January 13

instantly punished; as we see in the case of Lot's wife, and Gehazi, and Herod, and Ananias and Sapphira. And are there no instances of this now? What transgressor can be sure that he shall not die in the very act of iniquity? His breath is in his nostrils; there is but a step between him and death. A liar has dropped down dead with a lie on his lips. A swearer has called for damnation upon his soul, and the prayer has no sooner been offered than answered. The drunkard, in the midst of his intoxication, has been brought to soberness in a place where a drop of water cannot be found to cool his tongue. Derangement also may be, in effect, the same as sudden death. "He, that being often reproved, hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy." What night?

The night of his visitation. "In the same hour came forth fingers of a man's hand, and wrote over against the candlestick upon the plaster of the wall of the king's palace: and the king saw the part of the hand that wrote. Then the king's countenance was changed, and his thoughts troubled him, so that the joints of his loins were loosed, and his knees smote one against another." The effect at first seems remarkable, as the import of the inscription was unknown. Yet what can be more alarming than strangeness and uncertainty? But why does he not suppose that the prodigy is favourable, containing an encomium, or a promise? Conscience forebodes the meaning. But Daniel explains it clearly; and admonishes him—but unavailingly. He had been warned before. This was the last address, and not designed for his salvation. Of what use, as to his moral state and disposition, were a few moments of confusion, and terror, and attempted resistance, or flight? And what better, for the purpose of repentance, are the hours or moments upon which many are suspending an attention to the things that belong to their peace? Death-bed alarms and prayers, and the exercises which attend them, are most likely, if useful at all, to benefit the living rather than the dead.

Well! where is he now? Where he has been ever since that night in which he was slain. What a length of duration! And yet after two thousand five hundred years he is not yet brought to trial! Ah! not the extinction of being, but the intermediate state, and afterward the Judgment—this, this renders death so awful. O that we were wise, that we understood this, that we considered our latter end!

JANUARY 13.—"And Joseph called the name of the first-born Manasseh: for God, said he, hath made me forget all my toil, and all my father's house. And the name of the second called he Ephraim: for God hath caused me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction."—Genesis 41:51, 52.

THERE was nothing extraordinary in his thus giving them significant names. It was usual in those early ages to attach names to things, places, and persons, in order to mark any particular occurrence, and to be a memento of it. Thus, after the victory between Mizpeh and Shen, Samuel took a stone and called it "Ebenezer," saying, Hitherto hath the Lord helped us. Thus, when God had appeared for him, Abraham call the mount "Jehovah Jireh;" the Lord will provide. Thus Pharaoh, upon the promotion of Joseph,

called his name "Zaphnath-paaneah," the revealer of secrets. We read also that Moses had two sons; "the name of the one was Gershom," that is, a stranger there; "for he said, I have been an alien in a strange land: and the name of the other was Eliezer," that is, my God is a help; "for the God of my father, said he, was mine help, and delivered me from the sword of Pharaoh."

But what others do from custom, a good man does from principle. In a common observance, he has a motive peculiar to himself. And therefore we see Joseph not only thus naming his children, but doing it "after a godly sort."

We learn from his conduct, first, that it is desirable to secure the remembrance of interesting events. "God requireth that which is past; and our improvement requires it. We can only be affected and influenced by things as they are present in the mind—they are absent from it in forgetfulness. Forgetfulness is temporary ignorance or unbelief. "By which," says the Apostle, "ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you." He therefore admonishes his hearers to give the more earnest heed to the things which they had heard, lest at any time they should let them slip. God calls upon His people "to remember what Balak consulted" against them: and to "remember all the way the Lord had led them in the wilderness." Let us therefore say, with Asaph, "I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High; surely, I will remember His wonders of old." Was He once powerful, and is He now weak? once wise, and is He now ignorant? once true, and now faithless? once gracious, and now unkind? He is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. How many of our failures, especially in thankfulness and confidence, are to be traced back to a bad memory!

Secondly, what a marvellous change is sometimes produced in the condition of God's people! What does Manasseh signify? "Forgetting." Why did Joseph give him this name? "For God," said he, "hath made me forget all my toil, and all my father's house." That is, the hardships by which he had been exercised, the sufferings he had met with from his own brethren, and the anguish he had felt when torn so young from a home so endeared. Did he then banish all this from his memory? This would be perfectly inconsistent with his design in imposing the name. The meaning is, that his circumstances were so changed, that no trace of his former difficulties and distresses remained. We often say, in heaven we shall forget all our sorrows. Shall we then have no remembrance of the Hand that sustained us under them, and delivered us from them? Yes: but all sorrow and sighing will cease; and all tears will be wiped from our eyes. Few had ever been so tried as Joseph; and for a number of years the clouds returned after the rain, and fell heavier than before. At length he was not only delivered, but advanced. "And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, see, I have set thee over all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh took off his ring from his hand, and put it upon Joseph's hand, and arrayed him in vestures of fine linen, and put a gold chain about his neck; and he made him to ride in the second chariot which he had; and they cried before him, bow the knee: and he made him ruler over all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I am Pharaoh, and without thee

shall no man lift up his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt." Thus every thing of his former degradation and misery was effaced as if it had never been—the change proclaiming that nothing is too hard for the Lord.

Thirdly, the afflictions of the saints do not hinder their fruitfulness. What means Manasseh? "Fruitful." Why does Joseph impose this name upon him? "For God has caused me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction." His dying father remarks this under a beautiful image: "Joseph is a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough by a well; whose branches run over the wall." This includes, no doubt, a reference to his outward condition. Egypt had been the land, how truly! the land of his affliction: but he had succeeded in life beyond all example and expectation, and was made to flourish in all his estate. Here is surely an allusion to godliness, as well as to wealth, and honour, and offspring. What indeed in the eye of a good man is growing in every thing else, without growing in grace? What is it to abound in business, unless our soul prospers? What is it to be blessed with "the blessings of heaven above, the blessings of the deep that lieth under, the blessings of the breasts, and of the womb," if we are not blessed "with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ?" Paul prays for the Philippians that they may "be filled with all the fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God." Christian, what is this world to you but "the land of your affliction?" You have found it a vale of tears: but has it been a fruitful vale? Your trials need not prevent your fruitfulness; yea, they are designed to secure and promote it: and though they are not joyous but grievous, they yield the peaceable fruits of righteousness to them that are exercised thereby. What have they done for us? It is sad that we should need them; but sadder still that we should lose the benefit of them. Can we say, "It is good for me that I have been afflicted?"

Lastly, The hand of God is to be acknowledged in all our concerns, especially our mercies. Whether they are temporal or spiritual, they have the same source—every good gift, and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights. Joseph therefore says, He has done all things for me. If my condition has been changed, He changed it—"God hath made me to forget all my toil and my father's house." If I have been fruitful, in Him was my fruit found—"God hath caused me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction." It is the office of faith to lead us to God, and to show us his agency where others only see instruments and second causes. It is the business of humility to teach and enable us to say, "Not unto us, O God, not unto us, but to Thy name be glory for the mercy and for the truth's sake."—Both furnish evidence that we are in a course of preparation for that world where "God is all in all."

JANUARY 14.—"This thou knowest, that all they which are in Asia be turned away from me; of whom are Phygellus and Hermogenes. The Lord give mercy unto the house of Onesiphorus; for he oft refreshed me, and was not ashamed of my chain: but, when he was in Rome, he sought me out very diligently, and found me. The Lord grant unto him that he may find mercy of the