men.

ed: The state of French and German philosophy is such as to enlist the deepest feelings of every Christian, whose bosom glows with benevolence to the whole race of his fellow The science and literature of two among the most advanced nations of the world, is employed far more successfully against the religion of Christ than is any superstition of India. The latter cannot seduce an Englishman or American: the former does this daily.

We

Now we ask, can the friends of the Christian religion do nothing to resist this terrible enemy? Are we to combat the superstitions of heathenism, and still not even ask what can be done to resist a more dreadful foe in Christian lands? pretend not to say what definite steps can be taken to favour the cause of revealed truth in either France or Germany; but while God is the hearer of prayer, the subject deserves consideration. A single thing may be suggested: any measure that would favour the increase of piety and knowledge of the truth, among the lower and especially middle classes of France or Germany, would at length extend the benefit to the more refined classes. The literati of Germany would, of course, scorn any such attempts to reach their minds; but will they not at some time return to the religion of the Bible, and will not this be a consequence of prayers and efforts, which a preceding generation had ridiculed? Is it not a want of faith and true Christian zeal, that leads us to suppose the German philosopher beyond the reach of divine mercy, when exercised through any of its common channels? Were Christian writers in this country and in England, always upon the alert to expose the vagaries of infidel philosophy, and place over against it the truth of God, great results might at some time be anticipated. We are ever to remember, that God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;—that no flesh should glory in his presence."

We add a single reflection. Just before our Saviour appeared upon earth, there was prevalent a general expectation that some extraordinary person was soon to visit mankind, and produce a highly beneficial revolution in the world. While the Jewish prophets uttered the oracles of God, Roman poets, Indian philosophers, Persian magi, were the unwitting heralds of the Prince of Peace. Like this, is one of the signs of the present time. The Christian world looks for the se

cond coming of Christ, in the display of Millennial glory, as an event near at hand. French and German philosophy predicts a new religion and new social state, as the grand result of all preceding changes. The wisdom of the philosopher will doubtless disappoint him-the faith of the Christian may, as it respects the precise time, but cannot in the end. "Nevertheless, when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?"

ART. IV. THE DUTY OF THE CHURCH IN RELATION TO SUNDAY SCHOOLS.

MEN often come slowly to the adoption of the principles of the merest common sense, even in the doctrines and duties of religion. How much Christianity has lost whilst its disciples have been dallying in hesitation about obeying the simplest instincts of duty, we believe to be incalculable. They never ponder so deliberately, and with such cautious progression, as when an effort is proposed to take advantage of the very postulates of reason in promoting the triumph of the Gospel. The strongest illustration of this most anomalous fact is furnished by the history of the Church in regard to its efforts to control the education of the young. For it is no late discovery that the mind of childhood is susceptible of permanent moral impressions. No theme can claim a more venerable prescription to the last honours of triteness than this. And if the world are really ignorant of the connexion of early education with the destiny of the individual, it is for some other reason than the want of common fame to proclaim it: for it has been set forth in all conceivable forms, from the Proverbs of Solomon to the distich of Pope, and from the staring apophthegm of the copybook, to the rant of the college rostrum. It is thus that the great truth has been suffered to evaporate, even since the dispensation of the Gospel. The praise of education has echoed from the pulpit too, in good set phrase, but the Christian world slumbered upon the sermons until the Archbishop of Milan showed that the subject was capable of some practical inferences. But even this hint, like many others from that

disfavoured quarter, was despised by Protestant Christendom for more than two hundred years, and we have only just now celebrated the lapse of the first half century since the introduction of a universal system of religious education for children.

And yet it has taken that half century to carry the Church through the first process of awakening. We allude not to the agitation of contingent questions of lawfulness and expediency, to the suspicions and misgivings, or to the positive opposition and denunciation, which the Sunday School system encountered. For, that there prevailed during that period a singular frigidity on the general subject of the moral training of children, is shown by the absence of all effort to furnish a substitute for the plan of Raikes, acknowledged to be worthy of all commendation in its design, but which, it was pretended, could be prosecuted only by desecration, and the accomplishment of which was, after all, essentially impracticable. But, confining our observations to the earliest features of the plan itself, and to the Christian zeal which it enlisted, we say it is surprising, that it is only since the late Jubilee that the Church has seemed to begin to be aware of the divine designs in this new organization. Cases of what may be called, in reference to the efforts of teachers-accidental conversions of children, occasionally occurred, and they were proclaimed abroad as unprecedented wonders, and received with doubt or incredulity by the religious public. But when the Spirit of God moved through a church, the Sunday-School room presented itself in a new light to the revived Christians and the recent converts. Instead of being looked upon as a receptacle for street-idlers; a penitentiary; or, at best, as a place where the rudiments of reading might be conscientiously tasked into a child by making the Bible his horn-book, it presented the aspect of a gate of heaven; and teachers felt the appalling truth that the souls of these children were committed to them, and that there was no other way opened for their deliverance from hell than had been opened to themselves. They were led to a more solemn consideration of the nature of the office itself; and it soon becomes evident to a candid mind, that when Providence has assigned any moral field to its culture, there is a responsibility connected with the trust proportionate to the interest involved. They had, heretofore, been too apt to consider that it was a business of generous self-denial that they had assumed, and that the service

was so wholly gratuitous and voluntary, that it was something like a Roman Catholic supererogation to attend to it. But when they found that they were, as Christian subjects, bound to this duty as strongly as any other missionary, or minister is to his charge, the trust was seen to be as serious as any that could be committed to them, and that they were held by their fidelity to their Redeemer, to bend themselves to this commission until their Master should designate some other service. Thus, at length, there has arisen a dawn of promise that the true fundamental principle of the Sunday School institution is about to be extensively understood, and made the object of direct aim in all its provisions.

It has resulted from the recognition of this character of the service, that the efforts of teachers to become more practical have been directed to simplify and adapt the system of instruction. According to the ancient mode of practice (we speak, of course, generally,) it seems to have been considered that the injunctions of the Gospel are not intelligible by children. The precepts of morality and the ceremony of prayer were strictly enjoined, but the duties of faith and repentance were, tacitly, postponed to a season of more intellectual maturity. Children were practically considered as placed by their minority under a religious disability. The mode of teaching, the phraseology in which they were alluded to, the absence of direct endeavour to bring them to God, all showed that their training was prospective. It is true, the Church and pious parentage provided for their religious instruction, but it was after a manner which insured in many cases a lasting repugnance to the obligations of religion.

To how few of the present generation are the religious reminiscences of their childhood delightful! How many of us now recur, with no agreeable associations to the Sunday penance of reading the Bible and reciting the catechism, with the impression still vivid in the memory that the tedious intervals of the Sabbath services were to be killed by a course of reading which it was not expected we should understand! And yet all this waste of time and application was unnecessary, and these remembrances of the Sabbath days of childhood might be universally, as, in many instances, they are, cherished with unmingled feelings of happiness, had parents been alive to the fact that no book is more easily made entertaining than the Bible, or more intelligible, by familiar ex

planation, than most doctrinal catechisms. But the secret lies in a short line-the conversion of children was not expected and laboured for as a direct object. With a selfishness, like that of the apostles who would have restricted the announcement of the Gospel to the lineage of Abraham, the Church has comparatively disregarded, not only the claims of Paganism, but of its own children (as a class) on its guardianship. And God seems to have chosen, by a dispensation. more evident and striking than even Peter's vision, to awaken Christians, as he did the Jews, to the conviction that they have taken a narrow view of his benevolence. There is credible evidence for the belief, that during the year ending in May last, the Holy Spirit has been "poured out also" upon five thousand Sunday School pupils. The announcement has created as much astonishment as did the calling of the Gentiles; but the mere statement of such an unequalled accession to the visible Church from the ranks of youth demands the attention of that Church, and an inquiry into the nature of a system which must produce such an influence upon its future history. It is a subject for deliberate investigation, whether it be of God or not; and the decision should be made whilst its infancy may be taken advantage of to dispose of it in the easiest and most effectual manner. If the fact be admitted, all the abstractions of the argument are superseded, and we had better imitate our mother of Jerusalem, "hold our peace and glorify God," and obey his Providence.

In our judgment, the system of Sunday School instruction is a means, favoured by God, of supplying the deficiencies of ordinary ministerial duty, and of carrying into more extensive effect the designs of his mercy. It is not necessary to suggest any hypothesis respecting the moral and intellectual points of difference in the character of the people addressed by the apostles and of those of our day, which have caused a change in the style of preaching and in the discharge of other ministerial functions. Nor need we stop to fix the charge of delinquency upon the Church for not providing for the instruction of every class of the community. Taking admitted facts, we may, without prejudice, assert, that owing to the general character of preaching, the mixed nature of our congregations, their number, variety of employments, peculiarity of situation, and other causes, it is impossible for a single individual to apportion his services to all. This could not be effected unless every minister had a number of lay assistants,