relate to the conversion of the world, yet when we see the eastern world aroused by a meteor, and turning their eyes to the birthplace of Christ, we are furnished with an illustration of the infinite ease with which God can and will, in the fulness of time, make nation after nation bow to the sceptre of the Redeemer. By some events of Providence, no less interesting in their kind than the appearance of the star to the Persian sages, and falling in with the habits or circumstances of the different nations as that star coincided with the thoughts and pursuits of the Magi, revolutions of popular opinion will occur which will fulfil the prediction, A nation shall be born in a day. Happy will those missionaries, and ministers, and christians be who, with long patience, shall be found labouring and praying for those days, and shall have their faith rewarded when, by the great outpouring of his Spirit, the Lord, whom they seek, shall suddenly come to his temple.

Not merely to the Simeons and Annas of Jerusalem, nor to those who already love and worship him, but to every soul for whom Christ came to be a Saviour, does this act of the wise men speak encouragement. The object of the author is, to present the Saviour as an object of faith, and love, and worship; to excite those feelings which sinners should have to their Saviour; and, if any are ashamed of Christ, to show them in what ways some of our fellow-men, from every rank and in every condition, have expressed their love and worship; and to make it appear that all things are but loss compared with the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord. Reader, perhaps Christ, as a sacrifice for sin, is beyond the

present measure of your faith. He is the great mystery of godliness which, because you cannot fathom it, you do not receive; and, as Judge of the living and the dead, perhaps he awakens your fears.

Begin, then, where the wise men began, supposing your knowledge and your belief to be even as limited as theirs; but, adopting their desire and zeal to know something more of Christ, like them, follow on to know the Lord." Let us trace the progress of their faith.

The star shone at a great distance, but in the direction of Judea; and these wise men arose and followed it. But when they had entered on their way the star, for a large part of the time, if not entirely, must have disappeared. In the daytime they could not see it; in stormy and dark nights it was veiled; and thus, through their long and wearisome journey, they must to a great degree have walked by faith.

Not supposing that a king could be born out of the metropolis, they bent their way toward Jerusalem, inquiring for Christ. Instead of finding the great city moved with joy at his birth, it would seem as though the city had the first information of it from these Persians. The story of the shepherds, perhaps, had been treated with ridicule, and was forgotten; and the arrival of the Magi, with such an inquiry, only had the effect to trouble the king, and the whole city with him. Nothing daunted by this, nothing chilled in their faith and zeal, they literally followed on to know the Lord, seeking him with all their heart; and, pursuing their way to humble Bethlehem, behold, the star

which they saw in the east came and stood over the place where the young child was!

If we were half as zealous to know the truth respecting Christ, and the way of salvation by him, as these heathens were to find him, all our wishes would be crowned with complete success. We are strongly disposed to hope and to believe that they were not moved to perform such a journey, and such an act of love and worship, to die, after all, without a saving knowledge of the Redeemer. Supposing them to have become acquainted with the gospel, they must have reflected with great satisfaction on the pains they took to find the Saviour, the faith they exercised, their perseverance, and, finally, their not being offended at the lowly condition in which they found him, though their imaginations had, no doubt, presented him to their minds in a manner corresponding with the sublime sign which had distinguished his birth. If they took with them to their home the sacred books of the Jews; if devout men had been moved, during their brief sojourn in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, to disclose to them such thoughts and feelings, concerning Jesus, as Zacharias, and Elizabeth, and Simeon, and others like them, entertained; if, along their homeward journey, by day and by night, they read, and prayed, and talked concerning the Messiah, and found that they could worship still at the feet of that everywhere present Saviour, in the desert and in Persia, as well as in Bethlehem; and if, returning to their people with this song in their hearts and upon their lips, "For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince

of Peace," they thus became the worshippers of the true God and the Redeemer, what gain must they have felt that their long and dreary journey had brought them; what caravan ever brought back treasures to be compared with those unsearchable riches of Christ, of which they had become possessed; and what must have been their joy as they turned, from worshipping the host of heaven, "to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come!"

No distant, silent star beckons us, like them, to seek Christ. We have a more sure word of prophecy-a Bible, in which prophets and apostles conspire to bring us to the Saviour; his history is finished; we have not only his manger, but his cross, his tomb. Judea, Samaria, Galilee, are imprinted with his familiar footsteps; his resurrection and ascension, the gift of the Holy Ghost, the testimony and blood of martyrs, the conversion of souls already without number, all perform that office for us which that solitary star rendered to these wise men. But faith is not in proportion to the amount of evidence. "Prophets teach the Jews in vain; a silent star beckons the Gentiles; they arise and follow." Still, the same promise assures us of success, if we follow after the small portion of light which our unbelieving eyes take in; still, he that seeketh findeth, if he seeks, like these wise men, with all the heart.

These wise men will, hereafter, condemn those nations who, on the first news of Christ, and salvation by him, should have received the gospel, but still reject it. The Queen of Sheba will be summoned as a witness, at the last judgment,

against the men of the Saviour's time; for she came from the utmost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, while a greater than Solomon was with the unbelieving men of that age. So if we, with all our knowledge of Christ, should fail to believe on him, the sight of that company of wise men from the east, appearing in the last judgment before the Saviour, to be openly acknowledged by him as a consequence of their faith and zeal, would powerfully condemn our indolence and unbelief, and leave us without excuse. Could we then return to earth, no pilgrimages, sufferings, zeal, and love, would seem too much for so great an object as a personal interest in the work of redemption. Yet this is offered to us every Sabbath, and as often as we open the Scriptures. With the example of the wise men before us, and all that serves to illustrate and enforce the privilege and duty of believing on Christ, with every opportunity to obtain all that others have been obliged to purchase at vast expense, let us be sure that we be not thrust down from such exalted privileges to a deeper hell. It is not enough to commend religion by approving its doctrines and its influence. "He that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God."

If those wise men are now among the redeemed, having washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb, what thoughts and feelings they must have as they recollect the star in its first appearance to them; the difficulties which they overcame in following after it; the joy they felt when it reappeared, and gave a divine seal of approbation to their effort; their first sight of the