altogether, was a day which at once rested and braced up both mind and body, and made us better fitted to enter upon the succeeding six days of labor. When it closed, I felt that it had been, in a much truer and higher sense of the term, a day of rest, than if it had been marked by inertia or made different from other days, chiefly by reversing the usual household routine, on the observance of which the order and comfort of a family are so dependent.

Order in the details of our external lives has a higher use than that of merely conducing to the comfort and good. of the natural man. It affords a better basis for the development of the higher and better life, and therefore, Sunday is the very last day on which it should be set aside.

THE STORY OF DAVID BOOTHBY.

THE poems of George Crabbe, styled by Byron "Nature's sternest painter, yet the best," are not now read as much as their merits deserve. His "Village," "Parish Register," and "Tales in verse," are unrivaled for their photographic delineations of the trials and vicissitudes of life among the lowly. His genius, rarely dwelling upon scenes of beauty and grace, was devoted to portraying the circumstances and anatomizing the characters of those upon whom were laid the heavier burdens of life. Among the best of these "Tales in Verse," is the "Story of David Boothby," of parts of which Tennyson's "Enoch Arden " reminds us not a little; but we think Crabbe's poem much the finer of the two. The outline of the story is briefly this: Allen Boothby, the son of David, loves the fair Judith; but he is poor, and the parents of both are averse to their marriage. So, in the hope of speedily winning wealth to warrant him in claiming her as his wife, he accepts what appears a promising opening in the West Indies.

"The faithful Judith his design approved,

For both were sanguine-they were young and loved." Our illustration represents the scene just before he was about to embark :

"Adieu!-Farewell!-Remember! and what more
Affection taught, was uttered from the shore.
But Judith left them with a heavy heart,
Took a last view, and went to weep apart.
And now his friends went slowly from the place,
Where she stood still the dashing oar to trace,
Till all were silent. For the youth she prayed,
And softly then returned the weeping maid.
They parted thus."

....

"But when returned the youth? The youth no more
Returned exulting to his native shore;

But forty years were past, and then there came
A worn-out man, with withered limbs, and lame."

The old man inquires for family, kindred and friends. All were gone. Of Judith, who had waited long and trustfully for his coming back, he was told that

"In her grief she married, and was made
Slave to the wretch whom meekly she obeyed,
And early buried."

SECRET PRAYER.

SO, THEN, God bids you come often from the noise and strife and tumult of life; bids you to come even from the grandeur and circumstance of its public religious worship, and shut the door, that you may pray to your Father in secret. It is there your truest life is lived. It is there strength comes for the toil and weariness of life. It needs not long for this; not long to gather round you the sweet

sense of Fatherhood which shall make the whole day sacred and your work a service to God. You know before you start away in the morning to your toil you have only time, perhaps, for a loving word or two to your wife, and a hasty kiss for the little ones. But how much love you may put in those few words, and what sweet memory those little kisses leave all the day long! And so a moment or two of solemn speech with God, before the great tide of busy life flows in upon the soul, one short clasp of the Father's hand, one quick glance into his holy, loving eyes, will make the whole day sacred. We need no long prayers to bring us the sweet sense of God's Fatherhood, the hidden, secret communion of Him who is ever with us. I walk with my friend through a bustling, crowded street, and though I speak no word to him, the close pressure of his hand upon my arm, from time to time, tells me all I want to know. The little child, too, holding my hand through a long Summer walk, he looks up into my face, now and then. I look down into his, and in that look how much is said! what compact of trust and love! what bright assurance that all is fair and calm and pleasant between us! So a good man walks with God.-Rev. Geo. Dawson.

My life flows on in endless song; above earth's lamentation,
I catch the sweet, though far-off hymn, that hails a new crea-
tion ;

Above the tumult and the strife I hear the music ringing,
It finds an echo in my soul; how can I keep from singing ?

THEOLOGY.

WHERE the philosophy ends theology begins. The former is the knowledge of the natural, the latter is the knowledge of the supernatural. The one is the science of reason, the other is the science of revelation. But the natural points to the supernatural as the only rational explanation of its existence. So the body points to the soul, which animates and uses it as its organ; the law presupposes a law-giver, the creature is inconceivable without a Creator. Reason's highest function is to prove the necessity of a revelation. Philosophy teaches that there may be a God, and that there ought to be a God; that man may be immortal, and ought to be immortal. Theology knows that there is a God, and that man is immortal for weal or woe. Physiology cannot deny the terrible fact of sin and the moral disorder of the universe; but it cannot explain it, and still less, remedy it. Theology knows both the poison and the antidote.

To him who knows from experience that he is a sinner, justly exposed to the wrath of a holy God, and who believes that Christ is his Saviour, who satisfies all his spiritual wants and aspirations, the objections of infidelity have as little weight as water upon a rock or paper balls upon a fort.-Dr. Schaff.

CHRISTIAN faith is a grand cathedral, with divinely pictured windows. Standing without, you see no glory, nor can possibly imagine any; standing within, every ray of light reveals a harmony of unspeakable splendors.-Haw. thorne.

A MAN may talk virtuously, but if he lives in secret an impure life, his unconscious influence for evil will destroy the effect of his words. Character influences independently of its professions, and this influence of character is the heaviest weight in the scale of life.

his wife of adultery could bring her before the priest, and if she denied the crime could cause her to drink of the "bitter water that causeth the curse," this water being prepared by the priest in a prescribed manner. If she was innocent, the potion would be harmless; if she was guilty, it would produce inward mortification and external ulceration. Something like this kind of ordeal is common among the African tribes.

The ordeal by water, the invention of which is ascribed to Pope Eugenius II. (A.D. 824), was of two kinds. In the one, the arm of the accused was thrust into hot water, and then bound up and securely sealed. In three days the wrappings were removed, and if there was no trace of a scald, the person was adjudged to be innocent. In the other form of ordeal by water, the accused was thrown into a pond or stream. If he floated, without swimming, he was guilty; if he sank, he was innocent. An ordeal of this last kind was practiced until a comparatively recent time in the case of persons suspected of witchcraft. The right arm of the victim was bound to his left leg, and he was thrown into the water; if he floated, the charge was held proven.

In medieval Europe, the most usual form of ordeal was that by fire. This, says Blackstone, "was performed either by taking up in the hand a piece of red-hot iron of one, two or three pounds' weight, or else by walking barefoot and blindfold over nine red-hot plowshares laid lengthwise at unequal distances; and if the party escaped unhurt, he was adjudged innocent; but if it happened otherwise, as without collusion it generally did, he was then condemned as guilty." The ordeal by fire was the one commonly used among the higher classes, and there are upon record many instances in which noble ladies vindicated themselves by this means from accusations of unchastity.

The particular incident represented in our illustration, occurred in A.D. 998, when Mary, Countess of Modena, is said to have vindicated herself, in this manner, before the Emperor Otho the Red. In this case, a brazier filled with burning coals was substituted for the iron bar. "Holding this at arm's-length before her," so runs the legend, "she began her march, the abbot going slowly before her, as if to prevent her from proceeding too quickly, while from time to time he made the sign of the cross in the air, and continually repeated prayers below his breath. In this manner, her face expressing no sign of pain, but rather a radiant joy, she made the entire circuit of the vast hall, and in the end, approached the tripod, and placed the brazier upon it; and at the same moment a cloth was bound about her hands, and she was led to a seat. For five minutes the Abbot continued to sprinkle the bandage with holy water; then he unbound her hands and examined

THE ORDEAL BY FIRE.

them. No sign of fire appeared upon any part of them; no blister or wound of any kind was seen; even the delicate hairs upon the fingers were unsinged, and the hands were as fair and white as before the awful trial.

The ordeal of battle which plays so prominent a part in history and romance, seems to have been unknown among the ancients, except among a Spanish tribe mentioned by Livy. It spread, however, with the institution of the Order of Chivalry, and was introduced into England at the Norman Conquest. The Church early set its face against this mode of ordeal. Decretals were issued against it by Pope Alexander III. in 1179, by Innocent III. in 1215, and Louis IX. of France issued an ordinance against it in 1260; but it was occasionally practiced down to the beginning of the sixteenth century.

Among the other kinds of ordeal may be mentioned that of the bier, which was not uncommon in cases of murder down to the last century. The body of the murdered man was laid upon a bier, and the person suspected of being the murderer was obliged to touch the corpse. If blood flowed from the wound, or foam appeared at the mouth, or if the body moved, it was held to be a proof of the guilt of the accused. Though no longer legally recognized, this superstition is not even now wholly extinct. A special ordeal,

called the "corsned," was sometimes practiced by ecclesiastics. A bit of bread or cheese, loaded with anathemas, was given to the accused, along with the consecrated elements, and it was believed that if the person were guilty he could not swallow it. An ordeal practiced in Malabar consists in forcing the accused to swim across a stream infested with crocodiles. The Institutes of Menu contain the following directions: "According to the nature of the case, let the judge cause him who is under trial to take fire in his hand, or to plunge in water, or to touch separately the heads of his wife and of his children. Whom the flame burns not, whom the water rejects not from its depths, whom misfortune does not speedily overtake, his oath shall be received as undoubted."

In Japan, besides the ordeal of fire, accused persons were sometimes forced to swallow a paper inscribed with mysterious characters, and if he was guilty it was supposed that he would suffer extreme torment until he confessed. In Siam the accused and the accuser are sometimes placed together in an arena, and a tiger let loose upon them. If only one is killed, the other is held to be innocent; if both are killed, both are guilty. In Madagascar, up to 1862, the accused was made to drink the decoction of a poisonous fruit, a small dose of which acts as an emetic, while a large one is fatal. By managing the quantity administered, the officials could, of course, decide the result of the ordeal.

The idea underlying the whole matter is, that, when thus solemnly called upon, a just God would certainly interfere to save the innocent and punish the guilty. In Enggland at least, according to Blackstone, the ordeal could be performed by a deputy. This was certainly the case in respect to the ordeal by battle, when either party could appear by champion. The combat between Ivanhoe and Bois Guilbert, in Scott's novel, will recur to every one. When the ordeal was by deputy, the principal was bound by the result; the person who, for hire or from friendship, actually underwent the ordeal, suffering only the physical pain involved. Our language has preserved a memento of this practice in the expression "to go through fire and water to serve one."

MR. BRYANT'S LAST TEMPERANCE SPEECH. DURING the closing six months of his life Mr. Bryant took deep interest in the Crosby movement in New York, and on several occasions identified himself actively in movements for the suppression of drinking and the reformation of the fallen. Indeed, all his life has been an exemplification of the principles of temperate living. His pen, too, has always pleaded the side of better customs. Some of the rarest of his many heart-stirring hymns and poems are prayers in behalf of the fallen and the tempted.

A few weeks before his death he made a simple but feeling speech at a temperance meeting, in which he said that his mind for several days had been dwelling upon the fate of a man whose sad death had recently been reported in the newspapers. In early life, with education, business capacities, and good opportunities, he had made a place for himself among business men, and his prospects were very bright. Moderate drinking had led him to the drunkard's fate, and at last he ended his life by suicide. "Now, my friends," Mr. Bryant continued, "there was a time when this man could have ceased his habits of drinking, when the cup had over him no power so great that he could not have broken from it. But then total abstinence was his only hope. When the thirst for alcohol has been kindled in a man's throat, total abstinence is the only thing that can save him. For him to continue

his indulgence is as if a man should discover incipient fire in his house, and should say, 'I will delay a little longer before I attempt to extinguish it.' It will soon have made such headway that he cannot extinguish it.

"Another thought in regard to this man who committed suicide: He not only was led by example, doubtless, to his ruin, but he, in turn, led many others. The power of example is incalculable. A man who is licentious makes many licentious; he who is dishonest produces dishonesty in others. Influential men of convivial habits, who have not yet become drunkards, are the ones to be feared. Those men who can drink freely and never appear to feel the effects of it, are the men who are very dangerous. But they must ultimately pass beyond this stage. The man who makes himself an habitual drinker signs his own death-warrant. Let all, my friends, shun this evil."

A SCRIPTURAL ACROSTIC.

T HUS saieth the Lord:

Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.
Except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.
S peak the things that become sound doctrine-
Until I come in peace.

Now is the accepted time, behold now is the day of salvation.
D raw nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you.
A bound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost.
Ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace.

My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness,

A nd my mouth shall praise Thee with joyful lips.
G ive unto the Lord the glory due unto His name-
A nd worship at His holy hill.
Z ion heard and was glad.

I will sing of mercy and judgment.

Now are we the sons of God.
E xalt ye the Lord our God.

APPEARANCES DECEITFUL

REFERRING to a notice in one of our exchanges of the personal appearance of Dr. Palmer, the Associate Reformed Presbyterian says:

"This reminds us of a story we once heard of Dr. Palmer. When he was a theological student at Columbia, Judge O'Neal, who was greatly interested in the temperance reform, secured the services of young Palmer to deliver some lectures on temperance in different parts of the State. One of the places visited was Lower Long Cane Church, in Abbeville County. Palmer came to Abbeville the day before the meeting, and was there seen by a member of the Long Cane Society. He was a stranger to all others; no one present had ever seen him. When he rode up to the church, on the morning of the meeting, alone, on horseback, and dressed, no doubt, even more plainly than when the above correspondent saw him, three or four of the elderly gentlemen of the neighborhood-Esq. James McC., Esq. J. W., O. McC., and others were sitting on a log near by; and he who had seen him at Abbeville the day before said :