they are obliged to admit of none but such as are approved of and authorized by general consent in their church. The safest and truest way, however, is to observe none but such as are authorized by the Written Word itself. Traditions are like dead knowledges which only require a ceremonial performance, but effect no internal change of the spirit, and hence they pervert the truth oftener than they explain it. A man may, by a traditionary custom, wash his bodily hands with water before eating bread, but this does not affect his interior; for the powers of his mind, which are the hands of his spirit, may be unclean, not washed in innocency, and then all his outward washing is nothing but ceremonial hypocrisy! To attempt, then, to explain the Written Word by tradition, is like lighting a taper to behold the sun. Traditions, reader, are the dust of the schools: let thy outward and inward life be regulated entirely by the Written Word of God, and verily thou shalt be blessed for ever.
April Sixth.
INSCRIPTION ON THE CROSS.
"The king of the Jews."—Mark xv. 26.
IT has been stated by unbelievers, and brought forward as an objection to Revelation, that many things written in the Bible, are contradictory, discordant, and unworthy the wisdom of a Divine Being. This is thought sufficient by them to reject, as spurious, any written revelation. Such a hasty rejection is both unsafe, and unwise; for Divine Revelation is
