MAN AFTER DEATH.

25

of the sinning life, and projecting itself amongst the dark shadows of futurity, fetches from thence a whole host of terrors. Death by sin has become death indeed! and may fittingly stand as the awful symbol of all the consequences of disobedience to the law of God.

(5.) Only one other point in these histories need detain us. The third section of the book of Genesis (v., vi. 1-8) is called the book of the generations of Adam. It records the order of the families (or perhaps of the dynasties), and the ultimate result of the course they pursued. Each patriarch is named, his years are told, and then, as if to illustrate the fact that death reigned from Adam by an unchangeable law, it is added, "and he died." But to this mournful appendix there is a unique exception. Enoch, the seventh from Adam, was of exemplary goodness. He walked with God, and instead of experiencing death, passed into the life beyond-went to be with God.

That could scarcely have been written in an atmosphere of absolute scepticism concerning the life after death. Slight as the witness is to the antediluvian faith in a future life, yet it is real and reliable, and bears witness to a conviction that the true destiny of man was not death, but a life of consecrated fellowship with the Eternal. We can easily believe that others besides Abel and Noah "died in the faith" (Heb. xi. 13) of a future blessedness and joy.

Looking back on these documents, of what points may we be sure? Not many! But at least these.

I. They do not, of themselves, give us sufficient positive data to settle out of hand the question as to whether immortality entered or did not enter into the original constitution of man.

II. But the theory of man's nature fairly deducible from these facts embraces a distinctly personal and moral nature; a supremacy over and leadership of the rest of the creation; the sovereignty of conscience; a capacity for the divine and eternal: and therefore gives strong presumption of a life after death, a hint, indeed, of endlessness of being.†

III. The word DEATH as applied to man in the first instance distinctly connotes punishment for disobedience, and is used to cover the general, the whole result of wrong doing. This is well-established, and should be of great weight in the whole discussion.

IV. What DEATH BY SIN is, is made clear in the punishment of Adam, and embraces separation from nature, or shame; dread of God; selfishness; cowardice; fear of the future; burdensome labour; and fruitless sorrow.

V. No hint is given of "immediate destruction," of physical death as the result of sin, of disintegration of soul and body.

VI. The patriarchs believed in a life for man after death, and held strongly that fellowship with the Eternal is the beginning of an endless life. JOHN CLIFFORD.

* Paul's use of the facts (Rom. v. 12-21) in these annals will be discussed in due course. + Schultz (Old Testament Theology, Vol. I., p. 292,) says:-" To the creature fitted for fellowship with God, death is not merely a natural event, but the disruption of a fellowship which in itself could and should be without end; and there lies in the conception of the Divine image (Gen. i. 27) a pointing forwards to the plan of an indissoluble life." "Death is the whole province which is the issue of sin.".... "God is the God of life. What is consecrated to Him must be separated from death."

WHAT does that matter? The real question is, what is London itself-its people, its trade, its literature, its crime, its morality, its religion, its progress, and its power? Underground London may be interesting to the antiquarian, who can leap into ecstacy over a bit of Roman pavement; or to a leisureless merchant who wishes to be whisked to the "city" by telegraph; but the mass of men care for London above ground—for its seething crowds of human hearts and lives.

Still, it is what is under a city, town, or village, that determines what is above. Cedars and oaks do not grow in the air alone; they root themselves firmly in the soil, and derive their growth and their power to grow from thence. So towns and cities plant themselves in places adapted to their life; and their progress is determined by what is underneath them. It is London underground that has made the metropolis above-ground.

What! the stifling metropolis "underground" railway? Not exactly; though that must not be sneeringly put out of the account in reckoning up the forces that have made the million-peopled city. But there is an older agent, far, without whose regular and incessant ministrations, even this greatest city of the world would have been unborn; and by the direction of whose labours its growth has been determined from age to age.

The first brief settlement of the human race was by a river. Eden was not without its water course. Thirst is natural and universal to man, and savage or civilized, he has of necessity placed his home near the bursting spring, or reared his mansion by the flowing stream. Sites of springs and the nearness of rivers, together with the presence of fuel-wood and coal--have determined the dwelling-places of men. Those who, unwitting of London's future, elected this spot as their home, knew their needs, and how best they could be met. For the strata beneath London are peculiarly rich in springs; and at a short distance from it there is a vast development of chalk, permeable to water, and able to maintain a permanent river flow.

London is built on a bed of gravel, varying in thickness from a few inches to twenty-three feet; and next to it, and underneath it, you have strata of tenacious clay, with a thickness in some parts of 100 feet, and in others of 200. The gravel is nature's great water-filter; and the clay is the vast basin in which the water is accumulated, and down to which wells have been sunk all over London through many centuries. At certain points, where the clay and the gravel are cut through, this splendid arrangement of the "waterworks of nature" has originated famous springs, such as Clerkenwell, Bagnigge Well, St. Chad's Well, and Holywell.

Moreover, the extension of London was restricted by this order of "gravelabove-clay." London would not leave its well-watered area; where the wells stopped, it stopped, until the Water Companies undertook to supply the defects of the stratigraphical arrangements of the London basin. Westbourne Park would have remained untenanted till now if an artificial water-supply had not been produced; and so would many other parts of the metropolis, now densely inhabited. At the beginning of this century, the area between Paddington and Edgware was unpopulated, except at Kilburn, and merely because nature's filter of gravel was removed from over the clay of that district.

Nor is this all. Going still further down, we come upon a quantity of sand beds from 70 to 100 feet thick. Through these water passes easily; but other basins are formed by the intercalation of some beds of retentive clay; and so a second series of filters is formed, and another useful water supply. As the population of London increased, wells increased, and the stores in the London clay catchment basin became insufficient, and therefore Artesian wells were made, and from these Thanet sands thirsty London has been refreshed.

But in these later times even this double source has not sufficed, and therefore the bore has been thrust down to the basement rock of the lower basin,

WHAT IS UNDER LONDON?

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the well-known chalk, which is permeable to water, and holds it tightly, but is so much cracked and fissured that it is possible to accumulate and use it. The water from this THIRD store-house is "hard," i.e., it contains a quantity of the chalk itself in the form of bicarbonate of lime; therefore at Caversham they adopt the strange process, known as Dr. Clark's, of adding more lime, in the form of lime water, to the bicarbonate already there; thus carbonate of lime is deposited, and the water is made soft.

Efforts have been made to go deeper and to discover other supplies. London is still thirsty. Borings have been made at Kentish Town and Crossness; and quite recently at the Brewery of Messrs. Meux & Co., at the corner of Tottenham Court Road and Oxford Street. This last effort to sink an Artesian well was carried to the prodigious depth of 1,144 feet-nearly a quarter of a mile.

The revelations of underground London made by this boring are of exceptional interest. They passed through 21 feet of flint gravel; then came 63 feet of the bluish clay that Londoners are so familiar with; then 72 feet of clays and sands, described by the geologist as Woolwich and Reading beds, and Thanet sands. 656 feet of chalk followed. Passing through this the machine brought up the cores of 28 feet of a light grey sandstone, and labelled Upper Greensand. Then Gault Clay, 160 feet thick, resting on the Lower Greensand, with a thickness of 64 feet. At this point, 1,064 feet down, all was changed; and instead of meeting with the rocks that follow in the order of time, the diamond borer brings up some mottled red, purple, and light green shales, known as Devonian strata, a fact which proclaims an utter absence of all the Oolites, the Lias, the Trias, the Permian, and the Carboniferous strata, but shows that some of the oldest rocks in Great Britain are at an accessible depth under London.

Some have thought that this means that water is not to be obtained from any strata lower than the chalk, and that the hope of finding coal near London must be given up; but Professor Prestwich, who is the chief, though not the sole authority on this subject, says, "While there is every reason to hope that, on the south of London, we may yet find in the Lower Greensand, beneath the Tertiary Strata of the chalk, a source of large and valuable water supply for metropolitan purposes, there is strong reason to believe in the probability of discovering to the north of London Carboniferous strata, including possibly productive Coal-measures under the same Cretaceous formation."

That is the glance of geological science into the future. It is the work of the same science to tell the past of underground London, reconstruct its successive physical geographies, narrate the story of the changes which have taken place since the Rhynchonella bollensis swam in the Devonian waters; what London was when the Cotswold hills were being formed in the depths of the sea; and how the change came on which made London again a sea as deep as the Atlantic is now, and tenanted with similar organisms; and finally how it came to be an estuary in which the London clay was deposited; then rose up to accept its gravel filter, and welcome that unknown and indescribable mortal, the first Londoner. JOHN CLIFFORD.

DEATH OF THE PRINCESS ALICE.

SADDER news have not reached England from the Continent, since the death of the Princess Charlotte, than that which moved every heart to sorrowful sympathy on the evening of the 14th of December concerning the decease of "our Princess Alice." Endeared to the nation by her filial devotion to her father in his fatal illness-by the affectionate assiduity with which she nursed her brother-and by her unmistakeable goodness, she was also admired for her keen intelligence, large gifts, opulent domestic virtues, and eager activity in promoting the welfare of her people. Sincere were the prayers offered to the God of all comfort for her afflicted husband and motherless children, and for our Queen, in whose already bruised spirit a fresh wound was opened. God bless and console them all!

* Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, Vol. xxxiv., p. 911.

THE painfulest contrast ever presented by France and England is exhibited at this moment. Republican France is exulting in the straightforwardness of its tactics, in the confidence foreign nations have in their honesty, and frankness, and freedom from double dealing: whilst England has become conspicuous for trickery, deceit, and unveracity. The contrast between M. Waddington and Lord Cranbrook is one of the most suggestive studies of our time.

Blunders might easily be forgiven. Even the glaring Rhodope mistake, source of so much chagrin and humiliation to Sir Stafford Northcote, could be pardoned if we could only feel that our political leaders were honest and true men. Even devotion to the Turk in a Tory Government could be overlooked and overgot; but for our appointed rulers to be lacking in truthfulness is a cause for national humiliation.

Lord Beaconsfield corrupted his party long since, and now his fatal influence has passed into his colleagues of the Cabinet. Cranbrook has adopted his tactics. Distinctly has he asked and advised Lord Northbrook to say one thing when he means another. 66 There would be many advantages in ostensibly directing a mission to the Ameer to some object of small political interest; which it will not be difficult for your Excellency to find, or, if need be, to create." But Lord Northbrook declined to do such work: and so Lord Lytton was sent out to do the mean and despicable business, and has, alas! fatally succeeded; and landed us in this notoriously unjust Afghan war.

The facility of Lord Cranbrook in putting three true statements together, so as to make them equal to the coarsest falsehood has been well-exposed by Mr. Gladstone. The ability of the Marquis of Salisbury to convey a false impression by means of veracious language is not less notorious. The manner in which men of high moral repute, like Sir Stafford Northcote and Mr. Cross, succumb to this meanness is truly alarming. "A blunder in policy may be survived or amended, but the growth of a feeling of easy indifference with regard to the statements of English ministers in connection with the facts with which they have to deal is a more dangerous symptom of national decadence than the longest series of political mistakes."

A similar decay of moral fibre is seen in much of our daily literature. The Times has, as usual, become the organ of the Jingoes, and in advocating the Afghan war asserted that the policy advocated by Lord Lawrence, "was too just to be practical." It is to be feared also that the virus has spread far amongst the people, or else such political unrighteousnes would not be tolerated as it is; but the fires of God's righteousness will consume it and cleanse us. We shall have to suffer, indeed we are already within the furnace and feel the scorching flames. Confidence is broken, trade is stagnant, taxes increase, and a cry of distress is rising in the land. We shall find, as of old, that a people cannot suffer its leaders to depart from what is right and just without punishment. JOHN CLIFFORD.

OUR MINISTRY IN 1879.

WE hear that the Rev. Richard Hardy, of Queensbury, near Bradford, has resigned the pastorate. Mr. Hardy's ministry commenced in 1838, and his work at Queensbury ranges from 1841 according to the Year Book. Of the ministers in actual pastoral work amongst us, and the date of whose entrance upon ministerial life is recorded in our annals, only one, the Rev, R. Kenney, belongs to the previous decade, that of the twenties; there are six who date amongst the thirties, ten amongst the forties, twenty-one amongst the fifties, twenty-nine amongst the sixties, and fortyone belong to the present decade. There are others amongst us, some retired from all active work and awaiting the call of the Master to the eternal reward; and others still full of vigour and devotion, and rendering useful service as preachers of the word.

Scraps from the Editor's Caste-Basket.

I. PARLIAMENT has met, debated, decided, and departed. The Queen's Speech was short and insufficient. The debate was one-sided-nearly all the ability and conviction being on one side, and the votes on the other. The "Poor Hindoo" is to pay for our Imperialism. But there are signs that Jingoism is ebbing. Rhodope is the high-water mark. The Bristol election is a prophecy. The country is "coming to itself."

II. THE BISHOPS ON THE WRONG SIDE AGAIN.-Essentially the State ecclesiastic belongs to the church militant, and therefore it is not surprising that the episcopal vote in the Lords is in favour of war upon the Afghans. It is the wrong side, but it is the natural side of the Bishops. They are skilled in warfare, and in the defence of oppression and injustice, as the history of episcopal votes clearly shows. It is their character, and comes of their surroundings. Blackstone said, "It is curious to observe the great address of the ecclesiastics in eluding from time to time the laws (of mortmain) in being, and the zeal with which successive parliaments have pursued them through all their finesses; how new remedies were still the parents of new evasions." Is it not the same finesse which enables bishops to see a department of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in the death-spreading sword? We give the names of the Afghan evangelizers-Bangor, Chichester, Gloucester and Bristol, Hereford, St. Albans, St. David's, Peterborough, and London. Oxford had the temerity to vote for righteousness and peace! Think of a Bishop doing that!

III. "THE BULWARK OF PROTESTANTISM."-Mr. Orby Shipley has gone home, i.e., he has gone to Rome. He has long been an exile in the pay of the State Church which is called Protestant. This is the way in which he utters his farewell. "I have long held, I have long taught, nearly every Catholic doctrine not actually denied by the Anglican formularies, and have accepted and helped to revive nearly every Catholic practice not positively forbidden. In short, intellectually and in externals, so far as I could as a loyal English clergyman, I have believed and acted as a Catholic." The interesting seceder further says:"I have reason to know that there are a large number of persons of High-Church principles in the Church of England who still occupy a similar position to the one which I lately occupied." No doubt

"the Church of England is worth preserving," if only to make Roman Catholics; but it would be quite as well if a Protestant nation were not charged with the cost of preservation. Let the Church pay for itself, and then its Roman Catholic manufactories may go on unimpeded. We neither wish to fetter thought nor to support errors that destroy men and nations.

IV. THE TEMPERANCE v. TOTAL ABSTINENCE CONTROVERSY in the Contemporary does not advance much. It remains almost where it was left in the last number. Dr. Murchison says, "My experience has led me to the conclusion that alcohol, taken in what is usually regarded as moderation, is more or less directly the cause of the ailments which, in this country, render life miserable, and bring it to an early close." "I may sum up my opinions on the utility of alcohol to man in health and in disease in these few words: (1) A man who is in good health does not require it, and is probably better without it. Its occasional use will do him no harm; its habitual use, even in moderation, may, and often does, induce disease, gradually. There are a large number of persons in modern society to whom alcohol, even in moderate quantity, is a positive poison. (3.) In all conditions of the system characterized by weakness of the circulation the daily use of a small quantity of alcohol is likely to be beneficial, at all events, for a time. Alcohol, were its use restricted in accordance with these views, would, in my opinion, be productive of much good; but when taken in accordance with the fashion and opinions which are prevalent, it is to be feared that the good which it confers is incalculably surpassed by the evil which it inflicts upon the human race." We shall keep our pledge unless something stronger than this can be said.

(2.)

V. PASTORAL VISITATION.-J. L. D. makes the following suggestion: "I think you justly remark that the discussion on pastoral visitation would not be complete without the views of the 'laity' in the matter. As a layman I beg permission to say a few words which may or may not, after being buried in your waste-basket, spring up in our Mag. Surely the supreme office of our ministers is to be pastors; and without personal intercourse I fail to see how the pastor will discover what are the peculiar wants of those by whom he is surrounded; that the intercourse may be