ith all his heart and mind and strength?...
Without the gospel, nature exhibits a want of harmony between
our intrinsic constitution, and the system in which it is
placed. But Christianity has made up the difference. It is
possible and natural to love the Father, who has made us his
children by the spirit of adoption: it is possible and natural
to love the Elder Brother, who was, in all things, like as we
are, except sin, and can succor those in temptation, having been
himself tempted. _Thus the Christian faith is the necessary
complement of a sound ethical system._"

There is something to us very striking in the words "Revelation is a
_voluntary_ approximation of the Infinite Being." This states the case
with an accuracy and a distinctness not at all common among either the
opponents or the apologists of _revealed religion_ in the ordinary sense
of the expression. In one sense God is forever revealing himself. His
heavens are forever telling his glory, and the firmament showing his
handiwork; day unto day is uttering speech, and night unto night is
showing knowledge concerning him. But in the word of the truth of the
gospel, God draws near to his creatures; he bows his heavens, and comes
down:

"That glorious form, that light unsufferable,
And that far-beaming blaze of majesty,"

he lays aside. The Word dwelt with men. "Come then, let _us_ reason
together;"--"Waiting to be gracious;"--"Behold, I stand at the door, and
knock; if any man open to me, I will come in to him, and sup with him,
and he with me." It is the father seeing his son while yet a great way
off, and having compassion, and running to him and falling on his neck
and kissing him; for "it was meet for us to rejoice, for this my son was
dead and is alive again, he was lost and is found." Let no man confound
the voice of God in his Works with the voice of God in his Word; they
are utterances of the same infinite heart and will; they are in absolute
harmony; together they make up "that undisturbed song of pure concent;"
one "perfect diapason;" but they are distinct; they are meant to be so.
A poor traveller, "weary and waysore," is stumbling in unknown places
through the darkness of a night of fear, with no light near him, the
everlasting stars twinkling far off in their depths, and yet unrisen
sun, or the waning moon, sending up their pale beams into the upper
heavens, but all this is distant, and bewildering for hi