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colleges, a regular correspondence was kept up between them; and, as the completion of his term at college drew nigh, the time for their marriage was fixed. Influenced, however, it would appear, by an opportunity of forming a connexion that promised a larger amount of worldly advantage, this young man basely withdrew from his engagement. To the subject of this memorial the trial was an exceedingly painful one, and her health was for a time seriously affected by it. Some of her friends advised her to seek legal redress; and one of them even

offered to bear the cost of the action. She, however, declined to have recourse to any such measure; and, after the example of her Lord, "committed herself to Him who judgeth righteously."

The events of subsequent years satisfied her that she had taken the

right course, and made it clearly manifest that "all things" do "work together for good"-for the best

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to them that love God." The individual who had thus grievously wronged her, received that recompence of his error, which was in such a case to be expected: his matrimonial and domestic happiness, in after years, suffered sad interruptions. In this he probably saw the hand of God chastising him for his sin; a sin for which, it is hoped, like David, he sought and obtained forgiveness, yet the bitter consequences of which, like David, he was not permitted wholly to escape.

Let this be a warning to all, especially professors of religion, who may in a similar manner be tempted. Wrong doing, sooner or later, will

inevitably bring its own punishment; and they who estimate wealth or position too highly, will ever find that when, to attain them, they swerve from the path of strict integrity, disappointment and unhappiness will assuredly be the result. The person alluded to long maintained his position as a Christian minister; and that he was in the main a true servant of Christ, there! is no wish to call in question. His course was terminated long ago, and nearly sixty years have passed since the occurrence of this transaction; otherwise, this mention of it might not have been advisable.

Deborah, having learned the business of a dressmaker, was engaged, for two or three years after her great trial, in a respectable situation, with a pious family at Colchester. Coming to London on business, towards the close of that period, she met, apparently by accident, a young man whom she had known, though not intimately, at Salisbury, and who had occupied a seat in the same pew at Scott's-lane Chapel. This casual interview led to an acquaintance resulting in marriage. In Mr. William Robbins she found a suitable and affectionate husband. They were blessed with a family of six children, three of whom died young, leaving three daughters surviving, all for many years maintaining an honourable Christian profession, and following in their mother's steps, as she followed Christ.

For many years, Mr. and Mrs. Robbins were members of the church of Christ at New-court, Carey-street, London, then enjoying the ministry of the eminent Dr. Robert Winter,

In the Sunday school connected with this place, a daughter of the respected family at Colchester with whom, years before, Deborah had found a happy home, was at that time a teacher. By the invitation of this kind friend, her children, when very young, were led to the school presided over by the well-known and excellent Mr. W. F. Lloyd, of the Religious Tract Society. On the death of the venerable pastor of that church, in 1833, Mrs. R. became a member of the church at John-street, Bedford-row-the preaching of its pastor, the late Rev. H. J. Evans, having for her a peculiar attraction. In consequence of Mr. Robbins' declining health, in 1841 they went to reside with their daughter at Hendon. Here they took a lively interest in the religious services in connexion with a small chapel then existing, until the present more commodious one was erected, under the auspices of T. Spalding, Esq. In 1847 she was called to part with her beloved companion, with whom she had lived in uninterrupted harmony forty-three years. She bore the trial with the spirit of a Christian. Thenceforth, her thirteen years of widowhood very nearly resembled those of Anna, the prophetess, "who departed not from the temple, but served God with fastings and prayers night and day."-Luke ii. 36, 37. She had nearly attained the same age-" fourscore and four years,"when the time of her departure came. Her death was sudden, and it was peaceful. She was one of "those who, through fear of death, are all their life-time subject to bondage." -Heb. ii. 15. And yet, when "the

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last enemy" actually arrived, he was divested of all his terrors. Her death was but a translation from earth to heaven-from the infirmities and sorrows of frail mortality, to the perfected joys of everlasting life. Why should sudden death be regarded by the Christian as an event to be so much dreaded? To one who is habitually ready, particularly in a case like the present, it seems a thing rather to be desired. Ripe for glory, she was waiting for the coming of her Lord. He came suddenly, at length, and "absent from the body," she was "present with the Lord."

The testimony of a consistent life is far more conclusive than that of a death-bed. Deborah Robbins was, through her long life, a humble, intelligent, active, cheerful Christian; always ready to visit and to console the sick and sorrowful, and using to good purpose her influence over others. She had a retentive memory, a pleasing address, and good conversational powers. These, being combined with unobtrusive piety, and ever under the guidance of Christian principle, rendered her company attractive, and intercourse with her edifying in a high degree. She retained her mental faculties, and kept them bright by exercise to the last. She was favoured also with the use of her bodily faculties of sight and hearing to the close of life. On the forenoon of her last day on earth, her unimpaired strength of memory was shown in a recapitulation, to one of her daughters, of the principal circumstances of her early history.

The Rev. T. Fison, the respected minister of the Independent church

at Hendon, whose pastoral visits she much enjoyed, improved the death of the aged saint, in a sermon from Phil. i. 21, "To die is gain." This "mother in Israel" gone to her rest, Her course of usefulness on

earth is now ended. May we "Be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises."-Heb. vi. 12. J. B.

Essex.

The Counsel Chamber.

A DANGEROUS HABIT.

YOUNG MEN!-One of the crying evils of our day is the extreme prevalence of the habit of smoking. It is still everywhere on the increase, and threatens to become co-extensive with the manhood of the nation. It seems so thoroughly established, that the idea of uprooting it is all but hopeless. Its effects are such as to blunt the moral sense, and incapacitate its victim for rightly apprehending his true condition. It is matter for great satisfaction, however, that medical men are beginning to deal with the subject as one of a most serious character. Such is the case in Great Britain, in France, and in America.

From a book entitled "The Use and Abuse of Tobacco," by John Lizars, late Professor of Surgery to the Royal College of Surgeons, and lately Senior Operating Surgeon to the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh, we extract the following:

"Sailors and navvies smoke more than any other class. It does not appear to affect the nervous of either of these classes. The miner uses above eight ounces per month. Often breathing an impure air, the tone of his system is lowered, and then tobacco exerts its banefuj

influence on him. He is subject to dyspeptic, bilious, and nervous attacks, while those who do not smoke are invariably the healthiest,

"Now, let the sailor or navvy take to sedentary employment, and in a short time tobacco-smoking begins to affect him as it does the man of sedentary habits. His hand begins to shake, his mouth feels clammy, and he has a bad taste in it; he loses to a great extent his fine gustatory sense; his appetite becomes capricious; he feels languid and indolent; his memory becomes confused; he has cardiac disturbance. A strong constitution may resist it a few years, but ultimately gives way. It is generally supposed that those who labour in the open air are exempted from its bad effects. This is only the case in certain conditions. They must be well fed. On the labourer with low wages it exerts its baneful influence -first, from its own effects; secondly, from squandering a large portion that which should go to nourish him, whereby he is still further debilitated.

"I may mention a curious fact, not generally known, but which requires only to be tried to be proved,

namely, that no smoker can think steadily or continually on any subject while smoking. He cannot follow out a train of ideas-to do so he must lay aside his pipe.

"On the question of smoking, Professor Lizars quotes from a brother professor these words:

"I know of no single vice which does so much harm as smoking. It is a snare and a delusion. It soothes the excited, nervous system at the time, to render it more irritable and more feeble ultimately. It is like opium in that respect; and if you want to know all the wretchedness which this drug can produce, you should read the 'Confessions of an Opium-eater.' I can always distinguish by his complexion a man who smokes much; and the appearance which the fauces present is an unerring guide to the habits of such a man. I believe that cases of general paralysis are more frequent in England than they used to be, and I suspect that smoking tobacco is one of the causes of that in

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Young Men! I appeal to your own good sense if this be not a serious subject. It involves both the mind and the body, religion and health. In the streets of our great cities almost every man and every boy of the populace you meet is smoking. The lowest view of the subject is appalling. The present annual production of tobacco has been estimated at 4,000,000,000 lbs. ! This is smoked, chewed, and snuffed. Suppose it all made into cigars, one hundred to the pound, it would produce 400,000,000,000. The human family thus expend, every year, one

thousand millions of crowns in the gratification of an acquired habit, or about five shillings for every man, woman, and child upon the earth! This sum would build two railroads around the earth, or sixteen railroads from the Atlantic to the Pacific! It would build one hundred thousand church edifices, costing £2,500 each, or half a million of school-houses, costing £500 each; or one million of dwellings, costing £100 each. It would employ one million of preachers and one million of teachers, giving each a salary of £50. The above basis of calculation is in some measure imaginary; call it conjecture, extravagance, just what you please! Cut these down one-half-cut them down to suit your own notions. Even then, if you are a Christian or a patriot, a friend of God or man, you will not trifle with this stupendous iniquity, but, in some manly way, do your part to arrest its destructive power around you.

Young Men! The subject is intimately connected with personal religion, and with the cause of Christ on the earth. Dr. Chalmers truly said that the inhabitants of a Scottish Isle spent many times as much on snuff and tobacco as in promoting the interests of religion! The application of the test to multitudes of professing Christians would lead to a result for which few are prepared. How will this item of personal expenditure stand in the Account at the Final Audit?

Young Men! Consider what I say; and believe me,

Your true friend,

A CHRISTIAN ECONOMIST.

Popery.

ROMAN CATHOLIC STATISTICS.

FROM the new edition of the Catholic Directory for 1860 it appears that the Roman Catholic churches, chapels, and stations where mass is now said amount to 767 in England and Wales, and those in Scotland to 183; giving a total of 950 places of Romish worship in Great Britain. The same authority in 1850 (the year of the Papal aggression) stated the total, ten years ago, at 680, so that the increase has been nearly 50 per cent. During the same period the Roman Catholic clergy, secular and regular, in England and Wales, have increased from 788 to 1077, and those in Scotland from 110 to 154; in other words, the increase for Great Britain has been from 998 to 1235, or rather more than 25 per cent. The growth of convents for women and of religious houses for men has been even more marked; the Directory for 1850 giving a total of only 11 of the latter and 51 of the former, against 37 and 123 respectively in 1860. Hence it appears that monasticism has increased during the last ten years in the ratio of from 62 to 168, or nearly at the rate of 300 per cent. At present there are in Great Britain 12 colleges, all mainly intended for the education of the Roman Catholic priesthood,-for it is well known that the lay education in them is made wholly subservient to that of the "church students," and is consequently at a very low ebb, as far as secular and

classical learning is concerned. The two colleges in Scotland are St. Mary's College, Glasgow; and St. Mary's, Blairs, Kincardineshire.

RELIC WORSHIP IN ROME.

A FEW days ago, the most sacred of all the sacred crucifixes of Rome was paraded in the streets, to fire the people with a glow of holy enthusiasm. As the people believe a great miraculous power resides in that particular piece of wood, the streets were crowded to suffocation, each of the spectators confiding in the wonderful virtues of the crucifix for the furtherance of his plans, whatever their nature and variety might be. The priest supplicated the same object of adoration to perpetuate the rule of the Church and its Austrian protector, while the democrat was in good hopes that the carved figure would interfere in behalf of Garibaldi, Mazzini, or perhaps the excommunicated Victor Emmanuel himself. There is a great moral in such a phenomenon as this. Superstition, when it takes full possession of a man or a race, adapts itself to the peculiar idiosyncrasy of the individual. Mental obfuscation in matters religious has become so dense in the ecclesiastical atmosphere of Rome as to shroud from the vision of the people the very purposes for which it has been fostered. The Virgin Mary may have

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