return upon the head of Joab, and upon the head of his seed for ever; but upon David, and upon his house, and upon his throne, there shall be peace for ever from the Lord.'

Mary. And it was 'shedding innocent blood very much' that was the great wickedness of Manasseh.

Miss O. Yes, it seemed to be deepening and fixing the doom on the land, so that even Josiah's tears and prayers could win no remission.

Helena. And Jehoiakim began again to shed innocent blood, as if evil enough were not already on the land.

poor

Miss O. All the time the voices of the Prophets were declaring how the unatoned, unrepented heap of guilt was being laid up against the day of wrath; how, though man regarded not the cause of the destitute, justice would yet come, proclaiming to whom belongeth vengeance and recompense, Who maketh the cause of the His own, and who is the helper of the friendless. All the earth was full of darkness and cruel habitations, and the trum pets seemed to sound nothing but vengeance, though here and there was the softer note of promise, that one day 'righteousness and peace should kiss one another,' and that the sins like scarlet should be made white as wool, and that a ransom should be found.

Audrey. And bewildering and sorrowful as the world must have been even to those who had the Old Testament revelation; how much more melancholy and terrible it must have been to those who only saw wickedness and cruelty, without any hope!

Miss O. Yes; their perplexities and piteous sense that justice required an atonement that they could not find, seems shadowed to the utmost in the story of Agamemnon— all an illustration of Eschylus' own sad lines:

'But soon as once the genial plain,
Hath drunk the life-blood of the slain,
Indelible the spots remain,

And aye for vengeance call.'

Audrey. Almost the words to Cain.

Miss O. The house of Atreus, stained with dark ancestral crime-Agamemnon, incurring his wife's hatred by the sacrifice of her daughter, is murdered by her on his return from the war; then his son, the avenger of blood, is unwillingly driven by the gods to take retaliation for his father's death: but in his turn, for slaying his mother, becomes a prey to the curse of Cain. He is the fugitive and the vagabond-driven-hunted-lashed to madness by the dread goddesses'-the furies of conscience. It is a mere labyrinth of misery!

Helena. But he is allowed peace at last in the story.

Miss O. Yes; I should be very sorry to think that was put in merely for the sake of satisfying the spectators, and complimenting Athens. But it might have been that Orestes, having acted on a sense of a dreadful duty to be fulfilled, might be permitted to rest, and be pardoned after his sufferings. At least, the story, or old tradition, shows how natural religion taught that there was an expiation needed, and placed punishment on a higher ground than that of protection to society.

Audrey. Everywhere the sense of blood calling for

vengeance.

Helena. Even Pontius Pilate showed that, when he washed his hands, and said that he was innocent of the Blood of this just Person.

Miss O. And the sinful nation took it on themselves by their most fearful of all cries, His Blood be on us, and on our children.'

Audrey. That Blood, that Life, to which all had been tending.

Miss O. Yes, that Blood, in which we all have a part. Either we partake the deadly guilt of shedding it-it is upon us—or else it is that very blood of cleansing and expiation which was shed, to wash off the tres

pass.

Audrey. We are come to the Blood of Sprinkling, which 'speaketh better things than the blood of Abel.'

Miss O. Better things indeed. It silenced the cry for vengeance, which had gone up from the earth ever since she first drank in the blood of righteous Abel. Nay, even the animal creation were delivered, for they never again have had to suffer in order to pay for our errors! That Life was for the life of all men, who would accept the

ransom.

Audrey. But if we do not?

Miss O. Then we cast in our lot with the betrayers and murderers, on whom cometh all the righteous blood shed upon the earth; with those against whom the souls beneath the altar cried out for vengeance, and who received it in earthly type in the destruction of Jerusalem, and ever since in their enduring curse of homelessness. 'Slay them not, lest my people forget it.'

Helena. Cast in our lot with them?

Miss O. Yes, Helena. Those who crucify the Son of Man afresh, and put Him to an open shame, who are like Cain in a tyrannous hate against those whose deeds are righteous, what can they expect, save to look on with those 'who pierced Him,' to be left to the destruction of the corrupted Church, when the true and invisible Church hath come out of her, and hath been separated. There is no third alternative; Christ's Blood must be the blood of Abel or the Blood of Sprinkling.

Helena. And we would take it as the Blood, in which is the Life, and which gives us life.

Audrey. Indeed, the old voices of vengeance do turn to mercy!

Miss O. The city of refuge turns to the Church, where destruction and rapine are no more, and the avenger of blood comes not, or rather comes as our Redeemer, for the the same word, as I have read, stands for both Avenger and Redeemer in the original.

Audrey. I see why you spoke of the stern schoolmaster. The whole Law was to teach how none but Christ could save and atone.

Miss O. And soften, or rightly read the dread sentences of vengeance. Hear the Christian therefore, which unites Solomon's counsel to God's denunciation, 'Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord, therefore, if thine enemy hunger, feed him.'

Audrey. The avenger of blood is freed from the need of exacting punishment-his business is to have mercy! Miss O. Goodwill to men is proclaimed, and repentance and faith lead to that which can wash out the once indelible stain.

Helena. But murder still has to be punished.

Miss O. Punished, yes; but not in the old sense of being expiated. It is punished as the offence against society, and in accordance with the primitive law-but there is not the same weight of condemnation on those who leave it unvisited. The law of the land bears the sword, as having authority delegated over the subject; the relations of the murdered are not avengers, they have only to pardon.

Audrey. And the sovereign has the power of mercy, the blunted sword.

Miss O. To teach visibly that mercy and justice can henceforth be joined. The labour of the Church has been, ever since Christianity began, to sweep away the remains of cruelty which passion and vindictiveness had hung round the old cancelled law of the avenger, and to teach pardon. She has not yet fully succeeded, but much has been done, and forgiveness is her watchword. And where there is no wilful intention, manslaughter has ceased to be a crime, and, even in cases of absolute guilt, the soul may be forgiven, even where the body bears the penalty.

Helena. Then do you think the old law, that innocent blood unavenged brings punishment, is quite over?

Miss O. No, not as it is a natural law of Providence. Unrepented sin brings heavy retribution, and even repented crime works out a temporal doom. No one can look at history without seeing the retaliation on generation after generation. One thought of the end of the House of Plantagenet will show you what I mean. And so it is an unwholesome notion, that in these Christian days there should be no capital punishment. Not only must the wicked be restrained by fear, but the authority that God has delegated to rulers must not be trifled with, and life for life was almost His earliest law.

Audrey. Well, we have not much to do with that!

Miss O. Except, as I say, that all who think at all had better think justly. When I remember that Robespierre began his career with a book against capital punishment, I dread the sentiment that forgets that human laws are but the delegates of a God of stern justice, who will come byand-by to call us to account for the way we have treated our brother's life, and guarded His own sacred Law which He has left in our hands. What was once the Law of Vengeance, is now the Law of Mercy, and to trace it as such, and bring out the practical detail, must be our conversation next time.

(To be continued.)

COMMENTS ON THE PRAYER-BOOK. Rubric:- Then shall be sung or said,' &c.

The faithful spirit may now venture to uplift the voice in praise, direct praise, with the company of angels and archangels. May our hearts be alive with the song of praise, whether our voice have or have not the power to sing aloud. Melody is a powerful sympathetic stimulant: all creation uses it to lay their happy freewill-offering at the footstool of their Maker, each thereby stirring up the dormant action of the other. It is on this account