viction of direct relations between God and man; relations which bring into the horizon of earthly existence the lofty proportions of that celestial fane which God has built; wherein countless myriads of beings present glorious worship, and serve in splendid occupation :

"There's not a star,

But, in its orbit, like an angel sings;

Still quiring to the young-eyed Cherubim."

Observation confirms this. Those acquainted with scientific progress must be struck with the fact that, of late, the more brilliant achievements have been made in dealing with the unseen. The microscopist, the chemist, dealing with the ultimate particles of matter; those who puzzle themselves with the mysteries of molecular vibration; bear the victorious wreaths of successful discovery, and show that every atom is a whirling world with wonders great as those in the splendid realms of gorgeous suns.

This connection of all visible things with the invisible; and of life with germs that possibly are not organised in the sense of being eggs; possibly, in themselves, dead as the inanimate matter and putrefiable substances out of which they creep as living things; are evidence, amounting to scientific proof, that there is a continual going forth from the unseen to the seen; evermore an awakening of life from the dead; which, whether called evolution, or creation, renders the universe a sort of enchanted valley; and adds a strange unlooked-for confirmation to expectation that the forms which matter assumes are not its real substance-not essentials, but accidents. Whether any piece of matter shall take the shape of solid, of liquid, or gas, seems a question of temperature and pressure. At last, oxygen, one of the three most stubborn gases, the ubiquitous supporter of life, has, under a pressure of three hundred atmospheres, been condensed into a liquid. Who can tell the fixed and unvarying elemental form of matter? Has it any such form? Ought we to regard it as endowed with the faculty of assuming every variety of shape according to the mere accidents of environment? Whether so endowed or not, the world we live in is one of marvels; and, if we regard it as a material manifesta

tion of the Divine Being, the mysteries are analogous to those of the written Revelation: profound and, as to essence, inscrutable.

As verification of the whole argument, on any extended scale, would be impracticable for one man, a portion of Holy Scripture has been selected for tentative positive criticism; a portion which, as the first Divine word, and as intimately related to physical science, presents, in connection with peculiar difficulties, strange facilities for that positive definite examination which can alone content our age. Should the investigation give reasonable satisfaction, it will afford ground for belief that the same process may be successfully applied to other parts of the Sacred Volume. The verification, carried along a hundred lines of research, will prove that there is meaning in the world's work and in our earthly discipline; a supreme and attainable good to strive after; and that life is worth living, because Intelligence is at the heart of things. To our Father we say—

"Illi sunt veri fideles Tui qui totam vitam suam ad emendationem disponunt." Imitatio Christi.

To those who by various suggestions have given aid to this work hearty thanks are tendered: specially to him who, with patience and skill only surpassed by goodness, read the manuscript, and revised every proof as it passed through the press. The accurate Index was prepared by another friend, whose painstaking merits unfeigned praise. To our readers. we say "Omnia cunctanti," everything to those who wait: for as splendour from galaxies of stars afar off, goes forth in different periods of time, and arrives at the earth in widely separated intervals; there are beams of truth travelling from the Great Source which have not yet shone upon our mind, but will surely gladden us. When the grass has withered and the flower faded, when the Scripture Record has a new setting in the light beyond the veil, we shall find, some to our glory, some to our shame, that "the Word of God abideth for ever."