THE GOSPEL STANDARD, OR FEEBLE CHRISTIAN'S SUPPORT. VOL. V., 1839. MANCHESTER: JOHN GADSBY, NEWALL'S-BUILDINGS, MARKET-STREET. LONDON: R. GROOMBRIDGE, PANYER-ALLEY, PATERNOSTER-ROW. 1839. Reader, 154. R. T., 164, 210. S., 157. Sarah, 186. Sinner Saved, 141. Smoking Flax, 97, 267. Soldier, 25. Southall, 48. S. Turner, 37. S. S., 39. T. F., 66. Thomas Kingham, 86. Three Poor Sinners, 260. T. Nicholson, 176. Teacher of Babes, 196. Watchman, 207. Weakling, 20, 89. W. J. B., 280. W. T., 60, 111, 206, 244. POETRY. T. F., 120. W., 95. Watchman, 47, 119. W. G., 262. Pensioner, 72. Sarah, 24. W. L., 119. Teacher of Babes, 96. W. W., 240. THE GOSPEL STANDARD, OR, FEEBLE CHRISTIAN'S SUPPORT. "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness; for they shall be filled."-Matt. v. 6. "Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began."-2 Tim. i. 9. "The election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded."-Rom. xi. 7. "If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest.—And they went down both into the water, both Philip and the eunuch; and he baptized him.—In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost."-Acts viii. 37, 38; Matt. xxviii. 19. No. 37. JANUARY, 1839. VOL. V. AN ADDRESS TO OUR READERS. If our Magazine is, as we wish it to be, a living work, it will bear a certain resemblance to, and be, in a certain measure, a counterpart of, a living man. It will, therefore, have its ebbs and flows, its sunny spots and its gloomy shades, its dewy moments and its barren seasons, its green pastures and its desert sands, its heavenly testimonies and its earthly witnesses, (Job xvi. 8,) its law in the mind and its law in the members. To expect, then, perfection from us, is to expect what we utterly disclaim. We leave that to Wesleyan publications. The ground we wish to stand upon is the ground of life. Truth in the letter is good, because opposed to error; but truth in the letter alone will not satisfy us. We want something more than mere truth; something far above it, and far beyond it. We want clothed truth, which is as far beyond naked truth, as a living man is beyond a dead skeleton. A frame of dry bones is but an unsightly object, even though none be wanting, and each be in its place. It is only fit to hang up in a hospital museum for a surgeon to lecture medical students upon. And thus, however firmly attached we are to the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, we confess we turn away from the dry lectures of those Calvinistic authors and preachers, who always write and speak as if they had a skeleton ever hung up before their eyes, without a single particle of living flesh on its bones, or a single drop of life-blood coursing through its arteries. The mysteries of vital godliness, the heavenly secrets which are with the righteous, the blessed incomings from the fountain of life |