THE following is our hostile problem or hypothesis :We believe that MAMMON, the god of wealth, the spirit or genius of that wealth which is the key to all those worldly advantages which the Bishop of London appreciates so highly, is ANTICHRIST is the very arch ANTAGONIST of the Christian Dispensation now on the earth-that this is his character, his office, province, practice, to you, Christian reader, to us, to the state, to the church, to the parliament, to the bar, to the press, to the camp, to the stage, to all the civilized circles of the world, to our age, times, and nation.

We shall dissect this momentous problem, and see whether we cannot sustain and establish it upon a testimony, an evidence, which no rational man, or enlightened Christian, can gainsay with effect.

This hostile apothegm or hypothesis contains the following Five Particulars:

1. There is such a word incorporated in our English

language as MAMMON; and this word is a noun substantive, singular number, and has respect to person.

2. The proper meaning or signification of the word MAMMON, is god of wealth-the spirit, genius, or demon of worldly riches.

3. There is actually such a person, spirit, genius, demon, or being, as MAMMON, extant and everywhere present in all Christian communities.

4. This person, MAMMON, the god of wealth, is also the god of the world, the master spirit and ruling genius of all our worldly institutions, the prince of the power of the air, inflating and polluting the political atmosphere, which fills the court, the church, the senate, the camp, the city.

5. This person, MAMMON, the god of wealth, the god of the world, is, in an especial, radical, and evangelical sense of the word, ANTICHRIST-the Antagonist, the actual, potential, personal, revealed, denounced Antagonist of Almighty God under the Christian Dispensation.

THE TWO FIRST POINTS

OF OUR APOTHEGM can

give no offence, and therefore may be left to stand alone. We need to give no testimonies in support of these positions, because there is not any honest Lexicon which will not bear us out in the above definitions.

THE THIRD POSITION, that there actually exists such an entity or being as MAMMON, may be disputed.

But the question is decided by the word, the eternal word, of Jesus of Nazareth. Our divine Lord and Master has declared

"No man can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. YE CANNOT SERVE GOD AND MAMMON.”

The Evangelist tells us that when the Pharisees heard this-the Pharisees, "who were covetous"-they derided the teacher, and despised the testimony. And in order that our evidence may not be shaken by the exposition of any modern Mammonized Christian, we must insist upon it, that this fact-the real existence of such an agent as Mammon-has the word, the immutable and sacred word of the Most High for its basis. It is essential to the wisdom and the integrity of the testimony so given, that both these antagonist Masters should have the same real being. To suppose that the first is a real existence, and that the latter is a fictitious, unreal creature, is at once to assail the intelligence and truth of the Redeemer's dictum. The testimony to personal existence in the latter case, is equally invincible and decisive with the testimony in the former case. This testimony, we submit, is so clear, so specific, and so conclusive to our point, as to need neither corroboration nor exposition.

Our fourth proposition is,-That this being, MAMMON, the god of wealth, is also the god of the world— the master-spirit and ruling genius of all our worldly institutions, the prince of the power of the air, inflating and polluting the political atmosphere which fills the court, the church, the senate, the camp, the city.

This is a bold saying, no doubt; but how do we show that it is true-literally and practically true? Why, we appeal, in the first place, to common experience and daily observation, drawn from the practice of the world. Who that mixes in the busy scenes of life-who that reflects deeply upon the reports of our every-day transactions does not see and feel the truth of our apothegm? Wealth is the basis, wealth is the cement, wealth is the prime materiel of that which we significantly call our political constitution; wealth is the Primum Mobile of human transactions and affairs. What cannot wealth in this world accomplish! How little can be done without it? What respect does wealth receive, even when associated with personal worthlessness and moral corruption? What contempt is cast upon poverty, though it may be connected with every human virtue and excellence? Is not worldly influence almost invariably co-extensive with worldly wealth? Who can exercise influence who is destitute of wealth? Subserviency to wealth is the distinctive characteristic of our world.

The Word of God sets it down axiomatically and plainly, that "Covetousness is Idolatry;" and observa

tion convinces us that this idolatry is commensurate with the world. And its mighty power controls and directs the very individuals who are often the most disposed to doubt and to deny its existence. It has been very well remarked by one of the most modern Ashdod assailants of Mammon, that the vicious principle in which worldlings indulge, is "so subtle that you cannot lay hold of it, so as to render it tangible. It is so deeply seated, that you cannot draw it from its hiding-place, to make it visible in the face of day. You may convince a man who goes on in a regular course of licentiousness and intemperance of the folly and wickedness of his conduct, by showing him the inevitable miseries to which it leads, even in the present life. But we have no such hold on the covetous. reply to every argument, he will tell you, that what we call covetousness is only a necessary prudence to augment his estate, and secure it from danger, to provide for the wants of his family, and leave something to his children when he is gone; and that persons of good repute in probity and wisdom, are found prosecuting a similar course."*

In

Thus Mammon deludes, while it governs; thus Mammon is the deceiver, as well as the despot of the world.

From the evidence of experience and observation, we turn to the opinions of our most enlightened philosophers in political economy.

* Christian Beneficence, by Thomas Dick, LL.D., p. 330.