not, however, avoid coming to the conclusion that this Derketos answered to the dag. One is the Greek, the other the Hebrew word for fish; and both images display the same fact of a human form proceeding out of the mouth of a fish. Nor can we use a more power. ful argument that a real fish was made the receiver of Jonah, than by directing the reader to the original words, which in Hebrew are usually put to signify ship and fish. When ships are spoken of in the Hebrew, the word anioth* is mostly used; and when fish are spoken of, the word dag is used. We never see the word dag used for a ship; if therefore it is made to suit this purpose in Jonah, there is no precedent for it. It has even been thought by some that the method of giving names to different ships, might have been the cause of the receiver of Jonah being called dag, just in the same way that we give to our ships the name of animals, or fish, or cities, or great men. But how remote is the probability that such was the origin of the word, setting aside the fact that we possess no historical evidence to prove that this method of naming vessels was in fashion before the time of Virgil +. But among the fictions which were originally founded on the adventures of Jonah, may be quoted that of the exposure of Andromeda, the daughter of Cepheus, king of Egypt, upon a rock which projects into the sea at Joppa ‡. It is stated that for her mother's pride she was chained to a rock, in order to be devoured by a sea-monster; but she was released by the bravery of Perseus, who afterwards married her. Now if Jonah had been generally understood to have been received within "the hollow cavity" of a ship instead of a fish, the fiction of Andromeda would have, in all probability, gone to state that she was cast into some floating preserver to take her chance. It is remarkable that old Jewish doctors, who were great lovers of the marvellous, among their numerous traditions and interpolations of the scriptures, have, in almost if not all instances, preserved some idea of a living animal having been the preserver of Jonah. Josephus and the rabbins assert that it was a whale that enclosed Jonah, and that it went up the Bosphorus into the Euxine Sea, where he was cast out of the fish. And their belief in the miracle of Jonah's being received into the belly of the fish, does not bear a comparison with the real impression which was upon their minds, and which they gave authority for. Thus they thought the fish that swallowed Jonah was created from the beginning of the world; that, when it had brought Jonah into the Red Sea, it showed him the way that Israel passed through it; and in violent defiance of all anatomical knowledge, they supposed that the fish's eyes were as windows to Atergatis to be the same as Dagon, and derived from the Hebrew, Adir Dagan, "magnificent fish." Diana the Persian, or Venus, was, they say, changed into a fish, by throwing herself into the waters of Babylon. There was a very deep pond near Askelon, filled with fish, consecrated to Derceto, from which the inhabitants of the town abstained, through a superstitious belief that Venus having cast herself into this pond, was there metamorphosed into a fish."-Calmet, copied from Diodorus. The word sephineh is also put for ship in Jonah i. 5. Now if dag also means a ship, how very unlikely is it that two dif ferent words should be used in the same chapter to mean the another name for ships; tzi alir means a large capacious vessel. The ships that came to the aid of Eneas were the Tiger, a whale, and this was a name given by the Romans to a ship, it same thing, one of which does not again occur. Tzt is also Centaur, Triton, Pristes, Chimera, Scylla. As Pristes signifies is conjectured that dag might have been applied to the preserver of Jonah in the same manner. This was formerly the only port which the Jews had upon the coast of the Mediterranean Sea. All the materials that were sent from Tyre towards the building of Solomon's temple, were brought and landed at this place. It was a very ancient place, supposed to have been built by Japheth, and is celebrated as the place from whence Jonah embarked. Its antiquity may be inferred from the fact of the Mediterranean Sea having been at first named after it, the sea of Jaffa or Joppa. Jonah, so that he looked out and saw all as he went. There was also a tradition among these rabbins that Jonah was twice swallowed by a whale, once by a male and once by a female. But without further pursuing this part of the subject, the reader will have an opportunity of seeing that there is considerable evidence to show the prophet was received within the cavity of a fish. Our next inquiry will lead us to the evidence which favours that particular fish which some have undertaken to argue, with considerable learning, must have been the whale, others the sea-calf, and others again the shark. It would indeed be difficult to reconcile the statement of the prophet with any thing but an animal of some kind; for it would be impossible, or rather unreasonable, to suppose that a preserver, in the form of a ship, could be kept at the bottom of the sea; in which place the dag must have been, for Jonah to have said "The depths closed me round about; the weeds were wrapped about my head. I went down to the bottoms of the mountains." For it is clear that nothing but an animal of sufficient magnitude could penetrate to such a depth in the sea as to admit of such expressions as these being used. It is not, perhaps, considered by every reader of that beautiful prayer of Jonah, what was the real depth which the prophet descended, to have enabled him to express himself in the way he did; and it may be looked upon as an utter impossibility that any mere ship or cavity could have descended to such a depth as would admit of his going down to the bottoms of the mountains, which if what Mrs. Somerville states be correct, that the mean depth of the sea is about equal to the mean height of the continents and islands above its level-is equivalent to his having possibly penetrated as low as fifty thousand feet, or nearly ten miles t. This idea does not differ much from those of the Chinese, who consider that a painted eye on the front of their ship is indispensable in order to secure the safety of the ship when sailing. + We have inserted these observations of our ingenious correspondent, as it is interesting to examine the collateral evidence to the truth of scripture history; but we apprehend that no Christian can, after the words of our Saviour quoted above, have the slightest doubt that Jonah was really received into the belly of a fish.-ED. THE COMMENCEMENT, PROGRESS, AND BY THE REV. G. C. Rolfe, B.A., You, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight; if ye continue in the faith grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel." A VERY important truth is intimated in the text, a truth never to be lost sight of by the believer, a truth repeatedly inculcated by Christ and his apostles, a truth directly opposed to the fatal errors of the Antinomian, namely, that sanctification is one great end of our redemption; that a recovery of the lost image of God, no less than of his lost favour, was the great object of Christ's incarnation and death; that, though the saints are dead to tles, which may be regarded as a proof that he spoke and wrote as moved by the Holy Ghost. He never wounds but to heal: like a skilful surgeon, he probes the wound to the very core, keeps it open till the seat of the disease has been attacked, and, as soon as the poison is effectually eradicated, immediately he pours in the oil of gladness and the healing balm of Gilead. Thus, in the text, no sooner does he throw a gloom over the minds of the Colossians, by saying "You that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mid by wicked works," than instantly a ray of comfort shines forth-" yet now hath he reconciled." the law as a means of salvation, they are not dead to it as a rule of life. Were the scriptures given simply to make us "wise unto salvation" and strong in faith, do they not in addition exhibit this practical tendency, to make us "thoroughly furnished unto all good works?" Are the doctrines of the gospel in some degree mysterious and hard to be understood? They are nevertheless "the truth which is after godliness." Is faith merely an inward and mental operation? Still it is a mighty principle, controlling the passions, swaying the affections, elevating the mind, purifying the heart, and overcoming the world. Has Christ reconciled us to the Father in the body of his flesh through death, This peculiarity, be it observed, may be as is stated in the text? It is with this ulti- discerned in every part of scripture, and is one mate design-" to present us holy and un- internal proof that the sacred volume is a reblameable and unreproveable in his sight" at velation from God. Do threatenings therein the judgment day. Did Christ bear our sins abound? The promises do much more abound. in his own body on the tree? He thus suf- Do we read in the scriptures of sin, its tyranny, fered, that we, being dead to sin, should live its hatefulness, its ingratitude, its condemnaunto God. Has Jesus loved his church and tion? Instantly the Friend of sinners stands given himself for it? It was that he might forward for our acceptance. Do we hear in sanctify and cleanse it, that he might present one verse of our fall in the first Adam? In it to himself a glorious church, not having the next we are reminded of our full recovery spot or wrinkle, or any such thing. Are through the second Adam. Is the conscience true believers "elect, according to the fore- troubled on hearing the language of reproof? knowledge of God the Father?" Their elec- is the believer heart-smitten by some passages tion is evidenced through "the sanctification at the recollection of his many short-comings of the Spirit unto obedience." Are believers and backslidings? Immediately he hears the predestinated to eternal life as an end? Sanc- still small voice of love and mercy, of patification is the appointed means to that end: tience and forbearance, whispering peace and for, whom the Lord foreknows, he predesti- | consolation to his soul. Are we reminded in nates to be conformed to the image of his the scriptures of the storms and tempests that Son. Are we informed of the grace of God will gather around us on our voyage through that bringeth salvation? In the same verse life? Presently the Sun of Righteousness we are told that that grace teacheth us to live bursts into view, and dispels the surrounding soberly, righteously, and godly, in this pre- gloom. Do we hear of the many shoals and sent world. Do we read the pleasing intelli- quicksands on which we are in imminent gence" there is no condemnation to them danger of making shipwreck of our faith? who are in Christ Jesus?" It is instantly We are soon assured for our consolation, that subjoined, to check any false confidence, that he, whose piercing eye penetrates the unsuch as are in Christ "walk not after the fathomable depths, he, whom the winds and flesh, but after the Spirit." In short, is the the waves obey, ever sits at the helm, ever cheering communication of the gospel-" Be- pilots the vessel, and will at last bring us to lieve, and thou shalt be saved?" It commu- the haven of peace. Do we read in the sacred nicates with no less frequency and distinctness volume of the weakness of the members? this most necessary caution" faith without Immediately we are reminded, for our encouworks is dead." ragement, of the strength of Christ, the head of the body. Are we troubled at the repeated statements of our emptiness in the sight of God ? Ere long we are cheered with the assurance, that it pleased the Father that in Christ all fulness should dwell. Do we tremble at our naked and defenceless state before our spiritual foes? Immediately the divine armoury is thrown open to our view. Are we abased at the consciousness of our great unworthiness? Immediately we read, worthy and all-sufficient is the Lamb that was slain for the sins of the world. In the opening words of the text, the apostle reminds the Colossians of their former state of Gentile depravity : he tells them they were once alienated in their hearts from the living and true God, and evidenced the enmity of their minds by wicked works. Thus, you perceive, he uses no enticing words of flattery, but utters the plain unvarnished truth, a truth most humbling to the spiritual Christian, and highly offensive to the pride of the natural man. But here let me call your attention to a great beauty in St. Paul's epis 1 Let us now proceed to a brief illustration | peared in our nature, undertook the work of of the several truths stated in the text: the sad effect of the fall; our recovery through Christ; the final perseverance of the believer; and his future glorification. We, like the Colossians, have suffered from the fall of our first parent. We ourselves, in a state of nature, were alienated from Christ and enemies in our mind by wicked works. It is true, we have been born and trained under more favourable circumstances than those to whom the apostle wrote, who were partly of heathen parentage, the children of a people unblessed with the riches of the gospel and the light of a revelation from heaven. We, on the other hand, have sprung from parents professedly if not really Christian, have been admitted by the rite of baptism into the outward and visible church of Christ, and have enjoyed indirectly many collateral advantages from the general profession of Christianity. Outward circumstances may make us to differ in some respects from the Colossians; but yet the natural man, of whatever age or parent, age, of whatever clime or colour he may beis an enemy to the true God, and a stranger to vital godliness. "We all," says the apostle, writing to the Ephesians, who were converts partly from Judaism and partly from heathenism, including himself among the number, we all were by nature the children of wrath even as others." In Adam all fell by one man's disobedience came death and sin and all our woe: we inherit from our common parent, one and all, a body of death and a soul of pollution. Yes, indeed, we have been transgressors from the womb: time was, when we walked according to the course of this world, and went astray like lost sheep, wandering further and further from the fold of the good Shepherd: the heart was not right with God. The carnal mind, the mind with which you and I, and every son and daughter of Adam, came into the world, is so constituted as to be at enmity itself against God till the Holy Spirit works a change, it is in a state of alienation. That which is born of the flesh, in every case is flesh; and cannot become spiritual and meet for the kingdom of heaven till born of the Spirit. But, not to dwell any longer on this true, painful, and humiliating subject, man's natural alienation from God, let us pass on to consider how the child of wrath can become the child of grace, how a complete change can be effected in his situation and character, how, in short, God and man can be reconciled to each other. The way and only way of reconciliation is through Christ. "You, that were sometime alienated, yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death." Jesus Christ, praised be God, ap our redemption, and suffered as our surety and representative. "He bore our sins in his own body on the tree;" and his death purchased life for us: his voluntary sacrifice of himself upon the cross was accepted as a satisfaction to the offended justice of our heavenly Father. Thus God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself; and now, out of regard to Christ's death, and merits, and intercession, he waiteth to be gracious to the penitent sinner, and is most willing not to impute unto him his iniquities. Hence the really injured and offended party is already satisfied with the terms of mediation. It only remains, then, that man should lay down the arms of his rebellion, the enmity of his carnal mind be subdued, and the love of God be shed abroad in his heart. This inward change the Holy Spirit can alone effect, and will most assuredly effect in answer to repeated supplications for his gracious influences: this change, too, he has already effected in the heart of every true believer, who, by his faith, has become interested in all those blessings which Christ has purchased for his church. God is not only reconciled to him, but he is also in a state of reconciliation with God: he can look up to him and address him in the endearing language of "Abba, Father!" his judgment acquiesces in the wisdom and excellency of the gospel scheme of redemption, and acknowledges the commandments to be holy, just, and good. On recurring to the text, we shall perceive the apostle does something further than remind the Colossians of their present privileges, their being brought into a state of peace and reconciliation with one to whom they had shewn themselves such great enemies: he directs their thoughts onwards to their future exaltation in the kingdom of glory, to their presentation before the throne of the great Judge, "holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight." That the Colossians might keep on stedfast unto the end, and be faithful even unto death, he exhorts them to keep their eyes towards the crown of glory, to traverse with the eye of faith through the dark and unseen vale of futurity, and to look beyond that vale to the everlasting mountains of peace and righteousness. Such, brethren, must be our conduct, such our spirit, and such our views: we can endure with firmness a fight of trials, when seeing him who is invisible: we can patiently submit to the cross here, when fully expecting to wear the crown hereafter we can run with patience the race that is set before us, if we keep our eyes steadily fixed on the heavenly goal. Our spirits will not droop, our courage will not fail, our strength will not be exhausted, our service will not be constrained, whilst we look, not at the things which are seen and are temporal, but at the things which are not seen and are eternal: yea, our hope will be the more lively, our faith the more vigorous, our obedience the more uniform, our spirits the more encouraged, and our race the stronger, the more frequently we attempt to realize, and succeed in the attempt of realizing, the grand scenes and glorious visions of eternity, and the judgment day" when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, and shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe." May we not then stand on the left hand amongst the number of his adversaries, but may we rather be presented perfect in Christ Jesus, "holy, and unblameable, and unreproveable in his sight!" May we henceforth so live, as that when he shall appear we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before him at his coming! But here it may be asked, how can I be assured that I shall be accepted in that great day? The text answers this question: an entrance into heaven will be granted to those only "who continue in the faith, grounded and settled, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel"-to those only who patiently persevere unto the end in a life of faith and holiness. Now, these concluding words of the apostle lead us to remark, in the last place, the importance and necessity of a stedfast course of holy living. This part of the subject will be discussed with great brevity, but well deserves our most attentive consideration. We are in constant and imminent danger of falling: we have a wayward and treacherous enemy within, and a mighty and subtle enemy without; and, unless there be continued watchfulness on our part, we may draw back, yea, draw back even unto perdition. Moreover, in this age of religious inquiry, when there is strange diversity of opinion amongst the masters in Israel who sit in Moses' seat, there is a great probability that, without stability of principle, we shall be "tossed to and fro with every wind of doc trine." Not only is there great fluctuation in the religious aspect of nations and societies, but even in individual Christians, alas! there are sometimes grievous declensions from the way of truth. Many a child of God is constrained to cry out in bitterness of spirit-"O! that I were as in months past!" We are very much the creatures of outward circumstances; and our religion, if not firmly based on a solid basis, ebbs and flows with every tide of fortune, with every gale of prosperity, and every storm of adversity. Sometimes the clouds of adversity depress the spirits, damp the ardour of devotion, obstruct the onward course, and eventually drown the soul in a sea of sinful anxiety; but more frequently a continued prosperity, or an unexpected accession of wealth, draws the heart from the Lord into the world, and entangles the individual to his ruin in the pleasures and pursuits of this life: when riches increase, man's infirmity is to set his heart upon them. "I did know thee," said Jehovah to Israel, "in the wilderness, in the land of great drought; according to their pasture, so were they filled: they were filled, and their heart was exalted, therefore have they forgotten me." A change of circumstances, or a change of ministry, is sometimes the occasion of a great alteration in apparent piety. Professing Christians may be thrown into a circle of gay or worldly-minded friends and relatives: the evil communications of these will in a short time corrupt their good manners, and their sound principles are gradually undermined. A change of ministry, too, is sometimes attended with lamentable consequences. We may have sat for a time under the sound of the gospel, fully and faithfully preached: we may flatter ourselves that we have obeyed, from the heart, the truth; but, when less favourably circumstanced, our strong impressions may gradually subside, our love wax cold, and our former zeal degenerate into lukewarmness. unfrequently, too, injudicious and unequal matrimonial alliances prove a great snare to the soul: fresh cares and fresh pleasures, fresh acquaintances and fresh worldly ties, spring out of such connections; and most generally, when two are unequally yoked together, the piety of the one party gives way, and the ungodliness of the other gains the ascendant. We need only instance the histories of Sampson and Solomon in illustration of the wretchedness, the danger, and the degradation arising from such unhallowed associations. Some persons, too, are naturally fickle and unstable as water in their religious sentiments: they are not rooted and grounded in love: they do not hold fast any form of sound words: they run from one extreme to another: they may fall from the heights of Calvinism to the lowest depths of Arminianism, and at length perhaps plunge into the fatal gulf of Socinianism or infidelity. Not Such, then, is the weakness of flesh and blood, such the power of temptation, and such the cunning wiles of our great adversary, that we cannot be too strongly cautioned against inconstancy and backsliding; and the consideration of our proneness to err, both in judgment and practice, should operate as an THE SCRIPTURES*. THERE was a time when man, either by natural endowment or by a direct communication from heaven, possessed a knowledge of all the truths which were essential to his security and welfare. To contemplate divine subjects was then clearly and vividly to apprehend them; and to know them was profoundly to feel them. The understanding and the heart, the intellectual faculties and the sensitive affections, had not yet been unnaturally disjoined in their operations; nor were they as yet marked by that discordancy in their exercises by which they have since been too frequently characterised: the light which irradiated the one was warmth, cheering and animating the other. What the understanding approved as right, the heart embraced as congenial with its purest and noblest sympathies. During this interesting period in the history of his being, the whole character of man, including every element of his intellectual and moral purity and wisdom which assimilated him to the great nature, bore the manifest impress of that celestial Author of his existence. But soon this lovely image the malignant principle of sin into our nature, light and excellence was eclipsed. With the admission of incentive to humility, diligence, and watch- | him, and established in the faith, as you have fulness. We hear Jehovah repeatedly de- been taught, abounding therein with thanksploring the instability of the members of the giving." ancient church. "O Ephraim !" is his touching remonstrance, by the mouth of the prophet Hosea, "O Ephraim ! what shall I do unto thee? O Israel! what shall I do unto thee? for your goodness is as a morning cloud, and as the early dew it passeth away." We hear St. Paul lamenting the departure of a beloved fellow-labourer in the gospel-"Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world." We hear this same apostle expressing a determination to exercise a strict self-discipline "lest, after having preached to others, himself should be a castaway." We hear him further giving utterance to his apprehensions for the once-flourishing church of the Galatians, that, having begun in the Spirit, they would end in the flesh and we see those very people who at one time, in the height of their zeal and their attachment to the apostle, would have plucked out their eyes and given them to him, not long after-was effaced-this bright reflection of divine wisdom wards disposed to call in question his piety and his apostleship. We hear our Lord stating in a parable, that, when the evil spirit has been driven out of a man, he seeks for an opportunity to return; that, with a view to effect his late victim's utter ruin, he takes with him seven other spirits mightier than himself; and, should he succeed in these his endeavours, the latter state of such an one is worse than the first. We hear our Lord too stating, in the parable of the sower, that many for a while believe, but in time of temptation fall away. Lastly, we hear him saying to his followers in the present day, as he said to those who heard him in the days of his flesh-" Then shall ye be my disciples, if ye continue in my word; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." What, then, shall I say in conclusion? "Continue in the faith grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel." Suffer me to exhort you, that with full purpose of heart you would cleave unto the Lord Jesus Christ, who is alone able to keep you from falling, delighting to do that which is well-pleasing in his sight, and abounding in every good word and work: let nothing separate you from the love of him whose love to you was stronger than death: let nothing move you from the free and glorious hope of the gospel, a hope empty of all self-dependence, and resting on a sure foundation, a hope full of immortality, and entering within the vail. And, that you may hereafter be presented "holy, and unblameable, and unreproveable" in the sight of the omniscient Judge, as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, walk in him, rooted and built up in 66 was exchanged for darkness, knowledge for ignorance, purity for corruption, holiness and happiness for depravity and wretchedness. Thus, by his early apostacy and rebellion, did man forfeit his acquaintto a course of utter alienation from him in whom he ance with God, and consequently abandoned himself lives, and moves, and has his being. Under these circumstances of ignorance and helplessness, God was pleased, out of his infinite kindness and compassion, to bless him with a fresh discovery of his own character and purposes. This disclosure was primarily made by oral and direct communication: it was subsequently conveyed in traditionary records from one generation to another; and, finally, at successive peillustrated, and permanently embodied in written riods in the history of the church, it was amplified, documents, to be a complete, authoritative, and imperishable rule of faith and practice unto mankind till time shall be no more. of the character, the attributes, the will, and the deThese records, containing a full and explicit account signs of Jehovah, and of the origin, the apostacy, the redemption, the present relative duties and circumstances of man connected with the prospects of futurity, form that invaluable collection of writings which in our text are denominated the "scriptures ;" and these are they-these are the fixed and standing code of principles and doctrines which, amidst the evershifting changes and aberrations of human opinion, we are authoritatively commanded to search. To comply with this injunction-an injunction which was doubtless intended to extend beyond the immediate occasion of its delivery, and to embrace within its comprehensive import every age and condition of the church upon earth-is the duty and interest of all men but on the ministers of Christ-on those whose peculiar office and privilege it is to expound the doctrines, to inculcate the precepts, and to apply the promises of scripture to the various trials and exigencies of those entrusted to their spiritual care, this obligation is pre-eminently binding. The bible is that From "The Standard of Faith"-a Sermon preached at the rev. J. Davies, B.D., Rector of Gateshead. London: Hatchards. 1841. A most admirable sermon, peculiarly adapted to the present times-uncompromising and faithful. triennial visitation of the lord bishop of Durham, &c. By the |