صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

|

friend whose cup of earthly pleasure is now, peradventure, filled for the last time. The sacred watchfulness, the effectual fervent prayer of the righteous, may still avert the stroke so long delayed, and harmonize with the pleadings of the great Intercessor: "Spare it yet another year." In other cases, the wanderer's yearnings for the home he is never to see may be exchanged for a joyful entrance into a heavenly Father's house above.

ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY.

which becomes life sorrowing in its strength, cannot be expected from the torpors of age. The vigorous mind and active limb may seek subordinate relief from resolute diligence, from varieties of scene, pursuit, and companionship. But whither shall the tottering limbs hasten to find oblivion of the last great sorrow? Failing energies, like frost-stricken travellers, find increasing difficulty in the exercise needed to secure vital warmth and circulation. The alleviation which they cannot go forth to seek should be brought to them. And the benevolent spirit will find a pleasurable surprise in observing how welcome and effective the simplest attentions are now become. A degree of cheerfulness of manner, unseemly in earlier cases of bereavement, is here one of the gentlest arts of pity. It brings a ray of sunshine that thaws the gelid spirit. If the fond parents can talk only of their loss, be it so. Christian sympathy may inculcate the forbear-I did the same as this publican, and were sunk in ance, which professional courtesy teaches to the physician who patiently listens to the all-absorbing tale of a lighter sorrow. Honour awaits the friendly arm, which assists enterprising youth in the efforts that lead to future prosperity. The gentle hand, which supports the trembling steps of age in the first shocks of adversity, has also its own appropriate praise. If the one uplift the youthful head in honour and joy, the other counteracts the sorrow with which grey hairs too often descend to the grave.

"And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner."-LUKE xviii. 13. WOULD to God that truth so dwelt in me, that

a like sense of my own nothingness and unworthiness! This were the best and most profitable path I could tread. For it is the path by which the Lord descends into a man's heart, and communes directly with him. And to whomsoever the Lord so manifests himself as a God of pity, he manifests himself in the fulness of his divine attributes. To such a one, therefore, he is every way present..... Above all things, then, let a man learn to humble himself, and to lose himself, as it were, in the depth of his own nothingness. Experience proves that no habit of precaution, Yea, and never has he sorer need to sink himself no shelter of retirement avails to prevent sudden in the deepest deep of abasement, than when he and unforeseen disasters. The little band of rela- dreams he has reached the summit of perfection. tives is disrupted by a catastrophe, which spreads For, like as the loftiness of a tree is an evidence of dismay through a large circle of sympathizing acthe depth of its roots, so is the spiritual "stature" quaintance. In a numerous family, scattered over of the soul a witness to the depth of its selfsea and land, the probabilities of such affliction condemnation. It was the bitterness of his abasemultiply. If, notwithstanding all that prudence ment before the holiness of God, it was the overcan suggest, or the submissive prayer of faith whelming sense of his sinfulness, which at once avert, the stroke descend, the consciousness of not deterred the publican from lifting up so much as having neglected those duties will prevent the his eyes to heaven, and so exalted him in the sight bitterness of self-reproach in survivors. In these of the God of heaven, that he went down to his fatal occurrences, one peculiarity is frequently rehouse justified. "O, may we transcribe his exmarked-a peculiarity that tests all the power of ample into our lives, so abase ourselves in word obedient acquiescence, and suggests inquiries and deed, and so be justified unto everlasting which sacred reverence can scarcely hush into life!" Humility, in truth, is a grace of such silence. The catastrophe occurs at the moment surpassing excellency, that every other Christian which seemed the point of assured safety. The grace flourishes in the strength of it. Faith can wearied, but rejoicing traveller, has just reached neither be born in us, nor live in us, unless a his long-sought home: the long-expected vessel childlike spirit be given us: hope must be an outis lost when hailed from the shore! The vehicle cast from our hearts, if they be darkened even is dashed in pieces at the door-step of its expiring with the shadow of a dependence upon any thing owner. How often also is a period of perfect rest we can do out of Christ. And how can charity fuland unwonted satisfaction the precursor of great fil the law, except a living sense of our unworthiand sudden woe! How fearful the final injuryness and nothingness bend our soul low in adorawhich follows many marvellous escapes!

Can these disappointments be ordained to cheat the expectations of man, and to mock his helplessness? That were far from the God of love. Are they permitted to teach the uncertainty of human happiness? They have doubtless that tendency; but they have a deeper signification. The apparent severity really denotes the longsuffering of God, who protracts to the last hour his creature's joy and the rebel's probation. Those who have proved that this long-suffering is salvation should ever seek to preserve that frame of mind which may fit them to become as guardian angels to the child, the neighbour, the

tion of that love, whose pains and throes purchased worthiness and sufficiency for us-of that love to man, which constrains our heart to overflow with streams of kindly affection towards our brethren? And what is prayer from an unhumbled and self-righteous lip, unhallowed with the incense which can alone draw down the dew of grace upon the arid soul? or praise and thanksgiving, if they be not clothed upon with that poverty of spirit which recognizes in every mercy the free and exhaustless bounty of a reconciled Father? or adoration, if we worship ourselves, and honour the creature instead of the Creator? But in humility there is true exaltation: that

66

a

God open our eyes in time and give us repentance, which we see this sacrament doth, as it were, enforce

us unto in the reverent and true use of the same.

Bradford's Sermon on the Lord's Supper.

Poetry.

HYMN.

LORD of glory! God of might!
Sinful are we in thy sight:
Yet in mercy us behold,
Members of thy sacred fold.

Heavenly Father! glorious King!
Help us, then, thy praise to sing:
May we ever mindful be

All our blessings flow from thee.
Nothing but thy matchless grace
Brought us here to seek thy face:
But for it we now might rove,
Aliens from a God of love.

which abases the worldling, raises the believer : from the one the inheritance of the "kingdom" is withheld; to the other, the "everlasting doors" stand open. O, there is no shame, neither loss, in self-condemnation, but honour, unspeakable and measureless profit. Did Saul, whom the manifestation of the Lord himself cast down (even though a persecutor," called to be the fairest of "saints"), disdain to confess himself unworthy to be an apostle; nay, to behold in himself the "chief of sinners"? Can it be to our shame to follow in the steps of the "man after God's own heart"? to proclaim, by a life of selfhumiliation, that "the sacrifices of God are broken spirit," and feel that our sin stands always a witness against us? Let us be wise in time, and not arrogate ruinously to ourselves a better judgment in these things than his, who was not only Wisdom itself, but the very God of all truth. Be it not in vain that we have beheld the "publican" go "down to his house justified, rather than the other." The one found no grace, because the stiff neck of his own righteousness would not stop to seek it: the other received it, because Christ," who came not to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance," giveth grace to the lowly. He that exalted himself was abased; and he that abased himself was exalted. O, my soul, see to it always, that thou take "the lowest room;" for then shall the master of the feast say unto thee, "Friend, go up higher." Be thou the least and the weakest, the meanest and the chiefest of sinners in thine own eyes, that the Lord, thy alone righteousness, may, in his grace, number thee among the chiefest of his saints. By pride the first Adam fell: in self-humiliation the second Adam rose, and entered into his glory, that thou mightest "go, and do likewise." Yea, "blessed are the meek; for they shall inherit the THOU ART GONE TO THE SHORES OF THE earth;" and "Blessed are the poor in spirit; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."

The Cabinet.

H. S.

THE SACRAMENT OF THE LORD'S SUPPER TEACHETH REPENTANCE.-The supper of the Lord, then, is not simply Christ's body and blood, but Christ's "body broken" and his "blood shed." | Wherefore broken? wherefore shed? Forsooth that teacheth Christ himself, saying, "Broken for you, shed for your sins and for the sins of many." Here, now, then, we have occasion, in the use of this sacrament, to call to mind the gravity and grievousness of sin, which could not be taken away by any other means than by the shedding of the most precious blood, and breaking of the most pure body of the only begotten Son of God, Jesus Christ, by whom all things were made, all things are ruled and governed. O who considering this gear shall not be touched to repent? Who, in receipt of this sacrament, thinking that Christ saith to him, "Take, eat, this is my body, which is broken for thee: this is my blood, which is shed for thy sins"-can but tremble at the grievousness of his sins, for which such a price was paid? If there were no plague at all else to admonish men of sin, how grievous a thing it is in God's sight, surely that one were enough. But, alas, how bewitched are our hearts through Satan's subtilties and the custom of sin, that we make sin a thing of nothing!

May we ne'er be led to stray
From thy church upon thy day:
In thy courts may we appear
On each Sunday through the year.
Holy Father! hear our prayer:
May we all repay thy care;
Fondly may we love thy laws,
Faithiul prove unto thy cause.
May our teachers, pastors, dear,
With thy saints above appear:
May we all, when time's no more,
Safely land on Canaan's shore.

Illingworth.

WILLIAM GILLMOR.

SERAPH'S LAND*.

GENIUS OF

A TRIBUTE TO THE VIRTUES AND
THE REV. BENJAMIN DAVIS WINSLOW.

THOU art gone to the shores of the seraph's land,
To the sacred place of the righteous band:
Thou hast fled afar, like some forest bird
When the leaves of her dwelling are rudely stirr'd:
Thy lyre has dust on its ruin'd string:
Thy bride is sad in her flowery spring,
Thy foot unseen on the temple floor,
Thy voice unheard at the poor man's door.
Young soldier of truth! thou didst raise thy shield,
With its blood-red cross, on a stormy field:
Thou didst look unmov'd on the banner'd throng,
When the friend was cold, and the foe was strong.
In the front of the battle we saw thee stand,
With a fearless heart and a forward hand.
We did hope that the glories of coming years
Would cluster about thee: we thought not of tears.
But go! It was better to die thus young,
When thy praise was loud upon every tongue :
It was happier far than to linger on
Till the bloom and freshness of life were gone :
Since the seal was set on thy noble brow,
Thou hast kept thy promise, and paid thy vow;
And, when suns and systems shall fade and fall,
Those works of thine shall outlive them all.

* From "Christian Songs." By the rev. James Gilborne Lyons, LL.D. Philadelphia: George S. Appleton, 148, Chesnut-street. 1848.

Miscellaneous.

ROMANISM AND HEATHENISM CONFEDERATED AGAINST THE TRUTH.-There are twenty-five Christian families here (at Arokkiyapuram, in the Tinnevelly district), and altogether 104 souls. The church is large and airy, and the attendance on divine service always pleasing. A reader is stationed here; and there is a very good school, at times having an average of upwards of thirty children in daily attendance. This village is pretty much in the same circumstances as Sauthapuram, having in the immediate neighbourhood a large heathen population gradually becoming familiarized with Christianity; and now and again a few families come over. But here we meet with the same heathen landlord. To prevent people from becoming Christians, this wretched man's plan is to sue them in the civil court for recovery of debt; and, as defending an action would involve them in much expense, they allow judgment to go by default, and this is held over them to deter them from making a profession; and the threat is frequently reiterated, that any man who becomes a Christian shall have every article of property which he has seized and sold. Some time ago I had occasion to dismiss the catechist, who had lived several years in this village. As soon as the fact of his dismissal became known, the jesuit priests got hold of him, and offered him employment; and the offer of substantial advantages proved too much for him. He joined them; and, under their auspices, he is now settled in the vicinity, and endeavouring to create divisions here, and seduce the people from their stedfastness.

It is a curious fact that the heathen and Roman catholics can always heartily coalesce whenever an opportunity is afforded to oppose the gospel. Such is the case here. A man, who still continues a bigoted heathen, is an active partisan of the Romish priest, and has given land for the dismissed catechist to settle upon. It is not foreign to the purpose to remark here that the jesuits are in Tinnevelly, as in other parts of the world, exerting themselves to the utmost to infuse new life in the all but dead branches of the Romish church in south India; and not only so, but to proselyte from among protestants, or at all events in any way to oppose the truth. Whenever a worthless catechist is dismissed by us, they are forward to employ him: whenever a member of the church in a white village has been cast off by us for devil-worship or some other heinous crime, the priests run greedily and gather them, fit converts! to the communion of their harlot church. But they shall proceed no farther than our Master permits.-Correspondence of the rev. J. Thomas.

TEACHING OF IMAGE WORSHIP.-The rev. G. Mathan, in a letter from the Mavelicara district, south India, says: "I charged their church (the Roman catholic) with having mutilated God's word, in that they suppressed the second commandment in their catechism, because it was so directly against their practice of image worship. But on this occasion, seeing I was prepared to refer to their Syriac bibles, they had the audacity to maintain that the pope had authority to introduce changes in the Christian church, inasmuch as he had the keys of the kingdom of heaven! being shocked at this blasphemous remark, I could not avoid telling them that the power which they attributed to the pope was to be claimed by antichrist, since he was to change the times and laws' which God has instituted.""

* At Burdwan, and in other parts of India the same unnatural confederacy against the gospel has been witnessed.

NATIVE SUPERSTITIONS IN NEW SOUTH WALES.-Yu-lung is the name of the ring in which the tooth is knocked out. The trees near the ring are marked with rude representation with an axe, and similitudes of the nests of various of locusts, serpents, &c. on the bark, chopped quadrupeds are formed on the ground near the spot. They dance for several days, every morning and evening, continuing the whole of the night; no women are allowed to join in the ceremony. Múr-ro-kun, the Ka-ra-kul, a doctor or conjuror, three of whom the name of a mysterious bone, which is obtained by sleep on the grave of a recently interred corpse, where in the night, during their sleep, the dead person inserts a mysterious bone into each thigh of the three doctors, who feel the puncture not more severe than that of the sting of an ant. The bones remain in the flesh of the doctors, without any inconvenience to them, until they wish to kill any person, when, by unknown means, it is said and believed, they destroy in a supernatural manner their ill-fated victim by the mysterious bone, causing it to enter into their bodies, and so occasion their death. Múr-a-mai, the name of a round ball, about the size of a cricket-ball, which the aborigines carry in a small net suspended from their girdles of opossum yarn. The women are not allowed to see the internal part of the ball; it is used as a talisman against sickness, and it is sent from tribe to tribe for hundreds of miles on the sea-coast, and in the interior; one was shown to the rev. Mr. Threlkeld (from whom this account, with much other most interesting information, is derived) privately in his study, the black betraying considerable anxiety lest any female should see the contents. After unrolling many yards of woollen cord, made from the fur of the opossum, the contents proved to be a quartz-like substance of the size of a pigeon's egg. The natives allowed Mr. Threlkeld to break it, and retain a part. It is transparent, like white sugar-candy, They swallow the small crystalline particles which crumble off as a preventive of sickness. It scratches glass, and does not effervesce with acids. From another specimen, the stone appears to be agate of a milky hue, semi-pellucid, and strikes fire. Nung-ngún, a song. There are poets among them who compose songs which are sung and danced to by their own tribe in the first place, after which other tribes learn the song and dance, which itinerates from tribe to tribe throughout the country, until, from a change of dialect, the very words are not understood by distant blacks. Yár-ro, literally an egg; but mystically, to the initiated ones, it means fire or water. By this term, in asking for either element, the fraternity discover themselves to each other. Their name for women is kun-nai-ka-rá, when the tooth is knocked out of the men, and themselves are called y i-ra-bar, previous to which they are styled ko-ru-mun: The ceremony of initiation takes place every three or four when mystic rings are made in the woods, and numeyears, as young lads arrive at the age of puberty, the operation of displacing the tooth in the upper rous ridiculous ceremonies are gone through, before jaw, which is effected by three steady blows with a which the youths may seize a woman, and engage in stout punch, from the hand of the ka-rá-kul, after their fights.-Braim's History of N. S. Wales.

and HUGHES, 12, Ave-Maria Lane, St. Paul's; and to be London: Published for the Proprietors, by EDWARDS procured, by order, of all Booksellers in Town and Country.

PRINTED BY JOSEPH ROGERSON, 24, NORFOLK-STREET STRAND, LONDON.

[merged small][merged small][graphic][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][graphic]

THE BEE-HIVE.

(Bee-hive.)

A COLONY of bees is termed a swarm, or a hive, and consists of three sorts, viz., males, or drones; neuters, or workers; and the queen, or reigning female.

The drone is almost cylindrical in form, and has the division between the thorax and the abdomen not so distinct as either of the other kinds: the eyes and wings are large, and there is no sting. The workers, of a smaller size, have the abdomen conical, and composed of six segments, and a straight sting. The queen is larger than either the drone or the working bee: the abdomen is elongated, the legs brownish yellow, the wings short, and the sting bent.

VOL. XXV.

A hive of bees, besides males, workers, and a queen, contains eggs and larvæ destined for a future brood. The number of males may amount to 700 or 800; the workers in a well-stocked hive are from 15,000 to 20,000. On them all the labour devolves. But they appear to be really undeveloped females. The cells containing the larvæ are of three kinds: those for the drones are made larger than those intended for ordinary workers; while the royal cells are larger still. If the bees be deprived of their queen, and have combs in which are only the young of the working brood, they select one of these not more than three days old, enlarge and alter its cell, and nourish it with a peculiar diet. In a few days a queen comes forth to receive the homage of her subjects. Three

N

or four swarms usually issue from the same hive, each headed by its queen. The first is conducted by the old reigning queen, who has previously laid female eggs in the royal cells. The first hatched of these becomes the queen, and in her turn leads off another swarm. But, as the young brood are continually hatching, in the course of a few days another swarm is prepared to depart. The interval between the first and second swarms is from a week to nine days; the third flies sooner; and the last sooner still; so that the four are gone within about fifteen or eighteen days.

When the males have fulfilled the purpose of their existence, they are doomed to death. They are produced in April or May; and in July or August the workers commence a general massacre of them.

Bees have many enemies. Hornets and wasps invade the hive; also certain species of moths, which, in spite of the careful guard kept at the entrance, get in and deposit their eggs in the combs. The larvæ produced from the eggs form passages through the combs, and spin silken tubes too strong for the bees to destroy, which are therefore obliged to desert their hive.

the symbol is borrowed: "Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light to all that are in the house" (Matt. v. 15). Weare told, by the chronicles of the day, that from the fourth to the eighth century strange preachers travelled about, whom the prelates of the church of Rome were called upon to watch and provide against, because they were attached to no known church and acknowledged no supreme head; on which account they were often denominated " Acephales." There is much reason to believe that they were missionaries, sent out by the Vaudese church, who had outlived the great apostacy of Rome-spiritual guides, employed to re-animate the wavering faith of scattered flocks, and win additional souls to Christ. Such were the messengers of the 'glad tidings,' against whom denunciations were levelled by pope Čelestine. At a later day, namely, in the twelfth century, Bernard of Foncald, a Romanist writer, when speaking of the members of the Vaudese sect, who had spread themselves through France, says: "They all preach here and there, without regard to age or sex, and maintain that, to whomsoever the word of God is known, it is his duty to diffuse it In nothing perhaps more than in the habits of among the people, and to preach it." A writer of bees is the divine wisdom of the Creator visible. the following century, giving a history of the The structure of the comb, the rearing of the poor of Lyons,' thus expresses himself: "They brood, the devotion to the queen, the mode of (the Vaudese) apply their utmost zeal to seduce swarming, the order of duties and labour-all offer numbers into error. They train very young girls an ample field of interesting inquiry, and may to the knowledge of the gospel and the epistles, prompt the aspiration of the humble soul: " Óf for the purpose of habituating them to the ways Lord, how manifold are thy works! in wisdom of error from their very childhood; and, as soon hast thou made them all " (Ps. civ. 24). as these girls have learnt a little of these books, they use every exertion to indoctrinate others in their errors, in whatsoever quarter they may chance to be, if they find a favourable ear." It is an indisputable fact that the ancient Vaudese church despatched missionaries in considerable numbers and into all quarters; for it formed part of the fundamental rules of that church to engage in this work. Gilles, the historian, records that, in the synods, the priests (barbes), examine and admit into the sacred ministry such students as appear duly qualified, and appoint those who are to go on missions to distant churches.' And a portion of the monies collected by the Vaudese elders was placed in the hands of their ecclesiastical superiors, who divided it among those who were destined to go on missions. The same writer mentions, as being among the distant churches,' Calabria, Apulia, Sicily, and other parts of Italy, as well as other countries: this mission was usually for two years, and lasted until the missionaries were replaced by other pastors, sent out by a subsequent synod of the valleys.' He adds: "Those pastors who are qualified for the missions cheerfully undertake them, though danger attends the greater part of them, inasmuch as they undertake them for the glory of God and the salvation of man' " (Monastier's Hist. of the Vaudese).

MISSIONARY RECORDS.

No. XXXVIIL

"My brethren, persevere in this work; nay, more, increase; let it be a growing work, more powerfully felt in the deep springs of Christian obligation, and more glori

ously manifested in the rich streams of Christian liberality. We are not ashamed to beg in this cause: it is the cause for which Christ died. And, as we must work by means, and means must inevitably involve expenditure, we ask again for more funds; that when Christian fathers, mothers, and sisters, rising with true consecrated affections to this work, have supplied us with more men, we may be able to send them forth to preach in the dark places of the earth. 'Jesus Christ, and him crucified.'-H. MCNEILE, Sermon for the Church Missionary Society.

ANCIENT MISSIONS OF THE VAUDESE.-"There is no feature more prominent in the religious character of these early Christians, than the missionary zeal which animated them. In this respect there was a close analogy between them and the primitive believers. The greater the lapsing of neighbouring countries into the errors and superstitions of Rome, the more they appear to have valued the grace of knowing and serving God, as revealed in the pure THE MISSIONARY FIELD.-It has been calgospel of Jesus Christ. The Vaudese church did culated that there are at this time 1,500 Euroindeed feel the duty which she owed to her posi-pean missionaries employed in making known the tion, and entertained a living sense of her obligations to her great Head. Her device is a torch, burning and shining in the midst of darkness, and her motto, Lux lucet in tenebris'-the light shineth in darkness. Nor did she forget to give practical effect to that command of her Saviour from which

gospel to the infidels and heathen scattered over the globe, and that it is preached to regular congregations amounting to one million of souls, a large proportion of whom have been baptized. This enumeration includes the operations of the various societies in Europe and the United States.

« السابقةمتابعة »