On my next visit, however, I found that God could make use of the "weak things of the world to confound the things that are mighty." The tract which had been distributed the month previous, " Examine your Hopes for Eternity," had been made a blessing to two mothers. One of them, as she supposed, had experienced religion in early life, but having married a worldly man, she became careless, neglected all the means of grace, and lived "without God in the world." The tract opened her eyes to her condition, and aroused her slumbering conscience. She read it again and again, and, like the prodigal, resolved to return to her Father's house.

This individual, after telling what the Lord had done for her by means of the tract, requested me to visit a person in the room opposite, who was under deep concern for the salvation of her soul, having been awakened by the same tract. As I entered the room, she met me with a tearful eye, and the inquiry, "What must I do to be saved?" After directing her to the Lamb of God, we bowed together before the mercyseat, and pleaded with Him who is the hearer of prayer, and has promised to bind up the broken heart; and " while we were yet speaking," mercy was granted, and she saw a fulness in Christ as her all-sufficient Saviour. She was the wife of an infidel, whose hopeful conversion followed some time after, and had neglected every means of grace till the truth, by means of the tract, reached her heart. Having obtained peace in believing, she was anxious, in due time, to obey the command of her Saviour, This do in remembrance of me." These two mothers continue to live in my district; the wife of the ungodly husband has to contend with ignorance, intemperance, opposition, etc. She has a large family of children, who attend sabbath school, and endeavours to perform her duties to them under the trying circumstances in which she is placed. The wife of the former infidel fulfils her duties as a parent, wife, and professor of religion. When converted, they were living in one room, her husband, a journeyman painter, earning a scanty maintenance; they now occupy comfortable apartments over his own paint store, doing a profitable business, both members of good standing in an evangelical church.-New York Observer.

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HINTS TO CHRISTIAN TRAVELLERS.

WE frequently hear Christians grieve over the necessity of travelling as the cause of waste of time. I will not dwell on the unspeakable benefit they might receive by devoting this portion of their existence to meditation and prayer for their own growth in grace; but I will go further, and maintain that

they may widely benefit others, by employing it in fervent intercession for their fellow travellers. And even should they find no opening for further efforts in their behalf, they will have the happy assurance that they are glorifying God hereby more, perhaps, than they could do by hours of eloquence. I do not wish to depreciate the effects of Christian converse, which are indeed blessed; but I do say, that females especially, when they earnestly seek for the teaching of the Holy Spirit, will often be wrought upon by his restraining power as regards even religious conversation; while he always impels to prayer and intercession, for St. Paul says, "I will that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting." Sometimes even the gift of a tract causes hostility to arise in the worldling's heart; and though I think we ought to strive against the dread of exciting this feeling, and on all possible occasions, whether in season or out of season, not shun openly to prove whose servants we are, by thus inviting those among whom we are thrown to the contemplation of eternity, and the hope of the gospel; yet I know there are circumstances wherein our "strength is to sit still," and then what an unspeakable satisfaction it is, to know that no disinclination in our companions, no sense of female propriety and reserve, can hinder our bringing them in spite of themselves, as the friends of the paralytic in the gospel did, and laying them at the feet of Jesus, crying on their behalf to Him, who with a word, healed the poor palsied man!

And this is applicable, not only to our fellow travellers, the drivers, etc., but to the inhabitants of the towns and villages through which we journey, the passengers we may encounter, and more especially to the ostlers and others employed at the various towns on the road--men who greatly administer to our comfort, but who, by their idle and profane talk, seldom create any other feeling, than that of horror or disgust, causing the reflecting traveller to turn away his ear, as from an object in which he had not the slightest interest

or concern.

Were this blessed exercise of intercession constantly used by all the servants of God, not only while travelling, but during the occasional detentions to which we are all subject, and which, from a lack of simple childlike submission to the appointments of God, in all possible circumstances of our every-day existence, too often cause feelings of impatience and vexation, we should discover that the time which we are apt to say is lost, through our neighbour's want of punctuality, or from a variety of circumstances, is bringing in a blessed and abundant harvest to God's glory.

And besides this, we all know the trial of being constrained at times to remain in the society of the frivolous and worldly, with whom we can take no sweet counsel, and with whom we may be compelled, by the wisdom of the serpent, not to venture far on heavenly themes, lest the pearls of holy converse should be trodden under foot by them. In this case, also, can we not cry unto God, to speak to that heart which is closed by strong and dark prejudices against every affectionate exhortation of the Christian; and thus, by means of believing prayer, the strong holds, which have long withstood every other attempt, shall fall before the omnipotence of that supplication, which we know to be according to the Master's will, and consequently through the merits of Christ, cannot be refused by our promise-keeping God. We know not now, but we shall know hereafter, how many heavenly blessings have descended upon us through the intercession of fellow Christians, of some who are, perhaps, almost, if not altogether, personally strangers to us. And oh, how will the joy of even the holy city be enhanced, when we discover that by our simple believing prayers, through the infinite merits of Christ, souls have been converted from "darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in Jesus."

PRAYER FOR A BLESSING ON READING THE

SCRIPTURES,

BY THE LATE REV. WILLIAM ROMAINE.

O THOU Spirit of wisdom and of revelation, be with me whenever I read thy holy word: testify to me in it, and by it, of Christ Jesus, who he is, and what he is, to me; and glorify the Father's love in him. Open thou mine eyes to see the wondrous things revealed in it upon these subjects, that I may understand them in thy light, and that my judgment of them may be the same with thine. I beseech thee, also, to enable me to mix faith with what I do understand; and what, through thy teaching, I am enabled to believe aright, that help me to receive in the love of the truth. O God, fulfil thy promise; put thy blessed word into my inward parts; write it upon my heart; and what I am taught to love, grant me power to practise, that thy new covenant promise may in me have its full effect, and I may be in heart and life cast into the mould and form of thy word; thus becoming a real living edition of the Bible. Make it my daily study. Render it my constant delight. Let my meditations in it be always sweet. O thou holy and eternal

Spirit, witness thus to thine own record, and let me experience it to be the power of God, as well as the truth of God. In this dependence upon thee, in the use of it, let me be daily growing, until, by the will of God, I shall have served mine own generation; and then let it be the last act of my life to seal the truth of thy testimony concerning Jesus. Let me find thy witness true in the hour of death, and beyond death all the promises made good to me, through Jesus Christ, in life everlasting. Amen and amen.

SPEAK BUT THE WORD, AND THY SERVANT SHALL BE HEALED.

MATT. VIII. 8.

SPEAK to me, Saviour! as of old,
Thou didst in mercy speak,
To all, the timid or the bold,
Who did that mercy seek.

Speak to me, Lord, and bid me be
Loosed from my infirmity.

Speak to me, Saviour! Thou dost know

The plague that reigns within,

The strong dominion of my foe,

The tyranny of sin.

Speak but the word, and I shall be

Loosed from my infirmity.

Speak to me, Saviour! for my heart
Still cleaveth to the dust,
Prone from its Maker to depart,
And make of flesh its trust;
Bowed to the earth! O, bid me be,
Loosed from my infirmity.

Speak to me, Saviour! though thy voice

Rebuke in love severe,

In tribulation I rejoice,

Which tells me, Thou art near:

Chasten me still, until I be

Loosed from my infirmity.

Speak to me, Saviour! day by day,
Imparting faith and power,
Till every weakness pass away,
With life's last mortal hour;
In Thee complete, then shall I be
Loosed from all infirmity.

Y. Z.

UPON THE SMALL STARS IN THE GALAXY, OR MILKY CIRCLE IN THE FIRMAMENT.

WHAT a clear lightsomness there is in yonder circle of the heaven above the rest! What can we suppose the reason of it, but that the light of many smaller stars is united there, and causes that constant brightness? And yet those small stars are not discerned, while the splendour which ariseth from them is so notably remarkable. In this lower heaven of ours, many a man is made conspicuous by his good qualities and deserts; but I most admire the humility and grace of those, whose virtues and merits are usefully visible, while their persons are obscure it is secretly glorious for a man to shine unseen. Doubtless it is the height that makes those stars so small and insensible; were they lower, they would be seen more; there is no true greatness without a self-humiliation : we shall have made an ill use of our TRACT MAG., THIRD SERIES, NO. 81, SEPT, 1840.

K