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Central PresbyterianWbole No. 665.RICHMOND, V A., WEDNESDAY, MAY 1, 1878.Yol, 13.-NoNOT FARNot for. not far from the Kingdom, Yet in the ehadow of sin *,How many are coming and going, How few are entering in!Not far from the golden gateway.Where voices whisper and wait; Fearing to enter in boldly,So lingering still at the gate;Catching the strain of the music Floating so sweetly along, Knowiog the song they are singing, Yet joining not in the song.Seeing the warmth and the beauty. The infinite love and the light; Yet weary, and lonely, and waiting Out in the deeolate night!Out in the dark and the danger. Oat in the night and the cold, Though He is longing to lead them Tenderly into the fold.Not tar, not for from the Kingdom.*Tis only a little space;But it may be at last, and for ever, Uafi of rba redt place.A ship came sailing and sailing Over a murmanif so*.And, just in sight ol the haven. Dowu in the waves went she:And the spars and the broken timbers Were cast on a storm beat strand;And a cry went up in the darkness—“Not for, not far from the land!”Congrcgationalist.FOS THl CENTRAL PRE8BYTERUN.REMINISCENCES OF PRESBYTERIAN MINISTERS.BY AN OCTOGENARIAN.No. 42.REV. GIDEON BLACKBURN.The writer left Greenville and came to Dndridge, the capital of Jefferson county. Gray perhaps, would have called this l*n-dridge a helter-skelter town, but this was notderful success which everywhere followed his ministerial labors. The communication was replete with piety, but touched off by a glowing enthusiasm. From his description we supposed the days of Whitfield and the Ten-nencs had been revived. Times of refreshing had evidently come from the presence of the Lord. Sinners were bowed down in deep repentance, and Christians were rejoicing in a kind of Pentecostal season. My correspondent had followed Dr. Blackburn to \\ il-mington, Delaware, where many were added to the Church. One sound conversion is worth a duodecillion of counterfeits, but it would be a breach of charity to suppose that lasting effects did not attend the preaching of Dr. Blackburn, a man endowed with great spirituality of mind as well as by persuasive eloquence.The Dootor was true to his appointment, and no time was lost in making his acquaintance. His garb was plain and not so clerical as we could have wished. But he was a man of the West, who saw no great difference between bemespan and the purple and fine linen of Dives. His countenance indicated amiability—his manners modest and his colloquial powers were good, though perhaps not prce ninent. He bore the marks of age, but perhaps the rough life of the wilderness and the coarse fare of Indian wigwams may have given him an appearance prematurely old. On Sabbath the dilapidated church was crowded. The services were interesting, and the dispensation of the sacrament truly solemn. The discourse was delivered with great propriety, and his elocution was more deliberate than we had anticipated. He made no attempt to overwhelm the audience by the avalanche of his utterance. Oa the contrary he sought to give evangelical pleasure to the congregation by a calm, gentle and melodious voice. Still he was not destitute of force in his words, or of viiror in his manner. Ha aimed at flights ofin the first resurrection, and who are spoken of as “the rest of the dead, will be brought under the power of the second death. But suppose that this vision means simply that the people of God living during a Millennium before the coming of Christ will have the martyr spirit, what then will become of the millions of God’s people who will have lived and died before the Millennium, and hence, have no part in this first resurrection ? If they too are “ blessed and holy,*’ and if on “such also the second death will have nc power, why are these advantages spoken of as the peculiar privileges of those who have part in the first resurrection? Again, when it is said “ Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection,” it would seem as if “he was a person and not a principle that was to be resurrected. But who are “the rest of the dead ? All the redeemed being parties to the first resurrection, the “ rest of the dead” are the wicked dead. But if the first resurrection is the resurrection of dead principles, then the rest of the dead must be certain dead principles. JJy what laws for the interpretation of language, or symbols, can this first resurrection be made a spiritual one, and the Becond, literal ? To make the dead raised at the first resurrection, the martyr spirit, and the rest of the dead persons, is a perfectly arbitrary interpretation. Both resurrections must be either spiritual or literal. Bishop Newton Bays,“ we Rhould be cautiouB and tender of making the first resurrection an allegory, lest others should reduce the second resurrection into an allegory also.But Brown and others do find in this pas sage a second spiritual resurrection. Brown, in his “Second Advent, in one place, calls “the rest of the dead, “th9 opposing party, now alive, dead during the Millennium, and living in their successors during the “little season after the Millennium. In another place he calls them a “ dead cause. Andpresented are more consistent with each other, and with other doctrines of the Bible, and are compassed with fewer d fficulties than any others. P* T. P-(concluded )-Fua the Central Presbyterian.THE TERRIBLE FAMINE NOW RAGING IN CHINA.BY REV. JOHN W. DAVIS, SOOCHOW.If you will glance at any good map of China which gives the boundaries of the eighteen provinces of this .vast empire, you will see in the west a large province called Sze chuen North of this are two others, Kan-suh and Sben-si. East of Shen-si are Ho-nan and Shan-si. East of these are Shan-tung and Pe-che-le. In these eight provinces famine is raging V-ijh greater or leBB intensity in different places. The testimony to the wide spread'and awful suffering of the people in this northern'half of China is of the most reliable charS^r. Missionaries who have visited these regions within the past few months, and have seen with their own eyes the things that they relate, tell in unoxaggerated style of'the way in which thousands are perishing.The groatasc suff jriog is in Shan si and in Pe che le. List year the cry of want came from Shan-tuDg. Io that province there is, especially in the western end, much suffering this year also. The population of these eight provinces may be calloJ in round numbers a hundred and fifty millions. Theso do not all suffer from famine, but they all feel the cffcCtB of it in the high pricos of food.— Here in Soochow, the place from which I write, food is dearer than I have ever known t to be.The cause of the famine is a want of rain. Drouth has followed drouth for several suc-sessive seasons, and tho suffering has in-1 jreased year after year for three years, till*1nbsdsiaa:Uo)SId:01tlBol
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Central Presbyterian
Richmond, Virginia, US
Wed, May 01, 1878
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