Mr. Offord will follow him." When Mr. Tucker had prayed, Mr. Offord said, "Before I further lead your devotions I shall recite one Scripture; 'Thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.' I feel led to say one word on that, and it is, that we may humble ourselves and pray for sinners at one and the same time." Prayer having been offered, Mr. Spurgeon said: "I think we have felt the spirit of prayer; sinner, do you not feel in the atmosphere of hope? Hast thou no prayer for thy soul? Are eternal burnings such as thou canst bear without trying to escape from them? Is Christ so little esteemed that there is no desire in thee toward him? May he bring thee to trust him now. will solemnly sing one verse, and then I shall ask two more friends to pray." Mr. Clifford and Mr. Lewis then wrestled in prayer after the congregation had sung, "Just as I am, without one plea, We When the two prayers were finished, Mr. Spurgeon again said, "I could not let you go without a manifestation that we intend unity. I should like an audible Amen from the ministers. We do desire to unite as pastors who love each other in the Lord; as many of us as do will say, Amen." This was responded to by the ministers. And, Christian brethren, down below church officers, we can all say, I trust, we love one another; if so, say, Amen." The elders and deacons answered to this appeal. "And then, you who love the Lord, members of our churches, do we agree in this matter? As many of you as feel that you love each other in Christ say, Amen." The people responded most solemnly, AMEN. Although past the time we must sing this verse :— The benediction was then pronounced, and the assembly dispersed. SOON Work of the Metropolitan Tabernacle. OON as the Metropolitan Tabernacle | therefore, for Mr. Spurgeon to send his College began to assume a definite form, and promised to become a permanent institution, prejudices arose in certain quarters, and objections were urged against it. The Baptist denomination, it was alleged, had already made sufficient provision for the Collegiate training of its ministers; its colTeges were capable of enlargement if required; but even in their present state they were with much difficulty sustained. The formation of a new college would excite jealousies and divisions in the denomination. A different class of preachers would arise both in sentiment and acquirements that would introduce new elements of counsel and of action that might tend to weakness and decay. Would it not be better, students to one or more of the existing It their original constitution and design. Many young men full of zeal to make known to others what they had tasted and felt of the Word of life, and who needed only a certain course of training in order to accomplish their purpose with comfort to themselves and profit to others, were precluded from institutions which had been professedly established for that end, either because they had not the preliminary education required, or because neither they nor their friends were able to contribute to their support. Thus encouragement was given to some to aspire to the office of the Christian ministry, and a prohibition was laid upon others. The educational and pecuniary qualifications, if not the first consideration, were essential to success. The men of burning zeal, and ready utterance, must stand aside to allow the men of less substantial, but of more circumstantial, acquirements, to enter in. Upon what grounds had the opinion been founded that men of education and fortune alone possessed the gifts and graces that are needful for the Christian ministry? Might it not be that even to this work not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called. Certainly we have no right | to impose human restrictions upon an office which the Head of the Church has left free to all ranks and gradations of men. We do not hold that uneducated men should be encouraged at once to enter the Christian ministry, but that it is possible to furnish them with an education solely for that end, and that within a comparatively short period of time. We hold, too, that, provided they have a little more piety, prayerfulness, and zeal, such teachers will become more effective for all the great purposes of preaching, than those who far exceed them in literary at tainments. This was the experiment to be tried. Collegiate training had hitherto been limited to a particular class of candidates, and to a particular kind and amount of education; and the tendency has recently been to restrict the preliminary qualifications within still narrower bounds, and to bring our Dissenting colleges into nearer approximation with the ancient Universities of our land. The literary attainments of our ministers, it has been said, must advance | with the literature of the age. They must be prepared to stand in the foremost ranks of the scholars and critics of their day; and must have earned some literary degree, if they would secure the public confidence in their teaching. A strong current, not of public opinion, but of effort on the part of the tutors and directors of our colleges, has of late years been accumulating in that direction. What has the result been? Have the students that have passed through the new method of training been better preachers, more earnest, more eloquent, more adapted to the tastes and circumstances of their hearers, than those who preceded them? Have they taken more commanding positions, and been more effective in their ministrations? Have they more clearly and consistently interpreted and enforced the truths of God's Word? We unhesitatingly answer, No! The men who are the most effective preachers of our day, as a rule, are not the men of high scholastic attainments; but look among them for the rationalistic perverters of the simplicity that is in Christ, and you will not look in vain. This effect, we grant, is not to be attributed to literature itself, but to the undue influence assigned it as a needful and primary element in the Christian teacher, to the undue authority claimed for it in the exposition of divine truth, and consequently to a diminished reliance upon a prayerful and experimental discernment of spiritual things. Such a state of things might well lead us to pause, and to begin to think of retracing our steps, or at least to adopt some new method of collegiate training, better adapted to the real wants of the age. This has been done for us by God himself, in raising np, sustaining, and accompanying with many signal tokens of his favour the Metropolitan Tabernacle College. Stimulated by its example, other institutions, similar in their principle and design, have been formed with encouraging prospects amongst the Independents; and the whole subject of collegiate training is undergoing revision amongst the principal bodies of Dissenters. The College at the Tabernacle is no longer an experiment; it is an established fact. Numbers have gone from it, of whose success in the direct object of a preached gospel, we shall be able to give a very favourable account. | Many have succeeded, where others had failed. In many parts, where for want of sympathy with the condition of the people, and adaptation to their habits of thought and feeling, a Christian Pastor could not be sustained, the Church has been revived, and provision has been made for the minister's support. Some of the students have risen to consider able eminence, and have occupied im portant stations in their denomination; and others have established new and flourishing Churches. In both these re spects the results have been equal to those of other colleges, which make them their sole aim. Facts have clearly shown there was ample room for this college, and that it has become increasingly needful. What it may become we cannot tell. For what it has been, and what it now is, we are thankful. The great Head of the Church has called it to do a great work, and until that is accomplished it must remain. "The Master is come, and calleth for thee." G. R. Reviews. The Christian World, a weekly Newspaper, price One Penny. THIS is a marvel among newspapers both for its singular cheapness, and its enormous circulation. urge them to do their utmost to support and extend the influence of a paper so excellent; but we felt in duty bound to speak our mind once more to assure them that the Christian World comHow it can be pro-mands our constant and increasing confidence, and we heartily join the Editor in the hope that his weekly sale will reach to One Hundred Thousand, towards which point it is gradually approaching. duced for one penny amazes us, but its wide circulation is easily accounted for by its excellence, its liberal spirit, and its practical aim. Almost every other journal claiming to be undenominational, has become namby-pamby, truckling, timorous, and anything-arian, but the editor of the Christian World is manly in his utterances, and decided in his teachings, keeping back no truth because of its angularity or unpopularity. He gags none of us, but does his best to give an impartial platform to all; he commits himself to no person's peculiarities, but is willing to assist any man in earnest efforts to do good. His leading articles are admirable, his selections judicious, and his news fresh and varied. We recommend everything except that which very many readers like best, viz., the religious novels, and if we should ever be able to screw our grim judgment round to allow us to recommend works of fiction, we should most certainly put the tales in the Christian World in a very high place; not that we have read one of them through, but having taken tasters out of them, as traders do out of cheeses, we have a full assurance that the promotion of hightoned morality and practical godliness is the aim of the gifted writers. Our friends have no need that we should The Baptist Messenger is still our friend and ally. It is one of the most useful and excellent of the Penny Magazines. Apologetic Lectures on the Fundamental Truths of Christianity. By Dr. C. E. LUTHARDT; translated by SOPHIA TAYLOR. Clark, Edinburgh; Hamilton, Adams & Co., London. Ar the outset the author informs us õi his design: "The task which I propose to myself in these lectures is to state the general truths on which Christianity is founded, and to justify them in the presence of modern thought." With much profit we have studied this most important work, and intend to go through it chapter by chapter in our College Classes. It is not a book for the many but for the meditative few. Germany which has taught so many to doubt, has done much to help men to believe. Minds of superior culture, desiring to know the history of the rise and fall of empires of sceptical speculation, and to THE fame of Dr. Macduff's previous volumes will prepare the Christian public to expect much from him upon this congenial theme, and they will not be disappointed. The book will not only be bought because of its elegant exterior, but read because of the intrinsic excellence of the matter. Modern theology is rarely to our taste, but we make an exception in a few cases, and in this especially. The author feeds us while he describes the pasture, and with rich spirituality of mind enters into fellowship with the Great Shepherd, and leads the gracious reader up to the same state of privilege. May our Lord bless the man to whom He has given grace to write so sweetly of the Master and His flock. Missionary Geography. Sampson Low, Son, & Marston, 59, Ludgate Hill. be confirmed in allegiance to the kingdom | mination, first at Brighton, and then in which abideth for ever, will find in this London, who in the forty-second year of volume exactly what they require. We his age was suddenly removed from the wish some wealthy person would present midst of active labours to his rest. The all our theological students with a copy. brief history of his career is replete with The Shepherd and his Flock; or the occasion of his decease are well worth interest, and the discourses on the Keeper of Israel, and the Sheep of perusing; but the sermons of the dehis Pasture. By J. R. MACDUFF, parted form the most pleasing and inD.D. Nisbet & Co. structive part of the volume. There is a simplicity, a uniformity, a sincerity, an impressiveness, and withal an originality in these sermons, not often to be met with on occasions of this kind. Though not prepared for the press, they are far superior to many that are. There is no attempt to startle or allure by singularity of sentiment or eccentricity of style. The leading doctrines of the gospel are expounded and enforced with animation and zeal. We should like to see other discourses from the same pen, especially as we are informed that those we have were not selected for their superiority to others, but as indicating the direction of the author's thoughts and feelings not long before his decease. "Preached," as it is said of them in the Preface, "Preached as they were at the close of a comparatively short but useful ministry, it is remarkable how, as by anticipation, they bear on the great life beyond. They sound like the earnest utterances of one who felt that he was standing on the very borders of the better land,' and whose soul was fired with the desire that his hearers might be its eternal inheritors." This witness is true. cannot read these discourses without hearing sounds from the better land. Persuasives to Early Piety. By J. G. PIKE. The Religious Tract Society. An excellent idea, and well carried out. Memoir and Sermons of J. Clifford We THIS work is too well known to need commendation by us. It has done good service in the world, and "its eye is not dim, nor its natural force abated." Its republication by the Tract Society will enable it, we trust, to go forth in all its notice of all who take special interest in original might. It is well worth the youthful piety. While they are with us. The Religious Tract Society. THE object of this little volume is less lofty and direct than that of the pre- | great doctrine of imputed righteousness ceding. It is designed to inculcate, by more prominently dealt with. a series of pleasant tales, the duty of promptness in the exercise of charity. It is well adapted to its end, and, we hope, will have its reward. The Test of Truth. By MARY JANE GRAHAM. S. W. Partridge, 9, Paternoster Row. A CALM and forcible appeal to those who sincerely, or insincerely, doubt the authenticity of the Divine Word. The argument is new, and is illustrated by the author's own experience. She is thoroughly in earnest, as one who seeks to warn others of the gulf into which she had well-nigh fallen. The style is clear and pure, and the reasoning is cautious and conclusive. Tales for the Train. S. W. Partridge, 9, Paternoster Row. We have here the adventures of a pious youth who sought opportunities, in spite of the difficulties of position and circumstances, to speak faithfully to the souls of others. Am I a follower of Jesus? is the question upon which these adventures turn. The manner in which the subject of religion is occasionally introduced is of questionable propriety, to say the least. The attractiveness of the Cross does not come so much from itself in this book, as from the garlands that are thrown around it. The romance of this life is singularly combined with the realities of the life to come; but there are many wise and godly sayings, which some, we hope, will gather up for their eternal good. A Catechism of the Doctrines of the Plymouth Brethren. By the Rev. THOMAS CROSKERY. James Nisbet. NEARLY all the errors of Plymouth Brethrenism are here adduced and ably refuted. The manner in which this is done by questions and answers, presents the several points of controversy more distinctly and intelligibly before a large class of readers. The reasoning throughout is closely founded upon the Scriptures, and there is no intermingling of ungenerous feeling with the consciousness of superiority in debate. We should like to have seen the perversion of the Patrick Murphy, or Popery in Ire land. Jarrold and Sons, 12, Paternoster Row. THIS is a bold and startling exposure of the secret doings and intentions of Popery in Ireland. It digs through the of convents and cloisters the light of well and lets in upon the abominations day. It is exceedingly well written, and being founded upon a narrative of facts has more than the charms of a clever romance. Patrick Murphy writes with strong feeling, which is fully accounted for by the part he sustains in the narrative. His censure of the "powers that be," both in Ireland and the seat of government in this country, for their connivance at the deceptions and unconstitutional daring of Romanism is, we strongly recommend the book to every fear, not altogether undeserved. true Protestant. We Benaiah: a Tale of the Captivity. By Mrs. WEBB. Jackson, Walford, and Hodder, 27, Paternoster Row. THERE is a growing taste in our day for religious novels. We do not hail it as one of the best signs of the times, and cannot, therefore, commend the volume before us so highly as, on account of the talent and piety of the author, we could desire. It is perhaps one of the best of its kind, and we sincerely hope it may answer its design, which evidently is to draw attention to the Scriptures rather soothing and sentimental. than to produce a love for what is merely The Christian Brave. Edited by the Rev. T. SEAVILL. Elliot Stock, 62, Paternoster Row. THE Christian is the true hero, in comparison of whom none of the heroes of world-wide reputation is deserving of the name. Let the Christian but act out his principles, and this must be acknowledged both by the Church and the world. "The Christian Brave," in the instance before us, was a Mr. A. Roberts, who, in entire dependence upon Providence for support, wandered from country to country in search of the most |