And is the emancipation of truth less important than that of men? What wonderfully blessed results would follow if the true, that is to say, the revealed, doctrine respecting God, and Christ, and man, and the Church, and Israel, and the nations, and the world to come, were everywhere preached! It may be but a fond dream-an earnest desire springing from the conviction that these truths are of inestimable moral, intellectual, theological, and practical value-but the ideal perspective of what might occur in such a case is so beautiful that we are extremely reluctant to conclude that it is only a dream. We see, in imagination, Plato, with his philosophical guesses about the nature of the human soul, banished from the Christian pulpit to make room for Christ, with his infallible declarations, and Paul, with his inspired doctrines. We see faithful men "rightly dividing the word of truth," according to the inspired precept, and earnestly placing before the faith of their hearers the wonderful love of God in offering to mortals the glorious prize of immortality in Jesus Christ the Lord: and, in consequence of this doctrinal reformation, ecclesiastical reformation is a matter of course; many of the things which now separate Christians are removed; and they learn to love one another as in the ancient days, and thus repeat to the world the clear testimony of the early Church respecting the Saviour, the Church, the King, and the coming kingdom. It is upon such an issue as this that the heart rests as the goal and reward of labour,—an issue which cannot fail to shed gladness upon the hearts of millions, and to glorify our Father who is in heaven.

We have received the following most valuable letter from a ministerial brother in India, for which we heartily thank him, and which will gladden our friends as it has greatly cheered us :-" Although unknown to you either by name or in person," writes our correspondent, "yet sympathising heartily with you in your views touching the Second Advent, and the immortality of believers only; and admiring the gentle loving spirit in which you have advocated them; I feel it to be my duty to communicate to you a few matters relating to myself and my missionary work here, the knowledge of which will, I hope, cheer and sustain you a little in the truly good but comparatively thankless labour in which, as Editor of the RAINBOW, you are engaged.

"I cannot, like yourself and Brother White, rejoice in years of clear conviction that deprivation of being is the punishment which a righteous God will mete out to unbelievers in his Son. I have rather to regret that, as a minister of the Gospel, I have wasted the best of my prime in suggesting and enforcing figurative interpretations of eternal life instead of letting plain words have their primary and natural meaning. And yet amidst it all I was ill at ease. For nearly twenty years I had been unable to satisfy my mind, either from Scripture or from reason, that men are naturally immortal beings; consequently I could not receive,

nor have I preached, the dogma of endless suffering in hell. On the other hand I felt that the Scriptures did teach that good men would live on for ever, but how they became possessed of such an extraordinary privilege I utterly failed to see. Reason gave me no help in my inquiries, indeed proved rather a stumbling block to me than otherwise, suggesting, as it did, that if men are not naturally immortal beings-which I did not believe them to be-how could the saved among men be immortal? The burden of proof seemed to be thrown upon me, and hampered as my mind was in its thoughts by the notion that life in Bible language meant happiness, and that perishing and destruction were mere figures of speech for intense misery, the missing link, though it lay so very near to hand, remained unseen.

"At length, after many years of missionary labour, my health giving way, I went home to recruit. Passing a newsvendor's stall one day, I purchased a copy of the Christian World, containing the first of three letters on 'Life in Christ,' by Edward White, of London. I had scarcely read half way through the letter before I saw rising up before me, in glorious distinctness, the very idea after which I had been groping for years. The following two letters made brightness brighter, and filled me with shame and confusion that the prejudice I had entertained against a literal interpretation of God's word should have so blinded me that what was light I had called obscurity. Of course I read Dr. Angus's reply to the three letters; but much as I love him, and highly as, in most things, I prize his opinion, he did not shake my faith in the newly-received blessed doctrine of immortality for believers only. The few perplexities which it raised in my mind, calm deliberation, aided by Mr. White's reply to the doctor in the June number of the RAINBOW for 1870, completely dispelled.

"From that day to this I have rejoiced in the light; have been enabled to think about, and speak of, the character of God without a wringing thought or a drawback of feeling, and to behold even in the destruction of the wicked a benevolence of intention fitly harmonising with holy John's unqualified assertion- God is love.' After having tested the new conviction I had arrived at, by bringing it to bear upon all the texts of Holy Scripture which allude to future rewards or punishments, and being joyfully satisfied by the result, I felt it to be my duty to endeavour to spread my opinions. With this object I wrote to Mr. Constable, requesting him to aid my efforts with a grant of his books at a reduced rate. He generously complied, and twenty-five copies of his work, The Restitution of all Things,' and twenty copies of Will Sin and Suffering be Everlasting?' by J. Stratford, were sent by post to my most intimate friends and acquaintances both in England and India. A lady, unknown to me,-Mrs. S.-sent me a sovereign to purchase me a littleLife in Christ' library. Putting an additional sum to it, I

bought a second stock of books, and circulated them by post as before. I never made any secret of my views when in England, and was surprised to find among my brethren in the ministry what an under-current of sympathy many of them had with my professed opinions. I believe many of them are prepared very considerably to modify the expression of their views in relation to eternal punishment, when new impressions shall have commenced to operate decisively upon the thinking part of our Church members.

"On my return to India, I determined that Bengalee native Christians also should, so far as my influence extended, be set free from the heartwithering dogma in which they had been instructed. This I found to be no very difficult task, inasmuch as the natural gentleness of the Hindoo disposition-except when under the influence of passion or revengemakes everything like harshness repugnant to his feelings; whilst the influence of the Shasters' teaching,-which holds out re-absorption into God, at some time or other, to even the vilest of the race,-as far as it may insensibly affect them, leads them to regard any alleviation of terrible eternal punishment as a gladsome relief to Christian faith.

"With one exception, my native helpers-the catechists and preachers -are believers in the doctrine of eternal life by Christ only; the natural immortality of the soul is never asserted in our prayers or preaching; Jesus is set forth as the Author of immortality as well as the Author of faith, and we love to have it so.

"To encourage you in your uphill work by the knowledge that your labours are indirectly bearing fruit, I will briefly mention a few encouraging facts which have come to my notice.

"1. A native deputy magistrate, after a long conversation with me upon Christian doctrine, said, with joy beaming in his face, Sir, until to-day I have never before conversed with any religious European who did not at the outset indispose me to listen to Christianity, by his arrogant assumption of the soul's immortality, and the improbable doctrine of perpetual torment which he professedly erects upon it. I have always rejected Christianity at the outset on this ground. Now I find that there are Christians who disbelieve these two things, I shall be more inclined to think of Christianity with respect.' I subsequently lent him 'Popular Ideas of Immortality;' by Rev. W. Ker, from the perusal of which book he professed to derive almost unspeakable satisfaction.

"2. A godly indigo planter and zeminder, who, though a Ritualist, has for years disbelieved the common dogma of eternal misery, wrote me hearty thanks for the Touchstone' and Restitution of All Things,' and giving in his cordial adherence to the doctrine of life in Christ only. "3. A European deputy magistrate—a man full of faith and of good works has embraced the doctrine with all his heart.

"4. An ex-missionary, after reading Constable's 'Eternal Punishment,'

and hearing the doctrine argued and preached, is also among the converts.

"5. The European judge of our district has conversed with me often upon the subject, has read several books I lent to him, and now rejoices in the doctrine as freeing God's character from an imputation which he never could think about without discomfort.

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"6. Another indigo planter-not a decided Christian-wrote me a very thankful letter for a copy of Restitution of All Things,' stating it to be his conviction that this is the sort of doctrine to make men think of God, and not the dreadful one of everlasting torment in fire.

"7. My beloved wife now sees the doctrine to be both scriptural and reasonable.

"8. My eldest son is thoroughly inquiring about the doctrine.

"9. My native companions in the ministry and our native Church have accepted the doctrine.

“10. And, finally, the villages and markets of the district in which I am labouring, hear, in their own Bengali language, God's great truth declared He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son shall not see life; this is the record that God hath given to us eternal life, -immortality, and this life is in his Son.'

"I trust, dear brother, that you will feel cheered by knowing that even in India the views which you are labouring to spread have a few hearty sympathisers."

MINISTERING MOTHERS.

OTHER!" O word how sweet, how tender! What a fountain of disinterested love is in it! It is gentleness embodied. It is the child's heaven. "I'll tell my mother!" That is enough. There is peace in the very thought. There is no room for doubt. She will succour, she will help, she will shield her little one. The faith of that young heart is perfect; there is no room in it for the faintest shade of unbelief, no thought of the bare possibility of indifference to the welfare of her child on the part of the mother. Children are true believers. Our Lord selects them as illustrative models of Christians who would enter the kingdom. We say they must be converted and become like us-for that is what we mean, although we are too modest to say so ;but Christ says we must be "converted," and become like them,—a doctrine which the teachers both of adults and children would do well to look at again. Doubt is the troublesome companion of grown men. Reason kindles her brilliant lamp, and lo! it is questioned whether the All-Reason has spoken at all,-the fact being that the poor taper has

died in the light of the sun, whilst its owner thinks that the sun himself has gone out; but children receive with gladness the precious and beautiful things which they hear at the mother's knee about Jesus the Good Shepherd, the Lover of the lambs, and about the loving Father in heaven, with his house of many mansions, and his paradise of ever fruitful trees. The young heart, wondering and rejoicing over this new world of love and beauty, believes everything perfectly. All is reality to the Christian child; and it is therefore a matter of unspeakable importance that mothers should teach their darlings only what is true.

Of course it is not supposed for a moment, notwithstanding this pointed way of putting the case, that any Christian mother will teach her child something which she knows to be unscriptural. That is absolutely out of the question. "If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion ?" No parent, however foolish he may be in other respects, can do anything so heartlessly cruel and unnatural. But is it not possible to take for granted, as divine doctrines, opinions which commentators and sermon writers have been presenting to the public for generations, opinions in the belief of which we and our fathers have been trained since childhood,-but which, notwithstanding, are entirely opposed to the Holy Scriptures, the character of God, and the nature of man? Yes, alas! this is not only possible, but, as a matter of fact, it is done everywhere to the terrible injury of the young heart, and the deep dishonour of our loving Father in heaven; and we cannot help imploring Christian mothers who may read these pages to avoid, as they would the deadly pestilence, the fearful mistake which has blasted the joy of many a young loving soul, filling it with such dread of the very name of God that has either sunk it into hopeless melancholy, or driven it, as years advanced, into bitter scepticism. Our sisters will surely forgive our profound earnestness in this matter when we assure them that we are not speaking either from hearsay or from what common sense teaches us must be the result of those terrible misrepresentations of the Divine Father, but from actual personal knowledge of too many cases of religious despair, or determined infidelity.

Alas! it is bad enough and cruel enough to harrow the young heart with lying ghost stories, until the extremely sensitive nervous system is stretched upon a rack of anguish; but it is immeasurably worse to tell it that the Almighty God, whose will is law, and whose power is irresistible, will send the "souls" of men, and even those of children, to a dungeon of fire "to be tormented for ever," without the faintest hope of either death or deliverance. This HIDEOUS LIE has made life miserable in countless instances. It has driven thousands upon thousands to despair, madnesss, atheism, or suicide; and it has spoiled existence to