The Protestants of Hungary

IT would appear from articles recently published in the Press that the Protestants of Hungary are at present suffering extreme persecution at the hand of the Roumanians, who are among the Allies of Great Britain, and hold a large part of the Hungarian territory. The Roumanians belong to the Greek Church, and seem to have no toleration whatsoever for the Hungarian Protestants. No doubt Hungary, as a dependency of Austria, was involved in the recent War against Britain and her Allies, but this was due to its unscrupulous and tyrannical rulers. Things would have been otherwise if the people had been left to their own choice and preference; and it is, therefore, exceedingly hard that they should be subjected—especially the Protestant part of them—to the brutal treatment which the Roumanian soldiery are giving them as the sheer result of religious hatred. The Reformed or Presbyterian Church in Hungary numbers over two million people, and the Lutherans are upwards of one million. These and other Protestant denominations suffered much recently from four months of the Bolshevik regime, and matters are now no better under the Roumanian authorities. We earnestly hope that our Government may intervene and take steps to save the Hungarian Protestants and their schools, academies, and colleges from destruction.

It may not be unprofitable to recall, at the present moment, a little of the past history of this country in relation to the kingdom of God. In the twelfth century of the Christian era many were found in Hungary who adhered to the pure gospel doctrine of the Waldenses, and sought an asylum of refuge in it from the persecutions of Rome. These persons maintained their ground in spite of opposition until the beginning of the fifteenth century, when the famous John Huss was raised up by God as an eloquent and powerful witness against Papal Rome. He and Jerome of Prague, along with other devoted men, did not hesitate to declare the Pope to be antichrist. Such a testimony as they, in general bore against

Romish error in doctrine and practice, could not be endured by “the man of sin,” and so Huss and Jerome were condemned to death and burned at the stake. Their triumphant martyrdom was, by the blessing of God, made instrumental in advancing the cause of truth for which they died, and the Hussites, as they were named, increased to multitudes in Hungary and Transylvania. “The Scriptures were translated into the native language, and the Word of God grew mightily and prevailed.” After this period, however, there was a time of declension, but with the advent of Luther, in the sixteenth century, a revival of Protestant truth and life took place. God raised up a man, named Matthew Devay, who enjoyed the friendship of Luther, and was animated with the same love of truth and righteousness as characterised the great reformer. Devay’s labours were greatly blessed in turning many from darkness to light. Another man of a similar stamp appeared in Upper Hungary, named Stephen Szantai, who contended with great ability and Christian courage for the faith of the Gospel. These were times of God’s right hand. But the Protestant Church of Hungary had its vicissitudes in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the Jesuits and other emissaries of Rome obtaining frequent ascendency. Under the Emperor Joseph of Austria in 1781, however, an Edict of Toleration was passed, which gave full liberty to Protestants, and this has contributed to maintain the largest Protestant Churches to be found in the east of Europe, in the country of Hungary, to this day.

We notice next, briefly, a special and interesting connection which the Church of Scotland began to have with Hungary not long before the Disruption of 1843. All who are familiar with the history of the Scottish Church in the forties of last century know something of the remarkable mission that was then started at Pesth, in Hungary, in strikingly providential circumstances. In 1839, owing to interest in the Conversion of the Jews, a Deputation was sent by the Church of Scotland to the Continent and Palestine with a view to obtain information concerning them. The deputation consisted of Rev. Drs. Black and Keith, and Messrs. R. M. MacCheyne and A. A. Bonar. “Owing, however, to an accident which befell Dr. Black, one of the senior members of the deputation, while on their way through the Egyptian desert to Palestine, it was found necessary that he and Dr. Keith . . . should take their journey homeward by the Danube, and pass—contrary to all prior intentions—by that river through the heart of Austria.” On this journey Dr. Keith was taken very ill with fever at Pesth, and brought to the very confines of the grave. The Archduchess Maria Dorothea, a Protestant and a truly Christian lady, who lived in the grand palace overhanging the Danube, was informed of the Scottish minister lying in the hotel at the point of death, and went to visit him. She, who had been waiting on God for about seven years to send at least one messenger of the cross of Christ to the dark city of Pesth, found

what she wanted. The Protestant Church was at this time in a backsliding and formal condition. Dr. Keith, after six months’ detention in Pesth, returned home to Scotland, and advocated strongly and persistently the beginning of a Jewish Mission in the Hungarian capital. Our readers must consult, for example, Dr. Brown’s “Life of ‘Rabbi’ Duncan,” or other books, to get the full details about this Mission, which was started in 1841. Dr. Duncan was sent out as the first missionary. His labours were owned of God. The well-known family of the Saphirs and others were converted to the faith of Jesus Christ, who were themselves instrumental in saving blessing to many of their fellow-creatures. The great day alone will declare all the fruits that followed this work, which was carried on not without trials and opposition, The noble Archduchess was much blessed in connection with it, and she was a source of comfort and strength to Dr. Duncan and the other missionaries.

We have our fears that, while there is a strong Protestant Church numerically and formally in Hungary still, the blight that has befallen many of the larger Churches throughout the world is also to be found there. May the Most High, in His infinite compassion and grace, sanctify the trials through which the Protestant Hungarians are presently passing, to their spiritual benefit; and may He soon check the sword of the persecutor, and send times of gospel quickening and refreshing to the distressed people!

THEY that stoutly and resolutely assert that the blessed Scriptures are a sufficient rule to order, guide, and direct them in all matters of worship, they have a good cause (Luke x. 25-26); and they that suffer upon this account, suffer as Christians for well-doing. Such vain men greatly detract from the efficiency of the Scripture, who mingle their own or other men’s inventions with divine institutions; and who set their posts by God’s posts, and their thresholds by God’s thresholds (Ezek. xliii. 9). The precepts and traditions of men, with their inventions and additions to the worship of God, are styled posts and thresholds, because the authors of them do lean and stand so much upon them, and set them in the way to hinder others from the enjoyment of temple-privileges, unless they will own and comply with them in their way and mode of worship; but upon all such posts and thresholds that are of men’s setting up in the worship of God, you may run and read folly, weakness, rottenness, and madness. It is only God’s posts, God’s thresholds, God’s institutions, God’s appointments, that have wisdom and holiness, beauty and glory, written upon them. For men to set up their posts by God’s posts, and to give their posts equal honour and authority with God’s posts, this is a defiling of the worship of God, and a profaning of the name of God, which He will certainly avenge; for He will admit no rival of proprietary in the things of His worship.—Thomas Brooks.

A Sermon.

BY THE REV. JAMES S. SINCLAIR, JOHN KNOX’S, GLASGOW.

(Taken down by a Hearer.)

The Children of Israel and the Brazen Serpent.—NUMBERS xxi. 4-9.

WE have in this particular passage the record of one of the many remarkable incidents which took place during the journey of the children of Israel through the wilderness. The Lord had brought them out of the land of Egypt with a high hand and outstretched arm; He had given them a song of praise to Himself and of triumph over their enemies on the other side of the Red Sea; and although they had had since then bitter trials to encounter, and oft murmured against Him, He had never failed them in the hour of their extremity, but heard and saved when they cried unto Him. He had brought waters out of the rock, and sent manna and quails from heaven to eat. One would have supposed that, by their varied experiences of their own folly and of God’s gracious and unmerited help from time to time, they would have learnt better things; but it was not so. Here they manifest the same evil spirit still; they break out in bitter complaints against God and against Moses. We must, and do, condemn their ways in this, but we have reason also to smite on our own breasts, as individuals and a generation, and acknowledge similar guilt.

In considering this portion of God’s Word, in dependence on the Spirit of truth, let us observe:—

I.—The rebellion of the children of Israel, as here manifested;

II.—The chastisement or punishment which the Lord sent upon them for this rebellion;

III.—The confession that they made unto Moses and unto the Lord when they were thus chastised and punished; and

IV.—The Lord’s gracious remedy for their healing and deliverance.

We see in the passage, the rebellion, the chastisement, the confession, and the deliverance of the children of Israel, and as we go along we shall make application of these points to national and individual cases and circumstances at the present time.

I.—First, then, let us observe for a little the rebellion which the children of Israel here manifested. We are told that “the soul of the people was much discouraged because of the way.” There is not the slightest doubt but the way was a way of tribulation—a very trying and painful way—along which they were led, and, as we are informed, they became “discouraged” on this account. Now, this is not what one might call an innocent discouragement. It was a discouragement which proceeded from unbelief—from distrust of the Lord, of His promises, and of His power to save.

The way along which they had been led had been a trying one from the beginning, but the Most High had shown Himself able to help them in their greatest need and in their direst distress, and although the way still continued difficult and painful, they ought not to have been discouraged; they ought rather to have exercised greater confidence in God, and made more earnest application to Him to give them the help that they needed. This was, then, an unbelieving, an unholy, discouragement. And there is still such a thing in the world, my friends. People may be discouraged for the simple reason that they sinfully yield to unbelief, and do not put their trust in God. They do not give Him the glory that is due His name as a God of grace and of salvation in the time of need.

Now, we can see from the effects of this discouragement the truth of what I have said concerning it. “The people spake against God and against Moses, Wherefore have ye brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no bread, neither is there any water; and our soul loatheth this light bread.” Such was the fearful spirit of rebellion which this discouragement produced, that they actually gave expression to thoughts of open opposition against the Most High and against His servant, Moses. They openly expressed their doubts as to the advisability of their having been taken up at all from the land of Egypt, and they blasphemously insinuated that the Lord had taken them up, not with a beneficent purpose—not with a view to do them good—but with a view to compass their destruction in the wilderness. And then they went on to say what was not strictly true: “For there is no bread, neither is there any water.” It was certainly a truth that the wilderness, of itself, did not produce any bread or any water such as was necessary for their sustenance, but then the Lord, who had brought them up out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage, had given them, before this particular time, bread and water in the time of their distress. They had no right to say that there was neither bread nor water provided for them in the wilderness. And, then, they contradict themselves in this respect, for they admit in the next sentence that there was bread, but they speak of it in disparaging terms: they call it “light bread.” “Our soul loatheth this light bread.” The Lord had provided bread for them in the wilderness, but they did not like it; they regarded it as too tasteless. It was not the kind of bread that they got in the land of Egypt; they wanted something more pleasing and gratifying to their fleshly appetite than the all-wise God had provided for them.

Now, my friends, we see in the children of Israel here an illustration of things that are true concerning the human race in general, and, in a marked degree, at particular times in its history. We see an illustration of the discontentment that characterises the children of men in general with both the temporal and the spiritual provision that God makes for their need. Look, for

example, even at our first parents in the Garden of Eden, and their first sin. God had provided trees in that garden that were sufficient for their bodily sustenance and nourishment. They had everything in that respect that they could justly desire, or that they really needed, and yet we find that, under the subtle suggestion of the tempter, they are not satisfied with what the Most High allowed them in His good providence. There was one tree which was forbidden, and yet they would have this forbidden tree in order that they might add to the already ample provision that God had made for their requirements. You may see there the spirit of discontent coming in with the very first sin into the world, and you can see the same thing exemplified time and again in the history of the human race. We may say it was exemplified in a very extraordinary way prior to the recent, terrible war that plunged Europe into such bloodshed and destruction. The German people were not satisfied with the good things that God had already given them in His providence; they wanted to get more of this world’s goods, wider dominions, greater possessions. They were by no means the poorest or most ill-off of the nations; they were in the very front rank of civilised nations in the matter of possessions and general comforts, yet the spirit of discontent was there, and they were determined to get more of this world’s possessions, although they should plunge the whole earth into the direst misery. We cannot say either that our own nation has been free of this spirit of discontent, and that we have had no ambition for great possessions, and we cannot say but that at the present time the spirit of discontent with temporal things has broken out to an alarming extent. I take nothing to do with technical questions or grievances between man and man, between master and servant, but it is as plain as can possibly be that, apart from anything where questions of justice come in, there is a spirit of discontentment with the ordinary conditions of life that is not from above but from beneath, and is just the very same spirit that we find here in the wilderness. Oh, my friends, if any human being would get as much of this world’s goods as he could possibly have or enjoy, he would not be satisfied. The whole earth will not fill the immortal soul, and yet poor sinners think they will be satisfied and happy if they get more and more of it.

But I have to notice that here we may observe a suggestion also of our discontentment as fallen sinners with the Lord’s spiritual provision for our spiritual necessities. God, in His infinite mercy and love, sent His Word, His Gospel into Germany and other nations, our own included, at the time of the blessed and glorious Reformation. It was a season of the republication of the Gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ from Mount Sion, and the word of truth went forth among the German peoples and among other nations of the Continent of Europe. Consider even the effects of the translation and the circulation of the Holy Bible in the language of the German people, one of the wonderful works

that were performed by that outstanding servant of Christ, Martin Luther, and consider also the dissemination of divine truth, not only in that country, but in other countries, and in our own; and what is the spirit that has been shown for many years past in relation to this divine provision? How have the nations regarded the word of truth and the pure Gospel of salvation? They have esteemed it “light bread,” and whether they have uttered the words that are here found or not, they have exhibited the spirit that lies behind this utterance, “Our soul loatheth this light bread.” We have abundant proof for many years past that the soul of the German people, its leaders in Church and in State, has loathed the Word of God and the true Gospel of salvation. They have been foremost in circulating the dangerous doctrines of what is known as the “higher criticism,” which should be called the “lower criticism,” as it issues from the bottomless pit. They have been foremost in tearing to pieces the Word of the living God, and in casting doubts upon the truth as to the Person and work of the Son of God, Jesus Christ. Infidelity in many forms has been propagated by German leaders in religious thought, and it is to be feared that the people have swallowed down their pernicious theories, if we may judge by their recent conduct. I remember reading in the lectures of the Rev. Joseph Cook, who was in Boston, United States, but who is now dead, an important reference to the German people and their religion. In this special lecture he was setting forth the greatness of the German nation, and indicating that it had a very great future in every respect—he was not detracting in the very least from the German people and their attainments—and yet he was compelled to admit that, when he was there as a student—about fifty years ago, I should say—such a thing as a prayer meeting was hardly known among the larger Churches in Germany. If there was any real evangelical life, he stated that it was among the people who met for prayer and for reading of God’s Word in private houses. If you belonged, of course, to the State Church, and were baptised, you were a Christian. That was all that was necessary to make you a Christian. Thus he showed that things were at a very low ebb spiritually at that distant time. The soul of Germany loathed the Word of God as “light bread.” And, my friends, can we put the same charge away from our own doors? No, far from it. We have been too good scholars in the schools of German theology, and this has been the spirit that has been abroad for the past forty or fifty years, a disposition to loathe the pure truth of God concerning sin and salvation. If we did not say it was “light” teaching and theology, we said it was too heavy and dull for our spirits.

Ah! my friends, this is a spirit that is in every unregenerate child of Adam. The Word of God and the truths of the Gospel are not things which are naturally palatable to us as fallen creatures, and we have great need to be warned against giving place to such a spirit as is here expressed: “Our soul loatheth

this light bread.” Perhaps there may be more of this among us than we are aware of. Young people, for example, are ready to get tired of the plain, simple doctrines of God’s Word concerning sin and salvation. “Oh, we have heard these things over and over again; they are stale, tasteless to us; we would prefer to get something new and fresh—something that would be more interesting and agreeable to our own minds.” And many who stand up in pulpits in our time and generation have cast off the doctrines of God’s Word as “light bread”—old, antiquated fare—and they are doing their very utmost to please the natural, the fleshly, mind of their hearers. Well, that is a dangerous policy, a policy that will bring forth dreadful fruit. These new doctrines may be sweet to the carnal mouth, but they will be bitter in the belly; they may be sweet in the mouth of time, but they will be bitter in the belly of eternity. Oh! stick you to the bread of God’s Word and pure Gospel truth, and you will find it will be sufficient to sustain your immortal soul when you come to die—when you come to the swellings of Jordan—when you come to appear in the immediate presence of God, the Judge of all.

II.—Now I must notice, in the second place, the chastisement or punishment which the Lord sent upon the children of Israel for their rebellion. “He sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and much people of Israel died.”

The Lord Jehovah was gracious and merciful, but He was also just and righteous, and He could not, and did not, look with complacency upon such an unbelieving and bold spirit of rebellion and opposition; and so He sent serpents—poisonous beasts—among the people, that bit and wounded them, and many of the children of Israel died. Why did He send serpents rather than other creatures? Well, it occurs to me that He sent these serpents to remind and teach them that the spirit of rebellion they were showing towards God and towards His servant, Moses, came from the old serpent, the devil, who was a liar and murderer from the beginning, who poisoned our first parents, and who sought to drag down the whole race to eternal perdition. “He sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and much people of Israel died.” And although we should not say all, we are afraid many died eternally, as a consequence of the bites of these dreadful serpents.

Now, we may find a parallel to this in subsequent times. There are certain plagues, certain scourges, which may be compared to serpents, which the Most High sends upon the nations on account of their sins. There are, for example, the serpent of war, the serpent of pestilence, and the serpent of famine; and, oh, my friends, these serpents have been, in dimensions, like unto leviathan in our age and generation. God sent forth the fiery serpent of war and bloodshed upon the continent of Europe. This was His judgment on account of sin, and I believe personally that He sent this fiery serpent just on

account of our rejection of His Holy Word, our disesteem of His glorious Gospel. There is no sin under the sun more awful than the rejection of the Word of God and the contempt of the Gospel of Christ. God appears in all the glory of His wonderful perfections in the gift of His Son, Jesus Christ, and in that redemption which He purchased by His obedience and by His death upon the cross. “Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other.” This is the grand theme or message that is enshrined in the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, and when men—high or low, rich or poor, learned or unlearned—begin to loathe this Word and its contents as “light bread,” when they begin to spue it out of their mouths, as Germany and our own nation and other nations have been doing, they may expect that God will punish them, and that He will show that He is not to be trifled with. Oh! my friends, it is a very solemn thought to think that this sin was at the root of the terrible War that has been so recently waged. I do not say but that the righteous suffered as well as the wicked, yet at the same time it is to be deeply feared that this War was, in a pre-eminent sense, sent upon the nations for their contempt of the Word of God and their rejection of the glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ. And did He not send, also, the serpent of pestilence? It is said, in fact, that the pestilence slew as many as the War, although its ravages were more silent, and not so easily observed. And we have not been free from the serpent of famine also. These were dreadful serpents which God sent among the nations, and it is hard to say if their work is completed yet. But there are other serpents besides these.

I could suppose the fiery serpents were some larger and others smaller, some that could be plainly seen in the camp, others creeping in more secretly among the tents—among the families—biting young and old at unexpected moments. So we may see at the present time what fearful things are permitted in our communities in God’s judgment. What are the fearful strife and enmity, what is the frivolity, what is the immorality, what is the disrespect for the laws of marriage as instituted by God, what is the disturbance in family relationships, what is the drunkenness, and what are the murders and suicides? What are all these things that have broken out, and become so manifest since the War? These are just fiery serpents sent in God’s judgment upon us, and many people are dying even literally of their deadly bites.

Oh, my friends, we may come closer still and take a view of our own minds and hearts. What is a guilty conscience but a fiery serpent? What is the inward enmity to the truth but a fiery serpent? What is disregard of God’s law, and what are contempt of the Sabbath and disobedience to parents but fiery serpents? And if careless sinners continue under the influence of these evils to the end, they shall spend their eternity with serpents, with the

devil and his angels. Oh! what a mercy when a poor sinner is delivered from these fiery serpents that he finds in his own breast. That is the mercy that is worth speaking about, for which the Lord Jehovah is to be praised both in time and in eternity. Ah, see to it, my friends—and you especially who are still without Christ—that you are not allowing some fiery serpent of secret opposition to the Gospel, of secret enmity to the law, of secret distaste of God’s Word, to suck your life blood, to your eternal misery. We need not go to Germany: we can find fiery serpents within ourselves, and they are a blessed people who have been brought with these to Him who is mighty to save, to Him who has provided an effectual remedy from all the poisonous bites of the old serpent, the devil.

III.—Now, I pass on, in the third place, to observe the confession of the people and their appeal. “Therefore the people came to Moses and said, We have sinned: for we have spoken against the Lord and against thee: pray unto the Lord, that He take away the serpents from us. And Moses prayed for the people.” The children of Israel were no doubt a stubborn and rebellious people, a people ready to grumble and murmur against the dealings of the Most High, but they were not altogether left to utter blindness and hardness of heart; and how do we prove this? We just prove it by the circumstance that, when they found these fiery serpents coming upon them as a most destructive plague from Jehovah, they awoke to recognise their sin and their guilt, and they came with a plain, frank confession of their sin unto Moses, “We have sinned: for we have spoken against the Lord, and against thee.” And, my friends, in some circumstances, we might not have thought a great deal about this as anything more than what might be expected or looked for. Were they not under the hand of God? Were they not plagued with these fearful beasts, and was not death spreading in the camp everywhere? No wonder, we might readily say, though they should come with such a confession as this. But, after what we have seen in recent times among ourselves and elsewhere, we have a different view of the matter. Although God’s hand has been so heavy upon us as a nation, and upon other nations, where is the confession, where is the acknowledgment of sin, where is the humbling of ourselves in the presence of the Most High? Where is the acknowledgment that we have gone astray from His Word and His Gospel? Not a word, and, therefore, I have to say we are in a more terrible case than even the children of Israel here, stubborn and rebellious as they were. When they were smitten by the hand of God, they acknowledged their iniquity and made confession of it unreservedly unto Moses, the servant of God, and we see in this that the Lord had not left them entirely. He was still dealing with their consciences. And I say again, Are we not in a terrible case as a people? Although death has been everywhere in the camp, there is little or no repentance and turning to God.

People are as hard and insensate as ever; in fact, in the case of many, worse than ever. Many have gone into the War, and have come out of it worse than when they went in, and that shows that the rod of the Most High did not produce any proper effect on their minds and consciences. No doubt it is teaching us this, that affliction, no matter how terrible and how sweeping, will not of itself bring poor sinners to repentance. Oh, no. “Though thou shouldest bray a fool in a mortar among wheat with a pestle, yet will not his foolishness depart from him.” The Rev. Archibald Cook said that, although an unrenewed sinner were dipped in hell every morning, he would be the same sinner at night, unless he came under the converting power of the Holy Ghost. We as a nation have been dipped in hell in this terrible War. Are we any better at night? No; but worse in many cases. Ah! affliction has only a stupefying, hardening influence unless it is blessed by the teaching of God’s Spirit. And so, although the Spirit’s work is not expressly mentioned in our text, yet we can observe its presence, we can see the effects of it. It is a great thing when a poor sinner is brought to this point, when he is brought to make a full and open confession of his sin. “Against Thee, Thee only, have I sinned.” “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Well, we are told also that they asked Moses to pray to the Lord that He would take away these fiery serpents. Moses we, too often, think of as the embodiment and representative of the Law, as distinguished from the Gospel. Moses and the Law are sometimes spoken of as if they were identical, but Moses, although no doubt the representative of the Law, was also a type of Christ. Moses was a mediator between God and the children of Israel—a mediator certainly on a lower scale and sense than the Lord Jesus. He was only a type and figure of Christ, but still he stood, in an important sense, as mediator between God and Israel, and the people went to Moses and asked him to pray for them; and although Moses was justly grieved and indignant with the people on account of their sin, he was, at the same time, a man full of mercy and compassion, and he did not refuse. He did not say, as he might have said, “You deserve it all, and more; you have exhibited this spirit of rebellion on so many occasions, that I refuse to plead with the Most High for you again.” No; he did not thus speak. He was here a wonderful type of Christ. He immediately prayed, and asked the Lord that He would take away the serpents, and his prayer was answered. God manifested His grace as well as His righteousness. Moses, pleading for the people here, is a lesson for us in relation to Christ. Have you discovered your sin? Have you been brought, as a poor sinner, to lie condemned in the presence of God? Ah, well, put your case into the hands of the glorious Intercessor and Advocate within the vail, the New Testament

Moses. “If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous.” This was not a very good case—the case of these rebellious Israelites, a people that had sinned against light and privileges. In like manner, though your case be one of the blackest and worst cases under the sun, come with it to the glorious Mediator of the new covenant, the New Testament Moses, and He will not cast you out. He says, “Him that cometh unto me, I will in no wise cast out.” He was ready to take up the case of Zaccheus and of Mary Magdalene. He was ready to take up the case of Saul of Tarsus, who had been full of hatred and bitter opposition to the Gospel. He delights in receiving bad cases—cases of sinners of a desperate type and degree. “Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound; that as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.” Oh, then, come as you are to the feet of the New Testament Moses, and we can say there will be hope in Israel concerning you. What is wrong with this generation is just this—that we are not sinful enough in our own esteem; we are not needy enough. We are so good, and self-righteous, and self-confident, that we hardly need a mediator at all; and Christ, as Mediator, is cast out of the theology of the present age. Our fancied goodness will be our eternal damnation, unless the Lord will strip us of it.

IV.—I proceed, now, in the last place, to notice the remedy. We are told that the Lord said unto Moses, “Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass that every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live.”

The Lord here directed Moses to a method which He had devised for the healing of the people. He directed Moses to make a serpent of brass similar in appearance to the fiery serpents that were destroying the people, and He told Moses to put this serpent of brass upon a pole, so that the whole camp of Israel might see it, and He gave a definite promise that, if any bitten Israelite should look upon this serpent of brass exalted upon the pole, immediately he would be healed. And we are informed that Moses did as the Lord commanded him. He made a serpent of brass, and erected it upon the pole, and it came to pass that, if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent of brass, he lived. The remedy was effectual for the case. Ah! this wonderful Jehovah, who was terrible in His holiness and righteousness to punish sin, was also marvellous in His grace and wisdom to heal poor sinners from their sin and from its dire consequences. According to God’s appointment, this serpent of brass was to be sufficient to heal the bitten Israelites.

We can clearly perceive that there was no virtue in the serpent of brass itself, and that a piece of dead matter, such as it was, could not, according to its own nature, heal the children of Israel from the bites of these fiery serpents. It was, however, the Lord’s

appointed means, and He shows here that He can make means which appear to be the most ineffectual under the sun effectual for accomplishing His greatest and most beneficent purposes. Still, we have to understand that there was much instruction in this mode of deliverance by the serpent of brass. It was not a thing without meaning. What did it teach? Well, for one thing, by this method the source of the misery that came upon them, even the old serpent, the devil, was kept before the minds of the children of Israel; and, in the second place, they were shown that He who had power to send the fiery serpents had also power to take away the sting of these serpents, and make them utterly unable to do any harm. Thus the children of Israel were taught by this wonderful method the marvellous wisdom, the matchless goodness, and the almighty power of Jehovah in destroying these serpents through symbolic means that appeared to reason and sense utterly ineffectual to accomplish the end. But, my friends, we have an inspired interpretation of this divine method. The Lord Jesus Christ Himself makes a spiritual application to His own person and work of what is here brought before us, when He says to Nicodemus, “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” The brazen serpent was lifted up upon a pole in the wilderness, and the Lord Jesus Christ was lifted up upon the cross as the Redeemer of the spiritual Israel, as the Redeemer of His people. And what do you see when you behold Him lifted upon the cross? Well, you may see, in the first place, Satan, who tempted our first parents to sin, and has been tempting the human race ever since to continue in sin, who has the power of death, that is, the devil. And you may, secondly, see sin itself. The children of Israel could read in the serpent of brass their sin; it was a reminder of the sin that brought on the fiery serpents. So we see sin in the cross of Christ. He was lifted up as the sin-bearer and the sin-offering. The sins of His people were reckoned to His account. The Lord laid upon Him the sins of a multitude that no man can number. The Son of God—Jesus Christ—must suffer and die, if sin is to be removed. And, still further, we see the Lord’s gracious provision by atonement for the taking away of sin.

Ah, my friends, this is the divine remedy which the men of this world do not understand or receive. “The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto him.” God, in His wondrous wisdom and matchless love, reckons sin to the account of Christ, makes Him a sin-bearer, lays upon Him the curse that was due to the sins of His people, causes Him to enter into conflict with Satan, and thus, by His substitutionary work in the room of the guilty, He takes away the curse, makes an end of sin, destroys the power of the old serpent, and saves sinners from going down into the pit. Christ, then, lifted up

upon the cross, is the divine instrument of victory. He triumphed over sin, Satan, and hell; having spoiled principalities and powers, He made a show of them openly in His cross. “He hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.”

But as He was lifted up on the cross, so He must be lifted up on the Gospel pole. He must be lifted up in the sight of the whole camp of Israel; He must be lifted up in sight of the Church; and He must be lifted up in sight of the whole world. The boundaries of the visible kingdom of God were then co-extensive only with the nation of Israel, but Christ’s kingdom is now co-extensive with the whole world. “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.” Jesus Christ, then, as the sinners’ surety and as the sinners’ substitute, delivering souls from sin, from the old serpent, and from the curse, is the great central theme of the glorious Gospel of the blessed God. And, my friends, these “higher critics,” to whom I have been already alluding, are enemies of the cross of Christ. It is because they are enemies to the doctrines of substitution and atoning sacrifice that they have adopted and formulated their views about the Scriptures of the Old Testament. They regard the ancient sacrifices of the ceremonial law as mere natural things—the natural product of the human mind and of heathenish views as to the way in which we are to approach God—and they maintain that Christ, when He came, made an end of all that, and of every thought of forgiveness through a propitiatory sacrifice by blood, and that it is simply by His example of self-sacrifice we are to be saved. There is no atoning sacrifice in their delusive creed; but ours is different. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, we hold up Christ, and Him crucified, upon the Gospel pole. That is what Paul and his fellow-workers did. They held forth Jesus Christ and Him crucified as the wisdom and power of God unto salvation; and that is what must still be done by every true messenger of the cross of Christ. Every sinner is called upon to look to this atoning Redeemer—to look and live. “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is none else.” We do not hold the Arminian doctrines of universal love and universal atonement, or of natural ability to repent and believe the Gospel, but certainly we do hold and preach, on the authority of God’s Word, alongside the doctrine of election, the offer of Christ unto every creature under heaven.

Very likely in the camp of Israel there were many poor persons who were near their last breath, and who were brought out, in their utter helplessness, to the door of their tents in order to get a sight of the serpent exalted on the pole, and, if they got one glimpse of this serpent, immediately the poison was purged, immediately they lived. Ah! the crucified but risen Redeemer is the grand remedy. And very likely not a few in the recent

War, when they were at their very last breath, got a glimpse of the exalted Jesus, and the poison of the old serpent in their souls was destroyed, and they lived for eternity. That is our hope, at any-rate, concerning not a few who have passed away. Not into the “great unknown,” as they say nowadays. Oh! no; the future world is assuredly known. There is a heaven and a hell beyond death. There is a heaven where “the spirits of just men made perfect” are; where God—Father, Son, and Holy Ghost—reveals Himself in infinite glory and sweetness beyond what human language can express. “There remaineth a rest to the people of God” in the immediate presence of the three-one God. And there is a hell, where unbelieving and impenitent sinners go, the outer darkness, the lake of everlasting fire. Oh, my friends, the only way by which we can escape the dreadful consequences of sin, the power of Satan and the worm that dieth not, is by fleeing unto Jesus, by looking away from every other remedy, every other saviour, and casting ourselves unreservedly upon this Divine Saviour, who is able to save unto the uttermost. No sinner who draws near to the Father by the Son, Jesus Christ, the uplifted Saviour, will be disappointed. “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord. Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.”

Ah, my friends, look and live; look to this Christ. We are looking too much to ourselves, and to something we can do ourselves, instead of looking away entirely from ourselves unto Jesus. Although we know the truth in the letter of it, yet this cursed spirit reigns in us by nature. Nothing but illumination and power from heaven can deliver us from its grasp. Ah, where are you going to spend eternity, you who are without Christ? It is an awful thing to die without Christ, to go into eternity without union to the beloved of the Father. Oh, my friends, do not procrastinate now, or it may mean a terrible “never.” As poor sinners, look unto Jesus and be saved, or despise the day of mercy, and be lost for ever. May the Lord save us from such a terrible doom, and may He bring us by His blessed Spirit, in our poverty and misery, our blindness and wretchedness, the slaves of sin and the devil, to look unreservedly to Christ, the glorious overcomer of sin and hell, and be saved for ever and ever! Let us endeavour to strain our blind eyes towards this glorious Light of the world. Oh, my friends, one ray coming forth with power from “the Sun of Righteousness” is sufficient to remove the scales and let the light of life and healing and salvation into our perishing souls.

May the Lord bless to us His Word!

O! WHAT acclamations of joy will there be when all the children of God shall meet together, without fear of being disturbed by the anti-Christian and Cainish brood.—Bunyan.

The late Allan Macpherson,

LAGA, ARDNAMURCHAN.

ALLAN MACPHERSON (Ailean Laga) was born in the township of Laga, on the north shore of Loch Suinart, Argyllshire, near the latter end of the eighteenth century.

The writer desires, first, to record the following story concerning Lachlan Macpherson, Allan’s father, and the blessed results of his having received the late Kenneth Ross, Gaelic teacher and catechist, into his house, as that was told him by the late Donald Cameron, Camusachoirk, Strontian. The latter part of this paper came within the personal knowledge of the writer.

During the first quarter of the last century, the Society for Propagating Religious Knowledge in the Highlands of Scotland sent Kenneth Ross to Laga to teach the people to read the Gaelic language, and also to hold religious meetings among them. When he arrived there, he told the men the errand upon which he was sent, and he, at the same time, informed them that on no account would he lodge in any house without having a promise that all the family would attend worship, morning and evening. The heads of the families of the township held a meeting to consider the matter of the stranger’s proposals. After seriously considering the subject, they decided that they would willingly have him to teach and to hold religious meetings, but, as regards family worship, they resolved that they would not agree to that. When they informed Kenneth Ross of these decisions, he asked them would they oblige by directing him to another township. They pointed out to him a mountain track which struck right across the country to the other side, and told him that, by following that unmade road, he would arrive at a certain township. Kenneth Ross began to climb the braeface, as they directed him. Before he had climbed very far, Lachlan Macpherson, who was not present at the consultation held by the men, came, and inquired of them who the man was that was going up the hill. They told who he was, and why he came to the place, and the reason why they would not receive him. Lachlan went after him, and, when he got near him, he called to him to stop. Kenneth sat down till he came to where he was. He asked him what was the condition upon which he would live in his house. Kenneth told him. Lachlan said: “My conscience has been accusing me since many a day for not keeping family worship, and, if you will be an agreeable man in other respects, I am quite prepared to have you in my house.” Kenneth replied to the effect that, if he should find him a disagreeable person, he could send him away. So they turned back to Laga, with the following results:—

Some time before Kenneth Ross’s arrival, one of the sons of Lachlan Macpherson had come home from service. The farmer with whom he served was a good hand at the fiddle. He taught

the young man fiddling, and gave him a fiddle when he left his service. This son of Lachlan, and the youth of Laga, held dancing parties almost every night of the week. This conduct on the part of the young caused the godly catechist much grief. He met the young fiddler in a private place, and said to him: “Well, my young friend, I am very sorry for you; for, if you will not cease fiddling to the youth of Laga, you will not only be lost yourself, but you will be the cause of the eternal ruin of all the young of this place, and they will curse you for having done so, in hell fire for ever.” The young man began to whistle some tune, and walked away, without uttering a word. Kenneth Ross concluded in his own mind that the warning, instead of doing good, would do much evil by causing the young man and his sinful companions to persist more obstinately in their sinful course. He lay under this temptation during that week, but was praying incessantly to the Lord to arrest the career of his young friends. Next week, the young man met Kenneth Ross, and said to him: “What have you to say to me now; for, since you spoke to me last week I have not slept, because, as soon as I went to bed each night, the curses of the young of Laga sounded in my ears till morning?” Kenneth Ross answered: “I have nothing that I can say to you but what God says, ‘Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.'” The young man asked him: “What shall I do?” He answered: “There is a prayer meeting held here each Thursday evening, and you should attend it.” The young man said: “The youth of Laga will kill me with mocking.” Kenneth answered: “I perceive that the Lord has begun a work of conviction in you, and I would advise you to obey God’s voice to you in His Word; for, if you will not obey, He will lay His hand upon you so heavily that you will think very little of the mocking of your former companions in sin.”

But the young man thought that he should go to consult his minister about the matter, so he went to see him. When he arrived, the minister asked him why he wished to see him. He told him of his sleepless nights, and the awful curses with which he was harassed. The minister told him that they overdid their play, and consequently that he brought nervous sleeplessness upon himself; but that, as regards dancing, where could he find a more godly man than David, who was a good dancer and a fiddler too? “Don’t you be so incessantly at it, and you will find that sleep will return, and that that disturbance on your brain will wear off.” The young man returned home under the pleasant impression that David’s dancing justified him, and that his guilt and miseries had been removed. But, behold, that night, whenever he laid his head on the pillow, the sound of the cursing of the young of Laga exceeded an hundredfold anything he felt before. Next Thursday evening, after the prayer meeting was

begun, he came in, and sat away at the back of the door. This gave Kenneth Ross some encouragement and satisfaction. The following Thursday he walked through the township in good time for the meeting, and sat near the front, opposite the speaker. Next evening he went back to see the minister. When he arrived, the minister asked him: “Well, have you got rid now of the trouble you had on account of fiddling and dancing?” The young man answered, “Yes.” “I am pleased for that,” he said, “for I was sure you would soon be all right by taking care not to overdo it; but, as regards fiddling and dancing, there is no sin in them.” The young man replied: “That is just what brought me here to-night, so that I would warn you that you are a servant of Satan, and that your advice to me, had not the Lord in mercy delivered me from following it, would ruin my poor soul in hell for ever. I am now, by God’s grace, done for ever with fiddling and dancing, and I will never go to hear you again, and every one who will take my advice will not go to hear you.” So, the young man took up his cap, and departed. He faithfully kept to his word, for the minister never saw him in his church again.

Some years after these things transpired, the young man went up to the head of Loch Suinart to the herring fishing. There were scores of boats from various places present, and all were amply rewarded for their labour by large catches of fish. Every evening, after the nets were put into the boats, the Laga young man and the crews of all the boats, accompanied by many of the Strontian people, went up to the top of a hillock above the shore to worship God together, before they went out to cast their nets. Again, each morning, when they came ashore, and before they sorted their nets, they went to the same hillock, and there worshipped God. This continued all the time the fishing lasted. It seemed to the people to be more like a communion season than a gathering of fishermen. When the young man of Laga and his companions left, the people of Strontian felt as sad and lonely as ever they did on the Monday of a communion season.

While still a young man, he was seized with an illness which he took to be his end. One day, before his end came, he said to his mother, “Will you put on a good fire, mother?” She did so. When the fire burned well, he said to her: “You will find the key of my box in the pocket of my trousers; take it and open my box, and bring out the fiddle and bow which you will find at the bottom of the box.” She did so. He then said to her: “Kindly place now both the fiddle and the bow on the top of the fire.” She said to him that she thought they should sell them. “No, mother,” he said, “do you think that we should sell to another man that which almost ruined me for eternity?” His mother placed them in the fire, and, when they were burned, he expressed how thankful he was at seeing them destroyed. A few days after this, the young man of Laga departed to be for ever with Christ.

There were three of the sons of Lachlan Macpherson converted,

and they were among the brightest men in the congregation of Strontian. Their names were Alexander, John, and Allan. Donald Cameron told the writer the name of the young man referred to in the above narrative, but, as he is not sure whether it was Alexander or John, he has refrained from committing himself to any. The two, John and Alexander, died long before the writer knew the family, but he knew Allan during nine years. The father lived till he was a hundred and twelve years. The writer saw him at that age, and he had the use of all his faculties and of all his senses up to the last. He lived latterly for many years in the township of Innisafeorag, the next west from Laga. It was there that his end came. He never became a member in full communion with the Church, but, as regards his outward conduct, he lived a blameless life. The writer did not hear how long Kenneth Ross lived in his house, but the effect of the day on which Lachlan Macpherson climbed the hill after him, and brought him back, will never be forgotten throughout eternity.

The writer met Allan Macpherson for the first time in the year 1878. He was then living with his father and another brother and sister at Innisafeorag. Allan was a little man physically, and slenderly built. At that time the writer had no love to Allan, but had, on the contrary, a feeling of strong dislike. Why this was true can be explained only by the fact that the one was then in the kingdom of darkness, and the other in that of God’s dear Son, for he was one of the meekest and most inoffensive of men. In the year 1880 the writer came to live about three miles from the place, Camustorsa, where Allan then resided. On the Lord’s day they often walked together to the Aharacle Free Church, a distance of five miles. Many a pleasant hour they had together, going and coming to God’s house. If there was a sense of dislike before in the mind of the writer, it had changed to sincere affection by this time.

Allan’s great strength lay in prayer. He would begin prayer so low that one would be apt to conclude that, on account of his sense of inward corruption and unworthiness, he would never get off that dunghill; but he would, very often, get such nearness to God’s throne of grace, and such boldness to enter into the holiest of all by the blood of Jesus, that one could not but remember the case of Jacob when he said, “I will not let thee go, except thou bless me.” Such would be the tension of his mind and the upward exercise of his body in prayer, that he often quite unconsciously stood upon his tiptoes as he earnestly wrestled at “the throne of grace.”

He went to the Communion to Strontian on one occasion when the worthy catechist of Aharacle, Donald Cameron, was not able to go along with him. When the catechist met him after he returned, he said, “How did you get on at Strontian, Allan?” He answered, “Not very well, dear Donald, for they were too heavy on me. They called on me to pray at every prayer meeting

during the Communion season, and that was rather too heavy on me.” Donald said, in reply: “Now, Allan, had they ignored you in all the prayer meetings, would that not be worse still?” He answered, “Ah, dear Donald, aren’t you right!” Another day Donald asked him whether this or that thing would disturb his mind. The answer in every instance was in the negative. Donald said, “You are a happy man, Allan, for each one of the things I instanced would tempt me.” “But what of that, dear Donald,” he replied, “if the hen on the top of the house would do it?” He meant the hen scraping the thatch off the roof of the house.

During the latter years of his life he was often a sufferer from a certain painful disease. Shortly after one of these attacks, a friend was going on business to Salen, Loch Suinart, one day. As he was passing their croft he heard, behind the high hedge erected to keep the deer from destroying the potatoes, Allan’s brother weeding the potatoes with a hoe. He asked him how Allan was, and he answered that he was sitting on the grass beside him. The friend proceeded to the gate and went inside the hedge, to see Allan. When he came to where he was, he noticed that he was sitting on the damp ground without anything under him, so he said to Allan that it was not wise for him, owing to his trouble, to be sitting there, and suggested that he should go into the house. His brother, who had come across the field to where they were, said to him: “It is not wise for you to sit here, so you should take the advice given you, and go home.” He answered his brother: “It will not be long now till I go home.” It struck the friend’s mind that Allan did not mean the same thing by “going home” as his brother. The friend threw down a waterproof, which he had on his arm, on the ground, and when both reclined there for a short time, Allan said: “I do not know whether it was by the ears of my body or not, but I heard the singing of the song of Moses and the Lamb as distinctly as I hope to hear it when I go home to everlasting glory; and I know now that I will very soon be there. It was when I heard the sound of your feet on the road that it stopped.” After a few minutes both arose, and went towards the house. When they came to the road, Allan stood, and asked his friend: “Will you promise me that you will attend my funeral?” He answered, “I cannot believe that your end is so near as you think, Allan.” “I am,” he said, “certainly sure now that I will not see the sun rise to-morrow morning, and it would give me great satisfaction if you would promise to attend my funeral.” The friend gave him a conditional promise, with which he expressed himself satisfied. When the friend arrived at Salen he called on the Free Church student who officiated in the Aharacle congregation at the time, and told him of what Allan had said. The student was going across to Aharacle that Thursday evening to attend the prayer meeting.

This friend, after he had done business, returned, and called to

see Allan. When he went in, he found that he had gone to bed. After some conversation, he told Allan that, as he had to cross the loch, and as he was alone, he would have to go before the night came. “Yes, you must go,” he said, “but you will not go till you keep family worship here.” The friend replied that he never took upon himself to do so in the presence of any man to whom he gave credit for being a God-fearing person, and that he could not do it in his presence. “I am assured,” he said, “that you do it among your fellow-sinners where you live, so you will not refuse to do it here, for what is the presence of any man? You do it in the presence of God.” The friend still refusing, he said to him: “There are fifty-six years since I began to follow the means, and I have never been without worship morning and evening during that time. Are you going to leave me without the worship of God the last night I am to be in the world?” The friend then said that he would endeavour to do something in that way, provided he would himself mention the psalm to be sung, the chapter that he would have read, and that he would conclude with prayer. He said he would ask a blessing on the Word, and also mention a psalm, but that any chapter of God’s precious Word would be quite suitable. So he asked a blessing, and said: “Sing the beginning of the psalm, ‘I love the Lord, because my voice and prayers he did hear,'” (Psalm cxvi). The first six verses of that psalm were sung. Such singing as Allan had that night the friend never heard before or since. When the Bible was opened, the fifth chapter of Second Corinthians stood before his eye, and it was read. Then came the difficult part, to pray in the presence of such a prince as Allan; but it had to be done. After worship, the friend said to him: “You are assured that you will soon be with Christ, and I hope you will continue to pray for me while you are left here.” He rose up, sitting in the bed, and said: “I am sure that I will be with my blessed Saviour before the sun will rise on this world again, and I am quite as sure that you and I will spend eternity together in glory.” The friend and Allan parted, never again to meet in the body till the day on which the dead in the graves shall hear the voice of the Son of God.

When the prayer meeting ended at Aharacle, the student told Alexander Cameron and Donald Cameron, the two elders, what he was told about Allan. When Alexander Cameron heard it, he said to Donald that they would have to go at once to see Allan before he would be taken away. So, they started off at once to walk the five miles between them and their beloved friend. When they arrived they found Allan in a very happy frame of mind. After they talked with him for some time, Alexander Cameron said to Donald: “You better get the Bible, and keep worship, as we must be returning home now.” Allan said to them: “Worship has been held here already this evening, but it will give me very great pleasure that you both should read the Word and pray with

me before you leave.” Alexander Cameron said: “Who kept worship here this evening?” Allan told him. Alexander replied: “Surely things have come very low with you, Allan, when a Moderate has been your chaplain.” “Don’t you speak so of that young man,” Allan said, “but be as kind to him as you can, for you will see him yet standing as a witness on the side of Christ and His truth when the most of the ministers and people of Scotland will forsake Him and His truth.”

After the two elders left he said to his brother, “I would like you to rise at three o’clock in the morning, and to come where I am.” His brother said that he would willingly sit up all night if he would allow him, but he answered that there was no occasion for that. His brother rose about three next morning and came to his bedside. He told him that he was now going to leave him, gave him a last serious advice to repent of his sins, especially of the sin of drunkenness, and to look by faith to “Christ crucified” as the only remedy for guilty men. He warned him of the consequences of continuing in his careless and sinful courses, and of the fact that this would be the last advice he should hear from him. He then stretched his limbs to full length, closed his eyes, and passed away as if he were falling asleep. His brother looked at his watch, and noted that it was four o’clock in the morning.

Thus Allan Macpherson departed, to be for ever with Christ, in the month of July, 1882. His remains were buried in Isle Fiunan, in Lochshiel, where many bodies of the Lord’s dear saints wait till the last trumpet will be blown. Then they who now lie in the dust will arise, and sing for ever “unto him that loved them and washed them from their sins in his own blood.”

N. C.

A Letter from Rev. J. B. Radasi,

F.P. MISSIONARY, MATABELELAND.

THE following is the letter received by Rev. Neil Cameron, Convener of Foreign Mission Committee, from which an extract was given in last issue:—

C/O NATIVE COMMISSIONER, BEMBESI,
MATABELELAND, SOUTH AFRICA, 4th November, 1919.

MY DEAR MR. CAMERON,—I was very glad to receive your letter, and to hear that you were still enjoying good health. I have been troubled a little with sore eyes, but they are much better now. I am also very thankful to the Synod for the increase of £20. Everybody was hoping that the prices of things would go down after the War. But since peace has been signed, the prices of everything have gone up, and people are now paying much more for everything than they did during the War, which has caused a great deal of suffering amongst the natives.

I saw the report in the Magazine that some outsiders were maintaining that I had been using uninspired hymns in public worship.

That statement is absolutely incorrect. I have never used a single uninspired hymn, either in public or in private worship. I was very glad to see that you had given that false charge a flat denial. I wrote to Rev. Neil Macintyre, Stornoway, before I received your letter, contradicting that false statement.

I have always had it in mind that, if I could get a suitable lad, and he was willing and his people agreeable, I would send him over. I had Kiwa Mlahlo in my mind; he was a very nice lad, and his people were agreeable. But his health broke down, as you know, and I was disappointed. Other lads don’t stay long enough at school. They only learn the native language, and get their Bibles, and their parents take them away from school and send them to work, as boys, sixteen years of age, have to pay a poll tax of £1 a year, even if they are still at school, as soon as they reach that age. Kiwa Mlahlo is still teaching at our school at Induba, but his chest trouble often lays him down. . . .

I have a young Matebele girl, whose father and mother are members of our Church; she has been in our school for many years, and is now in Standard V. She and her parents are very anxious that she should go to Lovedale to be trained as a teacher, to come and teach the girls here, and they have no means to send her to Lovedale. I think she would be very helpful here, if properly trained. She could go at the beginning of next year, if our Church could support her. We have now over a hundred children in our school here, and the Inspector says there ought to be three teachers in this school now, one principal, and two assistants. We would like teachers belonging to our Church to teach the children.

I must now remain, with kindest regards, yours sincerely,
J. B. RADASI.

P.S.—I shall be very glad to have more Bibles.—J. B. R.

The late Mr. Lachlan Matheson.

LACHLAN MATHESON was a son of the late Donald Matheson, missionary, Glendale, Skye, of whom an obituary notice appeared in a recent issue of the Magazine. He went to France in the month of December, 1917, where he remained “in deaths oft” until he was demobilised in February, 1919. Before he joined the Army, he was, during several years, an adherent of St. Jude’s congregation. Although he was, latterly especially, very attentive on the means of grace, it was after he joined the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders that he became decidedly serious as regards the everlasting concerns of his soul. We give below a letter he wrote to a brother on the 17th April, 1918, from France. On his way home, after he was demobilised, he was attacked by the “flu” in his sister’s (Mrs. K. Matheson’s) house at Dingwall. His case became so serious that he had to be removed to the Dingwall Hospital, where he died of pneumonia.

We again desire to express sincere sympathy with his mother and each member of the family. The only consolation we and they have, is that we have good evidence from his letters and otherwise that he was truly converted, and that he is now with Christ, in the rest that remains to the people of God.

N. C.

“1/7th ARGYLL AND SUTHERLAND HIGHLANDERS,
17th April, 1918.

MY DEAR BROTHER,—I received your letter, and I am glad to learn from it that you are both well. We, as a family, ought to be thankful to the Most High for His goodness to us, not that we deserve anything but His displeasure for the very little fruit we show after the great privileges that have been bestowed upon us. He has brought us in face of danger and death, and is saying to us (as if it were to give us another opportunity to consider our ways), “Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die? I have no pleasure in the death of him who dies in his sins.” We must all meet that inevitable hour, and oh, that He would grant us the spirit of repentance and conquer our greatest enemy of all, unbelief; so that we might be prepared when it pleases Him to take us away. It is to be feared that the majority in our day are ripening for eternal destruction, as it is manifest that the rod of chastisement is making them more callous.

I am sorry to understand that there is a disagreement among the F.P.s regarding union. I hear there are three ministers in favour of it. Who are they? I hope N. is not one of them. I must now conclude with kind regards to you both.—Your affectionate brother,

LACHLAN MATHESON.”

Air Hobhairean an Dítidh.

LE MR. EOIN UELSH.

“An ti a chreideas ann, cha dìtear e; ach an ti nach creid tha e air a dhìteadh a cheana, a chionn nach do chreid e ann an ainm aon-ghin Mhic Dhe.”—EOIN iii. 18.

(Air a leantuininn o t. d. 277.)

‘N IS, tha cuid do bhriathraibh a dh’fhosglas mi suas dhuibh, a chum’s gun tuig sibh a chuid eile na’s fhearr. Anns an 19 rann, tha dìteadh air a labhairt uime; agus anns an ath aite tha e labhairt mu thimchioll solus; agus anns an 3 aite tha iomradh air a dheanamh air dorchadas. B’áill leam gu’n tuigeadh sibh na trí focal so uile; ciod a tha air a chiallachadh le dìteadh. ’Nuair a ta neach air a dhìteadh gu bàsachadh, ’nuair a tha binn agus breith air a thabhairt a mach (le cuirt-cheartais fhirinneach) agus air dol thairis air beatha duine ciontach a bhris air an lagh; air an aobhar sin tha iad a, toirt a mach na binn air gu’m bheil e toilltinneach air bas; agus nach biodh e beò na b’fhaide; eadhon

mar sin a tha chùis ann an so, ‘nuair a tha peacach ciontach air a chur aig a bharra fa’ chomhair Iosa Criosd am breitheamh, tha bhinn air a tabhairt a mach air, nach bi e beo na’s fhaide, ach gu’m bi e gu siorruidh maille ris an diabhul agus a chuid ainglibh. Tha a bhinn agaibh anns Mata xxv. 41, “Imichibh uam, a shluagh mallaichte, a dh’ionnsuidh an teine shiorruidh, a dh’ullaicheadh do’n diabhul agus da ainglibh.” Tha mi a’ toirt breith a mach ort, imich air falbh uam, o Dhia, agus o m’ ainglibh; air falbh a dh’ionnsuidh peanas siorruidh, maille ris an diabhul agus ‘ainglibh. Air sin leanaidh cuir an gniomh na binne, co luath ‘sa bhios i air a cur an cèill. ‘Nis tha aig an diteadh so trì cheuman: tha ‘cheud cheum anns an t-saoghal so; tha an ath cheum aig dealachadh an anaim agus a choirp; agus bithidh an ceum mu dheireadh aig an as-eiridh. Tha ‘cheud cheum aige ‘an so; oir cha bhì duine sam bith air a dhìteadh, ach esan a bha beò fo dhìteadh. Tha ‘cheud cheum agaibh anns an rann a tha air thoiseach, “an ti nach creid tha e air a dhìteadh a cheana, a chionn nach do chreid e ann an ainm aon-ghin Mhic Dhe,” far am bheil dìteadh ‘san ám a ta làthair air an droch-dhuine ann an so, air doigh ‘s co-dhiubh a tha e ag itheadh no ag òl, no codal, tha e a’ giùlan mu’n cuairt a dhìteadh maille ris. Tha mi a’ ceadachadh nach ‘eil so do ghnàth air a mhothachadh; oir tha àireamh ann nach ‘eil idir a’ mothachadh an dìtidh so, aon chuid ri àm am beatha no aig am bàs, gus am’ mothaich siad iad fein air an tilgeadh a dh’ionnsuidh an teine shiorruidh sin. Mar so tha a cheud cheum dìtidh anns a bheatha so. Tha’n an ath cheum an uair a ta a bheatha air dol air falbh; mar a bha e air a radh mu Iudas, “Chaidh e a dh’ionnsuidh àite féin;” agus mu’n duine shaibhir, tha e air a radh uime, “Gu’n robh e ann am piantaibh ifrinn.” Mar so ‘se sin an ath cheum dìtidh. Bithidh an treas ceum anns an as-eiridh, ‘nuair a bhitheas anam agus corp air an ceangal ri chéile a rìs (mar a ta e air a radh), “Eiridh cuid a chum as-eiridh na beatha, agus cuid’ eile a chum as-eiridh an damnaidh.” ‘Nis, ri aghaidh sin, mar a ta aig an dìteadh so trì cheuman, mar sin tha ann an saoradh na’m muinntir dhiadhaidh trì cheuman. Air tùs, tha e ac air toiseachadh anns a bheatha so, agus tha iad ann an seilbh air ‘nuair a ta a bheatha so air a crìochnachadh, agus an deigh sin, air an latha mhòr, bithidh iad gu sòlaimnte, air an saoradh, agus bithidh iad ann an sealbh air an aoibhneas maille ri daoine agus ainglibh.

‘Nis, ‘se’n ath fhocal, solus; leis am bheil e air a chiallachadh e féin. “Is mise solus an t-saoghail.” Tha e fior, gu’n robh e anns an t-saoghal roimhe ann an chreutairibh uile, agus anns na h-iobairtibh, agus anns an fhaistneachd so uile, agus na sgàilean; ach ann an so tha e a ciallachadh gu’n d’thainig e a dh’ionnsuidh an t-saoghal, ‘nuair a rinneadh am Focal sin na fheoil.

An treas focal (agus a tha ann an aghaidh an t-soluis) is e dorchadas; leis am bheil e air a chiallachadh an t-aineolas

thoileil so air Mac Dhe, nach ‘eil an saoghal a’ gabhail tlachd ann an eòlas air Criosd. ‘Nis feudaidh sibh fhaicinn ciod e an dìteadh a ta’n so (sin r’a radh) dì-mheas a dheanamh air an t-solus so, a ta air a dhaingneachadh le Dia; agus uime sin b’àill leis a radh, is ceart a ta’n t-ana-chreidmheach air a dhìteadh, do bhrigh’s gu’m bheil e a’ cur suarach an t-soluis. Ach beachdaich an so, An robh dìteadh ann mu’n d’thainig Criosd? Ciod is ciall d’a so? Nach deachaidh na Cinnich uile na’n slighibh féin? Nach do sgriosadh iad-san, aig nach robh lagh riamh, le lagh? (Gu’n d’thugadh an Tighearn a Spiorad féin. Tha fhios agam gu maith gu’m bheil an t-aobhar air taobh eile an fhocail.) Tha fhios agam gu maith nach robh dìteadh ann roimhe: c’ar son a tha e a’ tabhairt ainm dìtidh air falbh o na h-uile linn a bha ann roimhe, agus ga chur as leth an linn sin a mhain? Innsidh mi dhuibh, is gann gur fiu e ainm dìtidh, ma chuirear anns a mheidh e maille ri dìteadh na droing a chaidh am mugha anns an linn sin. Tha mi ceadachadh, gu’m bheil sìorruidheachd coitchionn doibh mar-aon; ceadaicheam, gu’n robh aig an duine shaibhir fearg agus piantan do-ghuilain; ach fathast cha’n ‘eil e ach mar neo-ni, ann an coimeas ri dìteadh na droing a chaidh a dhìteadh anns an linn sin. C’ar son? Do bhrigh’s nach eil solus ann a tha’n coimeas ris an t-solus so a thug Mac Dhia leis o neamh; cha’n ‘eil, eadhon solus Adhaimh anns an staid a neo-chiontais; cha robh ann an aon duibh ach dealbh no iomhaigh duine, ach ‘se an aon eile iomhaigh an Tighearn, a tha co fada a’ toirt barrachd air solus Adhaimh, ‘s a ta iomhaigh Dhe a’ toirt barrachd air iomhaigh duine nàdurra; an uair a pheacaich Adhamh ann an aghaidh a cheud soluis sin, bha ath-philltinn aige dh’ionnsuidh an t-soluis a bha gu teachd; ach an duine a pheacaicheas ann an aghaidh an t-soluis so (agus nach faigh beatha anns an t-solus so), cha bhi ath-philltinn aige dh’ionnsuidh solus eile. Gu dearbh bha solus na’m fàidhean na sholus mòr, ach cha robh e ni bu mhò ann an coimeas ris an t-solus so, na tha solus reult ann an coimeas ri solus na gréine a’ dealrachadh mu mheadhon an latha. ‘Nis, air faicinn gu’m bheil an solus so co mòr, ‘s nach ‘eil solus eile anns an t-saoghal a choimeasair ris, agus gur gann is fhiù e ainm soluis ann an coimeas ris an t-solus so, c’ar son nach feud sinn a radh, nach bi dìteadh air bith a chuirear anns a mheidh maille ris an dìteadh so, ann an coimeas ri so? Ach beachdaichibh, “Tha iad a’ gràdhachadh dorchas na’s mò na’n solus.” Nis, ma tha dorchas air a ghràdhachadh na’s mò na’n solus, nach bi so na dhìteadh? Agus mur bi an solus so gu sònruichte air a ghràdhachadh, nach ‘eil so na aobhar na’s leoir gu saoghal a dhìteadh? Ach tha mi stad ann an so agus a’ teachd a dh’ionnsuidh a cho-dhunaidh.

Tha na h-aobhairean air an suidheachadh, agus cha’n ‘eil an creidmheach air a dhìteadh, tha’n t-ana-chreidmheach air a dhìteadh a cheana. ‘Se aobhar an dìtidh, meud an t-soluis; mar is lugha do sholus, ‘s ann is lugha do dhìteadh. “Iad-san a pheacaich

gun an lagh, dìtear iad gun lagh. Tha aig solus ceudna an t-soisgeil a cheuman féin mar an ceudna. Bha e mòr an uair a bha e ann an staid ìrioslachd, bha e na bu mhò an deigh as-eiridh agus e bhi air a ghloireachadh, agus bha e do ghnàth a’ fàs na bu mhò; ach an deigh sin bha e air a dhorchnachadh agus air fholach fuidh dhorchas Phàpanach agus chreideamh Mhahomet; ach a nis tha e air briseadh a mach a rìs, agus ‘se so an solus mu dheireadh, an uair nach bi aimsir ann nì’s mò, agus mar an ceudna an solus a’s mò. Tha e na’s mò na solus nàdur, na’s mò na solus an lagh, agus tha e na’s mò na’n solus rè am na’n Abstoil, an deigh a dhol suas? Ciod uime tha thu a’ labhairt mar so? Tha agaibh an solus mu dheireadh, agus an soisgeil sìorruidh sin air a shearmonachadh do theangaibh agus do chinneachaibh, tha e air a shearmonachadh dhuibh. (‘Nis am bheil fhios agaibh ciod e a ta an leabhar beag a’ ciallachadh.) Mar sin thàrladh dhuinn a bhi anns an linn an uair a bha fàistneachd an t-Seann Tiomnaidh air a dheanamh soilleir dhuinn. ‘Nis an nì a chnuasaich mi mu’n a so? Chuir mi sìos e ann an àite eile, gu’m b’e an solus bu mhò an dìteadh bu mhò. Ann an laithibh na fàistneachd bha mòran do’n fhàistneachd nach robh air a thuigsinn; oir is beag a bha dh’fhios aca ciod bu chiall do’n fhàistneachd so, do bhrigh ‘s nach robh i air a coimhlionadh. Mar sin tha’n solus a nis na’s mò. ‘An sin tha e soilleir, co air bith a bhios air an dìteadh anns a ghinealachd so, gur e an dìteadh a’s mò. Dìteadh Iudas a rinn an Tighearn a bhrath ann an staid ìrioslachd; dìteadh na’n Iùdhach, dìteadh an t-seann saoghail gu h-iomlan, cha bhi e a bheag air bith ann an coimeas ri dìteadh a ghinealachd so.

Faicibh ma ta nach d’thèid sibh am mùgha anns an linn so; faicibh nach fuathaich sibh an solus so; agus faicibh nach bi bhur n-oibre olc. Ciod a their mi? Tha’n dìteadh is mò a feitheamh air na rìoghachdan so air son cur suarach an t-soluis so, O a Sholuis, a sholuis! C’ia mar a tha tàir air a dheanamh ort anns an tìr so? C’ia mar a ta e nach ‘eil eagal air duine sam bith air son peacachadh ann an aghaidh an t-soluis so? ‘Seadh ma ta a thìr fhàsail, thig an latha ‘san abair thu, O! na’m biodh againn an solus a bha againn aon uair, bu duilich leinn a chur suarach; agus ‘se so a bhitheas na bhreitheanas do’n tìr so, eadhon tàir a bhi air a chur air an t-solus so. Tha mi smuaineachadh, gu’m bheil e air a rùnachadh ann am breitheanas an Tighearn, a láthaireachd fhaicsinneach a thabhairt air falbh o’n tìr so, agus nach d’thoir e a láthaireachd gus am bi sinn air faicinn ‘ga iarraidh air a chaochladh do dhòigh ‘sa bha sinn riamh; uime sin na deanaibh cron duibh féin, ach leagaibh do’n t-solus so bhur n-ath-nuadhachadh; na deanaibh strì na aghaidh; na deanaibh cron duibh féin, do bhrigh ‘s gu’m bheil an solus so ag amharc oirbh. C’ar son a gheibheadh sibh an dìteadh is mò (do thaobh dì-mheas a dheanamh air an t-solus is mò)? Tha

fathast ùin ann air son bròn agus aithreachas a dheanamh, ach cha’n eil fhios agaibh cia fhad ‘sa mhaireas an aimsir so; air an aobhar sin na faigheadh an t-àm so diùltadh, ach deanaibh cabhag a chum ‘s gu’m faigh sibh tròcair co fhad ‘sa tha dorus na tròcair fosgailt, oir tha àm a’ teachd anns am bi e air a dhùineadh, agus nach faigh sibh a steach, ge do sheasamh sibh a’ muigh agus a’ bualadh, cha’n fhaigh sibh comas dol a steach, ach bithidh binn uamhasach air a cur an céill ‘n’ur n-aghaidh, “Imichibh uam sibhse a ta mallaichte, a dh’ionnsuidh an diabhuil agus ainglibh.” Uime sin gabhaidh aithreachas, agus pillibh a dh’ionnsuidh an Tighearn bhur Dia, air sgàth Iosa Crìosd. Dha-san, maille ris an Athair, agus ris an Spiorad Naomh, gu’n robh gach moladh agus urram uaithe so a mach agus gu sìorruidh. Amen.

Lines on an Old Bible.

(Written by unknown author on the purchasing of an old Bible, dated 1675.*)

O SACRED Book! so marked with age!
Thy misty leaves I prize;
Though dim thy page, with covers quaint,
Yet thou’st made many wise.
Thy pages, once did brightly shine
In happy times of yore,
When men, through grace, thy precious truths
Did then far more adore;
When Bunyan, Baxter, and the rest
Of Puritans so grand,
So masterly thy truths brought out
To all in England’s land.
And midst our country’s hills and vales,
In persecuting times,
The Bible was a fount of strength,
As ’twas in other climes.
How many a saint has scanned thy page,
Thy crumbling boards may tell,
And generations now have gone
That loved the volume well.
And still thy leathern boards will last
For ages yet to come,
To point some wanderers from their goal
Unto their heavenly home.
So safe thou’lt rest with me a while,
Till other eyes may scan
The volume that so sweetly speaks
Of God’s great love to man.
Thou’lt guide me still in wisdom’s ways,
That I may follow on,
To know and love my Saviour dear,
Like those that now are gone.

* These simple lines appeared in a religious Magazine some fifty years ago. They have been sent us for insertion by an esteemed Elder at Rogart, and we publish them, not so much for the poetry, as for the agreeable sentiments they express.—ED.