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January 20, 1909. THE PRESBYTERI/ CHRIST AND THE FAMILY. The law of the cross must control the family. Love, which is a natural passion and principle of life, will always insure the institution of the family and the ministrations of motherhood and the protection of fatherhood in the lower rancrec /-?f 1-1.1 D.-* ^ ? * ? Ja-w, w? i.uuian ?nc. 1>UI UHUirUi love needs to be inspired with divine emotion in order to insure the holiest ministrations and the highest service. Hence the Christian man is commanded to love his wife as Christ loved the Church?thoughtfully, considerately, tenderly, and with willing sacrifice?and the Christian wife is commanded to reverence her husband as the Church reverences Christ?with such faith and devotion as will seek his success and his honor. And parents are commanded to bring up their children in the nurture of the Lord?in that atmosphere of love and kindness and faithful training which will tend to promote a character worthy of continuance by virtue of its likeness to the character of Christ.?The Homiletic Review. SUGGESTIVE. It is the inner life that makes our world. If our hearts are sweet, patient, gentle, loving, we find sweetness, patience, gentleness, and love wherever we go. But if our hearts are bitter, jealous, suspicious, we find bitterness, jealousy and suspicion on every path. If we go out among people in a combative spirit, we find combativeness in those we meet. But if we go forth in a charitable frame of mind, with good-will in our hearts toward all, we find brotherliness and cordiality in every man we come up to in our walks and associations. "In ourselves the sunshine dwells; In ourselves the mu^ic swells; Everywhere the heart awake Finds what pleasure it can make; Everywhere the light and shade By the gazer's eye is made." This is the secret of that fine art which people possess of always finding good and beauty in others. They have goodness and beauty in themselves. There are such people, and there is no reason why we should not set this ideal for our lives.?Dr. J. R. Miller. GOD ANSWERS PRAYER. Jehovah, the loving God, distinctly promises to answer the prayers of his children. He that gave parents a love for their children, will he not listen to the cries of his own sons and daughters? He has wonders in store for them. What they have never heard of, never seen, or dreamed of, he will do for them. He will invent new blessings, if needful. He will ransack sea and land to feed them; he will send every angel out of heaven to succor them if their distress requires it. He will astound them with his grace, and make them feel that it was never before done in this fashion. All he asks of them is that they call upon him.?Spurgeon. lN OF THE SOUTH. 15 The Quiet Hour IT IS THE SAME NOW. UU ' ? iicn we read tne Scriptures we are again and again filled with surprise and sorrow to see that our Savior had so few friends among all those that pressed about him, to hear his gracious words and see his divine power exercised in behalf of the suffering and the sorrowful, but had so many enemies. Pitiable indeed does it all seem. In all his life, so ready to do good, so ready to save from the power of sin and the grave, and yet had so few to love and reverence him, earnest and anxious to give life and immortality to all that would accept, and yet so few were willing to receive him as "the way, the truth and the life." Could any one ever doubt the willingness of Jesus to save? And yet some pretended to do this very thing. Ah, the trouble was not with the blessed Savior; no, not at all! Jesus was willing to save, but men were unwilling to be saved. Does he not say, "Ye will not come unto me that ve might have life?" This was his sad lament 1900 years ago as he stood and looked into the faces of the men and women that thronged him to both hear and see. It is still the same. Circumstances have changed, but men never change; are the same today as they were then, and Jesus still laments their unwillingness to be saved. So earnestly and so powerfully does he set forth in the Scriptures this trim mnHitinn u*. ? -r , xjj itaauil UI sin, and pleads with all his great loving heart that men should come to him and live, "believe and live." Yet now, as then, he sorrowfully says, "Ye will not come unto me that ye might have life." Is it not strange, passing strange? Shall a judge offer pardon to the condemned and he reject the gift? Shall a sovereign offer to a rebel guilty of treason against the State, a free pardon for his grave offense, and the rebel refuse? So it seems Jesus Christ says, "Ye will not come unto me that ye might have life." Quaint old Matthew Henry says the only reason why men die is they will not come to Christ for life. Not because they cannot, but because they will not. This puts the matter in an alarming light. "He is able to save unto the uttermost all that come unto God by him." Man alone is the unwilling party. inn, 1KU?.K?.L1U1UN. The world has small need of a religion which consists solely or chiefly of emotions and raptures. But the religion that follows Jesus Christ, alike when he goes up into the high mountain to pray and when he comes down into the dark valley to work; the religion that listens to him, alike when he tells us of the nesre and joy of the Father's house and when he calls us to feed his lambs; the religion that is willing to suffer as well as to enjoy, to labor as well as to triumph; the religion that has a soul to worship God, and a heart to love man, and a hand to help in every good cause? is pure and undefiled.?Henrv van Dyke.