motive, but can find no basis on any other system or right action than that of spiritual faith. A man may craze his thoughts and his brain to thoughtlessness in such poor harbourage as fame and reputation may stretch before him-a woman, where can she put her hope, while passing through trials, storms, and tribulations, if not in heaven?

And that sweet truthfulness-that abiding love-that enduring hope, mellowing every scene of life, lighting them with the most pleasant radiance when the world's cold storms break like an army with cannon-who can bestow it all but a holy soul, tied to what is stronger than an army with cannon? Who, that has enjoyed the love of a godly mother, but will echo the thought with energy, and hallow it with a tear?

The worldly being has no points where Divine grace can reach him. Take away the object of his ambition, and he is soured; add to it, and he becomes intoxicated. Send him sickness, and he only writhes like a wounded snake. But the unsealing of the human heart by cutting off its earthly objects of love, turns the foundation of that love direct to heaven. The bereaved soul looks its heavenly Parent in the face because of its chastisement. Sacred, indeed, then, is that heavenfire whose presence gives happiness on earth, and even whose extinguishment serves to open the vision of eternal glory and reward in heaven.

UP AND TO WORK! ALTHOUGH you were a backward scholar, you may yet become a bright man. The loss may be fully repaired. Nothing is impossible to devout labour, carried on with vigorous perseverance. "What is the use of thee, thou gnarled sapling?" said a young larch tree to a young oak. "I grow three feet in a year, thou scarcely as many inches; I am straight and taper as a reed, thou straggling and twisted as a loosened withe." "And thy duration," answered the oak, "is some third part of man's life, and I am appointed to flourish for a thousand years. Thou art felled and sawn into paling, when thou rottest, and art burned after a single summer; of me are fashioned battle-ships, and I carry mariners and heroes into unknown seas." The richer a nature, the hardier and slower its development. Two boys were once of a class in the Edinburgh Grammar School-John ever trim, precise, and dux; Walter ever slovenly, confused, and dolt. In due time, John became Bailie John of Huntersquare; and Walter became Sir Walter Scott of the universe. The quickest and completest of all vegetables is the cabbage.

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With ordinary parts, such as belong to the bulk of mankind, none need despair of the qualifications necessary to eminent usefulness. The diversities which appear among men are much less the result of nature than of culture. Up, then, up, and to work! A PLODDER.

body by this emasculating drug, when its energies, in full force, should be given to God, and the good of our perishing race? What right have you to use a drug whose tendency is completely anti-vital, and which may cut short your life ten years, or twenty?

5. Religion bids you give the world a good example.-It has been said that ninety-nine victims in a hundred acquire this habit from infectious example. Be this as it may, the example of men in your position is unspeakably powerful and pernicious. It has power to sweep multitudes of young men down to death. "Father," said a little boy, "why do you chew tobacco?" "Because I love it," was the reply. The son chewed it, learned to love it, and thus ruined his health and embittered his whole life with disease. I saw a little boy with a cigar, puffing like a steam-engine. "Why do you smoke?" I inquired. "Father smokes, and I'll smoke, Sir," was the reply. The cry on every hand is, "Cure fathers, cure church members, cure men of influence; when they drop it, we will 'follow suit.'

a slave to tobacco; no longer make yourself the song of the drunkard by intoxication on your quid or pipe.

7. Religion bids you to be pure and Christ-like.-To use tobacco is defiling, is demoralising. It is a heathenish abomination, and you cannot respect yourself as its victim. Do you think you please Christ by using it? Do you think Christ would have allowed John to lean on His bosom, had he used it? Do you think the apostles used it? Are you willing this should be written on your tombstone: "Here lies a Christian, who cut short his days by the use of Tobacco?" Is this epitaph becoming for a Christian ?

8. Religion bids you to be entirely devoted to God.-The use of this pernicious drug forbids this. If you used it early, and have used it long, it has become with you the king of appetites. You love it better than honey, or milk, or bread, or wine, or the choicest fruits. It is usually the last thing which engages your heart at night, and it is among the first things which claim your fond regards in the morning. Birds may fill the air with music, flowers may load it with perfume, the sun may surpass himself in the beauty of his brightness; but you cannot enjoy the one or the other very much, nor God, their glorious author, till you have appeased a giant appetite which has dominion over you. "Be not deceived!" my brother. Think not that you love God with all your heart when this idol has such supremacy in your soul. Talk not of aspirations for "holiness," assurance, and "sanctification,"

"full

IF you are for pleasure, marry—if you prize rosy health, marry-and even if money be your object, marry. A good wife is heaven's best gift to man-his angel and minister of graces innumerable his gem of many virtues-his casket of many jewels-her voice his sweetest music -her smile his brightest day-her kiss the guardian of his innocenceher arms the pale of his safety, the palm of his life-her industry his surest wealth-her economy his safest steward-her lips his faithful counsellors-her bosom the safest pillow of his cares-and her prayers the ablest advocates of heaven's blessings on his head. Jeremy Taylor.

iniquity." "Take hold," Christianlike, and help us wake the Church, and wake the Nation, to this great and fearful evil.

ON FEMALE TALENT. "IF young ladies of the higher classes are merely instructed in the fine arts of life and of society, and are besides free from the prosaic cares of housekeeping, they certainly may bloom and develope into fascinating beauties, who can delight society and the world at large, and entrance their lovers, but can be of little use to their future husbands. In the same manner, trees without any earth, and nourished only by water, air, and light, can indeed

blossom, but will bear no fruit. Therefore, even to the most delicately brought up among your daughters, give solid instruction of all kinds, which shall cultivate their minds and hearts, and fit them to fill their places in creation as human beings, and in society as young ladies. Teach them, literally as well as figuratively, to cook plain food, as well as to bake fine confectionery, although they will probably prefer the latter occupation to the former; for the latter brings its own reward, is a more rare accomplishment, and will procure for them more praise from the guests at their father's table."

DISCIPLINE IN CHILDHOOD. YOUNG people, who have been habitually gratified in all their desires, will infallibly take it more amiss when the feelings or happiness of others require that they should be thwarted, than those who have been practically trained to the habit of subduing and restraining them; and consequently will, in general, sacrifice the happiness of others to their own selfish indulgence. To what else is the selfishness of princes and other great people to be

attributed? It is in vain to think of cultivating principles of generosity and beneficence by mere exhortation and reasoning. Nothing but the practical habit of overcoming our own selfishness, and of familiarly encountering privations and discomfort on account of others, will ever enable us to do it when required. And, therefore, I am firmly persuaded that indulgence infallibly produces selfishness and hardness of heart, and that nothing but a pretty severe discipline and control can lay the foundation of a magnanimous character.-Lord Jeffrey.

DOMESTIC LIFE IN THE MIDDLE AGES.

RUDE were the manners then; a man and his wife ate off the same trencher; a few wooden-handled knives, with blades of rugged iron, were a luxury for the great; candles were unknown. A servant girl held a torch at supper; one or two mugs of coarse brown earthenware formed all the drinking apparatus in a house. Rich gentlemen wore clothes of unlined leather. Ordinary persons scarcely ever touched flesh meat.

Noble mansions drank little or no wine in the summer; a little corn seemed wealth. Women had trivial marriage portions; even ladies dressed extremely plain. The chief part of a family's expenses was what the males spent in arms and horses, none of which, however, were very good or very showy; and grandees had to lay out money on their lofty

towers.

In Dante's comparatively polished times, ladies began to paint their cheeks by way of finery, going to the theatre, and to use less assiduity in spinning and playing distaff. What is only a symptom of prosperity in large, is the sure sign of ruin in small States. So, in Florence, he might very well deplore what in London or Paris would be praised or cause a smile. Wretchedly, indeed, plebeians hoveled; and if noble castles were cold and dreary everywhere, they were infinitely worse in Italy, from the horrible modes of torture and characteristic cruelty, too frightful to dwell on. Few of the infamous structures built at the time treated of, stand at present, yet their ruins disclose rueful

corners.

WE are assured by the highest authority that "the memory of the just is blessed." To record their names, then, and to speak of their virtues, can be no unprofitable task. It is at once our duty and our privilege, and it should excite our grati

tude to God, that in this world of sin and death, where iniquity so greatly abounds, He not only perpetuates a faithful seed, but also makes some the subjects of distinguished piety, so that they are "epistles of Christ, known and read of all men." Such