But here our thanks to John must cease. His phenomenal wickedness had done the world all the good it could. He did not mean it, of course. When he had signed the charter, and as soon as the Army of God had dispersed, he sent to the Pope for absolution from his oath, and to the continent for an army of murderers and marauders. He hurled upon his realm the excommunications of the Church and the torch and sword of his mercenaries. He went through England from end to end, as if determined to annihilate all life and property in his wild, insatiable revenge. His career of ruin was short. We regret that it could not have been terminated by the sword of justice, instead of by nature, and so have rounded up the measure of retribution. But every writer and every reader of English history, from that day to this, has in thought and wish constituted himself John’s executioner, and, setting off against the glory of Runnymede his detestable career, has learned to loathe injustice, treachery, cowardice, and sin in high places. [To be continued.] * * * * * We can not be just if we are not kind.—_Vauvenargues. SUNDAY READINGS. SELECTED BY THE REV. J. H. VINCENT, D. D. [_January 7._] HISTORY OF GOD’S BOOK. By REV. FRANK RUSSELL, A. M. The word of God began to be spoken to the first of the race in Eden, and such is the beginning of the Bible. It was only a spoken word, doubtless, for nearly twenty-five hundred years. From generation to generation through all the patriarchal ages it was preserved by fathers carefully teaching it to their children. Many fragments may have been lost, but it is no taxation of our belief that for many centuries much of the early Word may have been carefully treasured through the exercise of memory. We know of marvelous instances of the power of memory. It is supposed that the works of Homer, an elaborate poem with careful divisions, were preserved for centuries in critical form, by one generation repeating it to the next while it was unwritten. It does not bear the marks of change during these generations of its history, but is unique, precise, and giving every evidence of being the original work of one author, Homer. Sir Robert Peel is stated to have been able to listen to a speech in Parliament one and a half or two hours long, and then repeat it all verbatim, and it is also said at the present time that Gladstone has learned Homer so thoroughly that on hearing any line of it repeated he is able at once to repeat the following and the preceding line. Now Shem lived upon the earth after he came out of the ark five hundred years, and could have thoroughly taught the new race in Asia the story. Snatches of song and old tales which he related might have been verbally composed in the antediluvian period, and many think that specimens of the same still hold their place, set like pearls in the earliest Scripture writings. There is little