Again, "Ask and it shall be given you, seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall be opened unto you." Again, "The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” By such prayer, to use the language of scripture, we take hold upon the strength of Omnipotence ;—we move the arm that moves the universe. Do you know what it is to "take hold" upon the strength of a being? Enlist the heart of a moral intelligence and you "take hold" upon all the powers of his nature, and all the resources at his command. There stands before you a man of giant frame, high spirit, and dauntless courage. He is a very Samson in might, a Leonidas in valor. Yet a very child shall take hold of the strength of this Hercules, and bend him to his wish. He is a father. He has one little rebellious son whom he determines to chastise The rod is in his hand, and he is about inflicting the threatened punishment, when the little fellow looks lovingly into his eye, and says, "Dear father, though you beat me to death I will love you; spare me this once and I will never offend you again." The Father's strength for inflicting the punishment is gone, the rod falls from his hand, and he takes the dear boy in his arms, kisses him, and presses him to his bosom. Coriolanus who dares the Imperial city to arms, is seized by his aged mother Veturia, and his poor wife Volumnia. Their loving entreaties "take hold" of his strength, and as the mighty warrior stands with the nerves of his heart in their grasp, he exclaims :—

"Ladies, you deserve

To have a temple built you; all the swords

In Italy, and her confederate arms

Could not have made this peace.'

Thus we can "take hold" upon the strength of Omnipotence Elijah did this, and the Heavens obeyed his

in prayer.

will. Abraham did this, and the storm of fire stood for a time hovering over the devoted cities of the plain. Moses did this, and he seems to have held back the outstretched arm of justice ;-for the Almighty said, "Let me alone that I may

destroy this people." The good in all ages have done the same. True prayer takes hold upon the strength of the Infinite. It moves that heart whose pulsations are the forces of the universe.

Germs of Thought.

SUBJECT:-The Last Saying of Christ on the Cross.

"And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit."-Luke xxiii. 46.

Analysis of Homily the Five Hundred and Sixth.

THIS is the last saying of Christ on the Cross. It was uttered as in the same breath with the triumphant shout, "It is finished." Life, light, and joy, had come back to the world, when that sound passed over the universe, with the authority and power of its Creator. Now He is ready to depart; the hour of repose is at hand. We therefore should feel the deepest interest in the words. Never again,

as a sufferer, is He to speak:-the next words to be uttered by those holy lips, now livid in death, will be words of triumph. We shall make a few observations on the great truths implied in this utterance :

I. IT WAS WITH A STRONG CRY. We might expect the very opposite to this. His first utterance might have been strong and clear, and then as life waned, and strength diminished, each becoming weaker and fainter, until the last would become too indistinct and broken to be understood. The murmurings of the deep and dark river which his feet had now touched, would, according to the ordinary manner of dying, drown the sound of the last sentence. Thus it is with the dying; the tongue moves but feebly; the listening ear of affection can teach only unconnected words; and no possible effort can discover the meaning which

they are intended to convey. But Christ, with a voice that awakened the attention of those who stood at a distance from the cross, and aroused even the echo of the far-off hills, said, "It is finished"; "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit," and the next instant His heaving breast sunk, His eyes closed, the paleness of death was on His face; over which tears of sympathy for others' woe had often flowed. Here then is another evidence of the great truth, the unique fact which He often asserted, that He died not from necessity, but voluntarily. "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again." He was not vanquished by death, but submitted Himself to its power. It is a common physiological phenomenon, that whilst many persons in great bodily weakness have suddenly displayed under the power of convulsions extraordinary muscular strength, more so than they ever evinced in their health; after the excitement is over, they sink into a state of unconscious stupor, and imperceptibly glide off into the arms of death. But it has never been known that persons on the verge of life, only a few moments before death, have displayed any vigor of muscle, or strength of voice;-the organs of respiration become too weak to act. We therefore here have a physical evidence that Christ died, not from exhaustion of life, but from a willing consecration of Himself as a victim on the altar, a sacrifice for our sins.

"Father."

II. IT WAS WITH A FILIAL CRY. First: This is expressive of the permanent relation between Him and God. He was the Son of God, His beloved and only begotten. No humiliation or sufferings, no poverty or pain, could dissolve or weaken this blessed bond of union, this sacred, mysterious, uncreated, indestructible, relationship. God is the Father of all, the Parent of all intelligent beings. But in a far higher sense, is He the Father of Him whose distinguishing appellation was, "The Son of God."

They who have received the spirit of adoption, and are in possession of the privileges of children, destined to be heirs of the inheritance reserved in light, address God as their Father. His image is re-impressed upon their spirits, His love is shed abroad in their hearts, they are by His sovereign grace, His children. But in an infinitely higher, dearer, diviner sense, this relationship exists between Him and Jesus of Nazareth, who is "the express image of His person," "the heir of all things." With a confidence that no creature can reach, with love, purer, stronger than any with which seraph could look towards the universal throne, Christ addresses Him that sits in peerless Majesty thereon, "My Father."

Secondly: He used the expression as a testimony to the serene, blessed, state of His own mind, that the dark and terrible tempest beneath which His soul to the very centre of His being had quivered and trembled, had passed away. When He had to say, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" the trial had passed. God, who had said, "Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow," had now sheathed that sword for ever, and had received full satisfaction to His eternal justice, in forgiving, redeeming, and glorifying, condemned sinners. The serene light of His countenance shone upon the bleeding victim; the conditions of the covenant of grace had been fulfilled by our great High Priest and Intercessor; and He who had been so lately separated by impenetrable darkness from the approving smiles of His Father's face, was again restored to His bosom : for the law was satisfied, and the work was accomplished. Consequently, "My Father," was substituted for, "My God." Wide asunder are those minds that address the blessed author of all life from the spontaneous feeling of their own hearts,—the one "O God," the other, "My Father." The relationship may exist, and yet the child may feel so distant as not to be really sensible of its possession; and consequently ventures not to say, "My Father." Heaven is the home where every child is able

to say, without the damp shadow of a doubt, "My Father." This Heaven had already shone around the cross, environed with a halo of unfading glory, the arena of the most awful and mysterious conflict that was ever waged in God's uniand He that was gliding into the darkness of death, had His brow already encircled with the crown of Heavenly glory.

verse;

Thirdly: He used this blessed appellation as a plea in the prayer. This is the force of it in the model prayer, He gave His disciples. "Our Father which art in Heaven." "If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father who is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?" It is

the child appealing to the most living law of social being. It involves the strongest argument to constrain compliance; it awakens the tenderest chords of affection, that unite mind to mind; whilst it implies expectation on the one hand, the giving is the exercise of the highest conscious delight on the other. The child's wants must be first attended to, and its necessities supplied. Oh, then, with what readiness did the Eternal Father, attend to the cry of His own beloved and only begotten Son expiring!

III. IT WAS WITH A DYING CRY. It was not a swoon, during which apparent death was to impress its apparent stamp upon the body; but He, as a man, was passing through the process of actual dissolution: so that if life again were to throb in that body, it would be, not resuscitation, but a RESURRECTION. The tenderest, closest tie was now being broken. "He tasted death for every man." He died as

man dieth. "He gave up the Ghost."

IV. IT WAS WITH A CONFIDING CRY. He confided His spirit to God. The words convey to us the truth, that the undying spirits of intelligent beings are safe only when under the protection of the one universal Father. He is the original fountain of all spiritual existence;