THE BELIEVER A PARADOX.

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Paul, in the same spirit, speaks of being "sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things." He was light in the Lord, then, and none but Paul himself could shade or eclipse that light. Even his "forty stripes save one," only ministered to his greater joy on his way to glory, honour, and immortality.

When the waters of the Rhone fall into the lake of Geneva, they are turbid and impure beyond what rivers commonly are; and, for a considerable space, they render the lake muddy like themselves. But ere they reach Geneva, they are filtered into beautiful transparency, and blue, like the bright sky above them. Now, that physical fact is an emblem of a spiritual result. Man's whole soul, which is turbid and defiled by nature, may be so purified in the fountain of life, the gospel, that righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost may become his new birthright; and we are not light in the Lord, as we ought to be, when that joy is not

ours.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

Perfect Peace.

"No drop remains of all the curse,

For wretches who deserved the whole;
No arrows dipt in wrath to pierce
The guilty but returning soul

Peace by such means so dearly bought,
What rebel could have hoped to see?
Peace by his injured Sovereign wrought,-
His Sovereign fastened to a tree!"

OLNEY HYMN.

Perfect Weare.

The scriptural views of peace-Peace with conscience-The peace which the Spirit produces-Rom. viii. 16 explained-The peace of progress-Peace flowing from Christ's finished work-From communion with God-From his law-The Sabbath-Sir Matthew Hale-Rev. C. Simeon-An illustration.

"GREAT peace have they who love God's law." "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee." "My peace I give unto thee." "The peace of God which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds, through Jesus Christ our Lord."-These appear to be the gradations of peace provided for believers by the God of the gospel; and so ample is the arrangement for restoring happiness to man, that we need not scruple to assert, that there is something radically and essentially defective in our religion, when it does not bring some measure of peace into the soul. Can I be a subject of the Prince of Peace, and yet remain troubled and tossed as if I must one day perish? Can I be justified freely by the righteousness of Christ, and yet walk in bonds as if I were walking to judgment? Can my conscience be cleansed from dead works, while yet I feel and act as if my conscience were still condemning, and still defiled? Can my heart be a temple of the Holy Ghost, the commissioned Comforter of the soul of man, while comfort is a stranger to my bosom, while sorrow is unsoothed, and trouble, not joy, my daily portion? The truth as it is in Jesus has surely not been