiritual infancy I Why 
 should they not earnestly seek and truly obtain 
 the Spirit's baptism of power, of love, and of a 
 sound mind ( Why will Christians continue to 
 paralyze the right arm of their spiritual strengtli 
 by patching up a deceitful truce with the world, 
 by permitting their afiections to be placed so 
 much on its shadowy vanities '. Surely, it is 
 time for us to rise by faith into the higher life 
 of holiness, to dissolve every false and fatal 
 partnership with an ungodly world, to expand 
 the generous sympathies of our souls for a world 
 that so sorely needs all that we can think and 
 feel and do for its salvation, and go forth from 
 
THE SALVATION AJIMY. 
 
 85 
 
 and 
 i'rom 
 
 our ease, and fancied modesty, and wretched in- 
 difference, to grapple, in good earnest, with the 
 over-niasterino- woes of our fellow-men, and do 
 some substantial work for Christ. Oh, if one- 
 lialf of the Christians were what they ought to 
 be, would labour, and give, and pray, and suffer 
 for Christ, as they easily might, what rich bles- 
 sings wouM descend upon their own poor, starv- 
 ing, diied-up souls ; what worthy representatives 
 of Christ they would stand forth before the 
 world, to confound the sceptic by the unanswer- 
 able argument of their own lives, and to demon- 
 strate as nothino' else so well can, the abounding; 
 excellence of Christ and His gloriovu:^ religion, to 
 all sorts of gainsayers. If the living ( christians 
 of to-day were mostly of such a sort as this — 
 were like what, thank God, many really are — 
 how long would it be until there would be a 
 Bible in everv home in the world, a Missionarv, 
 and a Christian (Jhurch in every neighbourhood, 
 in every country under the sun — until children, 
 not by millions, but by scores and hundreds of 
 millions, would be in the Sunday-schools — until 
 intemperance, and other moral ulcers of societ5^ 
 would be healed bv bein^ exterminated — until a 
 purified press would be scattering its glorious illu- 
 mination to the remotest corners of the olobe — 
 
86 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 until the mouth of atheistic and infidel assumption 
 would be struck dumb — until all the idols of the 
 heathen mifdit serve for curiosities to succeedino- 
 generations — until Jews and Mohammedans and 
 Romanists, could hold out no longer in ^heir re- 
 jection of the only true Messiah, the oidy true 
 Prophet, the only true Mediator — tlie Lord Jesus 
 Christ? 
 
 Surely a responsil)ility of the most tremendous 
 sort, rests upon the Christian people now in the 
 world. May the great Head of His Church 
 arouse our sbtanbeiing souls, persuade us mightly 
 of our duty, and impart unto us all that strength 
 by Avhich we shall etfectually do His holy will, 
 and accomplish, each one, the great work He so 
 imperatively requires at our hands. 
 

 CHAPTER Viri. 
 
 THE RUSH OF TIME. 
 
 YEN" the very brevity of life is an- 
 other proof of the benevolent wis- 
 dom of God. The indefinite prolonga- 
 tion of haiMfin life in man's present 
 condition, wovdd ha v e l>een a calamity 
 a thousand times heavier, than all 
 the human race can possibly now endure. But 
 God has confined the period of oui' probation on 
 earth within very narrow limits. He gives us 
 just time sufficient to acquire all our necessary 
 experiences, and to accomplish all the work He 
 requires of us, prior to our departure for the 
 heavenly woidd. And herein lies the true value 
 of time, and the true greatness of luiman life. 
 
 It is a matter of almost self-evident truth, 
 that there must be some great purposes to be 
 
lMHp^»r«ta|»t»»l«a»wm iLl i K M " I II W.JI.1W B 
 
 
 li< 
 
 ■i' I 
 
 III 
 
 Pi i 
 
 H 
 
 .ss 
 
 VOICEK FROM THE THRONE 
 
 attained by luiip life — purposes which are in 
 keeping with the marvellous powers with which 
 human Itciuiis are endowed. Every atlieistic 
 and sceptical tlieory necessaiily strips human 
 life of any and every important object or end 
 whatfjver. It would be a transparent absurdity 
 to refjuire all the energy of the ocean's lesound- 
 ing wa\'es to ■' wnft a feather or to drown a fly " 
 — to construct and employ the mightiest loco- 
 motive to drag what the hand of any child could 
 easily draw ; but the like of this would be no 
 waste of power at all, compared to a being of 
 the splendid mental and moral endowments of 
 man, existing for no better objects than those of 
 merely the highest order of brutes. All such 
 systems smite oft' the royal crown of dignity 
 from man's brow, cancel his rightful patent of no- 
 bility, and make life a preposterous contradic- 
 tion, and a senseless, aimless, and worse than 
 useless vanity. 
 
 Practically, the life-objects of the sensualist 
 and pleasure-worshipper are not nuich better. It 
 is true, God has placed many elements of plea- 
 sure in this world, all along the pathway of 
 human life ; but they are put there, as a merci- 
 ful mitigation of an existence that would be 
 otherwise more rio-orous and intolerable than we 
 
THE RUSH OF TIME. 
 
 89 
 
 could well endure. But life was never meant 
 for one lono- holidav — for one lon^ round of the 
 gratification of sense — no more than the mouth 
 was meant to receive no food hut honey ; no 
 more than the fai-mer was meant to do nothino- 
 hut walk ami (iiL-' the tiower-heds of his oarden ; 
 no more than the father of a familv, was meant 
 to do nothiiiij: hut caress his wife and children. 
 Neither is it anvthinix hut a gross and cruel 
 degradation of life's majestic purposes, to devote 
 its brief term, either to the feverish pursuits of 
 wealth, the desperate attempts to climb the 
 ladder of worldly fame, or the greedy grasping 
 after human power and authority, which are 
 the absorbing pursuits of such multitudes. If 
 man's existence ended with the present life, it 
 might be a matter of some indifierence how he 
 chose to spend his little span of being ; but the 
 realities of the eternal world impart the most 
 indescribable importance and value to all that 
 belongs to this life. Whatever innnortal glories 
 the saints shall possess in heaven, wdiatever dis- 
 mal penalties the lost shall erdme in hell, take 
 their rise not there, hut here. Those boundless, 
 endless rivers of blessing or of woe, start on 
 this side the grave. In some respects, our brief 
 life on earth is the most important period of our 
 
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 I 
 
 
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 1 '1 
 
 i, I' 
 
 ■ 1 
 
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 II 
 
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 00 
 
 VOICES FROM THE TIIHONE. 
 
 whole unondinjiif existence, as it is the initial and 
 formative period. Just as the child is father to 
 the man, just as it is tlie plastic clay, that can 
 only he moulded into the <T^raceful or the hideous 
 form, just as it is in the sapling shoot, and only 
 then, that it can he determined whether the tree 
 shall grow erect and heautiful, or droop in crook- 
 edness and deformity. (Jod has put this price- 
 less privilege of choosing between an endle.ss 
 career of good oi- evil, hliss or misery, life or 
 death, oiibj once within our reach in the whole 
 circle of our heing, and that is- noiv, and Ity that 
 choice we shall and must ahide. 
 
 And what a hrief, changeful, uncertain thing 
 is life ! The longest human life may well be 
 likened to a vapoui- that appi^areth hut foi- a little 
 time and vanisheth away. When Me consider 
 how much of life must necessarily Ije .spent in 
 the preparation of chihlhood and youth, in labo- 
 rious toil for the bread that perishes, in sleep, in 
 sickness, in the imbecility of age, and in many 
 other ways, how extremely small a proportion of 
 time have most people left to devote wholly to 
 the interests of their souls and direct preparation 
 for eternity ! What countless multitudes never 
 live out half the allotted three-score years and 
 ten ! What years of bodily agony many en- 
 
THK Kl'SH OK TIMK. 
 
 91 
 
 dure ; while others pass from the bloom and 
 vio^ouv of life into a suddf^n and unlooked-f(^r 
 grave ! The strongest man in tlie world has no 
 certainty w]iat<'v<'r that hf? will he alive in 
 twenty-four liours. Jn siurh circiniistances, how 
 pT'eeioiis is eveiy uiouient — every opportunity ! 
 Surely if there be such a tliin<^' as wisdom, it is 
 in redeeminuj the time — in '^•IzinLj^.'very moment 
 that we can gain, and pressing it into the service 
 of oui- souls ; and if there \tfi sueh a thing as 
 folly, it is in its wilful and continual waste. 
 There is no extravagance* so dre-adful as that of 
 throwing away life's one glorious opportunity 
 to secure the undying jichen of f;teinity. 
 
 Oh, with what unutterable astonishment will 
 men look back by-and-ln' at their own super- 
 lative folly in frittering away theii' precious 
 years, in grasping after the empty phantom- 
 pleasures and gains and distinctions of this 
 world ! An<l with what overflowing thankful- 
 ness and satisfaction will OhI's children look 
 back on every hour that they weie enabled to 
 till up wisely and well, with exercises helpful to 
 their souls and g-\onU'inu: to Ood ! 
 
 And what our whole life on earth is to the eter- 
 nal future, so is the periwl of youth, to a large ex- 
 tent, in relation to our riper years. It would 
 
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 be hard to over-estimate the value of early life 
 in its bearing on our whole after character, his- 
 tory, and career. It is then that Christian 
 teaching can be most easily received, and most 
 indelibly imprinted on the mind. It is then that 
 the saving impressions of the truth and spirit of 
 God can be more readily stamped abidingly 
 upon the heart. It is then that the power of 
 evil is weakest, and the advantage of grace 
 mightiest ; that holy dispositions and virtuous 
 • habits may be more readily implanted and 
 matured into vigorous life ; while the noxious 
 weeds of evil, may be with less trouble, eradi- 
 cated or restrained. In those first few fleeting 
 years of childhood, either at the Christian 
 mother's knee, in the sanctuary and Sunday- 
 school, or in the blighting atmosphere of a god- 
 less home, and in the vicious school of unre- 
 strained and wicked companionship, are shaped 
 the almost certain future of innumerable multi- 
 tudes of men and women, not only for all their 
 after-lives, but for their whole eternity. 
 
 Would that the clarion-calls of reason, of God's 
 Word, of the Great I am Himself, would awaken 
 a slumbering world and a far too sleepy church, 
 to work the works of God while it is day, for 
 the night cometh when no man can work. In a 
 
i 
 
 THE HUSH OF TIME. 
 
 93 
 
 little, the night of the grave will close in upon 
 us all ! The angel of death will swear that, so 
 far as we are concerned, time shall be no 
 longer. Our sun will set, to rise no more on 
 earth. If we have trifled away our precious day 
 of grace — if we have consumed the flying hours 
 in sinful indulgence, in selfish pursuits, m heed- 
 less indifference to our soul and etei-nal things — 
 we shall in death, drop like lead into the 
 seething waves of remedile.ss ruin — we shall 
 awake to the dreadful consciousness that we are 
 toppling over into the abyss, which is the fitting 
 end of a wasted life ; and we shall go down that 
 cataract of eternal despair with a cry of anguish 
 that will rend the skies, — " The harvest is past, 
 the summer is ended, and I am not saved." 
 
 Eternal God ! have mercy upon us. We con- 
 fess with sorrow, that the vain things of time 
 draw our hearts with a most alarming fascina- 
 tion, while the realities of the unseen world 
 have but little influence over us. O merciful 
 God, open our eyes — change our hearts. From 
 this hour may we drop our deluded fondness 
 for earth, our perilous idolatry of these tran- 
 sient vanities ; and give us eyes to see deep into 
 eternity, to behold by faith the coming doom of 
 the ungodly, and the coming reward of the 
 
94 
 
 VOICES FROM THK THRONE. 
 
 righteous. O help us to make our escape, ere 
 wratli falls. Lay Thy nieiciful hand upon us, 
 and help our lagganl souls to flee to the open 
 arms of Thy dear Son. () may we surrender to 
 Him. May our affections, henceforth, be set on 
 thinos ahove, where Chiist witteth on the riuht 
 hand of God ; and may we strive, in the use of 
 every power and every opportunity, to prepare 
 to meet Thee in peace, through Jesus Christ our 
 Lord. Amen. 
 
m 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE DAY OF DOOM. 
 
 HE Book of God discloses to us the 
 coiniiiLC of a day of final reckoning ; 
 and it woidd seeni, even to our lim- 
 ited comprehension, that such is a 
 most reasonable and even necessary 
 requirement. A great deal of th«' 
 Divine administration in this world is involved 
 in mystery, ai-ising from the necessary in- 
 completeness of things here — from the nar- 
 rowness of the field in this life, which can- 
 not admit of the full expansion, and the full 
 explanation, of God's great plans in regard to 
 us ; and in the probationary character of our life 
 here, one of the chief conditions of which, re- 
 quires us to walk by faith, and not by sight. 
 It is to be expected that God, who, tli rough out 
 
 u 
 
96 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 
 ii ' 
 
 i It 
 
 I ii I 
 
 
 His entire dealings with us, never acts in a 
 capricious or merely arbitrary way, but always 
 treats with respect that reason and intelligence 
 He Himself has put within us, would at some 
 time clear up these mytseries, and justify to His 
 creatures even His most intricate works and 
 ways. He will do so in the Judgment of the 
 Great Day. 
 
 It seems, too, that equity requires a further 
 investigation and exhibition of character, and a 
 more perfect allotment of rewards and penalties 
 than ever takes place, or ever can take place, in 
 this life. 
 
 God has constituted our life here the most 
 perfect imaginable condition in which we shall 
 act our probationary part. There are some re- 
 wards, as necessary stimulants to virtue, and no 
 more ; there are some penalties, as necessary 
 discouragements to vice, and no more. For pur- 
 poses, which must be necessary in this state of 
 trial and imperfection, the tares and the wheat 
 often grow together, the masked hypocrite often 
 passes current for the genuine Christian, the 
 true believer often is rated as a worthless de- 
 ceiver, the wicked flourish often as the green 
 bay tree, and the righteous- are as beggars at the 
 rich man's gate. But all this will be equalized 
 
THE DAY '<F DOOM. 
 
 97 
 
 a 
 
 ays 
 nee 
 nne 
 His 
 and 
 the 
 
 •ther 
 ,nd a 
 ilties 
 26, in 
 
 most 
 
 shall 
 
 le re- 
 id no 
 
 ^ssary 
 pur- 
 
 ite of 
 rheat 
 often 
 the 
 js de- 
 o-reen 
 lat the 
 lalized 
 
 and expounded by-and-by. But what tongue 
 can describe, or mind conceive, the awful gran- 
 deur of that great day ! It will come, not with 
 the pi-emonitory muttoritigs of reverberating 
 thunder, not with the }K)rt('ntious ovcj-casting of 
 the sky, and long-continued signs and fiiglitful 
 omens ; Imt without a moment's warning. For 
 thousands of years l»efore, the Word of (iod, the 
 Holy Spii-it, and the accredited messengers of 
 God ha«l l>een sounding, as with trumpet-call, 
 the fearful tidings, and sucli alone will be ihe 
 world's warninef. It will burst as a hoi-i-ifA'intj 
 surprise on many an uid>eliever wrapped in his 
 carnal secuiity. As in the days of Noah, a scoffing, 
 incredulous, ath(ustic world, ate and drank, mar- 
 ried and gave in njari'iage, and rioted in the 
 pleasures of sense, until the veiy crack of doom 
 announced in a moment, that the end had cc)me ; 
 and amid thickening daikness, and cleaving 
 heavtms, and (piivering earth, and congregating 
 waters, men felt that ihv righteous judgment of 
 God was no lono-cr a mvtliic dream to ])e lauQ'hed 
 
 O I, o 
 
 at, but a fatal and final avalanche of destruction, 
 from which there was no escape. So will it be 
 in the far greater day of wrath, which is yet to 
 come. 
 
 In the very midst of a bustling world, eager 
 
i- . ss- tTUK z . a r » -» , - \m M.-sxt^ 
 
 1)8 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 I' 
 
 1. ■'! I 
 
 t I 
 
 in its race after the glittering trifles of a day, 
 and dreaming only of pleasure, under the opiate 
 power of sin, and incredulously asking "Where 
 is the promise of His coming?" the mighty blast 
 of the last trump will sound ! That blast wall 
 wake the dead. From all the catacombs and 
 crypts, the sepulchres of earth and the deep 
 graves of the ocean, the long generations of the 
 past will rise to life again, without the loss of 
 one human being. High on His great white 
 throne the Eternal God will seat Himself as the 
 Supreme and only Judge of heaven and of earth 
 and of hell ; and before wdiose dread majesty the 
 heavens shall pass away with a great noise, the 
 olements shall melt with fervent heat, and the 
 earth also and the works that are therein shall 
 be burnt up. It w^ill be Jesus, the once meek 
 and lowly and suffering Lamb of God ; Jesus, 
 wdiose spilt blood, wdiose entreating tears, whose 
 heart-melting calls, whose long-suffering patience, 
 men have treated with such unbelieving scorn, 
 such callous indifference, such heartless neglect, 
 who will re-appear on that throne, the mighty 
 Lion of Judah. He w^ill look with eyes of 
 searching flame through the innermost being of 
 each one in that assembled universe. And every 
 eye shall see Him. They that pierced and cru- 
 
TTTK f)AV OF IHM)M. 
 
 09 
 
 iay, 
 
 liate 
 
 here 
 
 )last 
 
 will 
 and 
 
 deep 
 
 f the 
 
 )ys of 
 
 white 
 
 as the 
 
 earth 
 
 ity the 
 
 |se, the 
 
 d the 
 shall 
 meek 
 
 Jesus, 
 whose 
 tience, 
 scorn, 
 eglect, 
 nighty 
 lyes of 
 eing of 
 1 every 
 nd cru- 
 
 cified Him, that neglected and rejected Him, and 
 they who loved Him and fought His battles and 
 lived to His <»:lorv. Oh, the anouisli of sinners 
 in that day ! How they will he filled with 
 shame and confusion and remorse ! How they 
 will call in vain for some-hiding place — the crash- 
 ing rocks, the up-heaving mcmntains, the wreck 
 of expiring nature, to hide them and all their 
 disgrace, from the wi'ath of the Lamb ! Oh, 
 how foolish, how unreasonable, how detestable, 
 will sin appear in that day ! How all the im- 
 pudence of atheism and infidelity will stand 
 abashed ! and what over-powering, crushing con- 
 tempt, will be in the gaze of unnumbered 
 millions as they look at the men who, in the 
 arrogance of their intellectual pride, strove to 
 banish God out of existence, and exile Him from 
 His own domains ! 
 
 How the toys of earthly pleasure and riches 
 and honours will shrivel into the most abject 
 beggarliness ! and how the folly of those who for 
 these things, have wilfully bartered the King s 
 favour and all their hopes, will startle that 
 universal throng ! 
 
 In that day it will be seen that nothing has 
 ever escaped the all-seeing eye of God ; and 
 from the Book of God's remembrance, from that 
 
100 
 
 VOICES FlUJM Tin-: TIfRONE. 
 
 il 
 
 infallible, register, where all the thoughts, words, 
 and deeds of men have been lecc-ded, God will 
 bring to light the true character of ea,ch. 
 
 What i-evelations ! All the deceivers, hypo- 
 crites, and secret villains; all the violent, tyran- 
 nical, and cruel ; all the false, lustful, and shame- 
 fully impure — will stand unmasked before God, 
 and will receive the execrations of the universe. 
 Oh, how the m<'n who have I'idden thi'ough seas 
 of human blo(jd to their pinnacles of fame ; who 
 have marked their pathwav throunh life by the 
 tears an<l anguish and ruin of thousands of their 
 fellow-men, will wither beneath the frown of that 
 righteous Judge ! 
 
 The sinner will sink to his true level then. 
 All the pomp and circumstance and pride of 
 earth, which served in this world to hide the 
 real rottenness in his soul, will avail him nothing 
 now^ The stamp of his eternal baseness and 
 infamy will V)e affixed to his l)iow. Those who 
 treated (Jhrist and His cause as beneath their 
 notice, who shut their ears to the cry of human 
 misery, who fattenevl on their selfish indulgences 
 and luxuries, and had no sympathizing tear to 
 shed, and no benevolent hand to stretch out to 
 alleviate the sorrows of the wretched and help- 
 less, the outcast and forlorn, — oh, how will the 
 
THK DAY OK DOOM. 
 
 101 
 
 who 
 Itbeir 
 iii\au 
 leiices 
 ;ar to 
 ut to 
 Ihelp- 
 II the 
 
 exposure of all this haiti-lieaiLeJ villainy .scorch 
 their souls, as it comes jL,dariiig into view, in the 
 presence of Ilini whose lit'c was one long sacri- 
 fice for the good of mankind ! 
 
 But that will he a «dorious «lav for God's 
 faithful children. it will set them right hefore 
 the universe. Here they struggle(l with a 
 thousand ditHculties, cut their way throuiih hosts 
 of foes ; they toiled on, in ohscurity and neglect ; 
 they were slandeied and jiersecuted, and made 
 as the filth and otiscouiinef of the earth ; they 
 were the gazing-stocks and the mockery of 
 the world, and many of them hi-anded as the 
 enemies of their race, and martyred eithei' in the 
 tires of the stake, or in the slower tortui-es of a 
 life-long persecution. All their painful wrestlings 
 with evil, all their sacrifices for Christ, all their 
 zeal for the world's highest good, often passed 
 for less than nothing, or the foolishness of folly, 
 with an ungodly and ungrateful world. But 
 that great day will declare it all. Christ will 
 bring out their righteousness as the noonday 
 brightness. They will then stand forth as the 
 only true sons of glory, as the only true 
 princes of earth, as the truest and best bene- 
 factors of mankind. All their love for Jesus, 
 all their hatred of sin an<l deliglit in holiness, 
 
 M 
 
102 
 
 VOICES FROM THK THRONE. 
 
 II! 
 
 IiIm;:! '!j 
 
 all their unre(|uit«Ml toil in the Master s canst', all 
 their ^'ciu'ruus and sclf-.saciiiieiuy- })eii('vnl('nce, 
 all theii- patient endurance ut* suH'ei-ing tor 
 Christ's sake, will then come to lij^dit; and He 
 will declare, hefore angels and men and devils, 
 that these are thev whom He deliohts to honour. 
 He will lift upon them tlie light of His counten- 
 ance, brightei*, sweetei-, more radiant than that of 
 ten thousand suns ; and amid the acclamations 
 of that innumerable host, He will speak in 
 tones of p(jwer and love, that will sen<l a thrill 
 through every heai't, and reacii to the depths and 
 height and amplitude of the universe, — " Blessed 
 are ye : I was hungry and ye gave Mv meat ; 
 thiisty, and ye gave Me drink ; sick, and ye 
 visited Me ; foi-asmuch as ye did it inito the 
 least of these Mv brethren, ve did it unto Me." 
 
 Inexorable justice shall then have its fullest 
 sway; but the Law, according to which every 
 sentence shall be pronounced, will be that very 
 Law which God had placed before the , ^'es of 
 men for thousands of years before. The Word 
 of Christ, spoken by prophets and apostles and 
 from His own sacred lips, and recorded in His 
 holy Book, shall judge us in that last great day. 
 The very Book w^hich has provoked so much 
 incredulity and such contemptuous aversion, so 
 
THI-: l»AV Ml- hnoM. 
 
 lO.M 
 
 ot"t(.'H [)us1i«m1 a.si<l(.' into <liistv fnnuTs to give 
 place to the frivolous novel or the ephemeral 
 newspaper, will unei-ringly d»'ci«ie wheie wi' are 
 to stand on that ti-eniendous day. The lovely 
 cliaracter an«l nohle life, too, of ev;'ry servant 
 of God will l»»' M nioinnnental condemnation of 
 the whole herd of sinners. What advantages, 
 what offers of mercy, what availing virtue in 
 the blood of Christ, what accessible light of 
 tlie Bible and the Holy Spirit's teaching, wlmt 
 numerous and golden opportunities had tnese 
 saints of Ood, ^^' .t those very sinners on the 
 left hand did not possess ( 
 
 All these saints of God \vere once the children 
 of sin and wrath, even as others ; and if these 
 wretched condemned sinners on the left liand 
 are not the happy saints of God too, it is be- 
 cause, while on earth, they preferred rather to 
 scorn the truth of God than accept it ; they would 
 not have Christ to reign over them ; they would 
 choose the indulgence of carnal appetites, to 
 self-denial ; a life of selfishness and sin, to a 
 life of virtuous restraint and benevolent labour. 
 And what God forewarned them of times with- 
 out number in His Word, they now realize. 
 What they chose, they have. It might have 
 been otherwise ; it would have been 'otherwise, 
 but for their infatuated foll3\ And now all is 
 
 ft 
 
 •t^ 
 
i ! 
 
 I 'III 
 
 • iLr 
 
 I! 
 
 1 
 
 104 
 
 VOICES KR(JM THE THUUNK. 
 
 over. Tlit'V stand, the blasted, ruined monu- 
 ments of their own suicidal unbelief, obstinacy, 
 and wickedness. 
 
 But when shall this awful day come ? That 
 we may safely leave to Him, who alone knows ; 
 but, as for us, the day of our death is leally the 
 judgment day to us. That day will fix our doom, 
 iri'eversibly and for ever. 
 
 Thank Ood, that day has not yet come * Oh, 
 w^ith what inibounded thankfulness should we 
 consider that we have still the opportunities of 
 salvation ! How we should fairly leap for joy 
 that the dread Judo'c of that great day, is still 
 the welcoming- Saviour of men, and wdll readily, 
 speedily, joyfully receive us, if we but renounce 
 our sins and accept His love ! 
 
 Oh, what haste we should make for His 
 opened arms ! How every hour should seem a 
 year of agonized suspense, until our peace is 
 made with (iod ! How every sin should be 
 dropped as a hot iron out of our hand ! How 
 God's gracious promises of mercy should be in- 
 stantly grasped, with far more eagerness than 
 men grasp gold, and estates, and thrones I How 
 the service of God, and anything He may ask 
 us to do or suifer, should be ardently entered 
 upon, with hearts bursting wdth gratitude for 
 the privilege ! 
 
His 
 
 nil a 
 ! iB 
 be 
 
 m- 
 jthan 
 IHow 
 ask 
 jered 
 for 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 DEEPS OF WOE. 
 
 .-<?tr. 
 
 OLLOWINU clo.s(i upon the revelations 
 and decisions of tlie Last Jndj^^nient, 
 will come the Hnal distribution of men 
 an«l angels, according to their cliarac- 
 ter and work. The abyss of perdition 
 will open its jaws to swallow up the 
 wicked. 
 
 And here we come upon the dai'kest and most 
 awful feature in human history oj* Clod's ad- 
 ministration. Tliis dreadful thouiiht of hell is 
 what creates such revulsion of feeling, and 
 awakens ♦such hostile unbelief in many a heart. 
 It is this that mainly .stirs the wrath of every 
 species of intidel ; and that engenders so much 
 hidden animosity to the CJospel amijngst such 
 lar^e masses of mankind. 
 
 V 
 
 it 
 
]0() 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THH<JNE. 
 
 How can a God of love send His creatures into 
 such unmitigated tortures as the flames of hell, 
 and that to endure for ever ! And fiom the 
 fancied inconsistency and impossibility of such 
 a thing, many have rushed, for relief, into the 
 self-made doctrines that either there is no hell 
 at all, or that it must surely come to an end. It 
 is not a question, however, which mere human 
 opinion can decide. Revelation alone can do 
 that, and it has done it. God says that there is 
 a hell, and that all the finally impenitent and 
 wicked shall be turned into it, and that settles 
 the question. Men may think what they choose, 
 but that does not alter the fact, any more than if 
 a thousand men were to deny that God ever al- 
 lowed in tins world such burning mountains as 
 Vesuvius or Etna, it would at all change the fact 
 that such volcanoes do really exist. 
 
 As to the implied charge of inconsistency and 
 cruelty, God's character needs no defence, li 
 He permits such a plea to be, that is an all- 
 sufficient reason why it must be right for it to 
 be, and why it must be in the utuiost harmony 
 with all His own attributes. 
 
 What superlative ignorance and effrontery, to 
 dictate to God, as to what is unwise and un- 
 righteous and unmerciful for Him to do ! 
 
DEEPS OF WOE. 
 
 107 
 
 and 
 It- 
 all - 
 it to 
 linony 
 
 kry, to 
 Id un- 
 
 it may be a somewhat harder thing to believe 
 this doctrine than to believe some other truths 
 o£ Divine revelation ; but it is, after all, a good 
 deal easier to believe that theie is a liell than to 
 believe that there is none — to accept the plain 
 scripture doctrine on this ]>oint, than to accept 
 other doctrines, that tlie rejection of this will 
 certainly drive us into. 
 
 Are we prepared to accept the doctrine — 
 notwithstanding the relation in which sin and 
 surtering stand as cau.se and effect — that God 
 shoul<l ail)itrarily abolish the effect, although 
 the producing cause still lield full sway ? As 
 well might we complain that God allowed the 
 mighty rock, that men tumljled over the moun- 
 tain brow, to descend in its <lestructive path to 
 the valley ; or complain that God allowed the 
 poison a man delibeiately swallowed, to cause 
 him dreadful suffering and death. 
 
 What monarch or cliief magistrate would be 
 required to relieve all his rebellious, vicious, un- 
 governable subjects from all the necessary and 
 painful consequences ai-ising from their miscon- 
 duct ? And why should God be re(|uired to do 
 that ? For the non-existence of hell, means that 
 men may go all lengths in iniquity ; and, by the 
 arbiti-ary act of God, shall be relieved of all the 
 
 lb 
 
108 
 
 VOICES FROM iHE THRiJNE. 
 
 
 i 
 
 I i 
 
 ■■I ' 
 
 i! 
 
 evil or paiiit'ul consequences of their crimes the 
 moment they die. 
 
 It* there be no hell, when sin is permitted -to 
 work out its painful effects, and where Clod's dis- 
 pleasure is evidenced, on what principle of jus- 
 tice can there be a heaven, where holiness works 
 out its })lessed results, and wheie God's approv- 
 ing smile is enjoyed ? If there l)e no hell, then 
 all men, good and bad, shall dwell together in 
 heaven ; and where would be the wisdom, jus- 
 tice, or mercy of mingling with tlie righteous and 
 holy, all the vile and incorrigible and abomin- 
 able that have ever disgraced the human name, 
 and all, that during their life-time, made l)itter 
 the lives of God's saints ? 
 
 But let them be mercifully renovated and 
 made tit for that holy place — that is to say, let 
 them be renovated by the arbitrary power of 
 God, whether they will or not. That is just the 
 thing God never did do with a single intelligent 
 creature He ever made ; just the thing He can- 
 not do, witlumt totally revolutionizing His 
 whole system of administration, both of angels 
 and men; just the thing that, even to our sense 
 of right, would be totally unfair, and a real in- 
 consistency of an unmistakable sort. God does 
 not compel any man on earth, by irresistible 
 
DEEPS OF WOE. 
 
 109 
 
 lio-eut 
 can- 
 
 His 
 Liigels 
 sense 
 [a\ in- 
 
 (loes 
 istible 
 
 force, to become good — that would be to degrade 
 man from tlie lofty throne of a rational, intelli- 
 gent, and moral agent, to a level even lower than 
 the In-iite ; much less will He force men who 
 have all their lives rejected Him, to accept Him 
 now% merely that they may escape the just 
 penalties of their crimes. 
 
 If there l)e no hell, then we must fall back on 
 the shocking alternative, that (jlod will permit 
 sin and sinnia-s of all <legre(!s to spread 
 confusion, demoralization, and devastation, in 
 ever-widening circles, throughout the universe 
 for evermore ; — a thing more discreditable to 
 the Divine character, and far harder for the 
 human mind to believe, than the most terrible 
 ideas of a bottoudess pit. 
 
 As to the proper eternity of perdition, that, 
 too, is a matter of distinct and special revelation. 
 We are taught tliat it shall never end — that it 
 shall last as long as heaven shall last. If, under 
 the impulse of mere sentiment, we reject this, 
 then how are we to reconcile ourselves to views 
 which are far more absurd in reality, than this 
 can possibly be in appearance ? It is easier to 
 believe that hell will never end, than that sin, 
 by some inherent force in itself, will ever work 
 
 I 
 
110 
 
 VOICES FROM T}1E THRONE. 
 
 i;: 
 
 Mi 
 
 I* ' 
 
 itself out to the extinction of its abominable 
 nature and distressing consequences. 
 
 It is easier to believe, too, that hell will never 
 end, than that God will arbitrarily strike out of 
 existence the iniquity of that pit of darkness, 
 without the proper and full satisfaction for sin 
 His justice demands, and for which, that justice 
 did demand the atouement of Christ, for the less 
 enormous crimes of men while still the day of 
 grace lasted. It is easier to b(>lieve that hell 
 will never end, than that any atonement of the 
 sin of lost souls and devils can bt' made, or that 
 God can furnish a greater and more effectual 
 atonement than that of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
 It is easier to believe that hell will never end, than 
 that either devils or the lost souls of men will, or 
 can, ever truly repent and be converted to God. 
 It is easier to believe that hell will never end, 
 than to believe that God would lie, or deceive us, 
 or blindfold us, merely to terrify us, by assuring 
 us that there was no hope for the lost, and that 
 hell would last for ever, when He secretly in- 
 tended, in some way, to deliver the damned from 
 their torments, and put out the iiames of per- 
 dition. 
 
 And who is responsible for the existence of 
 hell ? On whom shall we lay our indignant 
 
DEEPS OF WOE. 
 
 Ill 
 
 ible 
 
 3ver 
 
 fc of 
 less, 
 • sin 
 stice 
 -! less 
 ,y of 
 'hell 
 t the 
 
 that 
 
 ictual 
 
 Jhrist. 
 
 ,than 
 
 ill, or 
 
 God. 
 end, 
 |ve us, 
 
 uring 
 that 
 
 y in- 
 
 from 
 
 per- 
 
 of 
 
 ice 
 
 Ignant 
 
 blame for causing such awful and everlasting 
 torments ? The infidel lays the blame on God as 
 far as he dare. But is God really responsible for 
 the existence and torments of perdition ? Who 
 was it that made man at first, a very transcript 
 of perfect holiness and happiness, and destined, 
 him to remain so for ever ? It was God. Who 
 was it, when man willingly allowed himself to 
 be seduced V^y the devil and sin, mercifully de- 
 vised, at immense cost, a plan for his recovery 
 and salvation, and graciously gave him fui-ther 
 trial that he might regain all that he had lost, 
 and more ? It was God. Who was it that un- 
 dertook the most amazing mission of mercy to 
 mankind, to expiate our crimes, and deliver us 
 from all sin, and all wrath, and all hell ? It 
 was Christ — God manifest in the flesh. Who 
 was it that has been calling upon the human 
 race for thousands of years, to turn from sin 
 and hell, by all the voices of warning, of hope, 
 of love, of entreaty ? It is God. Who is it that 
 has ever offered to all men the freest, fullest, and 
 most immediate deliverance from evil, and all 
 its eternal results ( It is GuJ. Who is it that 
 endures patiently, the innumerable provocations 
 of negligent, heedless, ungrateful, and desper- 
 ately wicked men, and waits on them to the last 
 
112 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THKOXE. 
 
 moment, to see it* they will accept His offered 
 mercy ? It is God. And who is it when men, 
 in spite of all this, go defiantly and recklessly 
 on in their sins to the last, aii<l beoin to reap in 
 the eternal world the terrible and resultant 
 harvest of the seeds of wickedness they have so 
 liberally sown on earth — who is it that is to 
 blame ^ Is it God ^ Snrelv not 1 
 
 If God hides His gracious face from such, and 
 suffers them to chocjse eternal death in the error 
 of their ways — if He shower His wrath upon 
 sucli incorrigible sinners, who have, to the last, 
 defied all His authority, insulte<l His uiajesty, 
 blasphemed His name, trample<l on the blood of 
 His Son, and scornetl all His messages of mercy 
 — is He to be blamed ? Assuredlv not. Let 
 men direct their indignant horror of hell-tire at 
 its trite wild only caiine — 8lN — the very sin that 
 many of themselves are caressing and indulging 
 and excusing. It is sin that jias done all the 
 mischief — that has degraded and destroyed man 
 in the first ])lace — that has cost (^od all His 
 trouble to root it out and neutralize its deadly 
 effects — that has laid all manner of obstructions 
 in man's pathway back to ]-ighteousness and 
 peace — that lias kept on blasting all the beauty 
 and goodness in this world — that has been trans- 
 
DEEPS OF WOE. 
 
 113 
 
 forming human creatures into beings more like 
 devils than men — that has been turning the whole 
 globe into one vast charnel-house of death — that 
 has sunk a pit that is bottomless, kindled all its 
 fires of remorse, and woe, and wrath, that there 
 is nothing in the universe to extinguish — put life 
 into the gnawing worm, which there is nothing 
 to kill, and invokes evermore the wrath of a 
 Holy God, which there is no remedy to allay. 
 
 There is a refinement of perversity, and a 
 villanous crookedness of logic, worthy of the 
 Prince of darkness himself, in the attempt to 
 charge upon God, the direful and unavoidable 
 results at last, of that very evil thing which He 
 has all along l)een labouring so hard to destroy ; 
 and whose fatal and final effects upon mankind. 
 He has done all that even He could do, in order 
 to avert. 
 
 It may be an awful thing for the sinner to be 
 shut up in hell ; but perhaps it would be for him 
 even a more awful thing to be admitted into 
 heaven. The happiness of heaven will mainly 
 lie in the adaptation of holy natures to holy asso- 
 ciations and employments. A being placed in 
 heaven without a holv nature, could not be 
 happy there — could not be otherwise than ex- 
 tremely miserable there. If the happiness of 
 
 8 
 
114 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 li 
 
 111 
 
 111 :i 
 
 heaven will be found in the full blossoming of 
 those seeds of love and purity and goodness, 
 planted in the soul on earth, what delight could 
 the carnal, ungodly souls of sinners find in such 
 things ? They take no pleasure in such things 
 here — they hate and shun them — how could they 
 find infinite joy and happiness in them here- 
 after ? Moreover, there is nothing in heaven 
 but would add to their misery. If the sight of 
 myriads of holy angels and saints, and of a holy 
 God will, in the Day of Judgment, create unen- 
 durable agony, how could they endure the in- 
 efiable beauty of holiness, as shining in its 
 fullest splendours, in every being but them- 
 selves, and making, by contrast, their own 
 dreadful iniquity the more painfully conspicu- 
 ous ? Every look of purity would be a stab of 
 anguish, every song of praise would start a cry 
 of agony, every pleasure of holiness would be a 
 tantalizing and exasperating oflfence, while every 
 glance of God's eye, would be a rebuke of their 
 impious and offensive character, more terrible 
 than the fires of hell. 
 
 God wills no man's damnation. Men damn 
 themselves in spite of all God can do to save 
 them. He lifts His holy hand, and swears in 
 sight of heaven and earth, " As I live, I have no 
 
DKEPS OF WOE. 
 
 115 
 
 g of 
 ness, 
 lould 
 
 such 
 hings 
 I they 
 
 here- 
 leaven 
 
 rht of 
 
 a holy 
 
 ; unen- 
 
 bhe in- 
 in its 
 them- 
 
 j- own 
 
 ^nspicu- 
 stab of 
 •t a cry 
 lid be a 
 .e every 
 lof their 
 terrible 
 
 In damn 
 to save 
 ^ears in 
 have no 
 
 pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the 
 wicked tui'n from his way and live : turn ye, 
 turn ye from your evil ways, for ivltij ^^'^^^ V^ 
 clier' 
 
 The revelation of that awful hell, whoso ^^ap- 
 ing mouth and seething woe, move from beneath 
 to meet the sinnei', is to us a most merciful rev- 
 elation. It discovers to us the acrimonious and 
 incurable malignity of our sins — it is the dark 
 back -ground from which salvation shines on us 
 the more strikingly and invitingly — it is a most 
 powerful admonition against the impious bold- 
 ness of our sins, and a most urgent motive to us 
 to seek the path of life, while we may. Well 
 may we look over the mouth of that lake of fire 
 and tremble: those forks of fiame are making 
 ready to twist themselves around our souls, those 
 billowy beds of wrath are preparing a place for 
 us, those demoniac fingers are stretching up to 
 fix themselves in our hearts, those infernal yells 
 of triumph are preparing to resound as we drop 
 in thither. 
 
 Oh, God ! who among us shall dwell with 
 that devouring fire ? Who among us shall dwell 
 with those everlasting burnings ? Avert from 
 us that awful doom. deliver us from going 
 dowm into the pit ! Thou hast found a ransom 
 
116 
 
 VOICKS FROM THE TIIKONE. 
 
 — even Christ the righteous. For the sake ol 
 His (lying groans and streaming blood, deliver 
 us not into the bitter pains of eternal death. 
 Help Thou us, O Thou (lod of mercy, to Hee from 
 the wrath to come ! Help us to detest sin. (five 
 us penitent hearts. Help us just now to einbrace 
 Thy ottered salvation. 
 
 We would hide us in the wounds of Jesus, 
 from Thy holy wrath against sin. O blessed 
 Rock of Ages, thou art cleft to take us in ! We 
 cling to Thee, Thou Divine Saviour of men ; and, 
 holding Thy hand, sheltered in Thy all-powerful 
 love, we shall be sa\'ed from sin and wrath and 
 hell for evermore. Amen. 
 
 II I 
 
e oi 
 
 liver 
 
 eatli. 
 
 from 
 
 Give 
 
 hrace 
 
 Jesus, 
 )lessed 
 ! We 
 , ; and, 
 (Wert'ul 
 til and 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE LAND OF JiLISS. 
 
 OD destines His saints to dwell with 
 Himself foi'ever. But oli, how little we 
 know of that heavenly land I It is pos- 
 sible that God has given us in His 
 Word, as full information about hea\'en 
 as we are capable of comprehending, 
 and even more information than we ever have 
 had diligence enough to discover, and grace 
 enough to appreciate. 
 
 It is certain that more knowledge of heaven, 
 even could we receive it, w^ould not be beneficial 
 but prejudicial rather, to us in our present transi- 
 tion state. God has given us enough idea of 
 heaven to excite our strongest hopes and stimu- 
 late our greatest energies in His service. He 
 has withheld from us what would only gra- 
 
^ . I' 
 
 ft;'||ii!!i 
 
 tify a profitless curiosity, or what would over- 
 whelm us with sucli a home-sickness for those 
 brighter skies, as to totally destroy our relish for 
 earth, and paralyze all our necessary exertions 
 in doing His holy will. In looking heavenward, 
 we see through a glass darkly, but we see 
 enough to awaken the profoundest y<^arnings of 
 our souls. As when some strange and lovely 
 flower or delicate fruit, is wafted ashore from a 
 far-distant and unknown land, we long, as with 
 the consuming desire of a Columbus, to discover 
 and explore those isles of the blest, that undis- 
 covered country, whose visions of beauty float 
 gorgeously through our dreams. As in this cold, 
 dark world, we catch some sw^eet rays that stray 
 from the lit-up palace on high, and some faint 
 echoes of that delicious nuisic resounding 
 through those heavenly halls, fall on our ears, we 
 long to pass within those pearly gates, and be- 
 hold that glory and drink in those rapturous 
 strains. 
 
 And yet that earnest of our heavenly inherit- 
 ance tliat is already ours, feeble as it is, is a most 
 delightful foretaste of the perfected blessedness 
 that is to come. If God has spread out such a 
 beautiful and magniflcent world as this, as the 
 cradle of our being, as a home He thought none 
 
 t3 
 
THE LAND or ULISS. 
 
 119 
 
 over- 
 r those 
 lish for 
 Lertions 
 inward, 
 we see 
 lings of 
 I lovely 
 e from a 
 ^ as with 
 discover 
 at undis- 
 Luty Hoat 
 |this cold, 
 :hat stray 
 31116 faint 
 'sounding 
 r ears, we 
 a, and be- 
 rapturous 
 
 y inlierit- 
 is a most 
 lessedness 
 )ut such a 
 his, as the 
 lUght none 
 
 too great and good for the merest beginnings of 
 man's existence, wliat sort of a world in ex- 
 pansive amplitude and splendid furnishing, is He 
 likely to provide, wherein man's fully-developed 
 powers shall find their largest exercise ? 
 
 And if the joys of salvation on earth are so 
 sweet, if there is such blessed relief, when God 
 takes away our Ijurden of guilt, such indescriba- 
 ble enjoyment in the love He sheds abroad within 
 us, and in the smile of His countenance He uplifts 
 upon us, sucli comfort and satisfaction in obey- 
 ing even His hardest commands, and such rich 
 pleasure to be had in doing works of benevolent 
 Christian love ; what must the full fruition 
 of all this be ? The most delicious joy that the 
 human heart can feel, is after all, the joy of 
 purity and goodness in the Christian's breast; but 
 this is only a drop — the ocean of bliss lies beyond. 
 But what it means to drink in those exhaustless 
 joys, and 1)ask in those ever-l)rightening beams^ 
 we must die to know. In the i-esurrection morn 
 the Christian's sleeping dust will awake in new- 
 born glory. He went into the darkness, the 
 loathsome vileness of tlie grave, he will rise in 
 victory and resplendent loveliness. All th') de- 
 formities, meanness, gi'ossness, weakness, decay 
 of his riesh, will be left behind, and lovelier far 
 
120 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 than Adam, as he emerged in pristine beauty 
 from His Maker's hand, will the glorified saints 
 emerge from the dust of death. 
 
 Like the body of Christ, the Christian's body 
 will be a fitting temple of his glorified soul, which 
 will respond to the most delicate emotions, de- 
 sires and actions of spotless purity ; it will be a 
 fitting vehicle, through which the instincts and 
 wishes of the immortal spirit, can ever find the 
 fullest and freest gratification; it will be an ever- 
 varying and holy channel, through which the 
 most indescribable happiness will continually 
 flow into the soul. That resurrection morning will 
 be the Christian's marriage-day. His soul and 
 body were divorced in death ; they will be then 
 re-joined in the most delightful and indissoluble 
 partnership, and soul and body shall meet the 
 Lord in the air, and so be forever with the Lord. 
 
 And, oh, the blessedness of that eternal home i 
 With what sensations must those saints of God 
 consider that their warfare is accomplished ; all 
 the toil and suffering and weariness of earth is 
 passed away for evermore. The perils and 
 dangers and enemies which so often threatened 
 them are no more. They are safe forever. 
 Who can imagine how exalted will be the facul- 
 ties, powers and character, with which they will 
 
 'I 
 
THE LAND OF BLISS. 
 
 121 
 
 ible 
 the 
 
 tod 
 all 
 111 is 
 land 
 kned 
 tver. 
 Icul- 
 will 
 
 be endowed, how penetrating^ and profound their 
 intellect, how sagacious their wisdom, how broad 
 and varied the rano:e of their knowledge ; 
 how spotless their holiness, how ardent their love, 
 how unutterable their joy, how divine their ma- 
 jestic beauty, how potent their strength, how 
 sweet their tenderness, how commanding their 
 dignity, and how great and varied the commis- 
 sions that God may entrust them to fulfil, who 
 shall be His kings and priests to reign forever 
 and ever ? 
 
 Ah ! that will be Paradise indeed, where no 
 cry of pain will be uttered, where no sting of sin 
 will wound, where no pall of death will spread 
 its dark wing. In that city of the living God, 
 gushes the river of life from beneath the throne ; 
 there, on its blessed banks, is the Ti-ee of Life, 
 whose leaves are for the healing of the nations. 
 On those gates of pearl, and streets of gold, Hash 
 continually the unclouded glories of the Sun 
 of Righteousness, foi* there shall be no night 
 there. 
 
 Angels are there, ten thousand times ten 
 thousand, and thousands <jf thuusands, and each 
 one resembles the children of a Kinu'. What 
 must be the divine beauty and loveliness of 
 those beings, one of whom Saint John himself 
 
122 
 
 VOICES FKOM THE THK(K\E. 
 
 mistook for God, and fell down at his feet to 
 worship him I And what must be the happiness 
 the saints will find in their close, transparent, 
 delightful fellowship with these sister spirits ! 
 
 And glorious saints of God shall be there, a 
 multitude no man can number, from every age 
 and nation, from all the diversified ranks of the 
 human race. The little children, whom Christ 
 called to his arms on earth, and such millions of 
 whom He has so often called to His arms froin 
 earth — the hoary veteran, who has now renewed 
 an innnortal vouth — those who knew but little 
 here, but will there be taught in Christ's school 
 for ever — those who were mighty in holy know- 
 
 ledge on earth, but will amass 
 
 far greater 
 
 treasures of wisdom and knowledge there — those 
 whose earthly campaign was brief, but decisive — 
 those who were bronzed and scarred in a hun- 
 dred battle-fields for their Lord. Oh ! the bliss 
 of such companionship ! What will it be to 
 associate for ever with those brave, pure, noble, 
 generous souls ! To recount with them the 
 triumphs of the past, and the wonders of Re- 
 deeming Love ; to climb with them the higher 
 altitudes of knowledge and love and joy ! And 
 there will be some there, too, dearer, if possible, 
 still — some who were smitten from our earthly 
 
 ~^~ 
 
THE LAND OF BLISS. 
 
 123 
 
 And 
 
 tsible, 
 Irthly 
 
 embrace by death's rude hand, and left us to 
 travel the remainder of life's weary pilgrimage, 
 solitary and sad. In that blessed home, the 
 husband and wife, the mother and child, the 
 sister and brother, the friends whose souls had 
 been knit together as those of David and Jona- 
 than, will clasp each other again in heavenly 
 embrace — will walk together over those plains 
 of light, and mingle together their melodious 
 songs of joy, where parting shall be no more. 
 
 But more, far more than all these blessed 
 elements of happiness, will be the unveiled pre- 
 sence of God. There the Great I AM will reveal 
 Himself as He never did before. Neither in all 
 His wonderful works of creation, nor in all His 
 providential administration, nor even in re- 
 demption, as discoverable by mortal eye, does 
 God appear so great and glorious, so loving and 
 good, as He will then be seen. God's unclouded 
 glory will be a beatific sight, which will kindle 
 the undying and unbounded rapture of those 
 countless myriads of saints and angels. As we 
 attempt to speak and think of such heights of 
 glovious joy, a painful sense of the utter poverty 
 of language, and of thought itself, seizes us. We 
 are lost in wonder, love, and praise. 
 
 Oh, to think that this — that all this — and all 
 
ii^ 
 
 h 
 
 Wi 
 
 124 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 this for ever and ever — is within our reach ; 
 bought for us with Blood Divine, in preparation 
 for us by the Redeemer, who is gone to make it 
 all ready, offered us now in its first stages, and 
 promised us assuredly in its most perfect fulness 
 by-and-by ! 
 
 **ic 
 
 ?r 
 
 l! 
 
CHAPTER XJI. 
 
 STRANGE REFUGES. 
 
 X(/I^SF]S ! How strange that a man 
 dyinj;' of linnger should beg to be ex- 
 cused from receiving food ; or the tra- 
 veller, robbed, wounded, and nearly 
 murdered, should want to l)e excused 
 from accepting of the offices of the 
 good Samaritan ; or that the prisoner should 
 excuse himself from being lifted from his prison 
 to a throne ; or the condemned criminal ask to 
 be excused from receiving a free pardon, his 
 life, as well as untold honours and joys ! Yet 
 such, and far greatei', is the preposterous folly 
 of the human heart. One chief root of whole 
 swarms of excuses that people make for not ac- 
 cepting salvation, is the false view they take of 
 Christ's service as a (jreat bondage. They rebel 
 
 sil 
 

 %'H 
 
 i 
 
 126 
 
 VOICES B'ROM THE THRONE. 
 
 against the idea of so much self-sacrifice and 
 such severe restraints as Christianity imposes ; 
 and, through the medium of their distorted 
 fancy, they see in all this, a tremendous tyranny, 
 which they are glad on any pretext to avoid. 
 There can be little doubt that this touches the 
 real source of very much of the atheistic and 
 sceptical hostility to God and the religion of 
 the Bible, which has ever been manifested in 
 all ages of the world. There is, indeed, a sort 
 of tyranny in Christ's religion, the same as that 
 which shows no mercy to raging wolves and 
 devouring lions — a tyranny as overbearing and 
 relentless as that which gives no quarter to the 
 consuming conflagration, or the spreading plague. 
 The religion of the Bible is most intolerant and 
 most unmerciful in its attitude to all manner of 
 evil — to all the cruel and vicious and fatal ene- 
 mies of our souls ; but there its tyranny ends. 
 And if men reject the dominion of Christ, which 
 does certainly impose eff*ectual restraints on all 
 sorts of iniquities, what sort of liberty and free- 
 dom will they find in the ways of sin ? It is 
 with every man a choice of yokes — either that 
 of God and holiness, or of Satan and sin ; and 
 under which shall we find the most true liberty ? 
 How much lighter is the devil's yoke than that 
 
STRANGE REFUGES. 
 
 127 
 
 ■II 
 
 lat 
 
 of Christ ? How much more tme freedom 
 has the miser clutching his gold, the sensualist 
 driven headlong by the force of his passions, the 
 proud man carried away with conceit and 
 vanity, tlie drunkard bound to his cups with 
 far more tlian fetters of brass, than the Chris- 
 tian, whose very principle constrains him to 
 generosity, holds in check his animal appetites, 
 keeps down his vain pride, and warns him off 
 from the treacherous rocks and quicksands of 
 intemperance ? 
 
 He who throws oti' the salutary restraints of 
 Christ and His religion, puts on, at the same 
 time, in the service of sin, a yoke a hundred 
 times more galling and insupportable. To ^eek 
 emancipation from bondage by rejecting God 
 and His laws and service, is like renouncing the 
 civilized laws of Britain or America, and grasping 
 after liberty under an Oriental despotism ; only, 
 there is no despotism in all the univ^erse so 
 terrible, so unmerciful, and so relentlessly and 
 unchangeably cruel, as the tyranny of sin and 
 Satan and hell. The only true liberator is 
 Christ — the only true liberty is His service. 
 
 The difficulty of l)reaking away from some 
 besetting sin, is with many a common excuse for 
 refusing Christ and salvation. There is no doubt 
 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 

 128 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 
 that sin often has a fascinating power, as some 
 serpents are said to have, as they fix their glis- 
 tening eyes on their intended piey. But the 
 sooner the fascinated bird spreads its wings and 
 soars away from the serpent, the better ; and so 
 with the sinner — the speedier he gets c|iiit of his 
 darling sin the better, for it will devour and 
 destroy him for ever. It may seem pleasant to 
 glide smoothly down the stream of evil, while 
 the sun dances on the waves, and the l)irds sing 
 on the shore, and the senses are intoxicated with 
 luxurious sights and sounds ; but depend upon 
 it, the cataract is below, and the yawning, roar- 
 inoj ofulf of ruin is waitinjjf to devour. Better 
 far to shake off at once the deadlv fascination 
 of sin, and pull for life against the stream. 
 Better far lop off with one mighty, decisive 
 stroke, every right-hand sin, than sink in moral 
 rottenness into that dreadful pit of woe, to rise 
 no more. 
 
 But, say many, we live as we see others living, 
 and it is hard to be so singular a« a ('hvistian 
 nuist be. There is no doubt that, to be a Chris- 
 tian, we must be singidar, we must diflei- widely 
 and radicallv from tlie orreat bulk of mankind; 
 and it is bard to do this. But it is harder to lose 
 Christ and heaven, and be damned for the sake 
 
srHAN(iK HKh'l'CtES. 
 
 121) 
 
 •al 
 [ise 
 
 lian 
 
 Iris- 
 
 lose 
 lake 
 
 of company. It is hard to bear the opprobrium, 
 the tamits and ridicule of the world ; but it will 
 be very much harder to bear the remorseful re- 
 proaches of our own consciences, and the infer- 
 nal mockery of the lost to all eternity. It is not 
 easy to be excluded contemptuously from many 
 earthly circles ; it will be far less easy to endure 
 being excluded ignominously, and for ever, from 
 the society of the glorified saints and the holy 
 angels. 
 
 " Ah, but look at your Christians," says many 
 a triumphant sinner. " What better than mere 
 hypocrites are they ! Compare their professions 
 and their conduct ; am I not as good as they 
 are ? " 
 
 Well, it is, alas ! too true, that there is a sad 
 discrepancy between the professions and lives of 
 many professing Christians ; it is true, that 
 there may be, and doubtless are, real hypocrites 
 to be found in the Church, and that sinners on 
 this account have some just cause of complaint. 
 But then all professors of religion are not im- 
 postors and hypocrites ; nor are professing 
 Christians so generally inconsistent and false 
 and hypocritical, as many of these objectors 
 insinuate. 
 
 On what grounds do unconverted sinners take 
 
 9 
 
 !( 
 
130 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 I ^' 
 
 
 it upon themselves to judge and condemn, by 
 wholesale, the people of God ? They, at all events, 
 are not ijualitied to pronounce opinion about 
 matters entirely beyond their knowledge and ex- 
 perience. An unconverted sinner is not competent 
 to judge intelligently and fairly of the full moral 
 worth of those whose chief excellences are inter- 
 nal, in the state of the heart towards God. Hence 
 the judgment of the w^orld regarding Christians 
 is most generally, far too severe and condemna- 
 tory. And besides, sinners do not know what 
 Christians have to contend with, in making any 
 serious attempts to lead a godly life. They have 
 no idea of, and make little allowance for, the 
 fierce assaults of the devil, the malignant opposi- 
 tion of an ungodly world, and the treacherous 
 weakness of the human heart itself; all of which 
 assail the feeblest believer from the day he starts 
 heavenward. When sinners try to face all this 
 opposition themiselves, in their endeavours to do 
 right, it greatly alters their tune. 
 
 But suppose there were ten times as niany de- 
 ceivers and false professors as thtrt^ are, what 
 would that prove i That there are no genuine 
 Christians and that there is no genuine Christian 
 experience ! Surely not, no more than counter- 
 feit bank bills, no matter how numerous they 
 
STRANGE REFUGES. 
 
 131 
 
 by 
 
 its, 
 
 out 
 
 ex- 
 tent 
 
 oral 
 
 iter- 
 
 ence 
 
 bians 
 
 mna- 
 
 wbat 
 
 rany 
 have 
 
 r, the 
 posi- 
 erous 
 vhich 
 starts 
 ill this 
 to do 
 
 [ly de- 
 what 
 
 fenuine 
 dstiaxi 
 mter- 
 they 
 
 might be or widely circulated, would prove that 
 there were no genuine bills and that all bank 
 notes were .spuriovs and bad. The counterfeit 
 bill is really as positive a proof as we can have, 
 that there arc good and genuine ones, since all 
 the false value of t\w counterfeit is dei'ived from 
 its imitation of the real tind acknowledged value 
 of the genuine. The false and hypocritical pre- 
 tender to religion is the strongest proof that 
 there are real and genuine Christians, whose 
 solid and i-eliable Christian wo.th he is basely 
 simulating. And if there be a single genuine 
 Christian in the world, he is a standing condem- 
 nation, not only of all sorts of pretenders to re- 
 ligion, but of all sorts of people who are still in 
 their sins, since the grace that truly saves one 
 man, can just as truly save all others. What 
 a1)surd and irrational folly for sinners to attempt 
 to shield themselves from their own duty, by 
 pointing out how imperfectly others do theirs 1 
 As if two grievous wrongs are going to make 
 one right. If professors are wrong in not living 
 up to' their privileges in the gospel, are sinners 
 right in neglecting religion altogether ? It 
 will be a strange reason the sinner will have to 
 assign in the day of death, and in the final judg- 
 ment, that because professors would not serve 
 
 m 
 
mi 
 
 132 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 c; 
 
 nmi 
 
 ii 
 
 irl'l Pi 
 
 111 m 'jiin 
 
 God perfectly, ^/la^ he "luould not serve Him at 
 all! 
 
 There are many who think themselves already 
 good enough, and, therefore, do not trouble 
 themselves further about religion. Such people 
 pride themselves on their honesty, their morality, 
 their freedom from gross and scandalous sins, 
 and their general decent behaviour, and do not 
 see how such good, respectable people as them- 
 selves could be otlierwise than Christians, or 
 could possiby be lost at last. 
 
 Now all this good, external behaviour is cer- 
 tainly very conmiendable. Honesty and good 
 morals, and respectable conduct, are things not 
 to be despised, but to be highly-prized and faith- 
 fully practised. But what is it to be an honest 
 man in the highest and best sense ? Does 
 honesty mean no more than paying every man 
 what is owing him, and in dealing honourably in 
 the bargains that men make with each other ? 
 It certainly means more than this. A thoroughly 
 honest man is one who faithfully discharges every 
 obligation he is under, In every relationship he 
 sustains. A man who might pay up his ac- 
 count to the last cent, but who did not love 
 his wife, and took no proper care of his children, 
 IS deficient in honesty ; for he owes to his family 
 
strancjp: refuges. 
 
 m.s 
 
 /m at 
 
 ready 
 •ouble 
 people 
 rality, 
 s sins, 
 do not 
 theni- 
 ans, or 
 
 • is cev- 
 id good 
 Lngs not 
 ^d faith- 
 honest 
 Does 
 _^iy man 
 irably in 
 ii other ? 
 •rougldy 
 •es every 
 [nship he 
 his ac- 
 ,ot love 
 children, 
 lis family 
 
 the debt of affection and suitable care, quite as 
 much as the debt of dollars and cents to his 
 creditors. We sustain many important relation- 
 ships to our fellow-men, other than that of mere 
 debtor and creditor, and we sustain the most im- 
 portant relationship of all, to God Himself. 
 Has not God some heavy claims upon us ^ Do we 
 not certainly owe to God deep gratitude for 
 the unnumbered mercies that have crowned our 
 lives ; do we not owe Him our confidence, as 
 our best and most reliable Friend ; our most 
 heartfelt love for the unspeakaV)le gift of His 
 Son, our most obedient submission to His holy 
 will, and our sincerest sorrow that we have 
 grieved Him by ten thousand sins ? How can 
 these weighty and honest obligations be fully met 
 by our merely abstaining from lying, stealing and 
 the like gross transgressions ? It cannot be done. 
 No more than a child can discharge all its obli- 
 gations to a loving father or mother, by merely 
 not cheating a brother, ard not openly dis- 
 gracing the family : no more than a wife can 
 discharge all the obligations s'iic owes to her 
 husband, by merely not injuring any other 
 woman, and conducting herself with merely a 
 cold, outward propriety. As there 7nust be filial 
 affection and confidence in a child's heart to- 
 

 wmm 
 
 134 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 wards the parent and cheerful obedience as 
 springing therefrom ; as there must be tender 
 love in a Vvdfe's heart for her husband, and in 
 consequence of that tendei regard, she watches 
 over her own conduct and guards her character 
 from reproach, and strives to meet his wishes 
 and consult his interests ; so we, if we would 
 be Christians in any just sense, must have the 
 love of God slied abroad in our hearts, and 
 from that tender, all -controlling affection for 
 Him, regulate our lives both in careful abstin- 
 ence from all evil practices, and in the faithful 
 performance of all required duties. This is 
 impossible without a thorough renewal of our 
 nature, a complete change of heart, wrought 
 in us by the Holy Spirit of God. Ye must be 
 born again; and except a man be born again — 
 thus renewed and sanctified by the power of 
 Divine grace — he cannot enter the kin!j,dom of 
 heaven, the family of God's real children on 
 earth, and the holy fellowship of the skies. 
 
 Many a man excuses himself from seeking the 
 salvation of his soul, and setting about the ser- 
 vice of God, because he does not feel veiy much 
 inclined in that direction. But, oh ! what a 
 sort of wretched excuse is this ! The man who 
 is benumbed with cold and half frozen, may feel 
 
STRANGE REFUGES. 
 
 135 
 
 as 
 
 icier 
 
 d in 
 
 clies 
 
 ictev 
 
 Lshes 
 
 ould 
 
 e the 
 
 , and 
 
 I for 
 
 bstin- 
 
 ithi'nl 
 
 'his is 
 
 )t' our 
 
 ougbt 
 
 List be 
 
 Sim — 
 
 er of 
 
 om of 
 
 ■en on 
 
 ks. 
 
 Ino- the 
 
 he ser- 
 
 lunch 
 
 dmt a 
 
 ui who 
 
 lay feel 
 
 far more inclined to lay down to sleep on the 
 drifting snow than to bestir himself; but is not 
 that very stupor and disinclination to make an 
 effort the very strongest reason why he should 
 arouse every energy, and put forth his last re- 
 maining strength, to escape from what must be, 
 otherwise, his speedy and dreadful doom ? The 
 benumbing, stupefyng influence of sin, is one of 
 its mort a'arming symptoms, and a potent reason 
 for the sinner to call loudly for God's gracious 
 heip, before it is too late. 
 
 There are those, again, who say they are too 
 busy to attend to tliese things — they have not 
 time to seek God and live a holy life. That is 
 to say, fchey have plenty of time to attend to 
 all inferior matters, but none to spare for the 
 most impv cant Imsiness of all. They have 
 whole years to devote to the concerns of the 
 body that mrst soon perish ; they have neither 
 hours nor inioijtcs to take any care of the soul 
 that can never il'i^^ ; they have plenty of leisure 
 to hunt after all sorts of earthly vanities that 
 perish in the using, but not a moment to afford 
 to make their peace with God, and prepare for 
 the tremendous realities of eternity that are at 
 the door. Vs comp:'red with such folly as this, 
 that man v^'nid be a wise man, who stood play- 
 
i 
 
 im 
 
 VOICES FliOM THK THRONE. 
 
 ing with pebbles on the railway track, while the 
 thundering train was just upon him ; or the man 
 who, while his house was burning over his head, 
 was so absorbed in some trifling business about 
 the house, that he could find no time for flight ! 
 
 Others, again, have too much time ; so much 
 that they think they need !'• in ro hurry about 
 religion — it will do to ati j ^.o it at some 
 future time — almost any time, ^j vious to death. 
 That is as good as saying that the man who has 
 on hand a heavy day's work need be in no hurry 
 about commencing it, but can perform it almost 
 any time before night ; or that the sailor, who 
 knows that the storm is approaching, need be in 
 no hurry in furling his sails, and preparing his 
 ship to stand the fierce blasts and rolling seas. 
 
 Oh, the delusion of sin and Satan ! There is 
 not an hour we delay giving our hearts to God, 
 and setting out on the path of Christian duty, 
 but is making it the more difficult for us to 
 begin, and rendering less and less our hope of ever 
 seeing the kingdom of God. Around the })ro- 
 crastinator's soul, the evil one is weaving more 
 thickly every day the fatal meshes of sin ; is 
 forsfins: more stron^rly the dreadful chains of his 
 
 O O CD i/ 
 
 captivity; while he is receding all the time 
 
STRANGE REFUGES. 
 
 137 
 
 further and further, from the light of hope and 
 the arms of delivering mercy. 
 
 But, say many — especially of the young — re- 
 ligion is such a sad, melancholy thing, that if we 
 emhracc it we must surrender all pleasure and 
 happiness, and henceforth lead a gloomy and 
 miseral)le life. Who told you that ? Was it 
 God ? No ! for His command to all His children 
 is : *' Rejoice evermore, and again I say, rejoice." 
 Was it the Bible ? No ! for it declares that the 
 ways of religion " are ways of pleasantness, and 
 all her paths are peace." Was it the true saints 
 of God ? No ! for their uniform testimony is : 
 " Blessed is every one that feareth the Lord, that 
 walketh in His ways ; happy shalt thou be, and 
 it will be well with thee." This is an old 
 slander of Satan. It is true the Christian does 
 give up the feverish joys of sin — the wild, 
 worthless, deceitful, and thoroughly unsatisfying 
 pleasures of an ungodly life — pleasures that are a 
 good deal as a draught of the briny water of the 
 ocean to the thirsty mariner — that may gratify 
 for a moment, and then produce a far more raging 
 thirst than before. But the Christian, though 
 he must shun the forbidden and dangerous 
 pleasures of sin, yet may taste of all other fruits 
 in God's pleasant garden. A thousand innocent 
 
 1 f 
 
 ii 
 
worn 
 
 n 
 
 ?•' 
 
 1: 
 
 r 
 
 11 
 
 138 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 delights are open to him ; and, besides, he carries 
 in his own breast the very essence of the highest 
 happiness — the approving sniilc of God. if the 
 service of God is so miserable, and the service 
 of sin so delightful, how is it that hell, where 
 sin holds mighty sway, is the most wretched 
 place in the universe ; and heaven, where God 
 and religion are supreme, is of all places the 
 happiest ? 
 
 The truth is, that the^e is nothing in the 
 whole range of human experience so sweet and 
 delightful, and every way blessed, as religion ; 
 and that fits so exactly, and satisfies so fully, 
 every honourable instinct, and desire, and neces- 
 sity of our nature. But it is hard for the un- 
 renewed mind to appreciate this. Grossly mis- 
 taken views of religion and the enmity against 
 >'^>d, which sin has begotten in the human heart, 
 are what lead people into such wretched refuges 
 of lies. There is not one of them can bear a 
 moment's investigation ; and in the solemnities 
 of death and judgment and eternity, the wonder 
 will be, as it ought to be now, that such 
 thoroughly false and deceitful things, could ever 
 have the least influence on the human mind. 
 
 I 
 ( ■< 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 WELCOME FOR ALL. 
 
 HAT intense interest circles ai'"und 
 an unsaved soul ! The great lov- 
 ing heart of God, beats with an 
 infinite compassion towards him. 
 Christ, the good Shepherd, pui'sues 
 tlie wanderer witli tireless step, 
 that He may lay around him those bleeding 
 arms of mercy, that were stretched out on the 
 cross for a guilty world. The blessed Spirit 
 seeks to attract liim heavenward with a mag- 
 netism all Divine. The voice of Jehovah, re- 
 sounding in entrancing melody from the ecstatic 
 glories of heaven, and s\veeping down through 
 the awful caverns of hell in terrific thunders, 
 emphasizing the mighty lessons of the long past, 
 and calling up the tremendous developments of 
 
140 
 
 VOICES FR()"M THK THHOVK. 
 
 fni'! 
 
 a boundless future, sound continually in his ears, 
 " Awake from sin ! Arise from the dead 1 " The 
 Book of God unlooses upon him its thousand 
 tongues of warning, of invitation, of entreaty. 
 The Church of God yeai'ns over him as a mother 
 over a lost son, and looks out through her tears 
 to see him answer her tender call, to her arms 
 and heart and home. Lovino- ansfels and cjlori- 
 fied saints watch with an interest they take in 
 nothing else on earth, to see him turn his steps 
 toward God and life eternal, while his salvation 
 awakens their more delicious ecstacv and their 
 louder hallelujahs. Unsaved soul ! How the 
 universe is moved on your account ! See the 
 man of sorrows looking at you — those tears in 
 His eyes He sheds for you — that crown of thorns 
 was to buy you a crown of glory — that blood 
 dropping from His hands, His feet, His side, was 
 all to put away your sin. Look at that agoniz- 
 ing Lamb of God, and look at your sins for which 
 He died. " Oh," you say, " my sins, my sins 
 Behold, I am vile ! I am guilty, lost, undone 
 Oh ! this burden of guilt, it distresses, it breaks 
 mv heart — God be merciful to me a sinner.' 
 Blessed be God, the poor sinner who uttered that 
 same prayer in the temple, was very near salva- 
 tion, and 80 are you. Do you indeed feel as did 
 
WELCOME FOR AFJ. 
 
 141 
 
 the repentant, returning prodigal ? Then take 
 courage — there is blessed hope for you. Hark ! 
 what sweet tones of mercy fall upon your 
 troubled heart ! " Though your sins be as 
 scarlet, they shall be as white as snow." Catch 
 up that blessed echo as your own — Lord, they 
 shall be. " Come unto Me and I will give you 
 rest." — Resp(jiid : Thou wilt give me rest. " He 
 will subdue our iniquities ; Thou wilt cast all 
 their sins into the depths of the sea." Yes, Lord, 
 all mine. " I will, be thou clean," saith Christ. 
 " IViou wilt I ahull he made vjhole," say you ; 
 and oh, how soon the light of life will burst in 
 on your soul, and the fountains of your heart's 
 great deep will be broken up, and new joys will 
 rise to the surface, and beam out in your face, in 
 your songs of praise, in your unloosed tongue, 
 and all over your path to the skies ! Oh ! try it, 
 try it ! " Oh I taste and see that the Lord is 
 good." . 
 
 How sad that any who have once thus passed 
 from death unto life, should ever again return to 
 the dreary and tortuous paths of sin. Such a 
 spectacle as a backslidden Christian should 
 never be seen in the world, and would never be, 
 were the soul in every storm to keep a steady 
 eye on Christ ; and amid all the surging waves 
 
142 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 of lite, keep a firm hold of His heavenly hand. 
 A lapsed Christian is surely a most pitiable 
 sight. Samson, shorn of his strength, and 
 grinding in tlie Philistine prison, was nothing 
 to a Son of (iod, on whose brow Satan and sin 
 have inscribed the " Ichabod " of a departed 
 glory. The son and heir of a noble sire, feeding 
 swine in his far-off exile, starved and naked and 
 friendless, is only a faint emblem of the degra- 
 dation, misery, and helpless wretchedness of a 
 soul that has forsaken God. 
 
 But there is hope for even the poor back- 
 slider. The ruins of his soul may yet be re- 
 paired. His spiritual wealth that he has lost 
 mav be reo-ained. The blessedness he once 
 knew, he may find again. The inexhaustible 
 lovi! of the Crucified One, reaches down to the 
 depths of cA'en apostacy itself. Poor, lapsed 
 soul ! See how the forgiving Saviour searches 
 you out. He takes your hand in His ; He says, 
 " I love you still ; I am married to you ; come 
 back ; I will heal your backsliding ; I will love 
 you freely." " Yes," you say, " that is wonder- 
 ful love, indeed ! The w^orld has been to me like 
 the waste of waters to Noah's dove. 1 have 
 found no rest for my soul away from Christ ; I 
 am weary and weak ; let me drop again into 
 
WELCOME FOR ALL. 
 
 143 
 
 :e 
 
 I 
 
 Ito 
 
 the arms of my merciful Saviour. I am guilty 
 of more than common sin, but 1 know in whom 
 I once believed, and I will hide my guilt and 
 shame in the bleeding wounds of Jesus, and let 
 my love to Him be more than commofi. Let me 
 bathe His blessed feet with mv tears ; let me 
 get down lowest of all at His footstool ; and let 
 my life be henceforth a more signal testimony 
 to His power to save even the chief of sinners." 
 Does your heart respond to all this, " Amen, .so 
 let it be ?" God will send back another response, 
 " Amen, so shall It he!' 
 
 Blessed, indeed, are the true and faithful 
 people of God. Who in this world will compare 
 with them ? It is a small matter that some of 
 them are poor, others obscure, and most of them 
 count for little, as the world reckons greatness. 
 They are all princes in di.sguise ; they ai"e earth's 
 real and only aristocracy. They are all heirs- 
 apparent to thrones of power and riches and 
 glory, compared with which the greatest earthly 
 monarchy is only an empty toy. Their corona- 
 tion day is coming. It will be seen by-and-by 
 that the world was not worthy of multitudes of 
 God's people, who have all along been preserv- 
 ing it from moral putrefaction by their purity — 
 saving it from wrath by their prayers — and been 
 
 
IID« 
 
 144 
 
 VOICES FROM Tin: THRONE. 
 
 its sheet-anchor in all the storms of its career. 
 There is nothing in this world so precious in 
 God's sight, and ought to be in ours, as holy 
 men and women. But the only secret of their 
 worth, and of their power, is their purity and 
 fidelity to God. Without these qualities they 
 are nothing. No forces of evil can stand before 
 a thoroughly holy, and thoroughly earnest 
 church. One such Christian can always chase a 
 thousand, and two of them will put ten thousand 
 to flight. Satan knows that, and his mightiest 
 efforts are put forth to keep religion among pro- 
 fessors, as near freezing point as possible. A 
 spiritually cold church, largely saturated with 
 worldly-mindedness, is a great delight for Satan ; 
 but it makes angels weep, Christ's heart sad^ 
 and the world itself might well sit down and 
 mourn in sackcloth and ashes. Beloved follow- 
 ers of Christ ! Vou will surely never willingly 
 help to thus wound your Saviour in the house 
 of His friends, and retard the progress of His 
 glorious cause. " Ah," you say, it may be with 
 a melting heart and a streaming eye, " I am 
 afraid I have been doing so already, by my cold- 
 heartedness, negligence, and guilty conformity 
 to the world. I must, I will be, wholly the 
 Lord's henceforth." Let that resolution be 
 
WELCOMK FOR ALL. 
 
 145 
 
 with 
 am 
 Icold- 
 
 |iiiity 
 
 the 
 
 U be 
 
 written in heaven, and let its fullilnient begin 
 this hour. Do you see how your Divine Lord 
 
 lifting you up into a far liiglier, richer, 
 stronger, sweeter Christian Ufe ? Listen to 
 those words of powci- and Hfe — " From all your 
 idols I will cleanse you. I will sprinkle clean 
 water upon you, and ye shall be clean." Echo 
 back, "/ shall he clean, through the blood of 
 the Lamb." " Consecrate yourselves this day to 
 the Lord," is the loving connnand of Jesus. You 
 answer, " Yes, I do ; 1 surrender wholly to 
 Christ ; and all I am and have, I dedicate freely 
 
 Him." Oh, how His beaming face will shine 
 . wii satisfying refulgence on your believing 
 heart ! How your sanctified being will soar with 
 delight upwards towards God, while the little 
 bubble vanities of earthly wealth, and pleasure, 
 and greatness, will get less and less in the dis- 
 tance ; and the glorious twin-thought of holi- 
 ness and usefulness, will daily expand before 
 your eyes in attractive beauty and all-absorbing 
 interest ! If there is a cry that reverberates 
 with louder emphasis than any other from all 
 quarters, it is for a sanctified church — a church 
 full of the Holy Ohost and power. From the 
 throne of the eternal God descends the command, 
 " Be ye holy, for I am holy ;" and from ten 
 
 10 
 
ililPRIM 
 
 146 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 i ■•.■ 
 
 thouscand places of the earth, there issues the 
 Macedonian cry of benighted, enthralled, perish- 
 ing men, " Come over and help us ; shovv^ us by 
 your own holy lives, how to live and how to 
 die." And as you, beloved fellow-Christians, 
 heartily answx'i" to these miglity invitations, 
 with what power will you witness and work for 
 God ! Youj- eagei' enquiry will soon be, " Lord, 
 what wouldst Thou have me to do ?" How quick- 
 ly God will show you hosts of perishing sinners, 
 for whose salvation you will tind room for any 
 amount of auonizinff earnestness. You will find 
 plenty of the poor to be aided ; the downcast to 
 be uplifted ; the sorrowing to be cheered. You 
 will discovei' grand opportunities to strengthen 
 the weak hands, and lielp the weak resources of 
 Christ's struggling church ; and encourage and 
 succour many a weaiy, oppressed soldier of 
 Chiist, who is waiiino" war at fearful odds. You 
 will not stand by and merely watch others draw 
 the Gospel chaiiot in its uphill course ; you will 
 put forth a willing liand and help to push it 
 along. You, yourself, will be the most convincing 
 refutation of all that infidel sophistry can say, 
 while you will take from the mouths of the un- 
 godly, some of their main pleas for living in sin. 
 You will do more good in a year, than, perhaps, 
 
WELCOME FOR ALL. 
 
 147 
 
 say, 
 un- 
 H sin. 
 laps, 
 
 you have done in the last ten or twenty ; while 
 you will have some prospect at last of hearing 
 the Master say to you, '* Well done, good and 
 faithful servant !" 
 
 And you, dear young people ! Surely you 
 will lister* to God's great calls. There are none 
 in all the world that Christ will more joyfully 
 receive than you. What an opportunity you 
 have ! It will no< cost you a tithe of the effort 
 and trouble to give your hearts to God no^v, it 
 will by-and-by. Your life is l)efore you, and 
 what a happy, holy, useful life yours may be ! 
 How much evil you may prevent ; how much 
 grand and lasting good you may do ! How high 
 you may stand in the love of your fellow-men, 
 and in the esteem of God Himself ! Yes, you 
 lulll yield yourselves to God. Millions of young- 
 souls like yours are already Christ's ; you will 
 join their ranks. Then will you taste a plea- 
 sure, unknown in all the gi<ldy excitements of 
 sin, and wliich will grow more intense and satis- 
 fying till life's last hour. You will awaken a 
 thrill of joy, it may be, in a dear mother's 
 heart, who has sent many a tearful petition to 
 heaven for you, and in the church of Gcxl, who 
 are looking to you as their hope and stay for 
 the future ; and how the old standard-bearers, 
 
148 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 whose feeble arms must soon relax in death, will 
 kindle in grateful love to God and you, that 
 Christ's noble banner will have your strong arms 
 to hold it still aloft, when theirs are mouldering 
 in the dust ! 
 
 And you, fathers and mothers ! What tongue 
 can tell the importance of your work ! Have 
 you consecrated yonr own soul to God, that you 
 may the better lead your children with you to 
 heaven t Oh,, do you watch over those children 
 of yours as those who must give an account in 
 the Last Day ? Do you guard them against all 
 the snares of the devil, do you watch ivhat they 
 read, more vigilantly than ever you watch what 
 they eat ? Do you keep them from evil com- 
 pany with more dread than you would from the 
 reach of poisonous serpents ? Do you feel, as no 
 words can express, that on you mainly depends, 
 under God, their training for eternity, whether 
 they shall spend a holy, useful life here, and 
 dwell with God hereafter, or Avhether they shall 
 grow up in ignorance and vice, and drop at last 
 into perdition ? Oh ! the intense interest that 
 many parents take in the education of their 
 children ; and the intenser interest that a still 
 greater number take in their acquisition of 
 wealth and position, and worldly prosperity. 
 
wp:lcome for all. 
 
 149 
 
 ther 
 
 and 
 
 shall 
 
 it last 
 
 that 
 
 their 
 
 still 
 
 |n of 
 
 lerity. 
 
 Christian parents, your children have far higher, 
 far more urgent claims upon you than any of 
 these worldly interests involve. Their souls, 
 God Himself has placed in ijovr care, to be edu- 
 cated for Him and for heaven. As you value 
 God's favour, %ee to thh nrsf. As you hope to 
 meet them in heaven, leave no stone unturned, 
 no effort, no sacrifice unmade, to bring them 
 early to the feet (;f Jesus. Let your soul thirst 
 for their speedy salvation. And while, with 
 strong cries and tears and pray<.'rs, you approach 
 God's throne on their behalf ; while, with the 
 tenderest, and most faithful entreaty, you be- 
 seech them to be reconciled to God ; while, with 
 all the skill, and wisdom, and love, and perse- 
 verance, of a father's — a mother's heart, you 
 pursue this chief purpose of their being, and 
 chief purpose of your own holy relationship 
 as parents, God will not suffer you to labour in 
 vain. Your faithful sowing in tears will be fol- 
 lowed, sometime, by a harvest reaped in joy. You 
 will thus help to lessen ^'astly, the numbei- of 
 deplorable moral wrecks in liuinanity that float 
 so helplessly and hopelessly down to pei'dition, 
 whose sad career began, as it gent'i-all}' does, 
 early in life, long previous to leaving the paren- 
 tal roof. You will help amazingly to till the 
 

 I 
 
 J ! 
 
 If- 
 
 150 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 ranks of good men and women, whom this world 
 has, all along sorely needed and never more than 
 now ; you will go down to an honoured grave, 
 feeling that you have not lived in vain, nor tvill 
 you have. And those children you have thus 
 brought to Jesus, will lay tenderly your sleeping 
 dust in its last resting-place, with tears of truest 
 and most loving remembrance, while they will 
 rise up in the world to bless your memory, to 
 follow your pure example, and will, by-and-by, 
 greet you in the skies, and help to swell your 
 tide of innnortal happiness for evermore. 
 
 Oh ! you Christian men and women, who 
 possess much of this world's goods, how great 
 and precious is your opportunity ! Yours is a 
 great talent, but whether great for good or evil 
 depends upon yourselves. Forget not that all 
 you have in the world God has given you. The 
 silver and the gold, the cattle on a thousand 
 hills, are His. You occupy these things " till He 
 comes," and that will be very soon. All a man 
 has slips from his gi-asp, as his last breath is 
 drawn, and you will very soon draw your 
 last. 
 
 Remeud^er well, that if money is spent as sel- 
 fishness, pride and vanity dictate, it will exercise 
 a blighting influence on the soul ; it will power- 
 
WELCOME FOR ALL. 
 
 151 
 
 fully fan the flames of all sorts of corruptions, 
 and finally hang like a millstone around the 
 neck of its possessor, to drag him down to ruin. 
 But if, in the genuine spirit of your blessed 
 Master, you scatter abroad with a wise and 
 generous hand, you will discover one grand 
 means of keeping in check, the accuised spirit 
 of covetousness that lurks so surely in every hu- 
 man breast, besides mightily helping the growth 
 of every Christian virtue in your own heart and 
 all around you. 
 
 Oh ! let your soul pity the desolate widow, the 
 homeless orphan, the hungry, ill-clad, neglected 
 poor. Look how thousands of poor, wretched, 
 vicious beings are festering in hideous moral 
 rottenness, in all our great cities, and outside 
 them too ! What a field for your compassion- 
 ate and large-hearted generosity I Look at the 
 multitudes of sinners perishing in the world 
 around you, who, with far too imich truth, might 
 say. No man cares for our souls ! — Wi/i not you 
 care for them, and employ some of those means 
 you could easily find available, and help to save 
 them ? Oh ! consider the languishing (operations 
 of the Church of God, cramped and obstructed 
 and prevented from listening to many heart- 
 breaking cries for help, because it still lacks 
 
152 
 
 VOICES FROM THE THRONE. 
 
 '1 k'l 
 
 those vary means that you could so readily give. 
 And will you say nay ? God forbid ! Oh ! in 
 the name of the Lord, open both your heart and 
 your purse wider than ever, and come generously 
 up to the help of the Lord against the mighty. 
 And as you pour out your gifts into the Lord's 
 treasury, with an ever-increasing liberality, the 
 eye of the Master will rest approvingly upon 
 you; you will be repaid a thousand-fold in your 
 own soul's health and safety — you will know, as 
 the sellish and miserly spirit never can, the 
 luxuiy of doing good ; and blessed streams of 
 human gratitude will come back into your soul, 
 while you will make your property a perpetual 
 fountain of blessing to future generations, instead 
 of a wretched bone of contention for hungry 
 heirs, whose blessings are often but few and their 
 curses many- -while all you do with a single eye 
 to God's glory, will precede you to the better 
 land, and will come following after, to augment 
 your happiness and honour in the glorious world 
 beyond. 
 
 Lastly, you, who are the sons and daughters of 
 affliction — you, who are wa'estling with the in- 
 firmities of age, or with successive waves of 
 sorrow, or with the weakness and weariness of 
 
WELCOME FOR ALL. 
 
 153 
 
 ye 
 
 rid 
 
 of 
 of 
 
 this mortal life, — there is a bright light, after all, 
 in your clouds of darkness. 
 
 Look down and see the pit from which your 
 delivering Lord ha.s redeemed you, and is even 
 now working out your final deliverance through 
 manifold tribulations. Look around you, and see 
 and seize a thousand helps and encouragements, 
 to all of wd\ich you can lay just claim. Look up, 
 and see the smiling face of God, who, like as a 
 father pitieth his children, so He pitieth ymc. 
 Look into the sacred page, all covered with 
 golden promises, made valid with the signature 
 of blood Divine, and all for you. And look 
 beyond the flood of death, which is but a narrow 
 stream, and which you will soon get over, and 
 see the the iiowery land, the shining glory, the 
 central sun of light and life and joy, where 
 angels and saints are beckoning you away, and 
 Jesus will soon bid you come. Bear up a little 
 longer : a few steps more, and the weary wheels 
 of life will stand still, and you will bound with 
 elastic step, on that golden strand, to look into 
 the beaming face of Jesus, and swell the anthems 
 of glorious song to the great I AM, long as 
 eternal ages roll. Hallelujah. 
 
TORONTO; 
 
 " GIARDIAN " BOOK AND JOB OFFICE, 
 
 COURT STREET. 
 
I