this spirit, the Earl of Home, who had often sadly worried Nonconformists with his troop of horse, attempted by a base stratagem to seize Dr. Rule. He caused a letter to be drawn up, purporting to come from Mr. Carr, of Ninewells, in Berwickshire, begging the Doctor's immediate attendance with such medicines as were fit to relieve him from an extreme attack of cholic. The letter was despatched by one of Lord Home's servants, disguised as a countryman. Medicines were prepared by the Doctor, his horse was brought to the door, and he was about to start on his journey; but the messenger had more feeling than his Lord, and perceiving how the Doctor was rushing into danger and imperilling his life, he was touched with remorse, and informed Dr. Rule of the abominable plot; for Lord Home lay in ambush with his troop of horse, ready to catch the Doctor as soon as he had crossed the Border; and thus for a time Dr. Rule was saved from his relentless persecutors. child of John Kenedy, apothecary, and another of James Livingstone, merchant, in Edinburgh. The council found the charge proved by the admission of the defender, and notwithstanding these services were performed with the consent of Mr. Turner, Episcopal minister of the Kirk, John Kennedy was fined 100 and James Livingstone 200 pounds Scots. A heavier penalty fell on Dr. Rule; he was suspended from the benefit of the indulgence and imprisoned first in Edinburgh and afterwards in the Bass during his Majesty's pleasure. The Bass, the place of his imprisonment, is a great rock, about three miles from the East Lothian coast, not above one-sixth of a mile in diameter, but rising upwards of three hundred feet above the sea. A fortress which was on it was used by the Stuarts as a state prison, and here, amid the plaintive cries of solan geese and numberless sea fowls which tenant the rock, Dr. Rule was incarcerated for three months. His health began to suffer, not only from the loneliness of the place, but from the humid sea air, which was unsuited to his constitution. A petition was therefore presented to the council, reciting facts, and stating his valetudinary condition, and praying that his case might be taken into consideration. He was in consequence released from this inhospitable prison; but his liberty was gained, on the condition of his giving a bond, under the penalty of 5,000 marks, to depart out of the kingdom in eight days. Under such discouraging circumstances, Dr. Rule manfully breasted trials and difficulties, and maintained himself for several years by his labours as a physician in Berwick, waiting for the better times when he could return to his vocation as minister of the Gospel. Though there was little change in the spirit of the Hierarchy towards Nonconformists, yet King Charles II., who died a Catholic, and throughout his disreputable reign was favourable to Catholics, relaxed, by his own authority, the penal laws against Dissenters. By proclamation, he declared that he would grant indulgence to Nonconformists and Recusants to preach and worship under certain conditions. To the disgrace of many Presbyterians, these concessions were looked on with disfavour because Roman Catholics would be partly benefited by the indulgence. Dr. Rule, however, belonged to the more moderate party of Presbyterians, and took advantage of the proclamation, and in 1676 became indulged minister of Prestonhaugh, in Scotland. While here, he violated, it seems, one of the conditions of the indulgence. Looking back through the vista of nearly two centuries into these evil times, we can scarcely believe that a good man was tried, convicted, and imprisoned because he had preached and bap-wick were Presbyterians. tized beyond an assigned district. Yet such is the fact! The proceedings against Dr. Rule are preserved in the register of the acts of the Scottish council, and have been given by Wodrow. Dr. Rule was libelled before this council for keeping conventicles and baptizing children without the parish of Prestonhaugh. He did, it is stated, upon 1st April, 1680, take upon himself to hold and keep a conventicle within the Old Kirk of Edinburgh, called St. Giles, where he did preach, expound Scripture, and baptize a Banished from his native country, Dr. Rule returned once more to Berwick, and practised again as a physician. He soon, however, became minister of a congregation in Dublin, where he preached for some time with acceptance, till the revolution restored him to his own country. It has been stated that Dr. Rule was the first minister of the Presbyterian body assembling in Pottergate Meeting House, Alnwick; but, after his ejection from the Church, he never again settled in that town, though doubtless his influence was long felt there. His ministrations very probably laid the foundations of Nonconformity; for up to the early part of the present century, the great proportion of the people in Aln Some families, either from idiosycrasy, or from a perverse education, never become wise; the Stuarts, like the Bourbons in recent times, took no warning and no teaching either from misfortune or success. Their obstinate tyranny and besotted bigotry exhausted the patience of the people, and the revolution in 1688, which drove them from the British throne, ushered in the dawn of a better day for civil and religious liberty. Under William III. the cruel enactments restraining freedom of thought and worship were swept away or modified; and while England retained her Hierarchy and Liturgy and other religious forms were tolerated, to Scotland was restored the Presbyterianism which she loved and venerated, which was an element of her national life, and which was interwoven with her traditions, and associated with her great men and heroes. The changes introduced by the revolution were favourable to Dr. Rule, and opened the way to his return to his native land. He was called by the people on the 8th of December, 1688, to Edinburgh, and, this call being sanctioned by the magistrates, he became, in 1689, a minister of the Grey Friars Church. Additional honours and power were soon conferred upon him, for in the following year he was appointed principal of Edinburgh University, an office of influence and distinction, and which is now held by Sir David Brewster, one of the foremost of Scottish natural philosophers. Dr. Rule performed the duties of principal with great reputation. He also took a leading part in the church courts, where all measures affecting the interests of the Presbyterian body were discussed and decided. He appears, indeed, to have been, during the latter part of the seventeenth century, one of the most notable of the Scottish ministers. During the reign of William III. he was sent to London as one of the commissioners from Scotland, and, according to Calamy, he was when there much noticed and respected by the king. Spending a troubled life, engaged frequently in the exciting struggles of unsettled times, compelled repeatedly to change the place of his abode, persecuted and imprisoned, Dr. Rule could not have the leisure and composure requisite for the production of literary or theological works which would float his reputation down to posterity. That, however, he possessed good abilities, that he was respectably learned, and that his character was excellent, may fairly be inferred from the high and honour able position he attained in the latter part of his life. Calamy says he was a man of great candour and moderation, and generally esteemed and beloved. Wodrow speaks of him as the learned and worthy principal of the College of Edinburgh, whose memory is savoury in the Church. But perhaps a higher tribute is paid to his ability and power by the frequent and bitter attacks made upon him by Episcopalians, who, viewing him as a leader and authority in his own party, strenuously endeavoured to lessen the influence of his writings and character. Most of his writings were on the controversies of the day; they have ceased to interest, and are now only found in the libraries of the curious. His principal works were "A Rational Defence of Nonconfor mity," and "The Good Old Way Defended against A.M. D.D. in his inquiry into the new opinion of the Scots Presbyterians." So highly were his abilities and judgment estimated, that some of these were undertaken, at the request of the General Assembly of his church. The genius of Butler has invested his descriptions of the Puritans with an interest which will amuse so long as there are minds capable of relishing wit and humour. An attempt was made by the Jacobites to satirise and ridicule the Scottish Presbyterians in a book, published in the early part of last century, entitled, "Scottish Eloquence Displayed;" but the work is coarsely done, and instead of wit and humour we have scurrility and abuse. Foolish and profane stories are told of the preaching and prayers of the ministers. Some of them may be true; most appear the exaggerations of malice or ill-will; but for the truth of few is any evidence adduced. Such methods of treating opponents may gratify morbid tastes, but cannot refute error or advance truth. Dr. Rule figures as the leading hero in this book; and though nothing is alleged against his character, his writings are sneered at and ridiculed; it is objected against him that he admits many Presbyterians are neither moderate nor sober, and yet he blames the cruel persecu tions they suffered; he is reproached with deserting the old cause, that he might be thought moderate and sober. Garbled extracts are given from his writings, and phrases, and sentiments, detached from their context are strung together; yet, notwithstanding this treatment, and various quibbling and trifling criticisms, it is sufficiently evident that though Dr. Rule was a strong Presbyterian, he was the advocate of moderate measures, and disapproved of the violence of extreme parties. 'May not," says he, "two nations trade together and be governed by the same laws, and yet bear with one another as to church ways." It must, however, be admitted, that there are portions of Dr. Rule's controversial writings, of which good taste and feeling must disapprove; he speaks in no measured terms of the characters of "prelatical incumbents whose lives are scandalous and unfit to edify the people, and do rather harden them in wickedness." Hence, probably, the bitterness with which he was assailed. Unfortunately, the evils of persecution do not end with bodily suffering; for while it brutalizes the oppressor, it is apt to sour the temper, to strengthen the opinions and prejudices, and to increase the fierceness of the spirit of the victim. That Dr. Rule was a laborious student, even late in life, is shown by a sobriquet which was bestowed upon him. Dr. Campbell, who was professor of theology, was his greatest friend, and both were regarded as mere neutral position; its statements are the ornaments of the university. But their in strictest harmony with modern dishabits of study were different; Dr. Rule coveries. It teaches, among other imcontinued his studies far into the night portant truths, that the present system Dr. Campbell began his early in the morn-of things, though of long continuance, is ing. Living in the same street, with their not eternal, but had a beginning, both library windows opposite to each other, the candle of the one was often seen shining, which acts so important a part in the as regards form and motion; that light, when that of the other was newly lighted. whole economy of nature, from the Hence, Dr. Campbell was called the morning star, and Dr. Rule the evening star. aggregation of the elementary bodies Dr. Rule having lived to a good old age, upwards to the various forms of vital and maintained his principles, in good as organisation, and which is here expressly well as in evil times, was at length stricken distinguished from the celestial lumi. down with mortal sickness. He bore, it is naries, whence it is at present dispensed, said, his illness with exemplary patience was the first of created agents; that light and serenity of mind. The ruling passion was succeeded by the atmospheric arin him was strong in death; for not long rangements on which depend all meteoroprevious to dissolution, his mind began to logical processes, and as indispensable wander, and he imagined that he had yet for organic life as the antecedent agent one more sermon to preach to the people of was for this, and for the preceding inEdinburgh. His friends endeavoured to organic combinations. The introduction dispel the illusion, but without effect; he of life upon the earth, terminating with still insisted on rising from his bed and going the creation of man, to whom a place to the pulpit to perform this last duty. At length, however, he agreed to preach in the peculiarly his own is assigned in the house; he was raised in bed, his gown was scale of being, proceeded, it is found, in put on him, and the Bible was brought; he the order indicated by the sciences of then went through all the parts of Presby- geology and physiology, while the whole terian worship; a psalm was sung, and he creative process, from its beginning to its prayed; he then read out his text, ex- close, is declared to have extended over plained it, and applied it closely; he prayed six indefinite periods, termed "days," again; another psalm was sung, and after after the measure of time most comprepronouncing the blessing-"The grace of hensible to man, but more especially as the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, indicating seasons of activity in connexion and the Communion of the Holy Ghost, be with, and in contrast to others of repose, with you all.—Amen," he fell back and ex-mornings and evenings (comp. Ps. civ. pired. "A pleasant end," says Wodrow, 23). The distinction made with respect of this great man, just, as it were, at his to that all-pervading power, light, and work." His death took place in 1701, being then about 73 years of age. Dr. Campbell was deeply afflicted by his death, and said with much emotion, "The evening star has gone down, and the morning star will soon disappear." He, too, died in the autumn of the same year. the bodies from which it is most copiously emitted, with the further notice that its creation preceded the adjustments necessary for storing it in the sun, which was henceforth constituted to distribute it over nature, is a fact worthy of most careful consideration. It is a truth only recently recognised by philosophy, and is so opposed to all appearances and probabilities, that the statements of the Hebrew lawgiver on the subject were long confidently urged, by such as Extracts from New Publications. arrogated to themselves superior discern ment, as clear indications of the falsity of his views. But surely now, that the THE MOSAIC HISTORY OF THE truth of these statements has been incon CREATION. trovertibly established, the appearances and the probabilities which so long THE Biblical narrative of creation is militated against the writer of Genesis, simple and consistent; it is utterly and which would unquestionably have devoid of aught that can be reckoned ex-led any one less informed to state the travagance, and never outrages right reverse, should proportionally weigh in It is not only in a state of non- his favour, and show that his information antagonism to science, so as to occupy a was derived from a higher source than reason. the mere contemplation of nature, or the to the one, there is the fact already speculations, whether of Hebrew or adverted to, that the narrative is in very Egyptian sages. It may, with the general terms, and touches only the utmost confidence, be maintained that this was no accidental coincidence, or a discovery of the writer of the narrative himself. Nor is it more conceivable that he was indebted for it to any of his contemporaries; it therefore only remains, that he was led to this mode of stating the fact, though possibly without any knowledge of the scientific bearing of the question, by the Creator of the universe himself. This is only one of the many remarkable revelations contained in the first chapter of Genesis; another, not less worthy of consideration, and from the variety of particulars which it embraces even more striking, is the order in which it intimates, though in popular and general terms, creation succeeded creation in the organic world. So soon as the earth's surface was laid bare of its watery covering, a Divine mandate was issued that it should be clothed with vegetation, which is admitted to be the ultimate support of all animal existence. This was succeeded by the creation of various denizens of the deep, and of the winged creatures of the air; while a subsequent act of the great creative process peopled the dry land with its proper tenants," the beast of the earth after its kind, and cattle after their kind, and everything that creepeth upon the earth after its kind" (Gen. i. 25). The order here is, the wild beasts of the field and forest, the domestic animals, and the smaller classes of land animals; for it is to such that the expression creeping applies, and not to the reptilia, which were included in a former act in connexion with the peopling of the waters. And last of all was introduced, as the capital and crown of creation, rational and responsible man, made in the image of the Creator, and constituted his earthly representative, and with that view invested with authority over the whole inferior creation. great points of the creative process; while, with regard to the other, it is not an unwarrantable conclusion that some of its pages have not yet been read, or that the earliest of them may have indeed perished. As to the leading features, however, the harmony is remarkable; and such is all that can or need be reasonably expected in a matter of this kind; while, at the same time, there is the strongest presumption that the progress of scientific discovery will not affect the great principles already established, whatever it may do with regard to matters of detail, and their bearing one way or another on the Biblical history. Further, very remarkable is the amount of information communicated in the few brief intimations of the opening chapter of Genesis, This is no less striking than the accordance which it exhibits with the most recent results of scientific investigations into the various departments of nature, and which are here so wonderfully epitomised. In a few short sentences is condensed the whole history of creation, and the result of processes carried on for untold ages; every part rightly proportioned, and not a single sentence misplaced. Who selected the information, and who so skilfully abridged it? These are, indeed, questions which, if Divine inspiration be excluded, it will be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to answer. Nearly all that is communicated in the narrative of creation preceded the origin of man. It could not, therefore, have been the product of experience handed down by tradition to the Mosaic age; and as little ground is there for holding that in any of those early periods there was sufficient acquaintance with scientific principles, deduced from a long and careful study of nature, to enable an observer, however favourably situated, to classify the various animal forms in the precise order indicated in the succession according to which the old Hebrew history introduced them on the earth, or to read the history of the earth itself, and the several changes through which it passed, as inscribed by the Creator on No doubt, between this record of creation and that inscribed on the rocky bosom of the earth, there may be some noticeable variations, as for instance in the respective places assigned to the vegetable creation compared with some its solid crust. of the lower forms of animal life; but It must be very obvious that if the this can be explained on various grounds connected with the character and the readings of the two records. With respect Hebrew history of the creation had not been written under the guidance of the same Divine hand that fashioned the earth itself, it must long ago, by universal consent, have been pronounced false, not only in respect to one or two particulars, but equally so with regard to all its statements; and the inquiry would never have been limited, as it now fortunately is, by the progress of science and the application of sounder exegetical rules, to the few points which to some degree still form a subject of controversy. --[From Macdonald's Introduction to the Pentateuch, just published by T. and T. Clark.] TRUE HAPPINESS. race-course, to delight himself with its cruelties, is it difficult to conceive of the other being as pleasantly engaged in visiting the abodes of indigence, and witnessing the happiness which his almsgiving communicates? When the one at the theatre enjoys the scenic representation of some bloody murder, may not the other be as pleasantly occupied by some deathbed, in ministering the triumphs of faith to a soul about to pass into eternity? And when the one lies on his bed and delights himself with the fancy of that splendour and high station in the world to which, by the success of his speculations, he hopes to attain, the other may be surely as joyous in the anticipation of that time when he shall be raised to a principality in the kingdom of God. It is thus that the Christian neither shares, nor desires to share, the enjoyment of the pleasures of the worldling, but possesses others which, in their sweetness and dignity, far more than compensate for them. Although, then, religion had demanded of its disciples the surrender of much that is naturally and truly pleasurable, yet they would have had no ground for complaint, since it opens up for them so many other sources of enjoyment. But when profane men are accustomed to mock at the superstitious weakness and cowardice which submit to so many REGENERATION is valuable for its own sake, and would be covetable for the present life, though there were no hereafter. When the unbelieving and worldly allege or imagine that a religious life consists of nothing but self-denial, and penance, and mortification, and whatever else is vexing for the flesh and wearisome for the spirit, they make the charge on the ignorant presumption that there can be no pleasures but those which gratify them their balls, and routes, and theatres, and gambling, and debauchery; and when they see the saints abstaining from such things, they affect to pity them, as if they could have nothing else in which it is possible to find delight. But what signifies it in forming a judg-restrictions, we claim that they state, ment in this matter, though their depraved minds cannot comprehend how there can be any pleasure in life in the absence of such indulgences? And what signifies it, though they wonder and stare in incredulity at any one saying that he finds a wide field of enjoyment in the exercises of religion? When the inquiry respects a man's happiness, the question is not whether he be possessed of what gratifies you; but whether he be possessed of pleasures which gratifiy him as much as yours gratify you. Accordingly, though the Christian is shut up from many things in which the worldling revels, he is admitted to other pleasures in their stead, which are as gratifying to his regenerated taste as are those of the natural man to his depraved and vitiated taste. When the one chants with glee his loose or bacchanalian song, in the midst of dissipated companions, the other may, with as joyous feeling, I ween, be singing a hymn in praise of his Redeemer, in company with brethren ransomed from the world's follies and sins. When the one is away to the with some precision and particularity, what those restrictions are to which they refer. What pleasure is there, even according to their own estimate of pleasure, which our faith denies us? Let them mention one which will bear to-morrow morning's reflection, and we engage to show that the saint is not forbidden to enjoy it. Is he forbidden to taste of the fruit of the vine, and to be merry with his friends? Did not his Master sanction the conviviality by his presence, yea, minister to it by a bountiful exercise of his power? Is he forbidden to lead about a wife in honourable wedlock, under the clear shining of the sun-so unlike the infidel, who curses star-light and lamp-light, in the prosecution of his low and guilty amours? Is the saint prohibited from being a musician, or a poet, or an astronomer, or a botanist, or a student of any department of science whatever? Surely that nature which his Father has framed is as patent for his contemplation, as for the unbeliever's, while he has a principle of devotion within |